retirement

[floridays]

No they didn't. Just a portion. 41k retirees. Not the entire plan. Please get educated before posting. You should have plenty of time. Sleeping in your car should give you time to get informed.

Did blowing your wife's lottery winning's make you so testy, or did it just expose it more?

What kinda car will you live in, on blocks, in rural Kentucky?

Get all your dental work done before you retire again.

 

[floridays]

How does MetLife send you a pension check? If you are living in your car, how does the mailman find you?

Obviously you took a lump sum payout, how much taxes were taken out.
I'm just trying to figure out how much cash you blew through to put yurass behind a Fedex steering wheel again.

 

[floridays]

I apologize to everyone, besides old fart, for the successive posts.
I couldn't help myself.

Apology offered.
I was wrong to pile on.

Before I leave though, Exactly how did you blow through all the lottery winning @falcon back, aka @Old Fart .

I still got the popcorn, this should be a gooden.

 

[59 Dano]

What I'm saying is I will live on about $500 a month in Argentina so that I can save enough to take care of my wife and I in our 70's as it's very possible that Social Security will be reduced significantly some time between 2030 and 2035. As for going to another country if you aren't aware at least half of the U.S. population will depend primarily on Social Security in retirement as their income during their working years was too low to save enough to support themselves in retirement. And midrange couriers in the last 20 or so years are squarely in that group. You can go on and on about people moving up into better jobs but the business model of FedEx and many other companies depends very much on people being willing to accept less. And there are only so many better jobs to go around.

I think if you understood things as well as you think you do, you wouldn't be sleeping in your car.

 

[59 Dano]

Have a home in Overland Park, KS.

That's why you sleep in your car, right?

 

[59 Dano]

Except very few companies offer that now. Government is the way to go these days for a real pension.

LOL. Public pensions as a whole are terribly underfunded and a movement toward defined contribution plans for newer hires has already begun.

 

[vantexan]

LOL. Public pensions as a whole are terribly underfunded and a movement toward defined contribution plans for newer hires has already begun.

And yet what I said still stands. Very few corporations are giving traditional pensions these days and if you're going to get such a pension then government service is about the only avenue. That includes the military, the police, and firemen too. Surely you agree that to attract people to such career fields incentives like pensions are necessary, right?

 

[vantexan]

I think if you understood things as well as you think you do, you wouldn't be sleeping in your car.

Sleeping in my car allows me to live on $600 a month. I understand exactly what I'm doing.

 

[vantexan]

That's why you sleep in your car, right?

Yup.

 

[59 Dano]

And yet what I said still stands. Very few corporations are giving traditional pensions these days and if you're going to get such a pension then government service is about the only avenue. That includes the military, the police, and firemen too. Surely you agree that to attract people to such career fields incentives like pensions are necessary, right?

The current state of public pensions renders them largely unsustainable. What it would take to attract someone to a career depends on what that person wants to do and the compensation of his most likely alternative.

 

[59 Dano]

Sleeping in my car allows me to live on $600 a month. I understand exactly what I'm doing.

I don't doubt that you understand what you're doing, it's your understanding in general that's suspect.

 

[vantexan]

I don't doubt that you understand what you're doing, it's your understanding in general that's suspect.

Yes I know you can't stand me pointing out what the company actually did. Must destroy my credibility. When I talk about living overseas not only have I been to some places but I've discussed what life is like in many places with Americans who actually live in those places. Have been doing that for 25 years now. Yet if I demonstrate knowledge about something you aren't familiar with you can't stand it. Enjoy your job and your white bread life if it means that much to you. Alternatives to that are out there, and often are much more interesting. And thank the good Lord because working until my late 60's for a company like FedEx is a sure fire recipe for killing my soul and spirit. And for what? Ooo, I've got me a big honkin' pickup truck and a boat! Ooo, I live in a big house in an upscale neighborhood! Ooo, Ooo, look at me!! No thanks!

 

[vantexan]

The current state of public pensions renders them largely unsustainable. What it would take to attract someone to a career depends on what that person wants to do and the compensation of his most likely alternative.

Jobs like the military, the police, or the fire department require risking your life. If pensions are taken away better be ready to pony up much higher salaries. Or settle for much lower quality people in those fields. But you do illustrate that your view, and many in management at private corporations, is that wealth should only come to those who lead in private corporations. Everyone else has to settle for less unless they can come up with a better mousetrap. Darwinian capitalism.

 

[59 Dano]

Yes I know you can't stand me pointing out what the company actually did. Must destroy my credibility. When I talk about living overseas not only have I been to some places but I've discussed what life is like in many places with Americans who actually live in those places. Have been doing that for 25 years now. Yet if I demonstrate knowledge about something you aren't familiar with you can't stand it.

Dude, if you think I care one way or the other that you know all about the way of life in some other country, well, go right ahead thinking it. Whatever helps you sleep at night.

Enjoy your job and your white bread life if it means that much to you.

Just because I haven't made such a mess of my life that I have to seek refuge on the other side of the world means my life is white bread?

Alternatives to that are out there, and often are much more interesting. And thank the good Lord because working until my late 60's for a company like FedEx is a sure fire recipe for killing my soul and spirit. And for what? Ooo, I've got me a big honkin' pickup truck and a boat! Ooo, I live in a big house in an upscale neighborhood! Ooo, Ooo, look at me!! No thanks!

Ooo, I sleep in my car! Look at me!!

 

[vantexan]

Dude, if you think I care one way or the other that you know all about the way of life in some other country, well, go right ahead thinking it. Whatever helps you sleep at night.



Just because I haven't made such a mess of my life that I have to seek refuge on the other side of the world means my life is white bread?



Ooo, I sleep in my car! Look at me!!

You can't seem to understand this point...I realized long ago that FedEx was never going to give me a decent retirement in the States. But I did realize the value of the traditional pension for living overseas. My plan for the last 25 years was to live overseas and I worked toward that goal. FedEx doing what they did with pay and retirement hampered what I was working towards, but it was the goal to have a life abroad. The only way I would have messed up is if I never retired abroad. In the States you have to work your way up the corporate ladder, or have a skill people are willing to pay for, in order to have a decent retirement. Tens of millions won't, but they would never consider living abroad for a host of reasons, mainly fear of the unknown. Millions of Americans are living abroad, and there are tons of Facebook Groups, Yahoo Groups, and other forums where there is discussion and support about specific countries and cities. You want to frame it as failure but are unaware that modern communications and the strong Dollar make living overseas a very attractive alternative to just existing in retirement in the U.S., or the constant scrambling one must do to pay the high costs of a very expensive country. So enjoy your job, your life, your retirement in the States. The constant striving keeps the Dollar strong and makes it possible for me and my wife to have a better life abroad. We're even talking about living in Kansas part off the year, Argentina part of the year to have an endless summer. We both hate cold weather.

 

[59 Dano]

Jobs like the military, the police, or the fire department require risking your life.

You're aware that most people who join the military don't make a career of it, right?

If pensions are taken away better be ready to pony up much higher salaries. Or settle for much lower quality people in those fields.

Oh, paying more up front is most certainly the plan, along with defined contribution retirement plans. It's cheaper and more fiscally responsible. No employer should be tied down to a plan that requires providing a guaranteed salary to a person for 20 years after he's left the company.

But you do illustrate that your view, and many in management at private corporations, is that wealth should only come to those who lead in private corporations. Everyone else has to settle for less unless they can come up with a better mousetrap. Darwinian capitalism.

No, I think wealth should go to those that earn it.

Look, you were making $13/hour in the 90s and quit the company, only to return a year or so later make $10 and change. Then you quit again. Then you came back again. Then you left again. You also had some fiasco in the 90s that you posted about in which you pretended to be a commodities trader or whatever and made six figures doing that, only to lose it all. I don't know what was going through that twisted mind of yours but plenty of people who started around the same time you did and endured the things that you got mad and quit over are either entering or set up to enter decent retirements.

And here you are blaming a system that would have given you a decent retirement.

 

[59 Dano]

You can't seem to understand this point...I realized long ago that FedEx was never going to give me a decent retirement in the States. But I did realize the value of the traditional pension for living overseas.

No, FedEx isn't going to "give" you a decent retirement when you quit and come back at a lower rate every few years. That's why people who stuck with it have decent retirements.

You want to frame it as failure but are unaware that modern communications and the strong Dollar make living overseas a very attractive alternative to just existing in retirement in the U.S., or the constant scrambling one must do to pay the high costs of a very expensive country. So enjoy your job, your life, your retirement in the States. The constant striving keeps the Dollar strong and makes it possible for me and my wife to have a better life abroad. We're even talking about living in Kansas part off the year, Argentina part of the year to have an endless summer. We both hate cold weather.

You keep saying that the cost of living here is expensive and requires great effort to overcome. It isn't and doesn't.

 

[vantexan]

You're aware that most people who join the military don't make a career of it, right?



Oh, paying more up front is most certainly the plan, along with defined contribution retirement plans. It's cheaper and more fiscally responsible. No employer should be tied down to a plan that requires providing a guaranteed salary to a person for 20 years after he's left the company.



No, I think wealth should go to those that earn it.

Look, you were making $13/hour in the 90s and quit the company, only to return a year or so later make $10 and change. Then you quit again. Then you came back again. Then you left again. You also had some fiasco in the 90s that you posted about in which you pretended to be a commodities trader or whatever and made six figures doing that, only to lose it all. I don't know what was going through that twisted mind of yours but plenty of people who started around the same time you did and endured the things that you got mad and quit over are either entering or set up to enter decent retirements.

And here you are blaming a system that would have given you a decent retirement.

Wasn't a fiasco. Was a matter of lack of experience. Made it, lost it. Live and learn. Show me a courier with a decent retirement and I'll show you a courier who topped out early, bought a house with his spouse, got most if not all of the 25 years on his traditional pension, his wife had a decent job too, didn't have too many children and was conservative in his spending. Sure, it happens. Someone who never married and wanted to have a few things and had his pension cut down while raises were non existant, not so much.

 

[McFeely]

Show me a courier with a decent retirement and I'll show you a courier who topped out early,

What do you consider a decent retirement? Mine is in good shape, but it’s not because I topped out early (still under step 5).

 

[vantexan]

No, FedEx isn't going to "give" you a decent retirement when you quit and come back at a lower rate every few years. That's why people who stuck with it have decent retirements.



You keep saying that the cost of living here is expensive and requires great effort to overcome. It isn't and doesn't.

If you have a good paying job, sure. Most couriers live paycheck to paycheck. I didn't quit and come back every few years. I quit after 11 years because we hadn't got a raise for four years then got a very small one. Got frustrated. Came back and was willing to put in the 7-8 years I was told it would take to top out. Live and learn. Wasn't true. Put in just shy of 15 more years before quitting again. The ones who were topped out did make enough to have a few choices and a life if they were married and their spouse had a good job. I was back as a midrange employee for almost 15 years falling further and further behind top out. Please don't tell me all those midrange employees on the portable pension were doing just fine with their retirement. A lot of very unhappy people and a lot of turnover. How do you think 10+ year employees felt when told under the new pay plan they'd have to work another 7-8 years to top out when someone coming off the street would do it in 9 years? So try to frame it about me and my failings if you like, tens of thousands of couriers who hired on thinking they had a bright future with a great company found out differently. I feel for them because a lot of them are unaware of alternatives or worry that they'd be risking their life going overseas. And people like you stoke that fear when you don't know what you're talking about. Even if all they have is Social Security they are much better off in many countries. Not because the U.S. is horrible, but it's much more expensive than they can afford.