poles change retirement age

[Danzig]

'Poland's lawmakers have approved a controversial government plan to raise the retirement age to 67 for most Poles.

The lower chamber of Parliament voted Friday 268 to 185 with 2 abstentions to approve changes sought by the pro-business government of Prime Minister Donald Tusk, which argues that delayed retirement will help Poles build up larger pensions and reduce state spending.

Trade unions have vehemently opposed the plan and were staging a noisy protest outside Parliament.

The current law allows women to retire at age 60 and men at 65. The armed forces and some other services have even more lenient regulations which the new law also seeks to toughen up.'


something we should really consider.

current life expectancies in this country are far higher than they were when retirement was set at 65. our current system is untenable, this is one of several changes that should be made.

[Riot]

Originally Posted by Danzig

'Poland's lawmakers have approved a controversial government plan to raise the retirement age to 67 for most Poles.

The lower chamber of Parliament voted Friday 268 to 185 with 2 abstentions to approve changes sought by the pro-business government of Prime Minister Donald Tusk, which argues that delayed retirement will help Poles build up larger pensions and reduce state spending.

Trade unions have vehemently opposed the plan and were staging a noisy protest outside Parliament.

The current law allows women to retire at age 60 and men at 65. The armed forces and some other services have even more lenient regulations which the new law also seeks to toughen up.'


something we should really consider.

current life expectancies in this country are far higher than they were when retirement was set at 65. our current system is untenable, this is one of several changes that should be made.

No need. Social Security just needs a small cap raise. It's fine, and will be quite strong as the baby boom years are survived.

Medicare can be opened up to people 50 and above, and they've already made some good inroads into fraud and waste management that helps with some billions here and there.

The most important thing we do for each other are our earned benefits programs. We work a lifetime for them, we've contributed to them and we have funded them, and we deserve them.

[GenuineRisk]

It's easy for those of us who work mostly at a desk to envision working two more years, but we're also the ones who won't need SS quite as desperately, because we (one hopes) have been saving for retirement. The retirees who depend most on SS tend to be workers who spent their careers in lower-paying, more physically taxing jobs. Two more years of work for them often means higher health care costs, which ends up being more expensive than two years of SS payments.

Raising retirement ages is bad for the nation all around. The more elderly that work, the fewer jobs for the young. And the young have a lot more energy with which to cause trouble when they have no jobs.

In addition, a lot of people over 50 who are now unemployed will never work again, due to companies' reluctance to hire older workers. They will also be a huge drain on our economy, through no fault of their own. And the longer before they can collect SS and go on Medicare, the more expensive they will be later, due to poor living conditions and health problems they couldn't address sooner.

Our nation is facing a much more serious issue in long-term unemployment than it is in SS.

[Riot]

We spent decades having good, well-paying labor jobs for those that never went to college. You could advance as high and far as you were willing to work in the 1950's. Those jobs are mostly gone.

What's left is high-tech jobs, green energy jobs, professional jobs, but we've spent many years attacking and unfunding education, disparaging science and technology. We're too incapable at math, reading, science in the US. Those industries went elsewhere. We don't have the labor force for that.

We failed to adjust, and it's passed us by. I don't know if we'll ever be able to get our unemployment down past 5-6% again. The country simply refuses to invest in the type of jobs that can employ our unemployed: infrastructure repair, etc.

[Danzig]

Originally Posted by GenuineRisk

It's easy for those of us who work mostly at a desk to envision working two more years, but we're also the ones who won't need SS quite as desperately, because we (one hopes) have been saving for retirement. The retirees who depend most on SS tend to be workers who spent their careers in lower-paying, more physically taxing jobs. Two more years of work for them often means higher health care costs, which ends up being more expensive than two years of SS payments.

Raising retirement ages is bad for the nation all around. The more elderly that work, the fewer jobs for the young. And the young have a lot more energy with which to cause trouble when they have no jobs.

In addition, a lot of people over 50 who are now unemployed will never work again, due to companies' reluctance to hire older workers. They will also be a huge drain on our economy, through no fault of their own. And the longer before they can collect SS and go on Medicare, the more expensive they will be later, due to poor living conditions and health problems they couldn't address sooner.

Our nation is facing a much more serious issue in long-term unemployment than it is in SS.

i don't know about your last sentence....ss is headed for trouble.

i don't know what the best situation would be. i have made the same point, that people retiring are leaving a job for someone who needs it. but when you consider the vast amount of people about to retire, and the fact that those coming behind are of a lower number.....and how many of those now or about to retired are prepared? what would two more years do by waiting, versus not? certainly something to consider. if it's not mathematically feasible, than it's not feasible. but maybe it is.
and my husband certainly isn't a 9-5'er. makes good money, but he certainly isn't a desk jockey by any means. but then, we're not planning to survive on ss either.
i think the biggest problem regarding ss is too many assumed it would be all they'd need. people are living longer and longer, and taking far more out of that system than they ever put in. negative ROI can't continue forever.

[GenuineRisk]

Originally Posted by Danzig

i don't know about your last sentence....ss is headed for trouble.

i don't know what the best situation would be. i have made the same point, that people retiring are leaving a job for someone who needs it. but when you consider the vast amount of people about to retire, and the fact that those coming behind are of a lower number.....and how many of those now or about to retired are prepared? what would two more years do by waiting, versus not? certainly something to consider. if it's not mathematically feasible, than it's not feasible. but maybe it is.
and my husband certainly isn't a 9-5'er. makes good money, but he certainly isn't a desk jockey by any means. but then, we're not planning to survive on ss either.
i think the biggest problem regarding ss is too many assumed it would be all they'd need. people are living longer and longer, and taking far more out of that system than they ever put in. negative ROI can't continue forever.

Social Security is not in trouble. It's just not. Currently it's solvent until sometime in the 2030s, and in political time, that's an eternity to make the necessary changes. As has been mentioned before, lifting the salary cap would fix it forever, and that fix would affect barely 6 percent of the population.

Really, truly, it's not in trouble. People who tell you it is are either misinformed or lying to you (sometimes by lumping it in with Medicare, which is a totally different program and a totally different issue).

I don't think people assumed that SS was all they would need; I think a lot of people don't make enough money to have anything to put away for retirement. Someone working for minimum wage is not going to have money to put in an IRA every month. And SS is hardly cushy; it really is just enough to keep an elderly person from starving.

Again, the people who will be most dependent on SS are the ones who will be least able to last another two years, or five years of work, because their jobs tend to be physically grueling and they have less money during their working life to deal with health problems so they tend to let things go until the qualify for Medicare. Not because they're lazy, but because they have to decide between medicine and food.

And really, which cop would you rather have chasing the guy who just nabbed your purse- the 30-year-old or the 70-year-old?

[Danzig]

i've read too many times about upcoming issues to believe it's not in trouble. and yeah, i know it's not cushy.
they've already shown how much more people take out of ss than they've put in. that can't continue. and for the last few years the 'payroll' tax, a pseudonym for ss witholding, has been lowered for most of us. so instead of putting in an already too low amount, it's that much less.
it's been recommended for some time now that changes be made, but none have that would have a positive affect on ss going forward.
but then i've posted links to such articles and studies for several years now, only to be told there's no issue-so i guess that was all just wasted time and effort.


and this type of thing just makes my blood boil:

http://openchannel.msnbc.msn.com/_ne...double-dipping



double dipping is also practiced here in arkansas, and i have no doubt it happens plenty of other places. i've contacted the governor's office here before about it-but there's been no change.
mike ross is supposedly running for governor next, maybe i'll try him. as i told the gov's office, retirement from the public sector would help alleviate job searches for some, who could take over a state job-but not if the guy doesn't really retire! outrageous behavior.

[bigrun]

Originally Posted by GenuineRisk

Social Security is not in trouble. It's just not. Currently it's solvent until sometime in the 2030s, and in political time, that's an eternity to make the necessary changes. As has been mentioned before, lifting the salary cap would fix it forever, and that fix would affect barely 6 percent of the population.

Really, truly, it's not in trouble. People who tell you it is are either misinformed or lying to you (sometimes by lumping it in with Medicare, which is a totally different program and a totally different issue).

I don't think people assumed that SS was all they would need; I think a lot of people don't make enough money to have anything to put away for retirement. Someone working for minimum wage is not going to have money to put in an IRA every month. And SS is hardly cushy; it really is just enough to keep an elderly person from starving.

Again, the people who will be most dependent on SS are the ones who will be least able to last another two years, or five years of work, because their jobs tend to be physically grueling and they have less money during their working life to deal with health problems so they tend to let things go until the qualify for Medicare. Not because they're lazy, but because they have to decide between medicine and food.

And really, which cop would you rather have chasing the guy who just nabbed your purse- the 30-year-old or the 70-year-old?

I know some wiry 70 yo vets i would like to run down the purse snatcher..

Other than that you make good points...

[Cannon Shell]

What difference does it make what they do in Poland? Everybody knows most of them already live in Chicago.