Originally posted by: tom
People’s retirement should be an individual choice not a government mandate.
Of course that is very true, as far as the statement goes. Then there is reality.
Retirement education should begin about age six and continue through high school. Field trips should bus teens past the slum areas, and past the more affluent areas, with narration of how saving for retirement will make the difference when they become adults buy homes, have kids (and send them to college). Saving and investment counseling should happen in colleges, trade schools, even GED, mandatory Retirement 101 and 201, no graduation until a passing grade is earned. Hopefully by then every human who doesn't plan to live on the government's teat will already have a nest egg started. Graduates will measure job offers by what companies offer 401K or stock options or other means of building retirement their retirement accounts. And of course those 'accounts' should be transferable should employees change jobs.
Everybody followed this plan, right? I'm the first to admit retirement never crossed my mind until closer to it than I like to think. Oops! Who didn't want the bird (money) in hand rather than the one in the bush (savings) when you were young?
Most peoples' retirement earnings are tied in some way to government; wars, military operations (companies making parts for those f-15 fighters jets, the ones that got government contracts to make the parts), NASA, banking, on and on.
