Wake Up, Washington! Securing Retirement

[Omaha Steve]

http://www.afscmeblog.org/2010/09/29/wake-up-washington-securing-retirement/?__utma=1.1847225545.1261531521.1276721935.1276731138.86&__utmb=1.2.10.1285807779&__utmc=1&__utmx=-&__utmz=1.1275745986.79.4.utmcsr=google|utmccn=%28organic%29|utmcmd=organic|utmctr=AFSCME%20member%20deaths%20on%209-11&__utmv=-&__utmk=164405183


September 29th, 2010

Americans should be able to enjoy a secure retirement after a lifetime of work. AFSCME is participating in “Wake Up, Washington!” Month to encourage Americans across the country to tell lawmakers to keep their hands off Social Security and to fix the nation’s patchwork private retirement income system.

A recent study by the Insured Retirement Institute reported that baby boomers say they were “afraid” that even after a lifetime of work they could not afford to retire and expressed “concern about outliving their savings and investments.” Soon-to-be retirees are right to be concerned – retirement savings have taken a huge hit with the crash of Wall Street, raising many questions about who will be able to retire and when.

That’s not right. Americans who work for a lifetime should be covered by a retirement plan that isn’t a gamble. Unfortunately, today a secure retirement is hard to find.

While many Americans in the last generation had pensions and thus guaranteed retirements, the number of workers who can count on pensions is rapidly dwindling. Corporate CEOs are padding their own exorbitant compensation packages and hoarding funds while taking pensions away from their workers and forcing employees into risky do-it-yourself investment schemes. Our nation’s 30-year experience with individual retirement accounts such as private 401(k)s has left retirees at the mercy of the stock market, as detailed in AFSCME Secretary-Treasurer Lee A. Saunders’ article, “America’s Failed 401(k) Experiment,” which is now on Huffington Post and Firedoglake.

FULL story at link.