Is the better economy too late for people like me?

[life long demo]

8. From someone who got a job in 2004 at age 61

No it's not too late. Laid off in February of '04 at 61, spent every day looking/applying for a job. Kept lowering my expectations of what I wanted. Finally after almost 10 months, got a job in customer service in a heating oil co. Was paid $12/hr. I had been making $26/hr. I spent the next 2 years learning as much as I could about how things worked at the company, and was able to transfer into another job that I loved, still didn't make much more but was happy. Spent 8 years at that co., and retired now because you can't keep up with the 8hr/day working, I'm 70 now. Shifted my lifestyle to the extreme, everything extra went into an IRA or savings. I was able to refinance my mortgage back to a 30 years mortgage but to a very modest monthly payment. I still live very modestly but I can pay my bills. Am I happy that I had to do this, no, but there was no alternative. BTW, the company I worked for till '04 moved to Mexico and I was sooo pissed for a long time.