Posted on 09/20/2010 8:55:39 AM PDT by Pining_4_TX
Patricia Reid is not in her 70s, an age when many Americans continue to work. She is not even in her 60s. She is just 57.
But four years after losing her job she cannot, in her darkest moments, escape a nagging thought: she may never work again.
College educated, with a degree in business administration, she is experienced, having worked for two decades as an internal auditor and analyst at Boeing before losing that job.
But that does not seem to matter, not for her and not for a growing number of people in their 50s and 60s who desperately want or need to work to pay for retirement and who are starting to worry that they may be discarded from the work force — forever.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
I’m a licensed electrical contractor and I do not have to cover myself with workmans comp. Gotta cover the employees though but not myself. Being a contractor might be the difference. Also in my state you must be a licensed electrical contractor to offer your services as an electrician. All building contractors and also owner builder must use a licensee. Can’t pull a permit without it.
Have you contacted major churches in your area? In my rural community, there is a Catholic Church that rents its licensed commercial kitchen for these sorts of businesses.
Check around. Recently, one of our community organizations set up an incubator to accommodate three separate new startups all of which are producing different fermented foods for wholesale.
A third possibility would be a struggling restaurant. They might be willing to rent their kitchen on Monday, or whatever day they are usually closed.
Registered dietitians I have known are hired by certifying organizations to travel around and check out commercial kitchens. Maybe you can find a retired or unemployed dietitian to partner with you as a consultant on all the ins and outs of commercial production.
I'd have some tough thinking to do. What business do I get into? What "life" things do I give up in order to have the time required to run a business on the side? How do I handle customer needs that come up while I am working my regular job? I'm not good at sales and marketing, so how do I manage getting help with those things? So far, I haven't been able to solve those problems.
Self-financed, no long term debt.
Except for my emergency fund and my retirement funds, I don't have ready cash. I'm not willing to empty either fund to risk it all starting a business. Unless I can find something I want to do that doesn't require much initial investment (and I haven't found anything yet), I'd have to get a loan.
I’m in Massachusetts, at the bottom of our permits we have to sign under the penalities of perjury that we have both liabilty & workman’s comp or get Harry Homeowner to sign a waiver.
If you’re one of three bids but only you want the waiver signed - do you think you’ll get the bid in Mass, not likely - just pay the insurance (Again being the business owner you can never file for yourself) and move along.
Something in which you have a passionate interest, and really like. Because you are going to be doing a lot of it. If you do not like the work, you should not start a business, because then such a business becomes a job, and not a very good one.
What "life" things do I give up in order to have the time required to run a business on the side?
Whatever it takes. Sounds trite, but if you cannot invest money, then you have to invest time. Preferably both.
How do I handle customer needs that come up while I am working my regular job?
I did it nights weekends and holidays. I found that I was SO GLAD to have customer needs that it did not really feel like disagreeable work.
Since I was working and making a living when I started I did not need the business sales revenues, so plowed them all back into the business. Equipment, inventory, advertising. If you do it this way you do not have to touch your savings or retirement or ever need a loan, until such time that you expand enough to need to meet payrolls. By then, you have made it.
The most honest answer I have:
I think the biggest thing people will agree about is "You have to WANT it." If it is merely something that sounds like a nice idea, you will not make it go. It's hard work, lots of it. By the time my career ended I was working over a hundred hours a week. And I am glad I did. Because when the career ended, the lifeboat was almost ready. The first year was awful. The next one was bad, but bearable. The next one was nice. The next one was really good. This one is better.
If you think you hate taxes and health insurance costs now...haha. Just watch.
To start a business without a loan. If you create an S Corp for yourself. You then “sell” the corp stock to yourself in your IRA retirement account. This lets you self-fund your company without paying any taxes on a withdrawal from your retirement acct. As your business succeeds, the business then pays dividends to your IRA, (the business deducts it as an expense) and it is not taxed as income until you take it out of the IRA as a distribution.
Which means I lose what little security I have in my retirement account. No thanks.
As your business succeeds. . .
That's a huge assumption, especially in the current economy.
I think that's the problem. I highly risk averse when it comes to my financial security. The idea of trying to fund the start of a business at my age scares the heck out of me especially since I'm going to need help right off the bat with marketing and sales. I positively hate doing those things and have absolutely no apptitude for them. If I have to do them myself, I know the business won't get anywhere.
So I think you are right. If you don't have the "passion" for starting your own business, forget it. You can't just do it because you got laid off.
That’s what I’m doing. Scr3w it! If you can’t find a job, make one.
I was self-employed for years before I took a job (and lost it in a general cutback within a year). I figure that the economy is about a screwed up as it can get and will have to start looking up after the mid-term elections. Catch the recovery wave.
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For the Unemployed Over 50, Fears of Never Working Again
“
What a shock.
We have a President that hopes to ENSLAVE as many Americans as possible
to handouts from the Federal and state guvmints.
E.g., people over 50 and new university grads.
What a shock.
From a President that’s a Marxist/Communist/Socialist (take your pick).
Trying to start an undertaking that is demanding when you are thrown off balance and at a disadvantage puts a great pressure on the business to be able to pay you a salary when it really cannot afford to, and grow at the same time.
Some people claim this is one reason that so many small new businesses fail.
Then there is the motivation thing. Being starving is motivating, of course, but many proverbial "Starving" artists die poor. You have to have something YOU want AND something a lot of other people want for it to work.
But with enough motivation, anything can be made to work. Even those pyramid sales things, if one is willing to use and alienate every friend and relative they have in the process. That these organizations succeed is probably because everyone at one time or another thinks, "I'll start my own business and tell them to shove it!"
That said, I am not speaking as a "Success". I am getting by, and that will have to be good enough. Squinting at the crystal ball, I do NOT see a fifty foot Bristol Cruiser or an Aerostar in the future, ever. I am just a struggling jerk in a home workshop.
Health insurance? I just read about it, mostly. Can't afford it for a family of six. On the rare occasion that one of us has to see a doctor, we pay out of pocket.
Fortunately, we're a healthy bunch, and rarely have accidents.
I’m 50 and out on disability right now. My plan, when I’m able to return to work, is work for myself. I was a legal secretary, but I’m also a notary public and loan signing agent, so I’ll register with the local mortgage companies - loan signing work pays $150-200 for about 1-2 hours work. Most loan signing agents are turning down work - especially if it’s evening or weekend work (which I’m willing to do).
I’m also going to go back to work as a collectibles dealer, which I did for about 10 years back in the 1990s. I still have all my contacts, etc.
Between those two things, I should be okay, money-wise.
Well, you at least have a second source of income, even though it's not what you need to make. Perhaps it's time to think about building a small home business to fill in the rest of your lost income.
As far as jobs are concerned, we 50-somethings are definitely at a disadvantage in the market. You've almost got to have some unique or highly sought after skill (or personal quality) to be seriously considered by a prospective employer. Sales is an area where our age is actually a plus.
Someday you'll be 50+ and you'll reap what you're sowing.
Karma's a bitch that way.
I’m not sowing anything, but the article implies that 50 somethings can’t get “any” jobs. I know some way older Americans still working.
I think that for anyone of any age being unemployed in this economy is a terrible thing.
There's a marked difference between still working and those who are over 50 and have lost their jobs having difficulty finding a new job.
Don't know if you've looked at Yahoo or the Wall Street Journal websites today, but both had extensive articles on the difficulties that those who are over 50 are having in finding jobs once they've been displaced from their old jobs.
If you're over 50 and currently working, count your lucky stars because if you lose your job it may be a very long time until you find another, if you manage to find one at all...
That's the point.
On that point we will most certainly agree. It's really tough out there. I thought it was tough in the early 80s when I graduated college and had a hard time finding a job. I can't imagine what some people are going through right now trying to find employment..
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