More Americans 'unretiring'

Unretirement is defined as working at least 20 hours per week after the age when one is eligible for Social Security benefits. The October Sun Life Unretirement Index found more Americans are continuing to work past the traditional retirement age, less are financially confident and many will show their discontent by voting out incumbent seats. Sun Life created the Index to learn more about the reasons why Americans are choosing to “unretire.” Key findings were:

More than 80 percent of working Americans think it will take them at least three years to rebuild their retirement savings as a result of the economic crisis, up from 64 percent a year ago.

Fifty-two percent of workers think they’ll need to continue working for at least three years longer than planned.

One fifth of American workers think they’ll never recover their losses from the crisis.

“Seventy is the new 65″: The same amount of people think they’ll retire at 70, instead of the traditional age of 65.

Forty-two percent are confident they will now be able to take care of basic living expenses in retirement.

Only one in four have strong confidence they will be able to take care of their medical expenses.

More than half say they plan to vote against an incumbent in mid-term elections, regardless of party, because of their financial insecurity.