The Planners
Sat., January 1, 12:22 PM
Bear with me on this; it may seem to ramble, but there is a point to it.
When I started school, some sixty years ago, there was one kindergarten in my school. When my brother started a few years later, there were two kindergartens – one morning and one afternoon. By the time our little sister started, there were three; the school actually had to hire another teacher.
Now realize: I was eleven years old, and I certainly had no idea what birth rates were or even what they meant. I was aware, however, that there were more school children than there had been a few years previously. This was not rocket science.
There was one high school in our city, and it was a good school. My senior class graduated slightly more than five hundred students; at least half of them went on to college. My brother’s class contained well over a thousand students; the graduation procession went on forever. By this time the school was running double sessions and in danger of losing its accreditation. Why hadn’t the school planners built another school?
They said they thought the Catholic schools would absorb the difference. That was a spurious reason, of course; even if that many of the children were Catholic, the Catholic schools were not free. But it gave them some kind of excuse to delay what they darn well knew was necessary.
My little sister is part of the Baby Boom, the very beginning of it. Y’know, the increase in population that required hiring more kindergarten teachers. When I was in college, we knew about population growth and looked hopefully at an “incipient decline” in the birth rate. (That is, the population was still growing, but not as fast.) For forty-plus years, people in positions of knowledge and power have known there were going to be more people collecting social security by 2010, if not sooner.
Perhaps we can forgive them for not knowing that the job market would get so bad that people would want to retire sooner. But just where did they expect to get the funds? Out of the air?
The latest great idea is to allow people to invest their Government retirement money in the stock market. This rotten stock market, that hasn’t looked good for ten years? This market that has been robbed by the big executives while the little guys just lost money? (Let us not forget how many people failed as day-traders.) And after they invest their money and lose it, what do you think will be left for those who were more careful?
Many people – in the current work force atmosphere – can barely afford to support their families, let alone put aside some savings of their own. Furthermore, the majority of them, children of those who never learned to manage their finances, haven’t got a clue. In case you didn’t know, it’s not taught in the schools either; that’s a pity, because it makes arithmetic more interesting.
The federal government gives a Cost of Living Adjustment to social security recipients as well as those who receive a federal pension. On social security, the percentage translates to maybe $10 to $20 a month. It works out a little better for those who have pensions. I wonder what would happen if they decided not to give the CoLA to anyone whose pension exceeds $100,000 a year.
It boggles the mind. I hate this.
