Retirement In Jeopardy
By Bill Bates, Fri Dec 9th

Enron and United Airlines and so many more are specific examplesof the reasons your is in jeopardy.

Lets throw in two more examples, Social Security and "MotherNature".

An upcoming worry is General Motors. Once said to have been theworld's third largest economy, now has rumors floating ofbankruptcy.

How are individuals like you and I going to be able to retire?Where and who do we trust?

The "who" do you trust must be you! The "where", we will discussthat later.

Lets discuss the "who do you trust" question right now. I toldyou that the answer was "you"! You have within that round globesitting on top of your shoulders, all the computing power youneed. And, if you can add two and two together and get four, youcomputing power is much greater than any of the corporationsmentioned above.

Think about that last statement for a bit. Reread the paragraphabove again. Now take a brief break from reading. Grab yourselfa drink, take a walk around the yard, or just listen to theradio and think back over the last fifteen years and how manytime have you expressed the thought "those poor people" who havebeen involved in any of the opening examples.

Welcome back.

How is it that so many people have lost everything they workedso hard for over so many years?

Greed and a lack of faith are the reasons. Do you remember themany times quoted golden rule, "Do unto others, as you wouldhave them do unto you"?

No, do not change that to the more common altered version! Thatis a reflection of a total lack of faith and the ultimateversion of greed. If we, as a human race, are to survive we mustchange the attitude of how we interact with other people.

We must also relearn the most very basics of mathematics. Oneplus one equals two. There are only twelve months in a yearconsisting of either 364 or 365 days, which are only 24 hourslong.

Lets pretend for a moment ok. You live in a large city earning$6 per hour or less. It would be almost impossible to pay renteven on a one-bedroom efficiency apartment (if you could findone) and still eat.

Now add a family to that equation. Or say you live outside ofthe city and must commute to work. The month starts gettingscary.

Oh no! The car quit on the way to work and your told you need anengine replacement. Labor cost are $65-$120 per hour and theytell you it will take about 18 hours to replace the engine. Youwill be without your car all week.

You do the math. Your income has not allowed you to build anysavings. You most likely will need to visit a loan company forthe money to have your car fixed and in doing so, you increasethe demands on your very meager budget.

So you take an extra job to carry you through the rough timeahead.

How are you, in this situation, even consider retirement? Itwill never happen! If you cannot make it work now, SocialSecurity will not work either. You must continue to work.

I mentioned greed above. The most current example of this is thereport of medicine cost world wide compared to what we pay forthe same product, same manufacture, here in the US. The majornetworks are reporting (June '05) we pay twice what others doand in some cases, much more. Why?

Is it that as a US Citizen, we have more disposable income?

What causes inflation? Greed or Unions or is it a combination ofboth? Why does it cost more today to make a car than it did just15 years ago? What was it that happened in '71 to raise the costof a car by almost 33%? Was it greed or the Unions?

Anyone remember the strike Kroger Grocery Stores underwent in2004? If I had owned Kroger Grocery Stores, I would have shutthem down, changed the name, and then reopened as a non-unionbusiness. If I own a business, why must I accept dictation as tohow much I pay my employees? Is it not a free world?

In the past ten years, to many Unions have gone bust

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