The reason we are in the toilet is the FEDERAL RESERVE, look it up they have been stealing from us since 1913 and NOBODY does a thing cause they are bought, we just gave them 700 trillion dollars and now PRIME is at 0 or .5% ,yes I would hope they can afford to allow us to borrow our own money. The BANKERS own us and it will only get worse , wait till they put that chip in your arm, not quite the same as a BRAND but it will tell who owns US! Oh yeah another goal of there's NO MIDDLE CLASS, wait for it!

 

You (and I) are not mistaken, this is STILL the land of Hope and Dreams.

 

I have lost everything i ever owned 3 times in my life. Sold my junk and walked out with my sea bags and never looked back. I worked for years and refused to buy anything because i just did not want to deal with having all that junk. To me it still is just junk. House,Truck,Car,Boat,Bike,and all the crap the goes with that $hit. It is just junk.

I can pack a sea bag and jump a boat for a few months and have a pocket full of cash and no bills but i would like to try to keep my wife and keep her happy. She is the main reason i have all the crap i have now.

I am prepared to dump everything if it ever comes to that and i will not wallow in my own pity. I will just work and make sure she has everything she needs. If she don't like it i am prepared for that too. Won't be the first one, She went out with the leftover trash the last time i gave everything up

I did keep one thing, My daughter who was 6 weeks old and managed with the help of my parents to raise her as a single dad until i married my 2nd and last wife.

I lost out on a bunch of things due to my career choice and do not feel sorry for those who chose a career that is seeing hard times now. I worked my a$$ off in this career for 22 yrs now and was witnessed to 4 people losing their lives in this job and now people with toys are complaining about not having a retirement handed to them. Time to wake up your days are numbered.

I am not scared even without a high school or college education i managed to acquire enough paperwork and a license to do this type of work anywhere in the world and as long as the Coast Guard keeps playing Water Police i am good to go.

Now thats my story since it seems everyone else is posting theirs in the touring forum.

 

Double post.

 

Were all dealing with this right now and i feel for everyone, We lost our 401k company match, and 401k contributions, lost our xmas party, lost our raises, lost our long term disablility, and our dept maint lost all our overtime and are being put on 12hr rotating shifts. And we were told today that our normal shut down for xmas 2weeks that our dept (maint) usually works we better plan on staying home. Its sucks it really does. But the one thing that i look at is the fact i still have a job. And my company even though they cut these things did it to keep us all employed and cut the things that they felt were least important at the time and would keep all there workers employed. Thats more than i can say for some companies that just come in and say hey sorry but 200 of you got to go today and were not sure when will call you back. There trying thats all i can say.

Now i understand what i think Egale was hinting at and the problem with all this is typically when a company does this and 3yrs or less down the road when they are back to normal profits you never see any of your benefits come back. Once you loose them it seems you never get them back.

All i can say is my job is tied to the auto industry and i just hope things get better cause if not i will have to make some unpleasent changes. Which i will do what needs to be done to survive and feed my family. I have worked since i was 16 put myself thru college raising 4kids and working 60hrs a week graduated with honors and worked my way up from factory floor to a maint supervisor. Its all in what you want and how hard you work for it. And sometimes theres bumps in the road it sucks but that's the workin mans world. Lets all hope this mess starts turning around soon.

 

What's a 401K?

I got my own health ins policy ($10k deductable), a paid up $10,000 life ins policy, and SS for my retirement, and that is if I work and live long enough to draw it. If I don't make it to retirement, well then, who cares? I just try and get as much wind in my face as I can. that makes it all worthwhile.

 

So your outrageous health premiums are scarier than a guy who all of a sudden doesn't have the money to put a roof over his kids head or food to put in their mouth? What a LAME post!

 

Sounds like his business may be hurting, so I guess cutting benifits is better than cutting jobs. Our company went through a rough time a couple years back, froze raises for 2 years, lowered 401K match %, did whatever it could to avoid layoffs. At the time some people were angry, some quit, but looking back on it now, the ones of us that stuck it out are gratefull to the owner for doing what he had to to keep us all employed. 401k match is back up, raises are good and they are thankful to those of us that remained loyal.

 

+1000 M.E., The key here is that the employer is changing the game rules in the middle of the game, the bennys are part of a total package the employee/employer agree to up front. When the employee has hard times he does not go back to employer and change the rules, why would the employer do that? Unless the company is on verge of imploding I cant any justification. When times get better I would leave, but I would start looking right now.

 

To keep the doors open?
To stay in business?
Maybe it would be better if he just closed down. Ya, thats it.

Speaking of loosing everything CaptJon37 - I sure can relate there.
What are they gonna do - Cut your hair and send you to sea?
Been there, done that.

You do hat you have to do, to be succesful!
Case closed.