I just watched $9,437 of my qualified money evaporate today. And I'm 75% out of the market. I'd have put a bullet in my head if I'd have "stuck it out" and thought "long-term" as my "investment executive" recommended.
I've lived and worked through a few major market downturns. This one is different, especially for me, as I am nearing retirement and don't have time to make up the losses. It's different primarily though, in the sense that it seems to be more desperate and at the same time completely manipulated.
I wake up every morning and log into Yahoo Finance and read the pre-opening headlines. Everyday it's the same thing.
Markets Fear Greek Default
Jobs Report Negative
Downgrade
National Debt Soars
Euopean Markets Sour
Chinese Growth Stalled
QE III
Operation Twist
or my favorite
Sum of All Fears: Stocks, Commodities Tumble Over Recession Risk, European Implosion
All this as if on that particular morning, the financiars we're taken completely by surprise by EVERYTHING and the markets go bezerk. Now..analysts, economists, CFO's, federal bean counters, and politicians are being paid, and paid well to watch these situations. That is their job. So why the knee jerk reactions to every single seemingly predictable piece of news.....
The bankers and Wall Street have their own agenda, and it's not making things"fair" for us.
The politicians are about as dysfunctional a group as seen since 1859. They clearly don't have our best interest in mind.
So here's my solution. Pretty simple. I'd rather pay now an amount I can determine, than to pay later an amount they can mishandle and manipulate.
Case in point.
The US National debt today is $14,709, 514,292,310.87. Can we all agree that if we eliminated the debt, we'd eliminate the fear-mongering being dished out by every financial "prognosticator" in the government and the press. We'd force the Tea Baggers to lay down their misspelled signs and sing Cumbaya with Bill Ayers. We, as private citizens, would neuter in one simple action the thousand pound gorilla in the room that Congress can't seem to quite figure out.
So tax us. But with caveats.
1) This "special tax" cannot be touched by either the White House or Congress. It is to be a line item payroll tax that moves from the paycheck into a "trust" account that can "only" be used to pay down the National Debt. It can't be tapped for TARP or FEMA, or a Bridge to Nowhere, or the Congressional Medical Plan or anything but retiring outright national debt.
2) Obviously we'd need to pair this with a balanced budget amendment cutting federal expenditures to that amount created by income "before" this special assessment.
Think of it as a Homeowners Association finding out their management company has badly managed their HOA dues and their properties. They call for a special assessment to make whole the issues, so that their properties can be made liveable and rentalable. In this situation the Property Manager is likely given the boot...that's a whole new blog.
I'd much rather pay a higher tax that watch our government give Wall Street the opportunity to manipulate away my entire 401K.
There is no way we can "budget" our way out of this. It has to be a balanced approach. We're all going to have to suffer a bit. Case in point: We've been fighting two wars for 10 years. Have we purchased war bonds, are we growing victory gardens, are we rationing gas, or any other commodity. Is their even the slightest inconvenience to our highly important lives while largely the low incomer's kids are dying in the desert for something we can't even define any longer.
I'll conclude with some alternative ideas about how to cut federal costs:
1) Bring home all our ambassadors and their massive contingents, cars, homes, maids, entertainment budgets in all but the most important countries. Have you heard of "WebEx" or "Go To Meeting". It's 2011, we can do a conference call. In those "important" countries the ambassadors get a mobile home and a Yugo. We'll see who the real public servants are.
2) Cut foreign aid to...everyone. Done. Zippo, finite. Sorry guys, we're having a little trouble paying our own bills, so we can't bankroll you for awhile.
3) Adjust Congressional pay to $75,000 per year. Have congress be required to purchase healthcare independently and manage their own qualified plans w/o lifetime government guarantees. Again lets see who wants to "serve".
4) Bring the troops home from Afganistan and Iraq.
5) Close the borders.."it's the people stupid". Not just bad people or lazy people, but too many people. Our US population looks like the debt calculator. We add one new person every 12 seconds. Immigrantion provides populatin grows by one every 43 seconds.
6) Flat tax. One size fits all. Stop the bickering, stop the loop holes, stop the cheating, catch the cheaters. Simple, you make X you owe Y. Tax form is one page. Deductions for kids ? Bah ! You pay a stipend to the government for any babies over two.
7) Yes, adjust Social Security and MediCare to an income scale. Warren Buffet doesn't need SS. Yes we all paid in and those of us who made more paid in more, but who actually needs it to survive. Don't raise the age for SS benenfits, that's unfair to those genetically challenged. The government is entitled to screw all the people that paid in with years of minimal expectations. They sent the letters out every year reviewing our SS expectations. Sure make all the changes you want for those that are young who have time to compensate.
Congresss and Mr. President, I think I speak for many who'd be willing to ante up to help the country as long as we had some assurance you fellas couldn't "tap the keg".
