Michael, no need to apologize. My predicament is my own fault. I should have foreseen the changes in my industry, and adapted before my situation got to the point it did.
Your advice to your young co-workers is spot-on. Save what you can, and do so as early as you can.
My wife and I have always lived very modest lifestyles. We were approved in 1992 for a $300,000+ mortgage. Instead, we bought an $85,000 fixer-upper. I've never laid down "the law" with regard to money, except that one time. I said that we would not spend more than $100,000 on a house.
I'm glad I made that demand. And, now, so is my wife.
Life has its unexpected twists and turns: medical problems, job problems, business problems.
"Be prepared," as the old Boy Scout motto goes.
I lay out a lot of personal stuff on APS because I'm not ashamed of it.
But I can just hear some people saying, "well, if he had to liquidate his retirement savings back in 2, what would have happened to anything he'd had in a privatized SS account?"
The answer is that I had enough in personal retirement savings to pay off my creditors, avoid bankruptcy, and still be able to say today that I never stiffed anybody.
As for our congress? They've been stiffing me and you every day for decades by taking our FICA and co-FICA payments and using them for all sorts of pork-barrel projects.
SS is supposed to remain solvent until 2035. I'll likely be dead by then.
But you younger folks can help head off that insolvency now. Start by being politically active. Demand hard answers from the candidates.
Demand that they stop raiding SS funds for general revenues.
Demand that the money that is taken from your paycheck be pegged to you. I so often hear, "oh, that social security money isn't yours, it's the government's."
Bullfeathers! They took it from you, and it's yours!
Here's how screwed up the system is. When I received my first SS report when I turned fifty, I noticed something unusual: they showed me as having no income for the years 1983 and 1985.
Those two years were very good years for me, ones in which I hit the FICA ceiling.
So, I called the SS office. (I'm going to continue to use the term "SS" until it becomes synonymous with the Nazi SS).
"Hello. I just received my SS report, and there's two years of income missing."
"Well," the SS Unterscharführer replied, "all you need to do is send us your W-2 forms for those years, and we'll make the adjustments."
"Miss, that was over 15 years ago. I don't have my W-2's"
"In that case," said SS Unterscharführer, "you'll need to contact the IRS and get copies of your tax returns and W-2's for those years. We don't keep those records."
OK, off to the IRS. And the Unterscharführer at the IRS told me that they don't keep tax returns longer than seven years.
"Perhaps you might contact your former employer," the Unterscharführer suggested.
"He's been out of business for over ten years," I said.
"Well, then, it seems like you're just out of luck."
It was their mistake, their (for Art's Grammaw's sake, I won't insert the word I want to use here), but I have to take the loss?
But I wasn't through with Herr Unterscharführer yet.
"Ok, so you don't keep tax returns for longer than seven years? How is it that you're able to nail gangsters for tax evasion decades after the fact?"
There was a silence on the other end of the line.
"OK, pal," I said. "This is your job, and I'm not going to ream you for it."
Instead, I called my congressman and senators, and asked that they resolve the problem.
Five years and counting.
And somebody who's faking a disablility, or who's in the US illegally, is getting the money I paid in for those two years.
Maybe it's time to lock and load.
