Posted on 03/10/2018 7:11:58 PM PST by ilovesarah2012
In her powerful new book, “Nomadland,” award-winning journalist Jessica Bruder reveals the dark, depressing and sometimes physically painful life of a tribe of men and women in their 50s and 60s who are — as the subtitle says — “surviving America in the twenty-first century.” Not quite homeless, they are “houseless,” living in secondhand RVs, trailers and vans and driving from one location to another to pick up seasonal low-wage jobs, if they can get them, with little or no benefits.
(Excerpt) Read more at tiny.iavian.net ...
“We saw in the 1980s a shift from pensions to 401(k)s; that was a raw deal for workers. These retirement plans were marketed as an instrument of financial freedom, but they were really transferring risk from the shoulder of the employers to the backs of the workers.”
There is absolutely no reason for an employer to provide for your retirement. I’m just upset that Social Security was not voluntary, because had I been able to invest that money in a 401K I would have retired rich.
What I do object to is public employees getting fully indexed retirements with little or no personal contributions, and the ability to retire with full pensions before age 65 (here in CA cops and FFs get full retirement at age 50).
I am willing to listen to more than one opinion.
Great story! Just because someone doesn't follow a “conventional lifestyle,” doesn't mean it's a bad choice. It's probably not a good idea today, but we have acquaintances who retired early, and moved to a beach in Mexico. Down there, their money goes a long way.
A lot of these nomads were financially destroyed during the Obama adminisration. I don’t know any nomads but I do have a number of friends who lost homes and have no way of recovering from the catastrophy. They are just too old.
Exactly.
This is one of the things that I constantly ask my dad about, he’s in a retirement community.
I ask him all the time to have someone with no family to come share our table for a meal. He and his GF both tell me there are very few people with no family that comes to see them or have abandoned them.
That absolutely breaks my heart because I can’t imagine ever letting my parents or siblings be alone in that kind of hour of need.
“I observed so many older people who received no visitors.”
I worked in a geriatric facility in Des Moines, Iowa after leaving the military for about a year. I loved it. I loved being around seasoned citizens. Hearing their stories and probing them for what they thought about the world.
Old men sugar coat nothing. Old women sugar coat everything.
I would have stayed there longer if the money were better, but it was transitional work.
To your point, visitors were everything to the people there. And you’re right, many had no visitors at all.
It’s a rough road when you travel life alone....
This happened in the Reagan administration too. As soon as Reagan and Trump were elected, the press suddenly discovers homelessness and desperate people.
Retirement communities usually have structured activities and myriad opportunities to make friends. Anyone who is alone in such a setting probably wants to be.
True.
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Amazon is easily the most malevolent company on Earth.
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Sounds like the “retire at 55” crowd, after a few spending sprees.
Buying that big thirsty RV was really smart, right?
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That’s Funny...
It’s my plan as well.
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We had tons of “homeless” people with signs begging at the exits of Walmart and Sam’s Club until the middle of last summer. Now they are rare.
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It’s my wife and me against the world.
Nor are people on the road “full timing” anything new. My wife and I sold our home and hit the road for 4 nice years. When we wanted to move we did, but we tried to stay in one locale for at least two weeks in order to get a discount on the camping space. We knew folks who volunteered and worked along the way, but we did not have to. (Our next egg was growing in the market. And when it crashed, we held on until it recovered. The Trump market is something to behold. )
However, we sold the RV when we decided to settle back into a retirement community. The time on the road was a wonderful memory with many locations and friends. Not something I regret at all.
If it was the only way to make ends meet, I would accept this too, but like others have already posted, there are good and bad decisions, and even living out of an RV takes a little money. There were people in the parks who did odd jobs for the park to defray some expenses. I believe they were not unhappy to do this.
Nor are people on the road “full timing” anything new. My wife and I sold our home and hit the road for 4 nice years. When we wanted to move we did, but we tried to stay in one locale for at least two weeks in order to get a discount on the camping space. We knew folks who volunteered and worked along the way, but we did not have to. (Our next egg was growing in the market. And when it crashed, we held on until it recovered. The Trump market is something to behold. )
However, we sold the RV when we decided to settle back into a retirement community. The time on the road was a wonderful memory with many locations and friends. Not something I regret at all.
If it was the only way to make ends meet, I would accept this too, but like others have already posted, there are good and bad decisions, and even living out of an RV takes a little money. There were people in the parks who did odd jobs for the park to defray some expenses. I believe they were not unhappy to do this.
Isn't that just for Silicon Valley millionaires now?
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Robotic fastfood joints are springing up everywhere because of the steep increases in the minimum wage.
Soon there won’t be any “burger flipper” jobs available.
Before those increases, the front costs of robots were too high to be feasible.
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You were fortunate that you didn’t have any $10,000 breakdowns.
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