10 Careers Workers Retire Earliest In

There are a lot of people out there who want to retire as soon as possible. However, it is important to remember that an earlier retirement isn’t necessarily a good thing. Sometimes, it is because the retiree has enough savings to see them through their post-retirement life. Other times, it is because the retiree was forced to retire sooner than expected for one reason or another, with examples ranging from health issues that make it difficult for them to continue working to familial issues that make it necessary for them to quit so that they can fulfill their other obligations. As such, while it isn’t a bad idea for interested individuals to look for careers that offer the earliest retirement, they might want to check up on why that happens to be the case. After all, when it comes to important decisions, it is much better to be safe than to be sorry.

1. Airline Pilots

Airline pilots are some of the people who can retire earlier than others if they want to. In part, this is because they get paid well. However, it should also be noted that their employers tend to make handsome contributions to their retirement savings, which tends to be a huge help as well. Of course, the problem is that being an airline pilot isn’t a job that just anyone can do, meaning that interested individuals need to put serious effort into securing the necessary qualifications.

2. Physicians

Physicians are famous for earning a lot of money. This is particularly true if they are working in a particularly difficult and particularly in-demand field of medicine. As a result, it should come as no surprise to learn that physicians tend to have more in their retirement savings than most of the other people out there. Having said that, physicians are also notorious for their high burnout rates, which is something that interested individuals will want to keep in mind.

3. Dentists

Like physicians, dentists make a lot of money, which in turn, means that they tend to have a lot in retirement savings. In fact, it isn’t uncommon for dentists to have more than a million in retirement savings by the time that they are in their early 60s, though this can see a fair amount of variation for a wide range of reasons.

4. Financial Managers

Perhaps unsurprisingly, financial managers are some of the people who can retire the earliest. After all, they specialize in helping other people with their finances, so it makes sense that they would be quite good at handling their own. However, while financial managers make a fair amount of money, they still fall short of physicians and the like. As a result, their retirement savings by their early 60s tend to be around $900,000 rather than $1 million or more.

5. Electricians

Electricians can make a decent living with an average annual wage of $57,910. Combined with higher than normal contributions to their retirement savings, this means that it is common for electricians to have more than a third of a million in retirement savings by the time that they hit their early 60s.

6. Police

The police tend to be paid respectable sums, which isn’t even counting the rest of their compensation. As such, it is no wonder that the police tend to be very confident that they will have enough retirement savings to see them through their old age when the time comes. Something that can’t be said by all of the other people with all of the other careers out there.

7. Pharmacists

Pharmacists aren’t quite as high-profile as, say, physicians. However, theirs is a career that calls for considerable education plus experience. Moreover, they are not just in-demand but also expected to become more and more in-demand as the population as a whole gets older. As such, it is no wonder that physicians are also very confident in having enough retirement savings for them to retire, so much so that there are very few careers that can even hope to compete with them in this regard.

8. Lawyers

Lawyers tend to have very high earnings. Thanks to this, their average retirement savings by the early 60s is somewhere around $860,000. Having said that, interested individuals should take note of the fact that some fields of law pay much better than others. For instance, trial lawyers are famous for being some of the highest-paid individuals in their chosen profession.

9. Firefighters

Firefighters make a decent sum, but it is the high contributions to their retirement savings that enable them to retire with relative confidence. This is a good thing because firefighters tend to retire earlier than their counterparts in a lot of other careers. After all, there are lives reliant on their performance, which in turn, is reliant on their physical condition. As a result, while older firefighters aren’t exactly unknown, there is a limit to how long they can continue in said career as the physical effects of old age set in. In fact, there are some jurisdictions out there that actually have earlier mandatory retirement ages for firefighters because of this exact concern.

10. Physical Scientists

Physical scientist is the kind of term that conjures up images of scientists who engage in a lot of physical activity thanks to the particular demands of their particular position. There are some physical scientists like that out there. After all, the sciences have never been short on physically challenging tasks, which in turn, means that there is a surprising number of scientists who are in excellent physical shape. However, physical scientist actually refers to the part of natural science that focuses on non-living systems, thus setting it apart from life science. Naturally, physical scientists are in high-demand, which in turn, means that they tend to be paid well and otherwise compensated well. Something that explains much about their confidence about their retirement prospects.