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Business Insider
29-05-2025
- Health
- Business Insider
I'm 78 and still working part-time. Here's how I've stayed involved with what I love, 16 years after retirement.
This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Donald Kimmel, 78, who retired from his role as a bone biologist 16 years ago but continues consulting and peer reviewing articles. Kimmel, who lives in The Villages, Florida, said he's stayed healthy and active and has enjoyed his retirement years, even though he doesn't often get to the beach. His words have been edited for length and clarity. Socially and career-wise, I have no major regrets. I had several related jobs which I loved, which were well-suited to my temperament, and were financially well-compensated. I graduated from college as a chemistry major in 1968. I went to dental school out of college, but after a couple of years, I realized it wasn't exactly for me. I found some brochures advertising NIH-sponsored dental student research programs. While at a program in Salt Lake City, doing research was such an eye-opener that I knew being a graduate student would be a better way to go than continuing the dental program. Are you an older American comfortable sharing your retirement outlook with a reporter? Please fill out this quick form. We are especially looking to hear from people 80 and older. I talked to the guy who ran the program, who made an agreement that he would admit me as a Ph.D. student if I finished dental school. That's where my career doing bone research came from. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, my positions were 100% research and writing grant applications. I made the switch to osteoporosis research before it was popular. I moved around quite a bit, including to a hospital in North Carolina studying kidney disease effects on bone. I had made a friend with an osteoporosis guy in Omaha, and he recruited me to be a researcher on his team. After 12 years there, the first osteoporosis drug was put on the market in 1995. The guy who led the charge invited me to come to Merck, and I got to use all the new chemicals that Merck was making to create a second-generation osteoporosis drug. It was like heaven. However, once he retired, the program disintegrated. I was in my late 50s, so I started calculating what my next move might be. Going to work the day after retiring Before I retired from Merck, I made a point of getting a handle on my yearly expenses, expecting post-retirement they would be relatively close to what they were while I was working. I had a 401(k) and a 403(b) from a past university, and I had some inheritance money from my mom after she passed away in 2004. I had started using Fidelity Investments back in 1981. I wish I had known about and been able to practice asset allocation much earlier in life. I wish I had known much earlier the data proving the predictability of annual returns versus risk from various asset allocation strategies over long timeframes. When we were 56, my wife and I took out long-term care insurance policies. We have maintained them, though the annual premium is about sevenfold more now than when we enrolled. In 2008, I was offered a buyout and got a year of extra pay, which got me almost to age 63. I figured I could retire and make it for decades from my pension and transitional income, and I knew I'd do freelance consulting. It looks like I took early retirement, but for four or five more years, I was flying around to conferences and doing consulting. The morning after I took my buyout, I got this call from an attorney at Eli Lilly who needed me to do expert testimony during a lawsuit about a drug. Running races, peer reviewing papers, and taking it easy My wife ran a home decorating and window coverings business. While on a trip to the US Virgin Islands, she told me she wanted to take the income from her business and buy a piece of property. We wanted a place to go when it was cold in the winter, though we weren't wild vacationers. It was a big step for us, but we bought a condo in St. Croix in the mid-2000s. My wife's business was doing well, so we got another one on the beach. When my work was winding down in 2011, we used Airbnb and Verbo to list them. Until 2017, we figured out how to make them work as vacation rental properties. We balanced that with getting some people who lived in the Virgin Islands to do the local management stuff. Hurricane Maria ripped the roof off the beachfront condo, which was never the same again, so we sold them. We moved to The Villages, Florida, in March of 2010. It was a place which my wife, who had patiently followed my US-wide odyssey doing research around the US, had always said she thought she would like. It has been our longest stop. We projected we would be more able to travel in the early years of retirement, and we did river and ocean cruises. We've gradually started to slow down and have been traveling less in the last five years. Before Covid and after two years of brisk walking, I started entering 5Ks. Thinking of all those my age who don't even enter gave me an even better feeling. I got all the way down to 42 minutes. I can still do a mile in 16 minutes. I still peer review papers on bone science for medical journals. I've been able to stay current on today's knowledge. I like to pass down ideas on career moves that students should make. I enjoy talking to young people who are at those crucial phases and are looking for ideas. It's a fulfilling part of retirement. We have monthly expenses of about $9,400. We have monthly pre-tax income from three sources: combined Social Security of $5400, an annuity of $300, and an investment mix that historically both returns an average of ~$5,800 over an extended time period and lets us sleep at night. My Fidelity account executive in The Villages took my accounts and ran an algorithm on them, then showed me a historical evaluation of what various mixes of allocations were going to return. I can sleep at night with what I have now, and I've done some opportunistic buying over the last three or four years. Being older is about gaining all the easy advantages one can, to get through and avoid preventable illness. Because of my background, I can read the medical literature. I do my best to learn about activities and habits to do and avoid, and how to best treat conditions that I personally have. With health, remember this old adage. Smart people learn from their own mistakes. Wise people learn from others' mistakes.
Yahoo
09-02-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
NIH cuts put medical research at risk, scientists say, raising concerns at UC and elsewhere
Each year, the National Institutes of Health gives billions of dollars to the University of California to pay for research into cancer, Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, heart disease, diabetes and other diseases it has been at the forefront of studying for decades. But a drastic cut to NIH funding under the Trump administration set to take place Monday has caused alarm among UC leaders and many medical researchers, who said the move would "jeopardize America's research preeminence." Speaking to The Times since the cuts were announced Friday night, UC medical researchers expressed concerns about the future of their labs and lifesaving endeavors — as have others at universities and academic medical centers nationwide. The NIH said late Friday that it would slash by more than half so-called "indirect funding" — overhead for research supplies, building maintenance, utilities, support staff and other costs — that institutions receive as part of medical research grants. Beginning Monday, NIH-sponsored indirect funding will be capped at 15% of grants, down from 57% that many UCLA research projects receive and the 64% given at UC San Francisco, which has the highest rate in the UC system. Read more: UC, a top recipient of federal research funding, is concerned about Trump pause on grant reviews In its X post on the change Friday, the NIH shared a graphic that compared the indirect funding rates for Harvard, Yale and Johns Hopkins with their multibillion-dollar endowments. The highest among them, Harvard, was 69%. The NIH's move would save roughly $4 billion a year in tax dollars, the post stated. The agency said that more than a quarter of its $35 billion in research funding last year went to overhead. As a comparison, it cited private foundations, including the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative and the Gates Foundation, saying their overhead costs are 15% or lower. "The United States should have the best medical research in the world,' the NIH said in guidance posted to its website. 'It is accordingly vital to ensure that as many funds as possible go towards direct scientific research costs rather than administrative overhead.' University researchers said the money, despite being labeled "indirect funding," is essential to their work and pays to keep lifesaving science going — from ensuring the proper storage of biological samples to keeping alive animals for medical trials. They also contend that private foundations do not have to follow the same rules in how they categorize spending, saying it is unfair to compare overheads between the two. Read more: UC students sue education department over DOGE's access to private financial aid data Republicans argue that the costs are superfluous, part of bloated spending of taxpayer funds that President Trump has appointed Elon Musk to pare down. Scientists point out that universities have already been paying a greater share for research costs. Data from the National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics show that, since 1980, the federal slice of research support at universities has gone down 12% while university payments have gone up 11%. The NIH is the largest funder of UC research, providing $2.6 billion in the last academic year — 62% of the university's federal awards of more than $4.2 billion. In a statement, UC said that the "new administration guidance would imperil this vital support and jeopardize America's research preeminence." "These time-honored university partnerships have led to some of the most powerful and impactful research discoveries in human history," the statement said. "Life-saving treatments for cancer, diabetes, heart attacks, and strokes, including in children, and new technologies and industries that translate into hundreds of thousands of well-paying jobs are all at risk. America is first in research, but its dominance is not assured." On Saturday, UC officials were still analyzing the effect of the NIH move, and were in contact with UC lawyers, researchers and administrators on how to respond. In an email to his science faculty after the NIH announcement, a UCLA dean said: "As with many announcements over the last several weeks, this no doubt causes significant anxiety. Please know that the leadership at UCLA and across the UC is working to understand the implications." The White House defended its action, saying in an email blast to media outlets Saturday that "the NIH did not announce any cuts to actual research." It cited Vinay Prasad, a professor of epidemiology and biostatistics and medicine at UC San Francisco, who praised the NIH move on his blog. The cut "might even mean more science. Less money spent on the administration is more money to give out to actual scientists," wrote Prasad. "I am shocked to see researchers crying about how much money the university gets — it means more grants can be given per cycle." Several other UC researchers, many who had just applied for grant renewals after a recent application pause or were in the midst of assembling grant proposals, said they were stunned. "All my research will be shut down if this goes through. There is no other way to say it. It will be done," said Beate Ritz, a professor and vice chair of the epidemiology department at UCLA who has received at least $1 million a year for more than a decade from the NIH to research environmental pollution, Parkinson's and Alzheimer's. "It's not my salary. I get paid by the state to teach. But it is the cost of much of everything else." Read more: Trump's order on antisemitism and 'Hamas sympathizers' has California universities on alert Indirect costs cover items outside of salaries, travel, supplies and other direct expenses. The indirect costs are negotiated between the university and the federal government — typically every three or four years for UC campuses — which is why the change surprised scientists. Gina Poe, a neurobiology professor in UCLA's David Geffen School of Medicine, said she feared that her decades of research into memory, sleep and post-traumatic stress syndrome were threatened. Poe explained how her grant works. She receives $250,000 a year from the NIH to pay five undergraduate and graduate research assistants, among other expenditures, including rats and mice. This does not include her indirect funding. With UCLA's indirect cost rate of 57%, at first glance, it appears Poe would receive an additional $142,500 in such funding. But she said the math is more complicated and she gets much less. The federal government, Poe said, deducts certain costs from the grant before it calculates indirect funding levels. Major equipment costs, tuition awards to students and more are not included. In the end, her NIH indirect funding totals an additional $114,000, which mostly goes to UCLA and to the university's life sciences division to cover facilities costs and other expenditures. Among the budget items indirect funding pays for: workers who care for rats and mice, feeding them and cleaning their cages. It also pays for medicine and veterinarian visits. Under the new NIH formula, Poe's indirect funding allowance would be minimal. "The only way left for me to make up that money is to move my work to a private company, for UCLA to raise tuition to cover extra costs or to apply to private foundations where the competition is going to increase significantly for funding," Poe said. Read more: Trump poised to diminish the education department; fate of financial aid, equity grants uncertain Vivek Shetty, a UCLA professor of oral and maxillofacial surgery and biomedical engineering and former Academic Senate chair, expressed concerns that U.S. research power could be diminished. "America's global leadership in science and technology wasn't built on genius alone. It relied heavily on infrastructure and systems that allowed universities to transform ideas into innovations. Cripple that infrastructure, and the next medical or AI advancement will happen elsewhere — taking with it not just jobs and prestige, but also the economic vitality and societal progress that innovation brings," Shetty said. The funding change has hit a particular nerve at universities since Trump's inauguration. Many administrators have felt under the microscope from a president who has spoken out against what he describes as "Marxist" universities overrun with leftists. Last month, UC officials raised concerns after a temporary NIH pause on research grant reviews. Trump's executive orders have also targeted diversity, equity and inclusion programs — including in federal grants and programming. On Wednesday he signed an executive order designed to ban transgender athletes from participating in women's or girls' sporting events. Sign up for Essential California for news, features and recommendations from the L.A. Times and beyond in your inbox six days a week. This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
Los Angeles Times
09-02-2025
- Health
- Los Angeles Times
NIH cuts put medical research at risk, scientists say, raising concerns at UC and elsewhere
Each year, the National Institutes of Health gives billions of dollars to the University of California to pay for research into cancer, Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, heart disease, diabetes and other diseases it has been at the forefront of studying for decades. But a drastic cut to NIH funding under the Trump administration set to take place Monday has caused alarm among UC leaders and many medical researchers, who said the move would 'jeopardize America's research preeminence.' Speaking to The Times since the cuts were announced Friday night, UC medical researchers expressed concerns about the future of their labs and lifesaving endeavors — as have others at universities and academic medical centers nationwide. The NIH said late Friday that it would slash by more than half so-called 'indirect funding' — overhead for research supplies, building maintenance, utilities, support staff and other costs — that institutions receive as part of medical research grants. Beginning Monday, NIH-sponsored indirect funding will be capped at 15% of grants, down from 57% that many UCLA research projects receive and the 64% given at UC San Francisco, which has the highest rate in the UC system. In its X post on the change Friday, the NIH shared a graphic that compared the indirect funding rates for Harvard, Yale and Johns Hopkins with their multibillion-dollar endowments. The highest among them, Harvard, was 69%. The NIH's move would save roughly $4 billion a year in tax dollars, the post stated. The agency said that more than a quarter of its $35 billion in research funding last year went to overhead. As a comparison, it cited private foundations, including the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative and the Gates Foundation, saying their overhead costs are 15% or lower. 'The United States should have the best medical research in the world,' the NIH said in guidance posted to its website. 'It is accordingly vital to ensure that as many funds as possible go towards direct scientific research costs rather than administrative overhead.' University researchers said the money, despite being labeled 'indirect funding,' is essential to their work and pays to keep lifesaving science going — from ensuring the proper storage of biological samples to keeping alive animals for medical trials. They also contend that private foundations do not have to follow the same rules in how they categorize spending, saying it is unfair to compare overheads between the two. Republicans argue that the costs are superfluous, part of bloated spending of taxpayer funds that President Trump has appointed Elon Musk to pare down. Scientists point out that universities have already been paying a greater share for research costs. Data from the National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics show that, since 1980, the federal slice of research support at universities has gone down 12% while university payments have gone up 11%. The NIH is the largest funder of UC research, providing $2.6 billion in the last academic year — 62% of the university's federal awards of more than $4.2 billion. In a statement, UC said that the 'new administration guidance would imperil this vital support and jeopardize America's research preeminence.' 'These time-honored university partnerships have led to some of the most powerful and impactful research discoveries in human history,' the statement said. 'Life-saving treatments for cancer, diabetes, heart attacks, and strokes, including in children, and new technologies and industries that translate into hundreds of thousands of well-paying jobs are all at risk. America is first in research, but its dominance is not assured.' On Saturday, UC officials were still analyzing the effect of the NIH move, and were in contact with UC lawyers, researchers and administrators on how to respond. In an email to his science faculty after the NIH announcement, a UCLA dean said: 'As with many announcements over the last several weeks, this no doubt causes significant anxiety. Please know that the leadership at UCLA and across the UC is working to understand the implications.' The White House defended its action, saying in an email blast to media outlets Saturday that 'the NIH did not announce any cuts to actual research.' It cited Vinay Prasad, a professor of epidemiology and biostatistics and medicine at UC San Francisco, who praised the NIH move on his blog. The cut 'might even mean more science. Less money spent on the administration is more money to give out to actual scientists,' wrote Prasad. 'I am shocked to see researchers crying about how much money the university gets — it means more grants can be given per cycle.' Several other UC researchers, many who had just applied for grant renewals after a recent application pause or were in the midst of assembling grant proposals, said they were stunned. 'All my research will be shut down if this goes through. There is no other way to say it. It will be done,' said Beate Ritz, a professor and vice chair of the epidemiology department at UCLA who has received at least $1 million a year for more than a decade from the NIH to research environmental pollution, Parkinson's and Alzheimer's. 'It's not my salary. I get paid by the state to teach. But it is the cost of much of everything else.' Indirect costs cover items outside of salaries, travel, supplies and other direct expenses. The indirect costs are negotiated between the university and the federal government — typically every three or four years for UC campuses — which is why the change surprised scientists. Gina Poe, a neurobiology professor in UCLA's David Geffen School of Medicine, said she feared that her decades of research into memory, sleep and post-traumatic stress syndrome were threatened. Poe explained how her grant works. She receives $250,000 a year from the NIH to pay five undergraduate and graduate research assistants, among other expenditures, including rats and mice. This does not include her indirect funding. With UCLA's indirect cost rate of 57%, at first glance, it appears Poe would receive an additional $142,500 in such funding. But she said the math is more complicated and she gets much less. The federal government, Poe said, deducts certain costs from the grant before it calculates indirect funding levels. Major equipment costs, tuition awards to students and more are not included. In the end, her NIH indirect funding totals an additional $114,000, which mostly goes to UCLA and to the university's life sciences division to cover facilities costs and other expenditures. Among the budget items indirect funding pays for: workers who care for rats and mice, feeding them and cleaning their cages. It also pays for medicine and veterinarian visits. Under the new NIH formula, Poe's indirect funding allowance would be minimal. 'The only way left for me to make up that money is to move my work to a private company, for UCLA to raise tuition to cover extra costs or to apply to private foundations where the competition is going to increase significantly for funding,' Poe said. Vivek Shetty, a UCLA professor of oral and maxillofacial surgery and biomedical engineering and former Academic Senate chair, expressed concerns that U.S. research power could be diminished. 'America's global leadership in science and technology wasn't built on genius alone. It relied heavily on infrastructure and systems that allowed universities to transform ideas into innovations. Cripple that infrastructure, and the next medical or AI advancement will happen elsewhere — taking with it not just jobs and prestige, but also the economic vitality and societal progress that innovation brings,' Shetty said. The funding change has hit a particular nerve at universities since Trump's inauguration. Many administrators have felt under the microscope from a president who has spoken out against what he describes as 'Marxist' universities overrun with leftists. Last month, UC officials raised concerns after a temporary NIH pause on research grant reviews. Trump's executive orders have also targeted diversity, equity and inclusion programs — including in federal grants and programming. On Wednesday he signed an executive order designed to ban transgender athletes from participating in women's or girls' sporting events.
