Oh Boy, We are Screwed If You are a Working Stiff, Like Me,

[The Whiskey Priest]

Just a little article about our future…..or lack of one.

States are struggling with a $260 billion gap in another frayed retirement safety net: public pension programs. More than 5.1 million retired teachers, judges, law enforcement and other public employees now rely on public pensions, with another 15 million workers expecting benefits when they retire.

Seems like W. Virginia who adopted a plan much like that touted by Bush is in a very bad mess….

”West Virginia adopted such a program for new teachers hired after 1991, but lawmakers voted this year to freeze the system, citing the stock market slump and less-than-savvy investing by enrollees.”

It is not only the public sector’s pension plans that are in trouble…the private plans are also insolvent….
Before the 2004 act, at least 65,000 people lost all or part of their pensions when their employers became insolvent, leaving behind an underfunded scheme. In several notable instances, the insolvency occured following acquisition by a private equity investor.
The 65,000 received at least some of the promised pension due to the federal government pension insurance plan. April 12, there was this story…..
“The federal government's insurance program for bankrupt private pension plans is in danger of going broke, adding to the retirement anxiety of tens of thousands of Michiganians who have seen pension plans canceled or fear for the future of the state's struggling industrial base.

The Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp., a safety net designed to protect American workers, swung from a surplus of $10 billion in 2000 to a deficit of $23 billion in 2004. The problems are largely due to bankruptcies in the steel and airline industries.”

It would seem that the working class who has labored under the illusion that they had a retirement system that would see them through their old-age has been tricked. What kind of fools are we?

[QC]

1. I'm confused.

What does this have to do with the pope or Johnny Gosch?

[The Whiskey Priest]

2. Ah hell

No one told me tonights theme

[Conservativesux]

3. With the Peak Oil disaster coming at us full steam, this is going to be..

...a rather quaint subject, in just a few short years.

Run, dont walk away from the stock market "slump" as fast as you can.

Its not going be to just a slump before long :(

[B Calm]

4. I worked for crook that declared all profits as his salary.

He bought our profitable company fron Olin Corporation in 1985. He never put a dime back into the company and ran it into the ground in 1997 and filed bankruptcy. Our pensions were then taken over by PBGC and the payout is 80% of what it should be. I'm not old enough yet to collect my pension, so this is extreemly upsetting news..

[seabeyond]

5. this makes no sense whatsoever, bush's ss plan

i cant believe any thinking, and even non thinking person would buy into it. the non thinking will no they arent capable of playing the stock, and the thinking person knows the risk and how hard it is

a gamble