Over-50

We Voted - Now, Our Social Security and Medicare Are Shielded from "Reform" (Orwellian-Speak)

Legislative gridlock can be a very good thing. 

The divided Congress, reports Bob Blancato in MarketWatch, means that the push for "entitlement reform" has lost traction. That happened as a result of the midterms, in which 48% of us over-65 voted for Democrats.

"Entitlement reform" is Orwellian-speak for cuts in benefits for the aging such as Social Security and Medicare. Fortunately, that won't happen in Congress in the near term.

Right now, we aging who are receiving "entitlements" are sitting pretty.

For 2019, our Social Security payment will be increased 2.8%. Meanwhile, the monthly cost of our Medicare, pulled from the Social Security payment, only will increase $1.50. 

In addition, in many locations around the U.S. there are Medicare insurance supplement plans which have no monthly premium. They also have a ceiling on the out-of-pocket co-pays for any year. Even at the high end, such as $6000+, the expense is manageable. 

Fortunately, fewer of us are depending primarily on Social Security.

Those of us who want to continue to work have figured out how to find it. Here is my guide, free to download, on how to navigate both boom and recessionary economies to earn a buck  Download Outwitting ageism.

In addition, as The New York Times reports, employers are recognizing our value. In fact, our generation represents the fastest growing age group in the labor force. 

The rub comes when struggling to land, hold, and get promoted in those "good" jobs. In that niche, age bias is still dominant. To manage that reality more of us are discovering that we have to evolve into The Scrambling Generation.

Daily we have to manage both the setbacks and opportunities in our professional lives. There is no settling in, at least not if we are determined to continue to earn income.

Here is an e-book, also free to download, on doing the scramble. 

Coaching and Thought Leadership Ghostwriting about Issues Associated with Aging.

Complimentary consultation, sliding scale fees. Please contact Jane Genova at janegenova374@gamil.com.

 

Economists, Financial Planners - Stop Bullying Us Who Are Over-65

Somehow we made it through multiple economic downturns, including the whopper of 2008.

We did what it took to accommodate a workplace gone tech.

Many of us came from under debt.

Yet, some economists and many financial planners have been labeling us "Brand Dumb."

Come 65, announces the Schwartz Center for Economic Policy Analysis, 40% of us who are middle class will tumble into poverty. Read all about it in MarketWatch. 

That assumes we're relying primarily on Social Security. After we receive our 2.8% boost in the monthly payment, the average benefit will be $1,461.

Annually, that will total $17,532. Well, the supposed experts concede, that puts us way over the official government threshold of $12,060 for poverty.

However, the experts reply with this: Even at $17,532, many of us will be living in poverty.

But, will we? Or, more to the point, are we?

There are plenty of those in America 65 and over whom I coached who are living a fulfilling middle class life on their Social Security. They are doing that because they made it their personal finance business to adjust and keep adjusting to cost of living realities. 

For example, they knew to sell the family home when the real estate market was near the top. No, many of them haven't been caught in what could be another housing bust, especially in the northeast.

They shed a few tears about leaving all they knew but did the deed: They relocated from high priced locales to much lower priced ones such as Sierra Vista, Arizona, and Youngstown, Ohio. Renting isn't cheap but they know how to shop around in Landlord Nation. 

That's reality number-one.

Reality number-two is that not too many of us are winging it on Social Security, alone.

As The New York Times reports, more than half of us plan to or are already working beyond 65. Some have no intention of retiring at all.

In fact, the two age groups - 65 to 74 and 75 and older - have the fastest rate of growth in the U.S. labor market. That's why I have been a busy career coach for those over-50 who are determined to continue to earn income from work. The aging recognize that full retirement was their dad's and mom's game. A career path may end at age 65. Working rarely does in the current time.

No, we're not dumb. 

And, collectively, we should send this collective message to the economists and financial planners: We won't be bullied into assuming we played it all wrong during our peak working years.

Then and now there were problems. Often big ones, such as the collapse of our industry or medical bills.

But, we have emerged as The Scrambling Generation. Here is my guide, free to download, on how to make a buck, no matter what  Download Outwitting ageism.

And here is my e-book, also free to download, on how to keep finding the exit out of our comfort zone. 

Coaching and Thought Leadership Ghostwriting about Issues Associated with Aging.

Complimentary consultation, sliding scale fees. Please contact Jane Genova at janegenova374@gamil.com.

That House in Connecticut - You'll Probably Never Be Able to Unload It, Retire

Smart professionals, bad investment. 

A house in Connecticut, particularly in Fairfield County, once represented wealth. The assumption was that you had to be well off to purchase in CT. And when your career was over, either involuntarily or through retirement, you could cash out the assets and be financially more than okay.

That was then, of course.

Overall, the real estate market remains 15% below the 2007 peak. Here are more details from the media. 

Of the 169 municipalities, only 12 have recovered.

The McMansion, which had been an arrogant version of the American Dream isn't marketable.

Families are smaller and property taxes keep shooting up in that financially distressed state. Also, consider the cost of energy for heating and cooling what is now a white elephant. Will public affairs player Bob Dilenschneider be able to unload his Darien "castle?"

New industry isn't moving in to replace corporations like GE which are moving out.

And commuting on the main highway I-95 becomes increasingly horrific. One accident can put the counties in gridlock for at least 90 minutes. 

The implications are huge. 

At the top is that home owners can't count on that asset for retirement.

Those who can't sell their houses, at least for the price they want, might have to put all plans on hold. Those range from relocation for whatever reason to retirement.

Fewer professionals coming to the New York Metro area will shop for property in CT. A better bet could be the gentrifying Jersey City.

And, down on its economic luck CT won't soon recover.

Meanwhile, over in Queens, New York, which used to be a symbol of nowwhereville, property owners are sitting pretty. The coming of Amazon is raising all ships.

Attention is the currency of the 21^st century. Jane Genova helps you get it for products, services, points of view, causes, branding, careers after-50, and college admission.

In addition, this blog welcomes sponsored content.

Free consultation janegenova374@gmail.com

 

Get FIREd Up, At Any Age, Your Way

In a growing number of career paths we professionals are aging in dog years. 

By time we are in our 50s, too often we sit at our desks and daydream about how we can retire.

Yet, the cool new way of doing that - FIRE (financial independence, retire early) - seems beyond our grasp. We assume it's too late to get FIREd up.

Wrong. 

Radical savings can produce, within a few years, the option to shift to no work, a different type of work, or the same work but according to our own terms and conditions. The big misunderstanding is that FIRE indicates stopping working entirely. It may or may not.

More good news is that there is no one way to get FIREd up. After all, we are all different. And where we can adopt extreme frugality is therefore different for each of us.

One lawyer I coached after he was released from prison launched an online business off the grid in a cabin in Oregon. The only concessions to the modern age have been the electricity for the digital devices and what it takes for internet access. 

Me? My version of FIRE involved first paying down six-figure debt. The universe was smiling on me. It was before the real estate and global financial crashes. The house in West Hartford, Connecticut sold for a nice profit. High paying work came my way.

The debt out of the way, I had the option to go totally FIRE.

The dog and I took the I-95 ramp out of expensive CT to the dirt-cheap desert of Arizona. That was after we donated all our worldly goods, including his boxes of toys, to charity. That enabled me to choose what assignments I would accept - telecommuting, of course. 

Soon enough I had saved enough to return as far east as I was willing to pay for. That has been Ohio. I missed the four seasons. 

The next phase of FIRE will be to migrate next fall to a U.S. town on the border of Mexico.

My rent will be a third-less of what I pony up now.

Also my choice of assignments will expand because I will have access to all the western states (time zones matter) as well as enterprises in Mexico.

There, I can cross the border to Nogales, Mexico for dental tourism. Replacing any of my aging crowns will cost about a third what U.S dentists charge.

Recreationally, I can see the U.S. in my (2010) Chevrolet. I hate airplanes, which also seem unduly expensive. 

However, you may not want to embrace FIRE.

It's not for everyone.

One 50-something vice president of whatever I coached continues to spend lavishly on his avocation - classic cars. So far, he has been able to do that without destroying his health or his marriage. But, no, he doesn't like his job. That he can blow off.

We are all different. I couldn't shake off doing assignments I didn't find stimulating.

Coaching and Thought Leadership Ghostwriting about Issues Associated with Aging.

Complimentary consultation, sliding scale fees. Please contact Jane Genova at janegenova374@gamil.com.

 

The Retirement Plan - Universe Smirks

Many baby boomers and the oldest of GenX assumed they were mighty smart.

They carefully put together The Retirement Plan. The dream of relaxing and living a life on their own terms helped them navigate those rough career patches. That great boss had been replaced by an idiot. The promotion didn't come through. Longer hours were expected. 

Then, as The Wall Street Journal reports, The Retirement Plan had to be put on the back burner. There is also the dread that never will those two generations be able to retire.

One major wrench in the works is that the generations' parents and their children are both bellying up to them for financial support. Often that includes housing.

Those expenses drain and drain. No, all those people can't live as affordably together as the couple who assumed they would be empty nesters. 

Meanwhile, continuing to earn income becomes more difficult as one ages. Here is my article published in Odwyerpr.com on that common financial tragedy. And, here is my e-book, free to download, on how to continue to earn a living, no matter what.

The delay or the impossibility of retirement seems like a cruel joke the universe is playing on those who played by the rules. The push-back is for aging workers to have the courage and imagination to make their own rules.

For some, that can even be an adventure. A couple who assumed they would be empty nesters transformed what became a three-generation household into the kind of commune they bunked in during their 20s. It is turning out that the generations are learning from each other and enjoying the unique version of "community."

Takeaway: Plans are just plans. Life is what actually happens. 

Coaching and Thought Leadership Ghostwriting about Issues Associated with Aging.

Complimentary consultation, sliding scale fees. Please contact Jane Genova at janegenova374@gamil.com.

 

FIRE - That Dream Darkens

Several key players at his law firm have left. My client, a partner, has been mulling over doing a FIRE - that is, Financial Independence, Retire Early.

Then he can do what he wants in terms of work, without the long days and extreme pressure.

However, like so many considering getting off the traditional career path, his plan might have to be put on hold. Indefinitely. That is, unless he wants to adopt a lifestyle of minimalism. 

The stock market is getting lots of folks jittery.

The Wall Street Journal today warned that the deepening international economic slowdown can derail the U.S. robust economy.

Also, Steve Cohen, iconic hedge fund guru, warned of a possible bear market.

As MarketWatch reports, Cohen was attending a fundraiser when asked about the stock market. Essentially he observed that if, and that's a big if, it holds up, then the expectation should be for just marginal returns for the next two years.

However, there is the possibility that it won't hold up.

The value of a portfolio could sink. For too many that means waving good-bye to financial independence, at least for now. They probably can't retire early. Minimalism isn't an option most professionals want to embrace. 

In addition, the housing market has slowed, especially in the Northeast. The timing is poor to try to cash out the equity in what is usually players' biggest asset.

If early retirement is bypassed, the implications are obvious. In organizations the upward mobility pipeline will be clogged by those who feel they have to continue to hang in there. Meanwhile, aging professionals will have to struggle to remain productive and relevant.

Attention is the currency of the 21^st century. Jane Genova helps you get it for products, services, points of view, causes, branding, careers after-50, and college admission.

In addition, this blog welcomes sponsored content.

Free consultation janegenova374@gmail.com

Gender-Bias Lawsuits - Remembering When They Were Unthinkable

Distressed Avon should be braced for lots more stress.

This time it will be on its branding as a business that empowers women.

Eventually, the pressure also could be financial if there is a verdict against it in a jury trial or if it ponies up a hefty settlement. 

In addition, there could be a massive shakeup at the top. Male leadership could be replaced with females attuned to the specific needs of employees who are mothers or are in the process of becoming a mother. 

For a while now,  legal and business media outlets have been covering the initial litigation by Caroline Ruiz. She had been recruited by Avon for a procurement position. After a short time with the corporation she requested special accommodations such as working partly from home because of a high-risk pregnancy. She intended to continue fulfilling all her duties. Long story short, soon she was fired, allegedly for performance reasons. She had come to Avon with a great track record. 

What grabbed attention is that Avon supposedly is supportive of women. The reality, though, it came out was this: Its leadership is primarily male. And, according to Ruiz it was operating on the male experience at work as the default standard. 

Since then, the Wigdor law firm, representing Ruiz, has expanded that individual lawsuit into a putative class action, which had been filed yesterday. It requests a jury trial.

The amended complaint  has two clients and three other possibilities, so far. Many more could participate. 

All plaintiffs contend they suffered professional discrimination and some were actually penalized because of issues associated with maternity and child care (e.g. breastfeeding). Here are more details from Jason Grant at Law.com. And, here is a copy of the amended lawsuit. 

The timing of this lawsuit couldn't be worse for Avon.

Not only is it struggling for a turnaround in a changing global cosmetic marketplace.

This, of course, is the era when employment matters related to females are totally high profile.

#MeToo is just the tip of the iceberg. 

More a symbol of the changing values in the workplace is the risk top professional women have been taking in filing gender-bias lawsuits against their well-known employers. That kind of risk-taking is relatively new. But it is being embraced by more female players. 

For instance, brandname employment-discrimination lawyer David Sanford currently is representing, among others, female partners in law firms who contend gender-based bias. That ranges from compensation to promotability.

Sanford had been a pioneer in that, taking on GE in 2007. Unthinkable then, lawyer in the GE legal department - Lorene Schaefer - claimed gender discrimination.

That litigation, requesting $500 million in damages, sought class action status. Here are more details. GE settled before the complaint went to court.

More recently, Sanford's Sanford Heisler Sharp has been the law firm which achieved the settlement for Kerrie Campbell, who had been forced out of her law firm when she sued. Since then, she has launched her own boutique law firm and had been a guest speaker at Harvard Law School, discussing that experience.

Avon also has to anticipate a probable informal boycott. I have already steered clear of purchasing its whatever. Like most baby boomer female professionals, I put up with horrific gender bias, standard back then. Litigation wasn't considered an option by us "good girls." Instead, we would cry. 

Currently, more female professionals have been socialized to think like a lawyer. 

Litigation Communications

Making points of law, policy issues, and politics accessible and engaging for the public, media, investors, and more. Complimentary consultation. Please contact janegenova374@gmail.com.

 

Don't Hate Us Because We Did a FIRE

FIRE (Financial Independence, Retire Early) haters are nothing new.

They simply have secured a place on the media radar because more of us have embraced FIRE.

Incidentally, FIRE doesn't necessarily mean not working.

Rather it means if the choice is made to continue working it is performed on our terms and conditions.

For example, since I FIREd, I can afford to follow the Pareto Rule, that is sticking with the 20% of assignments which yield 80% of my revenues. Also, there is no financial need to max those revenues. My mindset, as with so many who have become undone along conventional career paths, has become minimalism. 

There were FIRE folks way back when. At the end of the 1980s, I leased an apartment on the Gold Coast of Connecticut from an expert in art restoration. He retrofitted his garage as his apartment. That bit of cost-efficiency allowed him to select only the assignments he wanted. The rest of time he enjoyed his little life, including being with his soulmate. She seemed to have no qualms about bunking in a garage in the land of McMansions. Greenwich, CT was on the border.

My colleagues turned up their noses at that whole garage scene. They assumed he should be involved, like they were, in the rat race. That entailed boarding the Metro North commuter train to Manhattan's Grand Central station before dawn in winter. 

In MarketWatch, Jonathan Clements looks at the objections current anti-FIRE constituents make.

Essentially, they don't believe FIRE is sustainable, holding forth that Suze Orman is on the money: You need $5 million to retire. Another beef is that they assume most of those who follow the FIRE path never had children or leave it to financial aid to fund their children's college costs.

What I sense is that they are jealous of us and/or addicted to the excessive stress of traditional careers. Remove the stress and they might envision themselves crumbling into nothingness. 

In April 2014, I wrapped my head and heart around FIRE. The first step was the ramp on I-95 leading out of the Gold Coast. Where I headed allowed me to practice radical saving.

Finally, I could live the meme of baby boomer mascot Alfred E. Neuman: What ... Me Worry?

The shock, though, is that once you go FIRE you discover that so many others just don't give much of a damn about hyper careerism. Somehow they discovered too that enough is enough.

At 30, 40, 50, 60, 70, 80 or more they define themselves as "retired." If they absolutely need to replace their car with 230,00 miles, they will parachute into a part-time job clerking at Marc's. 

In late August, my next phase of FIRE will take me to a small U.S. town on the border of Mexico. That can give me a shot at the dream of being a travel writer. That's because it will further downsize my fixed expenses. Incidentally, already I have covered dental tourism in Mexico and the southern Arizona town of Tombstone. 

Attention is the currency of the 21^st century. Jane Genova helps you get it for products, services, points of view, causes, branding, careers after-50, and college admission.

In addition, this blog welcomes sponsored content.

Free consultation janegenova374@gmail.com

 

The PTSD from College Years

iGens have been socialized how to manage a threat of or an actual gun attack in college.

Of course, many of them won't be able to shake off the memory of lock-ins as standard and losing classmates who had been at the wrong place at the wrong time. In The Atlantic, Ashley Fetters describes that current ethos. 

However, higher education, just like many other institutions in society, was never really a safe setting.

Baby Boomers such as myself vividly recall the verbal violence that faculty, administration, and upper classmen could and gleefully did inflict on us. I don't recall any instance in which we had even tried to push back. 

The time was before students had pounded into them that they had rights.

Unless a parent had been a lawyer - rare, since many of us were first-generation college - we didn't even know the legal language to associate with that kind of abusive behavior.  One is: the deliberate infliction of emotional abuse. 

Of curse, lawsuits against the miscreants and the institution itself for negligence in allowing that were unthinkable. We assumed that kind action would imprint a black mark on our credentials - and soul.

In addition, as yet, there wasn't the assertiveness industry to provide us with set phrases, facial expressions, and body language for responding to the abuse. No one had tutored us to use expressions like "That was unnecessary" when authority figures were inappropriately critical or just going about happily doing random target practice. 

The attacks, so routine, left their marks on our psyches.

It wasn't until I was in cognitive therapy in 2003 that I got it how many bits of trauma had become embedded in my sense of self. Their large number was due, in part, to the blind faith in higher education. We were told: The more education the better. So, we piled up the degrees - and absorbed the verbal violence. 

When an institution, as with education, is so critical to one's success, those needing it will probably always be at high risk. People have to continue going to school, even through it's marked as a setting for copycat mass shootings which transform the troubled into celebrities. Years ago, we got it the first week of college that tongue lashings and put-downs were part of the curriculum. 

Litigation Communications

Making points of law, policy issues, and politics accessible and engaging for the public, media, investors, and more. Complimentary consultation. Please contact janegenova374@gmail.com.

 

Thank You, But I Will Pass on Naming Lassie's Puppies

Tone-deaf.

That's the best way to describe the recruitment policies of an established organization dealing with economic development.

I had applied for a contract position rewriting content. Quickly I received a response. I had been selected to create sample content. That would be paid. 

And that was the good part. 

Now for the bad part.

I was explicitly informed that several applicants, including myself, had been chosen to downsize a policy-heavy document. I assume that in addition to word reduction it should be made engaging. The one applicant whom, they judged, was the best writer would be contracted to work with them on a long-term basis. The rest would be throw-backs. 

Insulting?

That's what I thought.

The powers that be at that organization could have simply indicated there was a paid trial assignment. That would have made good business sense.

After I thought about all that and wound up not participating I recalled slaving in my pre-teen days in the contests to name Lassie's puppies. That had been a popular Sunday night series on network television.

Back then the contest was a useful exercise for children to understand the concept of competition. The adults in the family agreed with that and gladly provided the 2-cent stamps to mail the entries.

No, I never did win the prize: 1 of Lassie's puppies. But I salute the producers of "Lassie" for socializing children to the realities beyond the farm where Lassie lived. With my relatives who worked in sophisticated Manhattan I analyzed what my entries might have lacked. The reverse engineering came up with the need for me to be more creative in the choice of names but still remain within the box of warm and fuzzy dogville. 

Now, I am simply puzzled why a reputable organization would lack respect for communications talent. The more enlightened approach is to simply position and package the competitive element as a necessary screening whatever.

Takeaway: Don't continue with a process that treats professionals like children. 

Attention is the currency of the 21^st century. Jane Genova helps you get it for products, services, points of view, causes, branding, careers after-50, and college admission.

In addition, this blog welcomes sponsored content.

Free consultation janegenova374@gmail.com