About how people live in retirement, once again you can not talk. The situation that Russians fall with the onset of working age is not enviable. And it seems that the amount of social benefits for pensioners is increasing annually, but with it inflation is also growing, which literally eats up all the increases. Why, then, at the sunset of their days, are people forced to fight for existence and survive, having dozens of years of work experience?
How to live in retirement, if it is barely enough for food? A lot of older people after reaching a well-deserved rest are almost below the poverty line. Those old people whom children help financially are in a better position. But what should lonely senior citizens with a minimum payout do, how to live on?
Pension in our country
The size of the minimum old-age benefits in the regions of Russia is a little over 8700 rubles. In Moscow, this figure is slightly higher and reaches almost 12 thousand rubles. Due to the length of service and seniority, many receive an amount in excess of the so-called minimum. Their monthly pension can reach 10-15 thousand rubles. But be that as it may, for most people retirement seems like a terrible nightmare. How to live, so that this money is enough until the next payment?
The current generation of retirees is significantly different from people hardened by Soviet communism. And although even today you can hear lamentations about how well you lived in the USSR, it is no secret to anyone that in those conditions, having to get a well-deserved rest, you also had to learn the basics of survival. Modern Russian pensioners have Soviet roots, and this only means that they did not grow up in "greenhouse" conditions, led an active lifestyle. Thanks to constant work, aspirations and perseverance, they acquired the ability to survive not in the most favorable conditions. The vitality shown by the representatives of that generation can be envied by today's youth.
So, how to live on a pension if it is within the cost of living? For this amount, it is quite difficult to satisfy even the most necessary, vital requests of any person. Due to poverty, some begin to apply more often to alcohol, are more often sick, which only exacerbates an already difficult situation. And besides, there is a type of people who no matter how much they pay, they still will not be enough. As you know, there is not much money. Therefore, first of all, you need to pull yourself together and do everything so as not to break psychologically. Experts urge to give yourself positive attitudes in order to try to improve the circumstances that have arisen or to adapt to them. There is no other way.
Benefits and subsidies
Instead of groaning and gasping, endlessly asking yourself the question of how to live on a small pension, you will have to gain optimism and be active. In the end, psychologists always advise rejoicing in a glass that is only half full, than looking at it with despondency and longing, considering it half empty. From all you need to extract the pros and not give up.
Local authorities are striving to implement regional projects whose ultimate goal is to improve the standard of living of people with disabilities. If the means provided by the state are barely enough for existence, the pensioner needs to:
- Find the addresses and contacts of social protection services on the sites of the local administration;
- to find out about existing and planned social programs, the provision of humanitarian assistance, the holding of actions, the formulation of lump sum payments, usually dedicated to public holidays;
- get complete information about the conditions for obtaining a subsidy for utility bills;
- make sure that all the merits and awards that give the right to receive benefits are taken into account.
So, the right to issue a certificate “Veteran of Labor”, which gives good privileges to pensioners, arises for citizens with a certain seniority, as well as for those who began working at a minor age during the Second World War. Some retirees continue to work in order to obtain the missing years of professional experience necessary for obtaining a preferential title. Here you need to be persistent and curious: rewards and surcharges alone will not appear.
In addition to municipal authorities, the support of the elderly is carried out by the Red Cross charity. Workers in this society know how retired people live. The Red Cross helps people in distress not only morally, but also assists those in need of expensive medical care, medicines, essentials, and food packages.
Profitable change of housing
Since the most significant expense item for current retirees is paying housing bills, it may be worth considering changing your place of residence. A lot of people solve their material problems in this way. There are several options, and each of them is possible in a specific situation.
The easiest way is to sell your home and purchase less floor space, and put the rest in a bank deposit. This will make it possible to get double benefits every month: on the one hand, a pensioner will increase income from interest on a bank deposit, and on the other, expenses for paying for utility bills will be reduced. So, a one-room apartment is much more economical in terms of maintenance than a two- or three-room apartment.
The second solution is to move from your own apartment or private house to a rented apartment with a smaller area. At the same time, tenants will also have to rent their property. The profit is obvious, but all kinds of risks should be taken into account. It is possible that after the tenants will have to make repairs. In this case, all proceeds will be spent on restoring a comfortable environment. The tenant can protect themselves and rent housing with the requirement to observe the safety and integrity of the property by concluding an agreement and receiving a security deposit. If the condition of the home at the end of the employment is in unsatisfactory condition, the security deposit will not be returned to the tenants. In addition, deciding to rent your own apartment for rent, you need to find out as much as possible about a potential tenant.
“Maybe I’m just starting to live, I’m retiring ...” - who doesn’t remember this phrase from Pechkin from his beloved cartoon, probably? And this is exactly what the majority of older people think, because having escaped from the vicious circle of “home-work,” they finally get the opportunity to devote more time to their families, grandchildren, and household chores. The only thing that darkens the idyll is a lack of finance. What to live on when retiring? This issue pushes retirees to decide to rent one of the rooms in their home. This option is suitable for those who do not have a special desire to settle in a new place. However, in this case, there are significant disadvantages:
- Moral discomfort. It is difficult for many elderly people to put up with the presence of strangers in their own apartment, so you should think in advance whether you are ready for such a step.
- No guarantees in the decency of the tenant. This issue requires careful study: letting the first person you meet into your house is not a good idea. Ideally, if the tenant is a good friend.
If constant cohabitation with a stranger is not affordable, you can try to rent a room for rent (for example, for people on a business trip). Many retirees have found this method of generating income suitable for themselves.
Other economical options
Very often for old people the question is not about where it is better to live in retirement, but with whom. It's no secret that surviving together is much easier than being alone. Consequently, many come to the conclusion that it is necessary to create a cost-effective union on a semi-commercial basis. Elderly people often find soul mates and decide to live together. This allows you to combine pensions and receive revenue when renting an vacated apartment.
Retiring in the city is difficult due to high food prices. Whether it’s the case in the village: in rural conditions you can buy food at a relatively low cost or grow vegetables and fruits on your own. Do not neglect the opportunity to go to live in the village for the summer. In retirement, you can often pay attention to the country garden, and harvest in the fall.
A modest diet of a pensioner
Most old people see for themselves the only way out - to save on food. Squandering is alien to Russian pensioners. However, a limited diet is not only a way to maintain a budget, but also one of the secrets of caring for your health in old age. When forming an everyday food basket, it is important to consider the needs of the body. It is advisable for pensioners not to overdo it with sweets, the use of fatty, smoked products, mayonnaise, etc. In order to live longer and get sick less, it is better to focus on natural, healthy and light foods.
Menu example
One of the options of the daily menu will help to understand how pensioners live on retirement and at the same time lead a healthy lifestyle.
- Breakfast. Rice or oatmeal in the water, seasoned with a spoonful of butter. In the absence of the latter, vegetable is quite suitable. Tea is black, green or herbal. Loose powder is cheaper, but before use it should always be doused with boiling water.
- Lunch. You can eat a banana or drink a glass of low-fat kefir. It is better to completely abandon flour products, but if you really want sweets, it is better to eat a piece of dark chocolate. Unfortunately, not everyone can afford good coffee, however, there are good budget varieties of this drink.
- Dinner. A simple and inexpensive soup of chicken offal (muscle stomachs, hearts, liver, necks). To make a rich broth, meat ingredients can be used individually or all together. First, the guts are boiled, after which the water is drained and the broth is boiled again. Before adding potatoes, offal must be well chopped or minced. Then add the soup, as usual, adding rice, cabbage, other vegetables, dressing.
- Dinner. As a side dish, potatoes, beans or peas, lentils, rice or buckwheat, pasta made from durum wheat are suitable. Any vegetables, as well as baked or stewed meat, fish, go well with the side dish. However, combining legumes with meat dishes is not worth it - an excess of protein does not have the best effect on the health status of older people.
How and where to buy products cheaply
A great way to constantly save on food products is to periodically monitor prices, monitor the promotions held in supermarkets, which are accompanied by favorable offers for certain categories of goods. Buying products during the stock period can save up to 50% of the budget. Most chain stores constantly offer discounts. It is advantageous to shop in large hypermarkets where the “1 + 1” promotional programs operate: the buyer pays only for one product, and the second, the same, is free.
Many appreciated the benefits of bulk purchases. Not everyone has the opportunity to immediately spend an impressive amount on products. However, such purchases more than justify themselves. In large cities, food bases and wholesale stores are within walking distance. If you purchase goods in such places, their cost is an order of magnitude cheaper.
For example, in a retail store a pack of tea will cost 50 rubles. The same is in the wholesale, but if the buyer immediately takes 3 packs, he will pay 120 rubles for them. Thus, one pack of tea at the wholesale price will cost no longer 50 rubles, but 10 rubles. smaller. In addition, the quality of products at wholesale bases is in no way inferior to retail. Over time, people adapt to this type of purchase, choose the most suitable product items for themselves, and prefer brands of individual manufacturers. The only drawback of wholesale purchases to save money is that it’s hard in the hypermarket to resist the temptation and not to buy too much.
Many retirees are advised to shop in the market. So that every penny was on the account, you should record each of your expenses. Even the purchase of a penny onion or beet should go under the record - this will track all the gaps in costs. On the market you can find quite affordable price tags, especially when it comes to spoiled fruits and vegetables. So, many sellers give slightly frost-bitten apples in winter almost for free, and you can get a great tea cake from them.
To live in retirement in Russia, you need to prepare for winter in advance. And the market helps again: here, elderly people often bring their own goods for sale at a low price. Experienced housewives know how to live in retirement. Women buy berries and vegetables at the market, freeze them, make jam from them, compotes, pickle, pickle.
Is it possible to work in retirement
Advantages are given to those pensioners who, upon reaching the working age, still remain in the ranks. If the state of health allows you to continue working in the same position, that’s fine. The safety of the workplace for a pensioner largely depends on the loyalty and understanding of the employer. Undoubtedly, one cannot miss the opportunity to continue work. But in this case, in no case should you work at the expense of your health. In old age, the burden on the body is much more dangerous than poverty.
How to live without a pension? This question does not concern the person who continues to work. But what to do to those who gave their best years and health, earning experience, and now have to be content with an amount that hardly reaches the minimum wage? Even if it seems to you that you no longer have the strength to work, do not discard the idea of ​​a part-time job at home.
Some people do not even think about how to live without a pension. With proper activity, you can always find a way and improve your financial situation. In addition, today there are many areas for self-realization, so you need not to give up and take the following tips into service.
Earnings at home
Is it possible to live on retirement without additional income? Today, the elderly have a lot of opportunities to get a good increase, without even leaving the apartment. We offer you to get acquainted with several options for part-time work and choose the one that is suitable for your capabilities:
- Earnings on the Internet. People who have minimal computer skills and typing can earn extra money by creating custom articles. To understand whether the work of a copywriter is suitable for you or not, it is enough to recall whether there were any difficulties when writing school essays. Today you can make good money on this.
- Call center operator, taxi dispatcher. These are popular vacancies. Work is carried out remotely, that is, at home. The job of the employee is to receive phone calls.
- Network marketing. Distributors are persons who distribute company products and receive a percentage of their sales. For people with experience in trading, such work is suitable. It is important not to lose vigilance, as in the field of network marketing it is easy to fall for the bait of scammers who profit from gullible retirees.
- Floriculture. Breeding indoor plants and growing seedlings in the planting season can provide a decent income. For sale, goods can be given to flower shops, greenhouses. This option for part-time work is suitable for pensioners living in a private house.
- Homemade baking. The products of good cooks are always in demand. Pies, all kinds of pretzels, rolls, cheesecakes - this is the power of every housewife. Why not make money on it?
- Minor repair of clothing at home (sew a button, hem or shorten trousers, redraw a dress, iron a shirt, etc.). The main thing is to do the work efficiently so that demand does not take long.
Farm
It is impossible to predict how much time is allotted to each of us. But regardless of how many people live in retirement, everyone tries to spend their final life stage in abundance, doing what they love. It is not surprising that for some, the onset of working age marks the beginning of a new life - quiet, measured and calm. A lot of retirees with retirement start farming, plant ducks, chickens, pigs, cows and other animals. Maintaining livestock requires a lot of effort and time, but even the smallest farm will provide pensioners with year-round natural products: eggs, milk, cottage cheese, butter, meat, etc.
Home staff
A good option for people aged is an unofficial part-time job. In the category of “home staff” vacancies are always in demand. How pensioners live on a pension without any additional income is not clear, but one thing is clear: getting a job as a nanny, housekeeper, governess, watchman or gardener, a person does not lose anything:
- Firstly, such work differs little from ordinary household work, and therefore special skills are not required for employment (with the exception of the nanny job, employers give preference to applicants with pedagogical education).
- Secondly, employers often allow service personnel to live on the territory of their home, provide workers with meals. Thus, a pensioner not only saves his salary and pension, but also saves on utility bills, food purchases, etc.
Internal migration
How to live on a pension, which is about 25 thousand rubles.? One answer begs: without much difficulty. This amount seems solid, especially for residents of the European part of Russia. But in Siberia and the Far East, living on this money is absolutely unrealistic. The thing is that food prices in stores are extremely high due to the costly transportation of goods - they are delivered only by plane. In addition, the predominant part of the lands of these territories is unsuitable for subsidiary plots. Utility payments account for most of the retirement benefit. How to live on retirement with such prices? Therefore, the northerners either continue to work when they reach the age limit, or leave for the regions of Central Russia. There, one can live quite comfortably on their retirement without practically denying anything to themselves.
Learning to plan expenses correctly
In fact, there is no universal way to live on retirement. In whatever country a person lives, whatever his income may be, he will always have difficulties with wealth because of his inability to plan a budget.
It is advisable to describe upcoming expenses in detail before each month. Set aside part for food, another part for medicine, for rent, for clothes, for gifts for grandchildren, for a “rainy day”, etc. When shopping at the supermarket, you must always recalculate the amount - this rule will help to protect sellers from dishonesty.
Since older people often get sick, it’s important to learn how to save on medicines. Moreover, we are not talking about refusing treatment. Some retirees have found for themselves a simple way not to overpay for foreign medications: they have purchased a pharmaceutical guide, which lists analogues of modern medicines. The same drug with the same active substance can cost several times cheaper only because it has a different name and is produced at a domestic pharmaceutical company. Why overpay for advertising and brand?
Living in retirement in Russia is not easy, but those who are smart about spending planning manage to save and even make a profit by creating deposits with the bank. If you want, even with a minimum pension, you can provide yourself with cultural activities, periodically visit theaters, museums, philharmonic societies and lead a busy social life. Despite the high cost of tickets, someone manages to purchase them at a low price with the help of acquaintances, while someone attends shows and exhibitions with free invitations and counter-tickets.
A huge role in the well-being of pensioners is played by their own adult children, either actively participating in the lives of their parents and helping them financially, or, conversely, indifferent and indifferent to the problems of their fathers and mothers. Do not forget about your parents for a minute, take care of them while they are around ...