Ready to retire? How much money do you have? 75% of those about to retire have less than $30,000.00.
Currently, an average rate of return is about 3%. That means three out of every four of America’s soon to be retired will have a generous $900.00 extra coming in. Every year.
That’s $75.00 a month. Gosh. A lifetime of work, and $75.00 a month. That’s on top of Social Security. If there were no Social Security, and we’d invested a similar amount of money in a private account, we’d have all of our principal back and we’d be bringing in an average of $4,000.00 a month, as do people in Chile. Instead of making retirees prosperous, governments make retirement painful.
No one in governments talk about the damage their policies do to their own people. Some like to do damage to their neighbors. As we get older, we see how painful governments make retirement.
Our job, as Catholic Fundamentalists, is to understand how much some people in government are hurting us. Then, we have to forgive them. Then, we have to love them.
We have many opportunities for such spiritual exercises.