Pennies on the Dollar
On Big Holes vs Small Holes
I just read an opinion piece by Rob Roper in a Vermont eZine about a new Vermont Bill just passed to skim 5% out of everyone’s paycheck to be placed in a retirement fund-without the employees’ permissions-but with an option to opt out later. Ostensibly to provide funds for poor, aging Vermonters, and to not have the rest of us paying for others’ inability to save.
This Bill, obviously, is an affront to right leaning Vermonters like Roper who believe they know best how to invest their money. The data would disagree.
According to a white paper on savings by the poor in 2014
SAVINGS BY AND FOR THE POOR:A RESEARCH REVIEW AND AGENDA by Dean Karlan Yale University, Innovations for Poverty Action, Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab at M.I.T, and NBER
“Only 22 percent of adults worldwide report having saved at a formal financial institution in the past 12 months, and 77 percent of adults living on less than $2 a day report not having an account at a formal f inancial institution (Demirguc-Kunt and Klapper, 2012). Mounting evidence also suggests that various demand-side constraints depress saving even among those with access. Social claimants, lack of knowledge, and/or behavioral biases may lead to sub-optimal saving.”
I feel there are much bigger issues to complain about in the current economic atmosphere, especially with abrupt climate change breathing her hot breath of death down our necks. But let’s say we do need to worry about our own retirements and those of our children. Let’s say we aren’t about to lose all the Arctic ice, or blow our planet up in a nuclear war. Let’s pretend we have many tomorrows left and retirement planning is a real concern.
What’s in your retirement plan?
My reply to the opinion piece By Rob Roper, though I’m unsure if it actually posted.
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Strange not to inform the public of such an important decision. The irony is that federal income tax rates over the decades have been much higher than we see today, by double digits, but people’s income until the late 1970’s was also much higher than it is now, in relation to inflation. Which is why our nation largely thrived in the 50’s and 60’s and is in full collapse now.
Had the federal govt followed a simple plan of raising the minimum wage by nearly a dollar a year like it used to, my $3 an hour Burger King job in 1978 wouldn’t seem like a distant, wonderful dream, and equal to approx $24 an hour today !
But no. Corporate lobbyists won keeping workers’ incomes stagnated.
For 40+ years our incomes have stagnated while CEO’s have ballooned obscenely. Of COURSE this is going to cause hardship for workers who are then forced to get more jobs (I have four and turn 60 this summer).
Remember Bush’s response to the older woman who said she had to work 3 jobs?
“You work three jobs? Uniquely American, isn't it? I mean, that is fantastic that you're doing that." To a divorced mother of three, In Omaha, Nebraska, Feb. 4, 2005
No. It was not fantastic, but it is uniquely American. Neither party understands this crisis.
Even highly educated workers are strapped and cannot save. Those folks who are less inclined to save from the pittance they earn will likely benefit from a plan like this. Folks like my father would benefit who never saved a plugged nickel in his ninety years and now his children have to worry about paying for his memory care. How about elders who had no children? Or elder people estranged from family and are alone and broke? Aging Boomers and Silent Generation come to mind. The young are expected to shoulder that burden and does that seem very fair?
But still, this plan is just a little finger in the gaping hole of our sinking ship.
There is much to scream about in the current economy, it would be great if we screamed about the real reasons we are all struggling financially instead of the made up ones. Whining about pennies on the dollar is a waste of energy. IMO. There are MUCH bigger holes in this ship to patch.
1) A living minimum wage is necessary NOW.
2) universal healthcare would have been great during the pandemic, and still would be great for anyone earning less than $100K a year. Europeans live longer, and healthier than we do. Universal healthcare is a big reason for that. 70% of home foreclosures in the USA are due to a health crisis. Uniquely American indeed.
3) There should be zero billionaires.
No one needs that kind of money (except the military industrial complex to wage its endless, bloody wars).
4) end all our wars including proxy ones.
Let’s all scream about those four things and see if we can unite together behind something positive? It might still be too late to save this sinking ship (for myriad of reasons) but we could try.
For a change.
Happy Father’s Day Dad, and to all the other dads out there as well.
My dad about 25 years ago. Photo by Pauline Schneider
My dad on his 90th birthday this last May. Photo by Paul Panagiotou
I had a dream about hard working/celebrating you last night. Made me smile, songbird. I am looking for another job now, and have no retirement plans other than that final retirement by and by. My beloved sister gets crazy and I can hear the worry about that. With love I remain, the feral hermit.
Retiring early because I've learned to live with less instead of thinking that I deserve more an better than someone else. Thinking about those who live on a dollar or less. Everything is monetized instead of valuing peaceful moments an a breath of clean air. We are all organisms. Choosing not to be sociopathic. The smaller brained creatures don't get a choice.