There are employees out there who think they don’t get much for their union dues. Right to work gives them a chance to object.
Dues goes to well paid union officials and their pensions.
The benefits from that tend to be pretty meager, especially for those below retirement age. Lots of loopholes in the coverage.
General FAQs About PBGC | Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation
Be interesting to know what percentage of PBGC beneficiaries are collecting the $85,000/yr max for a 65-yr-old, and what kind of pre-retirement income they were earning.
intercst
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In non-union shops the Private Equity oligarchs take it all.
intercst
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At the same time, unions spent over $50 million on political donations in the 2022 election year, mostly for one party. That spending does not align with the politics of a lot of workers. Being forced to support politics one doesn’t agree with is scummy as well.
DB2
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I don’t know how to cut and paste it , but the recent oxfam report on the rapidly rising billionaire wealth versus the dropping real earnings of the bottom 60% (5 billion people worldwide) is pertinent, I think.
Nobody stopping them from leaving and getting a job at a company with which they do agree.
Or do you mean like many employees of the company have to support politics they don’t agree with (i.e. the head of the company)?
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And how many millions of the company’s money do the “JCs” donate to pols that work against the interests of the employees? We don’t know. The shareholders are told it’s none of their business, even though management claims to be making the donations on behalf of the employees and shareholders.
Steve
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That money comes out of the company revenues, i.e., the money you and I give them in exchange for goods and services. You and I have a choice of whether or not to make said purchases.
DB2
As management refuses to release the information regarding who they bribe and why, how are employees, shareholders, and customers to evaluate whether they want to be associated with the company?
Steve
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Shareholders are entitled to return on investment. They put down the cash and took the risk.
So do all holders of their debt. Or not?
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I’ve read about and written about Social Security for more than 20 years, mostly on Fool 1.0 so I can’t/won’t find it, but the reality is that this has been true since the beginning of Social Security . It’s still true now. Roughly half of all elder Americans would be destitute if not for SS, and that has been true since the 1930’s.
The difference now is that we don’t house Grandma and Grandpa in the attic of a big family home, we “expect” them to live out their lives in some measure of comfort and grace. SS came about because of exactly this issue ; once corporate America (or infirmities of age) denied an income, half of elders were destitute. The interesting thing to me was - and continues to be -
Social Security has changed the outcome for nearly all seniors who would otherwise live in poverty (again, roughly half), and has made those who do prepare or are wealthy (the ant & the grasshopper comes to mind) even better off. Social Security did not originate here, although there were a few with military pensions from the Civil War, WWI, etc. But it was in Germany, IIRC, and then other European countries where the idea took root and then took off, As usual with government involved social improvements, it came to America late.
(And at the beginning did not cover more than half of elders, including teachers, government workers, farm workers, etc. That has been corrected over time, obviously.) The thing some politicians still won’t admit is that it’s better for the economy to have more people spending rather than holed up in an attic eating cat food to survive, and that requires some sort of welfare-ish mechanism. We have settled on pay-go, and it has worked pretty well for almost 90 years.)
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1.) FWIW I worked at a Fortune 100 insurance company for 27 years to build up a pension up to $39K/yr if I wait to 65. The concept of an $85K/year private pension these days is stunning to me. Maybe from car companies to tenured UAW? (I know state worker pension payments at that level for life can happen).
2.) They terminated the “final-average-pay * years of service” plan 10 years ago but grandfathered it, and just threw 4% of salary into a cash balance we couldn’t invest. The formula for the old plan turned 20 years of service * maybe $120K into @30%.
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Our formula was 70% of 5 yr FAS less Social Security times years of service over 30. Many executives with advanced degrees might get $85k with that formula but the numbers are likely to be few.
Then you probably have not really talked to that many.
A successful retirement investor very likely maximized their 401k contributions AND still put money in a taxable account. Roth contributions may not be allowed (back door excluded).
A successful retirement investor would be well aware of their ability to maximize their tax savings while working and then take advantage of Roth conversions upon retirement.
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I retired two years ago here in the UK. 96% of our combined wealth is in tax free accounts which are still growing!
I think the UK tax system is a bit different than the US tax system Typically, European (and UK) tax systems are much more linear, while the US tax systems have oddly formed “breakpoints” that really can influence behavior when income is near those breakpoints. Examples include eligibility for the earned income tax credit, eligibility for clean vehicle tax credit (earn $149,999, get a $7500 credit; earn $150,001 get $0 tax credit), and myriad others. Also, the tax brackets are oddly formed because they are the result of multiple iterations of tax legislation where a nearly evenly divided legislature has to have individual legislators convinced one way or another. For example, there’s a 12% tax bracket, but the next bracket jumps to 22%, and the one after that is 24%. No rhyme or reason. Especially no reason, we haven’t seen that since the 80s when they created exactly two tax brackets (plus the zero bracket of course) which really simplified the system and caused many fewer decision points for most normal working people.
So as a result all this Roth stuff, and all this “is it worth converting to Roth” typically wouldn’t apply under any system other than the weird, oddly formed, US tax system.
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Ours is a bit odd. Income tax can go from 20% to 40%, then up to an effective rate of 60%, before dropping to 45%:
It is scummy not to be educated on the benefits of unions and policies that favor unions. Doubling down by being against labor while in a union? Very crazy. I get someone’s dad might be ignorant so why not carry on with tradition?
This is like gun rights. No one is a good guy with a gun. Scummy? Sure when the children get shot all over this nation. Carry on with the tradition.
I’m going to surmise you feel the same way when the shoe is on the other foot? So it’s scummy that my purchase at Home Depot and Lowe’s go overwhelmingly to the other party? That Publix & Chic-Fil-A give to the same party. That the Koch’s, using their vast wealth from everything from toilet paper to oil likewise give to the same party?
Or doesn’t that count?
Unions give to politicians who support them in their various endeavors to improve the lot of union workers. You would hardly expect them to give to the party which tries to whittle down benefits for them, would you?
Seriously?
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