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How To Retire Without Money
By Bob Belmont
CHAPTER 1 WHY YOU SHOULD CONSIDER RETIREMENT
Page 2 of 7
At least not
for the overwhelming majority of us.
This is the
way life is more apt to be.
A youngster
gets out of school and starts looking for a job. Jim Average
might have liked to have become a doctor or engineer but it
didn't work out that way. For one thing, his people couldn't
afford to finance eight years of pre-med and medical school.
The first job that opens up for Jim is in a local print shop
where they teach him to do job printing. The pay isn't too
good but they tell him he's learning a trade.
He works in
the print shop for a couple of years and the company puts in
some new automatic equipment and Jim Average is let go. Not
that he particularly cares. He never did like printing anyway.
However, he's started going with Sally who works in a bakery
so he needs to get another job as soon as possible. You can't
get married on unemployment insurance.
The best job
he can locate is clerk in a local super-market and he does his
best to please a manager he can't get along with at all. He
and Sally get married but since it's necessary for her to keep
working if they're going to be able to live in a decent
apartment and buy a car, they decide against having children.
Down through
the years Jim has a series of jobs. Factory jobs, construction
jobs, a job in a shipyard during the war, another print shop
job. Once he and Sally even save enough money to open a
service station but for one reason or other it doesn't go over
and they lose all the money they invested. Once a depression
comes along and for long months the family has no work at all.
They have to move in with Sally's parents who can't really
afford it.
Children come
in spite of planning to the contrary and Jim and Sally sit up
nights trying to figure out how to make ends meet. Except for
when she's carrying a baby, Sally works at full time jobs.
It's the only way they can keep going at all.
Some years
aren't too bad. During the war and the boom that follows, Jim
does pretty well. They even make a deposit on a house and buy
a bigger, flashier car. They also go into the hole for a TV
set, a new refrigerator, and an electric stove. After which
they sit around nights some more, worrying about what's going
to happen if either of them lose their jobs.
At the age of
55 Jim stops being able to find work except such positions as
night watchman or elevator operator in one of the run down
buildings in the industrial part of town. And Sally can only
occasionally find employment when her health is up to it,
doing housework.
At 65 Jim
Average gets his Social Security money and they sell their
house and move down to Southern California to retire.
However, the amount of Social Security money coming in hardly
pays for living on the simplest standard. They get by only
because one of the children is able to send them a few dollars
each month.
These may
sound bitter, the above accounts, but they aren't far off the
beam. In one case you have a success and in the other you have
an average life.
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CHAPTER 1 WHY YOU SHOULD CONSIDER RETIREMENT
Page 3
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