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A Financial Wake-Up Call at Thanksgiving Dinner
I love my family.
They’re great, inspirational and kind. And last week at Thanksgiving, it was hard not to succumb to the warm fuzzies and think about how lucky I am.
But I was also reminded how clueless caring, loving people can be when it comes to money.
The topic of retirement savings came up at the table, as I sarcastically thanked my elders for establishing social security, a system which I’ll put money into for years and surely bear its fruits when I retire someday (ha!).
My grandma, who just turned 80 last week, didn’t get the joke. She’s financially okay because she still rents out property and works occasionally as a nurse. Plus, she gets social security and my late grandfather was covered through a pension (I haven’t heard of THOSE in a long time).
The thought of me starting a retirement account soon after my graduation this May seemed strange to her. Her previous financial advice, when I told her how furious I was about national student loan debt and my own crusade to fund my way through college, led to the subtle suggestion that I marry a “wealthy east coast boy.”
Sounds like a recipe for codependence to me. And I’m 21. I can barely order a beer, much less swallow the idea of immediately settling for the rest of my life, breeding with someone and relying on him for cash.
Speaking of cash, I found out that my dad has some credit-card debt. Not the end of the world, nor was it a lot. I asked him if he called the credit-card company for a lower interest rate. “You can do that?” he replied. My jaw dropped when I heard the rate he’s paying. Hopefully he’ll dial up customer service soon.
Meanwhile, there’s no college savings account for my six-year-old nephew. My 27-year-old brother is contributing to his employer’s 401(k), but he isn’t maxing out the company match, which is, after all, free money.
All of the above seemed a bit loony to me, but I was in for an even greater financial generation gap shocker.
Turns out my dad only has enough retirement savings to last about ten years. He’s 58. Suddenly, the thought of my dad old, bearded and living under a bridge by the Willamette River came to mind. My family has clipped coupons and grown our own produce with the best of them, but here was a massive financial foible that made me want to spew out my mashed potatoes and run for the nearest Fidelity branch.
Now, I’m spreading the FiLife gospel and opening the money discussion gates, even if it makes our inevitable imperfections glaring. I interrogated my dad about what his plans were to deal with his lack of retirement funds, and we’re still discussing solutions. Like any heavy family discussion, this will take time, patience and compromise.
It must be difficult for my dad, someone who used to work in finance, to face such a problem and to take financial advice from his college-age daughter who nerds it up by reading personal-finance sites all day. But spending his golden years poor and desperate would be even worse.
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Mary, you WILL collect from Social Security unless your generation capitulates and lets the plutocracy steal the trust fund, which is what Bush was trying to do.
Social Security is solvent. Unfortunately, the government has run up the national debt, and part of that debt is owed to the workers who put their money into the Social Security Trust Fund.
Workers built up a massive fund (trust fund) so there would be enough to cover the boomers’ retirement. The government borrowed the money in the trust fund, spent it, and now they don’t want to pay it back. They want to renege. They want to pay for the Bush tax cuts (for the wealthy) by spending money that was set aside by workers to cover their retirement years - it’s as simple as that.
Don’t let them get by with their thievery. Don’t let them undermine your faith in the Social Security system. They want you to believe the system is worthless so they can renege on the debt and dismantle it. Don’t buy into Bush/Rove propaganda. Don’t let them turn one generation against another. We can all fight these thieves together.
Got a chuckle out of you comment of collecting social security. As someone in his mid 30s, I have a better chance of getting hit by an asteroid than ever collecting a check from social security. AKA the greatest ponzi scheme ever, Thanks FDR!
Look forward to your updates.
You are violating my copyright on this picture. If you will look in the lower right of the picture, you will see that it is marked with copyright information. Please remove my picture from your blog immediately. I notice other pictures that you are using that are unique to other sites with which I am familiar. You should research your right to use these without permission.
Thank you in advance for correcting this problem.
John Howe
