Posted on 09/12/2024 6:47:04 AM PDT by mikelets456
I didn't know how to post without having a link so I apologize. I have to be honest, for most of my life (in sales), the harder I worked, generally the more money I made....more on that later. We are savers---putting in 401K, stocks, mutual funds, some precious metals, have property. We had no debt (except our mortgage----2.3% and under $100K). Recently we had a few things---our son's wedding, property taxes (up another $800 this year) car tires needing to be replaced, air conditioner crapped out, cost of food, gas, utilities, etc. We ALWAYS pay off any debt immediately but now finding it harder and harder....I actually got a credit card with 0% interest for 15 months just to give us some breathing room.
Back to work---I have been at this company for 38 years. Have been in the top 3 in sales every single year. The past several years we had layoffs, are on 4 day work weeks (20% less pay) and our sales are off literally 50%.
We have had some rough times in the past but this is, by far, the worst----and it gets even darker---I see no end to this downward spiral. In past times, there was always a light at the end of the tunnel. However, I don't even see a tunnel to find the light.
I know our entire industry (manufacturing---Chemical, plastics and oils companies) are all complaining and not spending any money. I don't get political with customers but they're all stating "They're waiting for the elections before initiating projects".
My question is---are any of you, or people you know going through this as well? If Kamala gets in there I don't know how we can survive if we continue in this direction....
(Excerpt) Read more at sheridanmedia.com ...
Bulk ag business here. No one is buying fertilizer or equipment. Ag business is predicted to decline 23%. We are dipping into savings to keep our employees. This cannot go on.
I’m supposed to be in my prime earning years. Debt free. but eating the seed corn.
Every state and region is different. If you don’t like where you are, vote with your feet. Make everything the same with a one-size -fits-all policy, and there will be no where to run.
Precious metal.
I am retired. I never eat out. Pack a lunch on a day trip. I figure out how to make whatever food I want. Fried egg sandwich with a slice of deli ham. Pizza based on flour tortillas, hamburger gravy. Food has never been that important which probably helps keep the weight down. I have found that people who center their day around what they eat tend to be overweight.
I have always bought older cars (less than $5,000) and don’t buy comprehensive and collision.
I buy work shirts at Goodwill on Monday 99 cent day.
Where I can, I will borrow books from library but most of what I read is too specialized. Many old books can be read online through Project Gutenberg. Unlike today, books over 100 years old didn’t primarily focus on race and sex. (For example, read an unabridged version of Robinson Crusoe.) No magazine subscriptions.
No professional or college sporting events or theaters. I guess one could watch local high school games but overall, I find them boring with too much drama. Nobody will remember who won the big Mayfield versus Oakville football game in seven years.
Mow own yard with used lawnmower, do my own painting, carpentry, and electrical work. I can’t do much plumbing.
I live in Fort Worth and had my taxes capped when I turned 65. Last year I received a letter from the tax assessor that my taxes were decreasing by almost $1000. Don’t really like Texas but with that kind of incentive how can I afford to leave?
Does your wife vote for Democrats??
The Democrat Party Organized Crime Families are doing just fine.
Let’s go Brandon!
I work at Home Depot part time the company is WAY DOWN in sales, it has become AWFUL for everyone, these bastards can not change what is happening in our lives by TELLING US it is not happening!! TODAY they say inflation is coming way down it is utter BS and NO ONE believes it NO ONE!!
Precious metals. Gold/silver
I can live with that. Our millage rate is actually going down a little this year.
It is kind of like that old cliché, “First the came for the Jews, and I said nothing. . .”
Here, it should be, “First, they came for the people on minimum wage, and we said nothing.
Because the Rich have decared War on poor people and middle class people. And their first target was the poor schlubs on minimum wage, and it was not adjusted in accordance with the cost of living for decades nearly. Most of us said nothing. We sat by and let those poor schlubs go on food stamps and Medicaid and housing assistance.
Now, the Rich are coming for us. We will own nothing and be happy acording to them. Conservatives have been a big part of this, with their ignorant Ayn Rand, Libertarian crap, and they sat by while factories were shipped overseas.
This is why RINOs, like Sh!t Romney, and Dick Cheney hate Trump.
Social security is NOT the problem. It is a little fix. Karl Denniger says that SocSec is included in the Entitlements Issue, to keep us from fixing Entitles, lest the Seniors rise in revolt.
“he CBO is out with their latest estimate on the detonation of our federal budget, and it’s not pretty. They point out what I’ve said repeatedly on the budget and “entitlements”: Social Security is not the problem and in fact will start declining in share of the budget in 2028; politicians speaking of “entitlements” lumping Social Security in with Medicare and Medicaid are lying. The entire problem is in medical spending and if current trends are not reversed — not just “adjusted” over time — will destroy the federal budget and economy. We will not get to 2037 before it happens either; in fact, if we do not act we’ll be lucky to get through the next four years as the markets will figure out that neither political party will take this issue on and resolve it. Simply put we must solve this problem and we must do it now.
https://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?post=231949
and
Note that Social Security is fairly easy to “fix.” First, we can stop tampering with rates on a forward basis. Second, we can (and probably have to) lift either the cap on wages at a faster rate (or once on a step-function basis), modestly increase the FICA tax, or some blend of both. A less than 3% increase in the FICA rate (both halves; you pay both even though you don’t see both directly) is roughly where the line is, assuming wages do not lift faster than inflation (payouts.) If they do some or all of that will disappear; the reason is that Social Security is a progressive system; that is, your first dollar of earnings (taxable) get you more benefit when you retire than higher earnings dollars do. So if people shift toward the higher end (before the cap-out, at which you neither pay or get more) then the deficiency closes.
The bad news is found in Medicare.
Medicare goes bust in eight years and there is no rational revenue-raising way to fix it.
For most of us who are not 75+ it will not be there unless the medical monopolists are jailed, hung or both right now.”
https://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?singlepost=3446205
“
“Spend down your assets”
What do you plan to live on?
I can’t afford groceries.
I’ve never been in this position, not in 70 years.
How do you get your taxes “capped?” Are you talking about your over-65 homestead exemption? That’s not a cap, just an additional exemption. That’s going to make anyone’s taxes decrease.
Property taxes are increased two ways, by an increase in your assessed property (tax) value, or by increases in the tax rates, normally the school tax, which citizens almost always stupidly increase by voting “for” school bond issues, as if they think they’ll never get the bill for it.
And PRAY, PRAY, PRAY.
“If you don’t like where you are, vote with your feet.”
You can’t run from international socialism. Democrats in DC are determined to smash the mainly white American middle class. People are being brought in from around the globe to change the electorates of the United States.
Understand what I propose is merely a cap:
Levies on any residential property of less than 2799 square feet of finished living space shall be no higher than the 2019 dollar amounts on the property, or for a newer or since resold property no higher than what it would have been levied at for 2019 if it lacked owner specific tax breaks, increased by 3% per calendar year since 2019 and by any percentage increase to its finished living space.
My proposed cap allows for the long-established government goal of 3% inflation.
If the local public employees vote for Democrats that produce 4% inflation, the local public employees will see the buying power of real property taxation from a property fall.
If the local public employees vote for financially responsible Republicans that produce 2% inflation, the local public employees might see the buying power of real property taxation from a property rise.
These local public employees are the people fighting hardest for Democratic victory.
What I propose is that they and the financial elite fight instead for pro-American Republican victory, for modest inflation, for lower interest rates, for less immigration.
“Building a [border] wall is a red herring”
Elon Musk
The Israel border wall was shown to be ineffective on October 7th.
I propose tax ‘walls’ be built in our federal constitution around middle-class houses and middle-class incomes.
A %20 import tariff that funds SS and MC. Makes sense since it it is a tax on foreign labor.
Spend down your assets
“What do you plan to live on?”
Social Security eventually.
“Medicare goes bust in eight years and”
“there is no rational revenue-raising way to fix it.”
Medicare will have to get fixed it other ways then. From my suggestions on my profile page:
ENHANCED HOSPITAL SERVICE COMPETITION
To reduce hospital costs, state law would be changed to allow:
1. large hospital complexes and systems to be split up
2. competitive hospitals to be built adjacent to existent hospitals
(if a building purchase request is refused)
3. independent surgical, imaging, lab and nursing care facilities to coordinate
to state law requirements to effectively function as hospitals
EMTALA
EMTALA care provision responsibility would be limited to one episode per patient in any 365 day period excluding paid-up previous visits, with a limit waiver to be at least $200 in cash or its equivalent.
EMTALA care uniformly billed at no more than 300% of Medicare amounts, including interest and late and other charges, could be collected in the manner of federal student loan debt.
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