Retirement, old age and the cost of an adequate life

John McCarthy lives what he calls a “strategic” existence. He’s 74, fortunate to be very healthy, but has struggled with learning disabilities his entire life, which have limited his income and opportunities.

It’s an “invisible disability that has created some challenges and often made me depend on the kindness of strangers,” he said, adding that it’s also made him resourceful and generous.

The Salt Lake City senior citizen makes do on $1,700 a month, which puts him over the federal poverty line for a one-person household in 2026 — $1,330 — but well within the government’s definition of low income.

He’s at the lower end of what the “Elder Index,” created and maintained by the Gerontology Institute at the University of Massachusetts Boston, calls “the gap.”

This very well-populated gap includes people over 65 who make do with income above the poverty line, where they are eligible for some government assistance, but below what would be required to comfortably meet the minimal needs the index measures. That includes having enough for housing, healthcare, transportation, food and miscellaneous essentials like cleaning supplies and clothing.

Michelle M. Putnam, the director of the Gerontology Institute, calls them the building blocks for meeting minimal basic needs.

It’s the “real cost of living” without any political addition or subtraction to where the financial line falls between haves and have-nots, she said.

“Elder Index 2025: Living Between the Lines” is a national state comparison report. It notes that in the gap, “individuals are considered vulnerable because they often do not qualify for social safety nets despite lacking enough resources for an adequate lifestyle.”

Having an adequate lifestyle when you’re a senior citizen is not just about income; location matters a great deal, as well. It’s far more expensive to live in San Francisco, California, than in Dayton, Ohio.

Unlike the federal poverty line, which is the same regardless of where you live in the contiguous U.S., the Elder Index assesses the cost of essentials on a county-by-county or metro area basis. And it admittedly doesn’t include everything, according to Caitlin Coyle, director of the institute’s Center for Social & Demographic Research on Aging.

Coyle said the gap is growing and speaks to the “broader trend of widening economic disparity.”

Two-person households are somewhat insulated, while the bigger struggles on average belong to single renters, she said.

“The Elder Index is a very bare bones, conservative cost-of-living metric. I think of those in the gap as the forgotten middle class. They have too much to qualify for programs like food stamps or Medicaid, yet they are struggling to keep up with the increasing cost of living,” Coyle said.

The Elder Index

The center has produced the index for 20 years, but at the end of 2025 it got one of its every-three-year updates, which accounts for cost changes. The costs are also adjusted annually based on the Consumer Price Index.

Coyle told Deseret News that it’s meant to add to conversations “from a policy, research and practical perspective. Often, when we talk about financial insecurity in America, we look at the federal poverty line, which does not account for regional differences or the concept that one is living on a fixed income in later life. The index puts those two ‘holes’ into context: the geographic difference and the late-life difference.”

Costs have risen pretty steadily over the last decade, according to a media briefing on the revised index. The researchers said for single homeowners who do not have a mortgage, the index increased by 31%, while for single homeowners with a mortgage it rose 29%, for example. And for single renters, costs rose a striking 47%.

The index differentiates based on health status — healthcare is obviously more expensive if health is poor — whether one rents, owns outright or carries a mortgage, is single or in a couple, as well as on income and location.

Among the things related to quality of life that the index doesn’t account for are debt, recreation — which can be as simple as an occasional outing or movie — or travel to visit grandkids, among many others. It doesn’t account for many social determinants that contribute to a happy life, Coyle said.

Housing costs, which are skyrocketing in many communities nationwide, including across Utah, are “the No. 1 driver of the index,” Coyle said. “Renters by far have the highest Elder Index values and are the most exposed to the fragility of the local market,” she said. “We see a trend: Renters need the most money, followed by people who own their home but still have a mortgage. The most insulated group are people who own their home outright. However, there are still people ‘in the gap’ in that category.”

The current index is based on 2024 data, so it could be even worse than it looks because it isn’t responsive in real time. It also doesn’t include dependent care, like an adult child caring for a grandchild or paying for an older person’s nursing home care, she said.

“I would argue the gap is even larger than we can demonstrate.”

A peek at some numbers

On average, nationally, a single person needs $34,000 a year to live a very basic adequate life. But about 7.7 million single older adults — more than half of them — do not have what it takes to meet that low bar. The researchers said that “the below-the-Elder-Index group is a combination of people who fall below the poverty line, but also 32% who are in the gap.”

As for older couples, about 1 in 4 who rent their homes have incomes below the Elder Index value of $47,000 a year for a fairly solid financial footing. That’s another 5.4 million people.

In both cases, good health is assumed. The share with poor health who fail to have enough for an adequate lifestyle is higher.

The states with the most expensive Elder Index values, assuming renting and good health, are:

• Massachusetts
• New York
• California
• Hawaii
• Maryland
• New Jersey

But there are lots of other ways to measure flourishing and floundering. For instance, the states with the lowest rates of economic insecurity for older singles are:

• Oklahoma
• South Dakota
• Iowa
• Wyoming
• Delaware

It’s a mix that varies with the situation. Massachusetts has a high cost of living and also high income, so a significant share of older adults live below the Elder Index line because income lags behind high cost of living. Mississippi has lower cost of living but also lower incomes.

In Wayne County, West Virginia, older people need $2,169 for an adequate income. In Orange County, California, it’s $3,733. The cost drivers are different, too. In Wayne County, rent is $850 a month, compared to $2,400 a month in Orange County.

Using the index at elderindex.org, anyone can compare up to four counties or metro areas at a time and select housing status and other factors.

For those who own their home, the biggest cost driver is healthcare.

A couple in good health needs about $3,000 a month in retirement on average to reach the average adequate, but basic Elder Index line in Utah, Putnam said.

And good health might change. Or the roof could need replacing. Or.... Even if you own your own home, she said, and a rise in housing costs around you doesn’t affect you directly, it does. Property taxes may go up.

3 metros, 3 stories

Deseret News chose three geographically diverse metro areas to compare, based on what’s adequate for older adult couples in good (not poor or excellent) health who have a mortgage.

In the Boston area, the monthly expenses in the index would require $5,355 compared to $4,027 in the Orlando metro area and $4,362 in the Salt Lake City metro area. The biggest differences are housing and healthcare costs.

A couple in the Boston metro would need about $64,260 a year, which is 123% of the national average of $52,380. In Orlando, the same couple would need $48,324 a year or 92% of the national average. Salt Lake City metro is pretty much at the national average, at $52,344 a year.

Single renters in good health have very different results. The Boston area is far more expensive than the other two, at $3,774, compared to Orlando’s $3,080 and Salt Lake City’s $2,857. Housing costs are the main difference. For renters, the Boston area costs are 133% of the national average.

As the Elder Index website notes, quoting a 2022 New York Times article, “Living costs and inflation rates vary considerably around the country and that means a Social Security check goes farther in some regions than in others. The Elder Index shows that the average benefit covers 90% of living costs in rural West Virginia but just 38% in San Francisco.”

Planning for retirement

The index can help adults approaching retirement see what they’ll need and if they’ve saved enough or have adequate resources. Using Utah as an example, Coyle said, “The index makes real what people are living every day. Utah may have historically been considered an affordable place to age, but the index shows that is no longer the case due to population growth and development.

She added, “People who are retired now were saving for retirement when the reality was much different than it is in 2026.”

Still, it’s a “realistic benchmark for what people will need in retirement,” she said. And it provides objective data for a policy conversation. “I hope states and localities use it when setting eligibility criteria for assistance programs. Often requirements are so low that people in the gap don’t qualify for things that would deeply improve their lives,” according to Coyle.

Aging affects pretty much everyone and Coyle worries about “the fragility of the gap.”

“People are living in a lot of anxiety and fear about how they are going to keep going if a financial shock like a health event or a natural disaster happens. We want to shed light on the fact that people who have worked their whole lives and ‘done the right thing’ still aren’t able to make ends meet,” she said.

Even at that couple level, what they’re bringing in from Social Security is usually not enough to meet the Elder Index. They need more income than that, Putnam said, noting people in the gap may need help: Perhaps an adult child buys the fridge when theirs goes out. And they buy toys for their grandkids at Christmas from a dollar store or they rely heavily on coupons to decide what they eat.

One vital aspect of a good life that may get missed in or below the gap is the ability to do little things that bring joy like attending a concert or a play.

Socialization is one of the weak points of the Elder Index, because while it’s good for letting someone figure out which community might be affordable, it doesn’t let you bring your church or your friends or your family along.

“Sometimes the worst thing people can do is move away from their support network,” Putnam said, “because they need it for socialization or help. Building new networks takes a lot of effort.”

Making do

Putnam describes the federal poverty line as “well below need.”

She bridles at the notion that seniors are hogging resources like housing and jobs. “That’s a complete misunderstanding of who the older adult population is. It’s really large, really diverse and it does include a lot of really wealthy people. But it also includes in some states 30-40% of people. There’s no way they’re taking all the resources. And the other thing that happens when people think that way is they really forget all the contributions older adults make in terms of supporting their families and their kids and their communities — and the importance of having age-diverse communities."

Putnam said most people haven’t saved a lot for retirement. “A large amount of people” don’t have access to a 401(k) and lots of folks have somewhere between $50,000 and $100,000 saved, she said. “It’s helpful, but it’s not like that target million dollars or whatever that people are advised to save.”

McCarthy, the Salt Lake City resident, qualifies for subsidized housing, which takes a third of his income. He lives near downtown, so he gave up driving and walks everywhere, though he’s keenly aware that should his health falter, his world will shrink. “I really don’t know what my future will be like,” he said.

He has held a number of jobs over the years, in his native California and in Utah, including working with computers, at start-up companies and with an airline that at one time had him train staff on being helpful with people who have disabilities. He’s retired now.

Food is, for many, the biggest challenge. McCarthy has developed a system to help ensure he has enough to eat. He has learned food pantry schedules for when his resources peter out and he also shops very, very carefully. He said he also tries to pass on food to others in his low-income community who need help.

“It was probably about 15 years ago that I thought I’d better learn about this because my future is very uncertain with a learning disability,” he said.

Because he is at the low end of the gap, McCarthy qualifies for some assistance, like the subsidized housing, though that’s precarious, since program rules can change. He’s seen that in action: With recent changes he was “bounced” off Medicaid and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program.

He’s had to be resourceful to survive.