Reality: Income fluctuation

No one is spared income fluctuation throughout a lifetime. Everybody gets to deal with the hardship of this eventuality. In other words, there’s a huge gap in your income between your prime and that of your golden years in retirement.

It is the latter that you should seriously review. The strength of your retirement pay collapses, e.g., the administration cuts 25 percent of your paycheck. Trust me, it’s troubling even with a conscious spending plan in place.

The death of the retirement program is troubling for active employees in “nowhere land.” They’ve nothing to look forward to after 20 years of service. How do they deal completing paying for the first family home, costly health insurance, and other family obligations? It’s one tough nut to crack especially when one contracts degenerative long-term illnesses.

It’s an issue everybody would have to deal with and no one is spared the cost and struggle with illnesses as you age. It’s a deep valley without human trail. It’s a dead zone area. It’s hard finding the pinnacle of the hill from the abyss that leads nowhere, financially. It’s the new financial reality where even negligible pennies turn vital change.

Some may qualify for federal entitlement programs like Medicaid and NAP. But for those who can’t get in the bout is especially difficult when you reach your golden years. No fun-walk in the park either. It becomes even harder when one is bed-ridden.

The kids may be around to help but they also have their own set of familial obligation. It’s comforting though the strong sense of communal sharing where we pitch-in to help in whatever way we can. Comforting!

Friends, long-term illnesses do not leave much room for maneuvering. Often it hits when you least expect it. It’s hard all the way around. My mental acuity is still strong refusing to accept that my physical health has devolved into ailment land. But this journey is a sure thing for every Tom, Dick and Harry. If you could engage saving for that rainy day, do it today!

Mundane stuff

Buddy Magoo is staging what he hopes would be an annual conference at the CK Cemetery. He said the last one he held was very successful. “Conferees all agreed with my presentation and there were not questions either.” He didn’t say that the participants are all in their graves. Thus the dead silence and full agreement in everything he said. Why not invite legislators so there’s fodder for comedy, lai?

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Over the last 45 years, I’ve heard every political candidate belt it out in the campaign trail. Most never said anything of substance but are sufficiently shallow to think they did. One braved re-echoing ad nauseam the statement of the previous speaker. When he got down the latter said, “Braddah, I didn’t say what you said I said.” Ooops! Failed to engage the brain.

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Another speaker ripped off a piece of an empty beer case and used it when called to address the crowd. He was waving it saying, “You have to have a plan. This is our plan!” He knows he’s got the crowd fooled who were too busy high-fiving with tons of beer. A ripped beer case turned NMI plan? Clever!

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The rainstorm started out early evening as a drizzle until it engulfed and drenched the entire island by dawn. This phenomenon is similar to the economic hardship at home. It started out with negligence, turned apathetic, and mediocre that has floored every household Marianas-wide. Unfortunately the heavy squalls would be around for quite some time. Brace for it in the event it turns into a storm at the village level.

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It tickles the mind the taste of the New Zealand sandwich, you know, the ones given to our legislators for attending a gay marriage ceremony. The guys were there for a power generation conference and had time for a wedding. Eh, our power bill is still prohibitively expensive and is bound to skyrocket some more. It needs a different DNA to bring it down. Let’s go!

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One often wonders if what we’ve said against casino is understood at all. If we’ve failed, what’s the culprit in the apparent miscommunication?

Said Magoo, “Eh, when you write for da kine article, make for da kine short, braddah. You see, da guys struggle on two fronts: 1.) Reading what you’ve written. 2.) Understanding what was written.” I’m convinced that the issues were discussed in simple English.

Warmed Magoo, “You see, braddah, when you say too much too quickly, no time for da kine boys on da hill to digest and collect wisdom from what was said, yeah?” Is the problem inadequacy of knowledge-based repertoire under their belts or volume? And how do you deal with those whose reading comprehension is stuck at the fifth grade level?

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You need to read something in order to think through materials or a serious matter to buckle down to brainstorming what’s at issue.

I’d rummage through large dailies from New York, D.C., L.A., Japan, and my favorite newspaper, the Wall Street Journal. Either that or I’d download heavy materials from various foundations saving documents like constitutionalism, the Judeo-Christian principle upon which was founded the U.S. Constitution, investment spiral and decline; inequality; poverty; freedom and democracy in the Middle East or Asia, among others.

There’s the thirst for knowledge and an understanding of issues from near and far. How interesting the power of ideas that I have come to terms with and how easily they could be implemented right here at home so we exit persistent bouts with fiscal and financial crisis. While there’s the dearth for conscious leadership amidst the deepening mess, it’s sad that it doesn’t exist. Si JR.