For those of us who saw it coming, there’s a sense of scheudenfrade watching others come to terms with the financial Armageddon. There are a lot of older people who followed the rules and had a “diversified” stock portfolio that’s nearly gone. Buy and hold indeed. The alternative “safe” strategy of Treasury bills (bonds) is paying out a mighty 0.75%. So, let’s see, to live on the interest at a modest US$50,000 a year would require a nest egg of precisely $6,666,666.66.
How many retirees are sitting on that kind of wealth? Would you expect to be living on fifty thousand a year after piling up nearly seven million dollars? Most people would be thrilled to retire with a million bucks in the bank, but to keep it safely in T bills means living on US$7,500 a year. That’s like having a job that pays US$3.68 an hour, less than half the legal minimum wage. And that’s with a million bucks!
No wonder there are so many anecdotal tales of older folks going back to work. So sad after a lifetime of work and savings to have it basically stolen by a bunch of fat cat Wall Street type who got filthy rich while losing our money. The Jon Stewart/Jim Cramer face-off Thursday really managed to sum it up well, as well as just being funny. There’s something terribly wrong with the best journalist in America being a comedian, but thank Dog for Jon Stewart.
0 comments:
Post a Comment