Retirement delayed and broke anyway

[Kath2]

21. This post hits home with me.

I'm a 65 year old female and I have pretty much given up on employment, also. After working full time since 1976, putting myself through college and law school at night, becoming a member of the Maryland and DC Bars and having nearly 30 years of experience in insurance defense litigation you would think I would have a lot of options. Wrong. I renewed my Maryland Bar license last night and I really don't know why I did.

The insurance company I worked for closed claims operations in this state in 2021, leaving me and approximately 500 co-workers without a job. Thankfully, I had enough time in to earn a pension but it is a fraction of my former salary. I thought I would quickly gain a position at another insurance company. Again, wrong. It seems no one in corporate America is even interested in interviewing, much less hiring, a woman in her 60's, regardless of education or experience. So I bounced around finding employment at a grocery store and even doing landscaping at 64. My significant other convinced me to quit work as that landscaping job was hard on my body and didn't pay much.

Now I do some free lance pro bono work, and occasionally for-pay work (legal document review, mainly), for the causes I believe in.

I agree that, after all we have been through, we deserve a decent cost of living in our mid-60's. I don't want a pity party but I do think a lot us who worked hard and played by the rules have been screwed. And, yes, I will be voting Blue!