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Loads of people make bad financial decisions. I was reading on a forum once where a son-in-law was complaining about a situation after his FIL had died. The FIL apparently had a very good pension. Then after his death, they found out that the pension had died with him, and the wife was not going to get the pension. The SIL was furious, and was blaming the union for not paying the widow the pension. He finally got it when someone mentioned that he obviously had signed paperwork that he would get more money per month if only he received the pension, and it did not pass to his wife. Many people do this thinking they will live to be 95 or something. He was dead so it didn't matter to him, but the poor wife then had nothing. The OP was shocked to learn what his FIL had obviously done. So many people are in the dark about finances. His widow had probably signed paperwork allowing this to happen, but like the husband, was distracted by the higher sum of money available. Sad.
The company did "cough up all they'd promised". They did not back out of any promises. Lockheed Martin did not go bankrupt or fail to pay pensions. This individual took a lump sum and spent it! That is one reason he accepted that the blame was his. It appears he also spent his income as fast as he earned it and failed to accumulate an emergency or other savings/retirement fund.
How does someone make it to their late 50s with only an 8th grade education? Society mandates 12 years of education as a minimum. Maybe his parents or early life circumstances were to blame initially. Getting a GED is not that difficult. He did not bother to expend the effort. Now 25 years or so later he is working as a Walmart greeter. What did he do in the past 25 years? Did he work? Did he spend any effort on gaining some education or skills?
I may be cold, but I ask the question, what should society do for people who make bad decisions? Do we take away some of their rights to make bad decisions, do we let them make the decisions and suffer the consequences, or do we bail them out to erase the effects of those decisions?
So you honestly think that everyone is cut out to go to college or even to finish high school? My ex-FIL was maybe 10 years older than the guy in the article - laws were obviously different about when you could quit school then. My FIL had an 8th grade education and got a "good" job working for the county highway dept. mowing grass in the medians and plowing roads. He was a great guy - had his own (small) house and a garden. I don't know that he could have graduated from H.S. His son, my ex was the first in his family to ever go to college.
Don't judge someone in their 80's by your own situation. I can't answer your questions about the rest of his situation but you've certainly made some assumptions - all of them negative.
no not everyone is cut out to get a "full" education " or degree but those people have to be very creative to work around it . lots of tradesman or even my septic guy in PA . had minimal educations but they found ways of compensating by doing things others can't or won't do themselves .
Loads of people make bad financial decisions. I was reading on a forum once where a son-in-law was complaining about a situation after his FIL had died. The FIL apparently had a very good pension. Then after his death, they found out that the pension had died with him, and the wife was not going to get the pension. <snip>His widow had probably signed paperwork allowing this to happen, but like the husband, was distracted by the higher sum of money available.
That happened to my grandfather's second wife, too. Her first husband died and it was then that she found that his pension had no survivor benefit- that would have been back in the days when the spouse didn't need to sign off. (And that's why she went looking for another husband- her remaining SS wasn't enough to live on.) I started a small pension from a previous employer after DH was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia so electing the benefit with no survivor payment was a no-brainer. He needed to sign a consent form in the presence of a notary.
Thank god for Oregon's public service pension plan. I worked 31 years and have a decent pension plan. I also put money aside into a deferred compensation program. As a result, I have a good solid pension, which my wife also gets when I pass. The money wasn't great when I was working, but the pension is great!
I'm related to someone who worked for the same government agency as I did, originally, in the same location. We made very little when we were all hired at low grades but she was hired as a seasonal employee and I was hired as a permanent employee about a year before she was hired. She worked in a different division than I did. I kept telling her to apply for permanent positions with higher grade promotion possibilities but she said she wanted to be off in the summer. She applied for no jobs to better her situation. None of her 3 husbands made much money, either, but they worked full-time. The work they did could have been done anywhere so they could have moved. Eventually, the agency decided to do away with her division in our location. They gave those employees a year's notice. She was in her 30s at that time. Again, I told her, they would all be out looking for scarce jobs at the same time and they all had the same skill set and that she should be looking for a job right away and not wait until they all got the boot. She did absolutely nothing about it. I think she thought their jobs would be saved at the last minute but of course, they weren't. She got a one time payout at the end, if I remember correctly.
She had one kid when she was in her 20s and another when she was over 40 . She eventually got a decent job with a private company but they decided to move to another state and she wasn't going with them. She was on and off unemployment for years. She almost lost her house a few times. I bailed her out, twice. She had oil problems and kept getting subsidized emergency deliveries. Her house was falling apart. The kid she had in her 40s was a special needs kid and then she couldn't work and like I said, she had 3 serial husbands. I'm sure at some time she got some sort of government assistance. Her dad lived with her for a few years until he died and paid her rent (and other things) to keep them afloat. Meanwhile, I kept applying for jobs in my agency to move up the ladder and finished my degree by going to college at night after working full-time in the day so I was eligible for higher graded jobs. When I hit my plateau, I took a job in headquarters in DC. to get even higher graded jobs and that's where I retired from after 34 years with a decent pension. I moved again right after I retired to a low cost state.
Now she's divorced from husband #3 and has all kinds of medical problems and her special needs kid (now 19 or 20) lives with her in another more affordable state. He can only do menial work if he gets a job. He gets some kind of social security. Kid Number 1 is in his 40s now and stayed in the old state. He has a decent job. She's in her 60s now and should be eligible for Medicare in about a year or two.
The point is, she made one bad decision after another. She didn't live lavishly and blow her money on other things. She just lived stupidly. That's why she's not retiring. You have to work to retire. Her opportunities were there when she was young and she blew it. She can't work now.
my old housing projects buddies are the same . they lived "stupidly" . i pleaded with them back in the 1970's to go to the trade school i signed up for . nope , they rather hang out and work low end jobs . it required no effort on their part . today they are raising their own families in the same projects and complaining about the bad deal life dealt them ...
Last edited by mathjak107; 12-13-2018 at 08:17 AM..
I think our financial decisions reflect certain points of our psychology. My niece makes pretty good money, but she grew up poor and seems to be strongly oriented towards seeking status--expensive parties, nice cars, pricey clothes for herself and her children. Even though she is in the financial industry, her money decisions scare me. She once sold her house without realizing that she hadn't yet built up any equity.
I'm the opposite. I figured out a long time ago that the thing that scares me most is running out of money. Even though I am retired with sufficient and (mostly) stable income sources, I continue to save. I love saving money. To me, money in the bank is security. And, I guess security is happiness.
After writing my earlier post I had another idea as to how this could have happened.
Possibly through ignorance, cognitive limitations, misdirected trust, or total deceit; the employee applied for and received what he thought, or was told, was a Severance Package for loss of his job, when it was actually a Cash-Out of his Pension Balance.
The revelation that the 29 year seniority worker had only an 8th grade education supports this later idea.
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) I started a small pension from a previous employer after DH was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia so electing the benefit with no survivor payment was a no-brainer. He needed to sign a consent form in the presence of a notary.
. She eventually got a decent job with a private company but they decided to move to another state and she wasn't going with them. She was on and off unemployment for years. She almost lost her house a few times. I bailed her out, twice. She had oil problems and kept getting subsidized emergency deliveries. Her house was falling apart. The kid she had in her 40s was a special needs kid and then she couldn't work and like I said, she had 3 serial husbands. I'm sure at some time she got some sort of government assistance. Her dad lived with her for a few years until he died and paid her rent (and other things) to keep them afloat. Meanwhile, I kept applying for jobs in my agency to move up the ladder and finished my degree by going to college at night after working full-time in the day so I was eligible for higher graded jobs. When I hit my plateau, I took a job in headquarters in DC. to get even higher graded jobs and that's where I retired from after 34 years with a decent pension. I moved again right after I retired to a low cost state. 
