How the hell are we supposed to retire?

Santapez said:
Still confused how we went from "How can I set myself up for retirement" to "How are the finances of the Billionaires doing?"
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I think it's because it's hard to set yourself up for retirement while the billionaires hoard all the money.
Yes, I'm setting myself up for a very fine retirement, hopefully a very early one. And yes, I still believe greed at the top makes that much harder to do for the majority of Americans. But I guess that's why we have an unlimited supply of people willing to work for pennies. Well, until COVID came and taught all the millennials they can make more money in crypto than at a restaurant, lol.
 
1TrackMind said:
They will stay, if you have billions, you need a solid military to protect your billions and the shipping lanes necessary to get goods from Asia to here, and trademarks/patents etc… and global negotiating power to keep the market forces in your favor. An argument for why they should pay more, they benefit a lot more from the military might of the US. They also want to be able to lobby the politicians, this is easier when in Us. Millionaire rock stars don’t necessarily require this, but they are a pretty small percentage of wealth holders.
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You are confusing where a billionaire maintains a business and where a billionaire legally resides.
 
Mahnken said:
I think it's because it's hard to set yourself up for retirement while the billionaires hoard all the money.
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I like this impression people have that billionaires are sitting on a huge pile of cash and gold. Most billionaires are billionaires because they own stock in their own companies that is worth billions.
 
Mahnken said:
I think it's because it's hard to set yourself up for retirement while the billionaires hoard all the money.
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How does Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos continuing to hold their shares in the companies they've built make it difficult for you to set yourself up for retirement?
 
rick81721 said:
I like this impression people have that billionaires are sitting on a huge pile of cash and gold. Most billionaires are billionaires because they own stock in their own companies that is worth billions.
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I don't have that impression. Of course they aren't sitting on a pile of cash, that wouldn't make them more money, would it?
 
JimN said:
Don't ask the people that bought shares in their companies.
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Yes, $TSLA has made significant contributions to my retirement plans, lol. But I have a wife that makes enough money to allow me to sit at home and learn how to invest/trade. I don't think Tesla's average employees (or amazon's) have that luxury. And don't know how to properly invest, if they even have any money left after paying for rent.
 
rick81721 said:
You didn't answer the question - how does it affect YOUR ability to retire??
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My employer over the last year completely took away their pension plan (was cut off to new employees over 5 years ago, but now they are not contributing to it at all anymore), stopped matching all 401k contributions, froze raises for over a year... Had record profits and bought out several other hospitals while expanding a few of the ones they had. There's a lot of greed at the top, they keep taking, middle class suffers.
 
Mahnken said:
My employer over the last year completely took away their pension plan (was cut off to new employees over 5 years ago, but now they are not contributing to it at all anymore), stopped matching all 401k contributions, froze raises for over a year... Had record profits and bought out several other hospitals while expanding a few of the ones they had. There's a lot of greed at the top, they keep taking, middle class suffers.
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Which is why employment nowadays is a revolving door. There's no loyalty, because, why should there be? The only way to advance is to keep switching jobs. Employees aren't happy, and their work and performance shows it. It's why any employee who is good, always leaves, because all they are is a number anymore. There is less and less incentive to actually be good at your job.
 
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Mahnken said:
Which is why employment nowadays is a revolving door. There's no loyalty, because, why should there be? The only way to advance is to keep switching jobs. Employees aren't happy, and their work and performance shows it. It's why any employee who is good, always leaves, because all they are is a number anymore. There is less and less incentive to actually be good at your job.
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Depends where you work. There are lots of great companies out there that treat their employees well.
 
Mahnken said:
Which is why employment nowadays is a revolving door. There's no loyalty, because, why should there be? The only way to advance is to keep switching jobs. Employees aren't happy, and their work and performance shows it. It's why any employee who is good, always leaves, because all they are is a number anymore. There is less and less incentive to actually be good at your job.
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I've only ever worked for small companies, and they have all been great. I always get sad when people say stuff like this, because there are actually good companies out there, you just have to find them. Maybe there aren't any in your industry though, which sucks.
 
This is a funny one... My aunts and uncles own a heating and air conditioning company. After the last few years under tRump's tax plan, their business made huge profits. Did that go to the workers? You know, the way "trickle down economics" is supposed to work? Helll no, they all bought vacation homes and are starting to retire early. Money stays at the top.
 
JimN said:
I've only ever worked for small companies, and they have all been great. I always get sad when people say stuff like this, because there are actually good companies out there, you just have to find them. Maybe there aren't any in your industry though, which sucks.
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I think they are few and far between nowadays. And a lot of people just don't have it in them to go from job to job looking for the one in a hundred that will treat them fairly. After a while you just believe that the grass isn't going to be any greener on the other side. They didn't tell us in highschool which field to look into if you wanted to be treated like a human.
 
Bike N Gear said:
Raise the taxes on the billionaires, lower them for middle class and I'll be able to retire sooner.
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i didn't hear anything about lowering taxes for the middle?

using some round numbers, there are 100M households (it might be 115, but close enough)
so if all 700 bil$ peeps were taxed +$100M each on average that is $700/house/year. Or maybe we'll exclude the upper middle,
so maybe we get to $1,000 each. Can't even do an AXS upgrade.

solving the crisis 1 billionaire at a time.

now instead of them giving it back, the government just spends it.
now they have $70B more in the government coffers - woohoo! doesn't cover the interest payment on the debt.

think i got the math right.
 
Bike N Gear said:
Raise the taxes on the billionaires, lower them for middle class and I'll be able to retire sooner.
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1. Why would higher taxes on billionaires have any impact on your ability to retire sooner?

2. Trump lowered the taxes on the middle class. From what I have seen, Biden has no plans to reduce them further.
 
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