An age of uncertainty

It was a bad day at the bingo table. When the numbers fall right, the senior citizens who gather in a small conference room in the rear of the Kroger grocery store for their weekly bingo game fill their bags ...

[Alz]

This is such a Liberal story. More scare tactics. We're all one paycheck away from death. It's just the way life is. It is uncertain. None of us knows what tomorrow will bring.

Dahleen Glanton, did someone tell you to write this?

[Jean-Pierre]

It is time that the media start focussing on this increasingly problem for the eldery. With the baby boomers on the verge of retirement, this is going to be compounded.

The Oil companies are having breaking record years of profit. I hate government intervention, but maybe some of these profits should be used to lower the price of gasoline.

[Barry]

What's left out in this "story" as usual in advocacy journalism? BALANCE!!!! Where are the seniors who are doing quite well, thank you, because of prudent savings, investment, and structured living? Oh no! That wouldn't fit the template, would it Tribune? People like us and many that we know took the advice that was everywhere to save and invest. We are in our 70s, never made a whole lot of money, did without those things that ballooned credit cards. These anecdotal articles are so tiring. Just identify them early as bias so we can skip reading them.

[need 3rd party]

Lets not forget all the people on SSI who should not be. Like drug useers just for starts.

[CAC]

Barry, is your head in the sand? Many, many, many of the newly impoverished elderly are women (which I bet you are not) who did not accumulate Social Security credits or build pensions in the workplace but stayed home to raise their families, as was expected by all. Now, what do they have?
My mother gets a social security check smaller than the average one mentioned in this article, and that's all. She's lived past 90. The house in Detroit sold for very little. Savings long gone. No credit cards, ever. What do you recommend?
She's comfortable because she lives with my husband and me. What happens to people like her with no children?
C'mon, Barry. Tell us all about it.

[LAC65]

And if you withdraw more from an IRA to pay bills you pay at a higer earned income tax rate!

[need 3rd party]

CAC wrote:

Barry, is your head in the sand? Many, many, many of the newly impoverished elderly are women (which I bet you are not) who did not accumulate Social Security credits or build pensions in the workplace but stayed home to raise their families, as was expected by all. Now, what do they have?
My mother gets a social security check smaller than the average one mentioned in this article, and that's all. She's lived past 90. The house in Detroit sold for very little. Savings long gone. No credit cards, ever. What do you recommend?
She's comfortable because she lives with my husband and me. What happens to people like her with no children?
C'mon, Barry. Tell us all about it.

That is a person should got more for the work they did at home.

[Rational Man at home]

Jean-Pierre wrote:

It is time that the media start focussing on this increasingly problem for the eldery. With the baby boomers on the verge of retirement, this is going to be compounded.
The Oil companies are having breaking record years of profit. I hate government intervention, but maybe some of these profits should be used to lower the price of gasoline.

Brilliant solution. Windfall profits tax the oil companies -- and watch supplies drop even further. Pretty stupid to work harder when the extra you make just gets taken away -- to be used for something that someone else decides is 'important'. From each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs -- that is Marxism. And it already has failed over and over. let's NOT try it here.

These kinds of stories are just scare tactics by the left-wing nuts, designed to grab more money out of our pockets as taxes. And we all know our taxes are used sooooo well, dont we?(HEAVY SARCASM there)

[Rational Man at home]

CAC wrote:

Barry, is your head in the sand? Many, many, many of the newly impoverished elderly are women (which I bet you are not) who did not accumulate Social Security credits or build pensions in the workplace but stayed home to raise their families, as was expected by all. Now, what do they have?
My mother gets a social security check smaller than the average one mentioned in this article, and that's all. She's lived past 90. The house in Detroit sold for very little. Savings long gone. No credit cards, ever. What do you recommend?
She's comfortable because she lives with my husband and me. What happens to people like her with no children?
C'mon, Barry. Tell us all about it.

So what do you suggest? I am not unsympathetic, but I also don't think that taking money from those who saved/invested/planned adequately for their future to fund those who failed to save/invest/plan adequately is not a viable solution.

SSI was NEVER designed to support a person in retirement. It was designed as assistance, but not as the only income.

I don't have a solution, but taking from people that have scrimped and saved and planned for their retirement seems destined to put more people in the same impoverished situation.

[ignacio aguirre]

this kind of articles are really useful for retirees. Give us more, thanks