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And don't forget insurance, everytime we walk out of a medical or dental office, we owe the equivalent of a car payment. And we are healthy. Luckily we do have it though.
Things are just not right anywhere ,still, I don't care what the numbers "say" out there,etc....
I just spoke to a friend today who's husband has been with his company for 15 years now (which is long considering things in the manufacturing sector...), he had a good paying job (low 6figures) and he was told that their "numbers" are suffering, everything is down,production,sales,etc... so they are going to start chopping salaries,starting at the top and working their way down. That is the way I suppose it should be done, but we aren't talking about people who got rich off of anything. These are hard working people who went to college,worked their way up the ladder and are now being told that their salary is going to be cut by 55% with no compensation.
55% is significant obviously and many people with his company will have to severly alter their lifestyles and some probably will struggle paying their mortgages.
They were also told that they were going to be taking away several of their paid personal days,again,not a tragedy, still, an alter to their lifestyle.
In the meantime though, we are still watching the auto industry who have been bailed out, pay their employees compensation for loss of income, they are all being paid for their 2 weeks off with the shutdowns that occur during the holidays and they are still being allowed to keep their exuberant amount of vacation time that they have!
We know people who were off the entire summer due to the TLO's that were PAID and now have the entire month of December off-again PAID!
How does this continue and on who's money are they getting paid with?
People have had to go on food stamps,loose their homes,etc... due to loss of income and still, these people are living as though nothing is happening around them.
Still, they are being offered compensation for their loss of income,still they are working OT .
Unless I am missing something, this just doesn't make sense to those of "us" who are struggling in this supposed recovering economy?
i know someone who just lost his commercial real estate inspection job after 18 years. this economy is losing people who have been paying into the system faithfully for years.
Its very sad. My advice would be if you make a 6 figure salary, learn to live on half of it and save the rest. If you never lose your job, or never have to take a pay decrease etc, then good for you, you will have saved lots of money. If you do lose your job or take a big pay decrease then you will still be ok because you saved lots of money and always lived within your means. You see when you LWYM'S you will always be ok. Its the people who make six figures and buy a ton of stuff they don't need (Huge house, very expensive cars, boats, etc) who can't afford their bills when layoffs etc. happen. Nothing in life is guaranteed to you. LWYM's and being a good steward with your money is the way to go.
First off I'd like to know what the pay will be after the 55% cut? Seems as though a company couldn't cut by that much and expect too many to show the next day unless the remaining 55% is still a living wage. I know what you are driving at but some people are organized in the sale of their labor, like pro athletes they get paid whether the boss loses or wins. all in all, it's the fat cat's and not workers that benefit from government largess'. Don't worry too much about the Auto workers though, it can't last, and then you'll feel better when they too are on the soup line...........
The remaining wage would still be considered a living wage.. however, when one is use to making a low 6 fig.income, to have that taken away with no notice, time to prepare, is devestating in some ways.
They will be fine, but life will be extremely adjusted for them. They realize they are "fortunate" in the fact that he still has a job, it just seems odd that while thousands of people still continue to suffer wage reductions,loss of benefits,loss of vacation time (paid),etc... that the auto industry can still afford to pay their associates what they get paid ( not just line employees,but office & management as well) AND not only do some of them get paid more than they should, they continue to get yearly increases,they continue to receive OT pay and they continue to pay them for their TLO's... again, who has an entire Summer off-paid and then gets to keep their vacation time AND then gets the entire month of December off-paid??
Who gets a $90K compensation for loss of wages?
Our friend that I was speaking of in the previous post is not going to receive any type of compensation for his loss of income and neither do thousands of other people.
I certainly don't think anyone should have to stand in a soup line or sleep in a shelter at night, but I also don't believe that someone who has worked hard for all these years deserves to be told they are not going to get paid less than our line associates in the auto industry who are getting paid on our dollar. That is all.
I completely empathize with anyone going through hard times right now, as we are too. I just don't understand how a company or a union can justify their employees getting what they get in today's times and with other people's money.
I want to know who is making out on all of these "incentive" packages the government is churning out ?
A high school classmate of mine is retiring from the Local Police Department... nice guy and well liked. His pension is 180k per year... that's 15k per month with full medical... I just don't get this kind of retirement as a public servant
that won't continue indefinitely and i don't think it is hard to see the logical path that this economy is now taking. i have been reading an interesting blog by charles hugh smith which logically addresses the coming situation:
1. Millions of productive citizens will opt out, voluntarily or involuntarily. Millions of small business owners will get tired of paying taxes so thousands of Federal bureaucrats can "earn" $170,000 a year (and pile up benefits the private sector can only dream about) and make sure Goldman Sachs employees (the "doing God's work" CEO is only worth $250 million, poor guy) can divvy up $16 billion in ill-gotten gains.
While they aren't wealthy, many small business owners are comfortable because they scrimped and saved and sacrificed. So when they close their business because it's no longer worth the hassle, the guff, the taxes, the bureaucratic fees and paperwork, then they will survive. The closure of the business will deprive their employees of jobs and the local stripmining machinery (local government) of tax revenues--revenues which cannot be replaced. http://www.oftwominds.com/blog.html
I agree... I see more business owners deciding to call it quits and opt out...
Some have children unwilling to put up with the even increasing demands...
Others have told me they are not going to buy new trucks and earth moving equipment and find out in a couple of years regulation has made them worthless...
It is a real problem here in CA... Owners of Trucks only a few years old either have to retrofit if possible for average price of 21k or sell the truck for next to nothing out of State...
as people are taxed and regulated, they are going to move and it is an inevitability. (which actually addresses point 3 of the post)
3. Internecine Conflict Between Protected Fiefdoms will intensify. As Federal and local government tax revenues continue plummeting, "tax the rich" schemes will proliferate and promptly backfire. The truly wealthy--THE 1/10 of 1% WHO OWN SOME 2/3 OF THE PRODUCTIVE ASSETS OF THE NATION--will buy exemptions or loopholes from their corrupt and venal Congressperson for a mere $100,000 or so. (Even a million is cheap when you're saving $100 million.)
That leaves the working "rich," those professionals and business owners who have a choice. They can always opt out and just shut down, move to another state or country or cut their business or hours down to subsistence level.
The more "raise taxes" schemes which are passed into law, the faster tax revenues will drop. Most lower income households pay no tax at all except the 7% FICA/Social Security tax. The "rich" pay almost all the income taxes, and as they opt out tax revenues have nowhere to go but down.
Stunned that their revenue-enhancement plans have backfired, the various protected fiefdoms (fire departments, cop shops, city hall, school districts, transit districts, universities, "Defense" a.k.a. Global Empire, brought to you by Military-Industrial Complex, Inc., with special guest, Blackwater Associates, Sickcare/Medicare/Medicaid, and so on) will start jockeying to be first in line for the dwindling tax swag.
Fire departments will start mailing out flyers pleading for extra property taxes lest they have to close a station or three (anything other than take a pay cut or slash their lavish pension/medical bennies) and Police chiefs will exit their chauffeured vehicles a block from the "town meeting" (so they can appear to walk in with appropriate humility) where they will plead for "more cops on the street." (Never mind the PD retirees drawing $100K per year in cash and bennies.)
The revolving door between "Defense" corporations and the Pentagon will spin even faster as lobbyists sprout like evil weeds, hawking new costly ways to "fight" GWOT (global war on terrorism). "Either pay us now or the nation will be at risk." Yeah, right. Like a $300 million fighter jet has anything to do with GWOT, or "Homeland Security" has anything to do with, well, homeland security.
Go ahead and nail another "terrorist leader" in the Yemeni wastelands with a high-tech drone missile; did anyone look at the demographics of the region, which is exploding with literally millions of young men devoid of goals and gainful employment? Are high-tech weaponry toys anything other than profit machines for Protected Fiefdoms? Go ask the captains and commanders on the ground before you answer; don't take the word of some overpaid pundit/PR hack/government factotum.
Sadly for the Protected Fiefdoms, there simply won't be enough money to fund all their fat jobs, fat pensions, fat benefits, fat expense accounts, fat contracts, etc. (The Chinese have simply stopped buying more U.S. Treasuries, by the way; the "pusher" is getting tired of providing endless credit to the junkie, who will soon be experiencing the dread tremors of agonizing withdrawal from credit dependency.)
That leaves the working "rich," those professionals and business owners who have a choice. They can always opt out and just shut down, move to another state or country or cut their business or hours down to subsistence level.
I've become friends with small business owners in Sweden, Austria and Germany...
Much of this is already par for the course.
Farmers could Farm more but it means less profit if they go exceed their goverment allocated Milk Production.
Shop owners could stay open longer hours but they have to pay a hefty fee and only the Super Stores like a Home Depot, Target or Macy's type can justify the expense.
It's also hard to get employees to work overtime... Overtime is taxed at a much higher rate... so no one really wants it... if they have to work more hours they demand comp time off which is highly prized.
I know a watch maker that only works so many hours a week... he could easily work more... but he too says it only means paying more in taxes and less time with his family...
Incentives and Disincentives do work...
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