For those retired....what do you enjoy most?

[ultrarunner]

Not one of my retirement friends regrets it... it is also true that they all have good to excellent pensions with full health care... union, public safety, large firms like AT&T or Municipal Utilities... plus a few with Commander or Captain military rank

My older, non-retired friends are company owners or partners... they built the company and it is very much a part of them.

I do think it is different going forward because many of the new and soon to be simply don't have the pensions and lifetime health care.

Another dimension in my family is no one has ever retired... we work until we can't and then pass away... especially true for the farming side... and in no way do I mean it as a bad thing... only there is always work to do in farming and even if the torch is passed to the next generation... there is plenty to do.

 

[brin]

Not one of my retirement friends regrets it... it is also true that they all have good to excellent pensions with full health care... union, public safety, large firms like AT&T or Municipal Utilities... plus a few with Commander or Captain military rank

My older, non-retired friends are company owners or partners... they built the company and it is very much a part of them.

I do think it is different going forward because many of the new and soon to be simply don't have the pensions and lifetime health care.

Another dimension in my family is no one has ever retired... we work until we can't and then pass away... especially true for the farming side... and in no way do I mean it as a bad thing... only there is always work to do in farming and even if the torch is passed to the next generation... there is plenty to do.

Back in 1965 when I joined the police force in our town...a fairly large city...the starting pay was $570 a month....we paid no Soc. Sec. and had a pension...but at the time it was nothing to brag about...You could retire after 20 yrs. but could not collect your pension until you were 55 yrs. old ..so someone who started when they were 21 yrs. old...would be 41 at retirement and have to find another job for 14 more years or stay on the police force and take those risks for another 14 yrs...most guys back then were not willing to put up with police work that long so they moved on...so did I after 6 yrs...I started my own business and I'm so glad I did....

Back then....public employees were not paid more than their civilian counterparts like now....so Ultra...don't feel bad....who knew their deal would be gold...I mean I would have never imagined police would be paid $200K a yr..and retire on 80% of that...So how could we have known...????

 

[jaotguy]

and parents teach people skills.

and the problem is that a lot of parents don't have people skills ... and so can't teach their kids anything but "entitlement" ...


hence the need to teach it ... heck start in high school ... no one gets out alive till they pass it .... now part of the 4 R's

readin, ritin , rithmatic and RESPECT

Japan has the right idea ... everyone "working" has a noble and respectable job ... and if I remember correctly , they use "san?" after after introductions or conversations ( noble /honorable ) .... even to the door person or coat check ... rudeness is one of the things that are not tolerated ( and you lose face if you do )
...

saw it once , a westerner boss chewed out an oriental worker ... the rest ignored the "boss" and anything further he had to say .... the 'boss" was instructed ( by the shop supervisor) to apologize to the worker or they would not respect or follow him anymore... another associate stepped up and did what was expected , and they returned to work , but the "rude boss" was ignored after that .. just like he never existed .....

that same boss was hired to run a section of a major firm . ruled with an iron fist and threw hissie fits if things didn't go his way ... the whole section walked in to his boss and said " he goes or we all go right now ... make a decision." ... he was gone by 10 AM ...

 

[ultrarunner]

Very true... several of the parents of kids I went to school with were officers as was my Uncle...

All the Dads were always doing side work or second jobs until they made rank... they had to if they had a family to support.

When my uncle died in the line of duty in 1964 there was a 10k life insurance policy that the department offered at a low premium and that was it...

Had this happened today... his family would have been well taken care of including full scholarships to the some of the finest California Universities...

Times really have changed... I did test for several departments and my timing was off... it was just when all the area departments were under a consent order to hire women and minorities... Oakland actually sent recruiting teams cross country.

Public Safety in the SF Bay Area does boggle the mind in terms of employment packages and the older package was even better...

Under the old package... officers would retire based on rank and there are officers that retired 30 years ago and the pension is based on the compensation of current officers with the same rank...

One of the guys I went to school with has 15k a month coming in and he was in his early 50's... got so bored went to work for another department and pension...

 

[tcreeley]

Respect always works. In education, it works there as well, but has been set aside.
Like the clueless bosses, we have the national and state politicians cutting budgets and coming up with ways to "improve" schools- Goals 2000 -Bush sr, All Children left Behind -Bush jr/Kennedy, Common Core -Obama.

These bureaucrats come up with unrealistic plans that are dictated top down.
At the state level it goes the same way.
Today it is high stakes testing and merit evaluations for teachers. None of it works because kids are not bushings that can be machined to a specified set of tolerances.

Text book companies are doing well- as all of the text books are being replaced across the country. Consortiums selling testing protocols at the state levels love it- millions involved. Software companies love it- more millions spent. In the classroom, students and teachers are stuck trying to make it work, and it doesn't - square pegs in round holes, one curriculum for all.

If becoming a mechanic is in your blood, you still have to take algebra 2 and chemistry, study Hamlet in English - even if the result is that you will be unable to attend the vocational school for auto mechanics because of F's. Besides, the educational elite are doing their darndest to cut all of the voc programs.

Education is nolonger respected. Pols have been make their living on badmouthing it, when they have nothing else to say.
Every 5 years I have had to renew state certification, be fingerprinted, and undergo background checks. Custodial staff, food service staff, office staff, ed tech staff (teacher aides) have also to deal with this. This is what a public school is about. Then we have had the "shooter trainings" - being told by law enforcement to hide the kids in darkened classroom corner if and when -so they could run run swat team operations from central command posts outside the building.

Common sense and reality is slipping away.

The kids are worth the effort, but the top down structure in education is make learning a farce. The joke is that many of our pols couldn't meet the standards they are insisting on every student meeting. The disconnect is in thinking everyone is cut out to be a bright highly polished bushing in a bin. People are diverse. Opportunity needs to be there for all, but not all are cut out to be electricians, surgeons, or cosmetologists -different jobs for different folks.

Retiring is worth it- just to get away from the stress of this "make believe"- where the "correct paperwork product" is more important than the real product - so that the money keeps flowing at the state and national levels where the goals are set and tax dollars are wasted and spent.

 

[TomSeller]

Respect always works. In education, it works there as well, but has been set aside.
Like the clueless bosses, we have the national and state politicians cutting budgets and coming up with ways to "improve" schools- Goals 2000 -Bush sr, All Children left Behind -Bush jr/Kennedy, Common Core -Obama.
.

Something has to give when it comes to US K12 education. We invest at the top of the international scale, yet the education quality is at the bottom of the scale. Retirees and everyone else could use a break in taxes. Where I live schools absorb over 50% of local property taxes and then get more from the State and the Federal governments. It is like a bottomless pit.

 

[JDgreen227]

OP here....one of the things I enjoy most is being able to make obnoxious, opinionated posts here on TBN and tick others off....

 

[RoMad]

As a soon to be retiree (12/31/14) I have really enjoyed the on topic (hint,hint) comments that have been posted here.

 

[tcreeley]

Something has to give when it comes to US K12 education. We invest at the top of the international scale, yet the education quality is at the bottom of the scale. Retirees and everyone else could use a break in taxes. Where I live schools absorb over 50% of local property taxes and then get more from the State and the Federal governments. It is like a bottomless pit.

Cut the bureaucrats and pols out of education, restrict it to just local school boards. Stop wasting money on new initiatives, millions for testing etc. Stop lying to the public that everyone should go to college. All students are not equal when it comes to smarts, some are better at it than others. Stop wasting money on forcing "Billy" to learn something he never will be able to learn - teach him what he can learn. It is a bottomless pit because pols and lobby/business groups see dollar signs and talk the public into wasting tax dollars on stupid things.

In these comparison- we always include all of out students- all abilities including spec educ. Do these countries we are compared to include these students as well?

 

[OldMcDonald]

As a soon to be retiree (12/31/14) I have really enjoyed the on topic (hint,hint) comments that have been posted here.

The thread will probably still be running when you do retire. You can then make a post that actually is on topic. And to be fair, the OP has tried to keep it on topic too - this is the post immediately before yours:-

OP here....one of the things I enjoy most is being able to make obnoxious, opinionated posts here on TBN and tick others off....