How Much Annual Income Do Retirees Have?

Catherine of CA. In this world, it is best to rely on yourself. The minute you place your future in the hands of a husband, wife or government you are relying on the fact that things will always stay the same. You have to fend for yourself in this world, just as animals do in the animal world. Most animals living in areas where food is not abundant in the winter months have adapted themselves. The work hard all of the good months to put stocks of food for the winter months. There were no government handouts, husbands or wifes working on their behalf to save for their future. They do it all on there own. If you figured that Social Security was going to take care of you for the rest of your life, you are going to have a very hard time as you dwindle towards your elder years.

You can not blame anybody else for your situation. You chose to not save money, you chose to invest in individual companies and take the risk, you chose to have a family and work at a dead end job with low pay. These choices in life have created your situation. You have nobody to blame but yourself.

I worked very hard over my life, I constantly saved 30% of my income no matter how much I was paid. I went without a lot of nice things, big screen tv's, dinners out, cable TV and such. I constantly learnt new skills to stay current with computers as they came to the for front during the late 80's and 90's. I spent a lot of time learning Microsoft products, MS WORD, EXCEL, Power Point and the like. During my career that ended in 2005 at 62 I never earn't more than 72k. However, as I saved 30% of my income each and every year starting since I was 26 I had amassed 3.2 million dollars. I continued my financial education and decided in 2006 to learn all I could. As such I had a well diversified portfolio and during the crash I was only down 19% at the bottom, however, seeing an oportunity to buy when the down hit 7200 I moved all of my bonds into the stock market. When the down was back to 10500 I then reallocated my money back to a balanced portfolio. So here we are today with 3.6 million dollars in my portfolio. I have since learnt the buckets of money strategy and moved my next 10 years of needed money to cash for living off.

As you can see, I had to constantly learn new things, live frugally and learn to invest. I relied on myself, raised 3 kids, and had my wife stay at home for her entire life. Unfortunately she passed away in 2007. I now live alone, have a great woman friend and visit my kids and grand kids monthly. My life is blessed because I used the principles in the bible to guide my way.

So your choices are : 1. Go back to work and save everything you can. Relying on the government to feed you is only going to make your life harder each and every year as inflation eats at the handout you are given...

Grotto of GA 4:33PM October 26, 2010