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I am still thankful and feeling great about 2017. At this point in life for all who feel secure it is a blessing. Security comes in all styles and standards.
May yours be realized and continue in the new year.
Teaching may not be that bad of a choice. At least it wasn't years ago. Two of the most popular choices are no better: humanities or business. I have never understood what either was designed to teach, at least in terms of jobs. Even worse my daughter looked at a highly ranked college where many of the students received "multi disciplinary" degrees.
it has been a very good choice for some . my buddy retired with a 75k pension from the board of ed .
but non the less , like petch said there are plans in place for those who have no plan whether you like it or not . .
we even have the gov't tax plan for all your deferred retirement money if you don't make a better choice .
Status:
"Smartened up and walked away!"
(set 26 days ago)
11,782 posts, read 5,795,007 times
Reputation: 14207
Quote:
Originally Posted by funisart
Without guilt. I do. Why do many on this forum have to derail threads and post “but look at poor me” type posts?
The attitude in just your first two posts says it all. I seldom contribute here as I see many travel - have 2 homes - are fortunate not to have money worries - and that's great - you earned it - but I also see someone less fortunate responding who gets ripped for not saving enough ect.
No one is taking away your good fortune - but some give the vibe that they think less of those of us who have worked just as hard - but may have had circumstances that interfered with saving for retirement - or those of us that worked in a position that didn't pay as much because we loved our job and didn't need the material things others do.
If we could each just put ourselves in the other person's shoes for a moment before speaking - it would help.
The attitude in just your first two posts says it all. I seldom contribute here as I see many travel - have 2 homes - are fortunate not to have money worries - and that's great - you earned it - but I also see someone less fortunate responding who gets ripped for not saving enough ect.
True, but only by a few people. And they're usually the same people. Why not just put them on your ignore list? It's far easier and has a higher likelihood of success than expecting everyone demonstrate empathy:
Quote:
If we could each just put ourselves in the other person's shoes for a moment before speaking - it would help.
It's a lovely thought but there are people in the world who are incapable of empathy. They walk among us. They have no idea what thoughts or emotions are in the heads of others and they never will be able to envision it because their brains don't work that way.
The ability to comprehend that other peoples' mental states are different from one's own is called theory of mind. With a person who lacks theory of mind, it is pointless to expect them to think before commenting because they don't see any reason not to say exactly what they are thinking. To them, their thoughts are the indisputable truth.
this is very very true . as i like to say ,you see people float like a cork in water to wherever life pulls them .they float from one dead end job to another or one bad situation to another . they drift with the tide so to speak .
in fact did you know in our state , ny , ( i can't speak for other states ) the lowest paying jobs you could get at one time with a degree was social worker or teacher .
our university's and colleges were designed , very sneakily , to crank you out as a teach or social worker by default if you drifted and had no clear cut plan of your own .
the classes leading to those careers were always more plentiful and a bit easier . but worse was you got caught in a funnel. once you drifted down the funnel those course's would not lead elsewhere . there was no turning back once you hit a point .
my son wanted to be a lawyer -it happened , his wife wanted to be a cpa - it happened , my daughter had no idea what she wanted to do . she was cranked out a teacher by the built in plan .
This really rings true to me! A friend who graduated a year or two before me with a Soc degree and "pull" got a job right away..... and was making less than I was making working as a waitress while going to school. It really opened my eyes and I changed courses immediately.
Also, for my generation, many teaching and social worker jobs were considered wife jobs and paid accordingly. They also played into our feelings of wanting to save the world.
Truly, if you didn't have an idea of what you wanted to study, you intended up in FoED
Regarding the "teacher funnel" described above, if teaching and social work is so low paid, then the pension, and medical bennies are a justified perk for working years in an often thankless job trying to push some knowledge into the rest of the country's kids' heads. It's an important job, and some actually have the "calling" to teach, akin to a religious calling, rather than a fall-back or "default" career. They suffer underpaid conditions, often having to buy school supplies out of their own pockets for the lower income kids because school districts have gotten so cheap about such things. Often the kids are unruly because it seems half the parents have forgotten to teach manners and study habits at home. In the upper grades, teachers can be assaulted, or falsely accused of abuse by their students.
In my opinion, no one should be begrudging teachers their retirements and benefits. Instead they should be thanking them for doing a job not many are willing to do, and doing it for long enough to achieve retirement. Are there districts where teachers are better paid? Certainly, but we have to have teachers in EVERY district, affluent and under-privileged. It's the same conundrum as public employees. Non-pensioned folks begrudge pensioners their retirements, without realizing that those folks worked long, hard, and often shockingly dangerous jobs for decades, often at lower salaries than private employers pay for less dangerous work. Instead of thanking the public servants for doing what others can't or don't want to do, they complain about pensions for first responders, military, electrical line workers, sewer system employees, school bus drivers, etc. Now pensions for politicians....that's another story!
The OP never explained why they felt the need to declare they weren't guilty about being financially secure.
I wrote the OP after a thread was closed. In that thread the OP (not me) was castigated for being thankful for his finances. “Derailers” use “poor me” posts to try to “guilt” those who are secure or at least feel secure. My Op is asking why they feel is necessary to post such things. Nowhere have I castigated someone for poor choices, I have great empathy for those struggling. Why is feeling thankful for financial security a target? Why can’t we have a thread for those who are doing well without so much angst , or someone throwing politics into the mix??
I don’t feel guilty because I worked, saved and planned.
True, but only by a few people. And they're usually the same people. Why not just put them on your ignore list? It's far easier and has a higher likelihood of success than expecting everyone demonstrate empathy:
It's a lovely thought but there are people in the world who are incapable of empathy. They walk among us. They have no idea what thoughts or emotions are in the heads of others and they never will be able to envision it because their brains don't work that way.
The ability to comprehend that other peoples' mental states are different from one's own is called theory of mind. With a person who lacks theory of mind, it is pointless to expect them to think before commenting because they don't see any reason not to say exactly what they are thinking. To them, their thoughts are the indisputable truth.
Excellent! I could not rep you again.
I sometimes post to say that you can be content with a less than lavish retirement,,,,, as I am myself. Luck has also played a large part in my good life even if is not the life some consider successful. And I worked hard.
I think my posts sound foolish to some but I want to speak up. Your retirement is not a failure because you don't own two homes and travel first class. It is a success if you are happy, or at least the basic needs of life are fulfilled.
^^^And to many, two homes and international travel are just not even something they aspire to. And that's just fine.
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