FAA shares blame also

Stan Gosnell wrote:

I hope I can still be flying then. I don't even hope to be able to
retire before then. Social Security won't be enough, and my 401(k),
which is only a few years old, keeps going down in value, not up.
People who want to put their money into a private account rather than
Social Security need to really think about the possibility. Several
counties around here did just that with their employees, and those
retirees are in a real bind, with little or no retirement income.
They're just screwed.


Yes, being able to afford to fly later in life is the other component in
addition to health. My 401K has been rising since about 2002. You must
have some poor funds in your account. Mine took a big hit in the
2000-2002 time when telecomm collapsed, but it has since recovered to
more than its pre-bubble value. It won't hit what it peaked at during
the bubble prior to my retirement! :-(

I'm guessing maybe you opened your 401K at the market peak and then
sustained the downturn loses, but even so, you should be seeing
increases in value over the last year or so. If not, you need to
rethink your investment choices.

It would be a real shame to be healthy and have a medical at 75 and not
be able to afford to use it.


Matt

Matt Whiting wrote in
:

Yes, being able to afford to fly later in life is the other component
in addition to health. My 401K has been rising since about 2002. You
must have some poor funds in your account. Mine took a big hit in the
2000-2002 time when telecomm collapsed, but it has since recovered to
more than its pre-bubble value. It won't hit what it peaked at during
the bubble prior to my retirement! :-(

I have the funds available to me, through MFS, which are indeed poor.

I'm guessing maybe you opened your 401K at the market peak and then
sustained the downturn loses, but even so, you should be seeing
increases in value over the last year or so. If not, you need to
rethink your investment choices.

I opened it when the company offered it. My last statement showed
basically zero growth, even with max contributions. My investment
choices are severely limited by the company. I have them as diversified
is possible considering the poor mutual funds available.

It would be a real shame to be healthy and have a medical at 75 and
not be able to afford to use it.

I don't ever expect to be able to fly after I retire, unless my real
retirment fund kicks in (a lottery ticket). I can't afford to fly for
fun now.

--
Regards,

Stan

"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary
safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." B. Franklin

"Matt Barrow" wrote in
:


"Stan Gosnell" wrote in message
...
I hope I can still be flying then. I don't even hope to be able to
retire before then. Social Security won't be enough, and my 401(k),
which is only a few years old, keeps going down in value, not up.

Sounds like someone is speculating.

I'm reading the regular Social Security report I get. It tells me how
much I can expect to receive based on my contributions. Social Security
was never intended to provide a comfortable retirement, just enough to
eke by on.

People who want to put their money into a private account rather than
Social Security need to really think about the possibility.

Your retirement account is supposed to make its gains over several
years, not a "few" years. How diversified is your account and in what
ratios?

It's as diversified as I can get it, given the limited options provided.
I've followed Morningstar's recommendations to the extent possible. MFS
just provides ****-poor funds, and we have no other choices. I have some
other mutual funds, invested over a couple of decades, but they still
haven't recovered to the value of my original investments. Given 40
years of average growth, and my net gain will probably be a couple of
percent, if I'm lucky. And these are no-load funds.

--
Regards,

Stan

"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary
safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." B. Franklin

"Stan Gosnell" wrote in message
...
"Matt Barrow" wrote in
:


"Stan Gosnell" wrote in message
...
I hope I can still be flying then. I don't even hope to be able to
retire before then. Social Security won't be enough, and my 401(k),
which is only a few years old, keeps going down in value, not up.

Sounds like someone is speculating.

I'm reading the regular Social Security report I get. It tells me how
much I can expect to receive based on my contributions. Social Security
was never intended to provide a comfortable retirement, just enough to
eke by on.

People who want to put their money into a private account rather than
Social Security need to really think about the possibility.

Your retirement account is supposed to make its gains over several
years, not a "few" years. How diversified is your account and in what
ratios?

It's as diversified as I can get it, given the limited options provided.
I've followed Morningstar's recommendations to the extent possible. MFS
just provides ****-poor funds, and we have no other choices. I have some
other mutual funds, invested over a couple of decades, but they still
haven't recovered to the value of my original investments. Given 40
years of average growth, and my net gain will probably be a couple of
percent, if I'm lucky. And these are no-load funds.

My wife is the financial type in our family (16 years with Merrill-Lynch
before she "retired" to run our business), but she would probably recommend
minimizing your 401K contribution and go with an investment account (NOT
with one of the big brokerage firms) on your own. That's what we did, when I
got laid off in 1997 -- she rolled our account into a separate/private
account, mainly tied to index funds and some growth funds. Our returns since
have been very good and we "missed" the dot.com collapse in 2000.

Funny, I think, that being laid off has proven to be the best thing ever
happened to me.


Matt
---------------------
Matthew W. Barrow
Site-Fill Homes, LLC.
Montrose, CO

Stan Gosnell wrote:


I hope I can still be flying then. I don't even hope to be able to
retire before then. Social Security won't be enough, and my 401(k),
which is only a few years old, keeps going down in value, not up.
People who want to put their money into a private account rather than
Social Security need to really think about the possibility.

If I had the chance when I started working to put all my social security
money into the same funds as my FAA 401K I would do that in a heartbeat.
All Federal employees have the same 401K, called the Thrift Savings
Plan. All the funds are index funds. I would be so far ahead of social
security in the long run. If I was king I would eliminate SS and make
everybody take the same amount of money as they currently send SS every
month and invest it in the same 401K plan I have now. If you don't want
stocks you can pick our fund that isn't a stock or bond fund. It always
gives you 2-3% above inflation. That still would give you far more than
SS would.

Stan Gosnell wrote:
Matt Whiting wrote in
:


Yes, being able to afford to fly later in life is the other component
in addition to health. My 401K has been rising since about 2002. You
must have some poor funds in your account. Mine took a big hit in the
2000-2002 time when telecomm collapsed, but it has since recovered to
more than its pre-bubble value. It won't hit what it peaked at during
the bubble prior to my retirement! :-(


I have the funds available to me, through MFS, which are indeed poor.


I'm guessing maybe you opened your 401K at the market peak and then
sustained the downturn loses, but even so, you should be seeing
increases in value over the last year or so. If not, you need to
rethink your investment choices.


I opened it when the company offered it. My last statement showed
basically zero growth, even with max contributions. My investment
choices are severely limited by the company. I have them as diversified
is possible considering the poor mutual funds available.


It would be a real shame to be healthy and have a medical at 75 and
not be able to afford to use it.


I don't ever expect to be able to fly after I retire, unless my real
retirment fund kicks in (a lottery ticket). I can't afford to fly for
fun now.


That is too bad. I'm lucky in that my company gives us a pretty good
selection of fairly good funds from Fidelity, Vanguard and a couple of
others although we recently lost some good ones (Dodge and Cox, for
example).

Might want to think about a Roth IRA that you can self-direct.

A pilot not being able to fly after retirement is something that just
must be avoided! :-)

Matt

Matt Barrow wrote:

My wife is the financial type in our family (16 years with Merrill-Lynch
before she "retired" to run our business), but she would probably recommend
minimizing your 401K contribution and go with an investment account (NOT
with one of the big brokerage firms) on your own. That's what we did, when I
got laid off in 1997 -- she rolled our account into a separate/private
account, mainly tied to index funds and some growth funds. Our returns since
have been very good and we "missed" the dot.com collapse in 2000.

Hopefully, she wouldn't recommend minimizing (whatever that means) his
401K. She should recommend that he contribute to the 401K only enough
to capture the full employer match and then turn to a Roth IRA and max
that out before looking at other alternatives.

Matt

Newps wrote:



Stan Gosnell wrote:


I hope I can still be flying then. I don't even hope to be able to
retire before then. Social Security won't be enough, and my 401(k),
which is only a few years old, keeps going down in value, not up.
People who want to put their money into a private account rather than
Social Security need to really think about the possibility.


If I had the chance when I started working to put all my social security
money into the same funds as my FAA 401K I would do that in a heartbeat.
All Federal employees have the same 401K, called the Thrift Savings
Plan. All the funds are index funds. I would be so far ahead of social
security in the long run. If I was king I would eliminate SS and make
everybody take the same amount of money as they currently send SS every
month and invest it in the same 401K plan I have now. If you don't want
stocks you can pick our fund that isn't a stock or bond fund. It always
gives you 2-3% above inflation. That still would give you far more than
SS would.

Well, unfortunately, this isn't the case. If this was the case, then SS
would be in much better shape. The reality is that current recipients
of SS are getting MUCH more back than what they put in plus any
reasonably earnings. That is why the system is going broke. If it
weren't for the fact that it will go broke at some point, SS is a great
deal from an investment perspective assuming you live very long in
retirement.

Even so, I'd still rather have personal control of the money I put into
the SS system, but that is for reasons of security, not effective rate
of earnings.


Matt

"Matt Whiting" wrote in message
...
Well, unfortunately, this isn't the case. If this was the case, then SS
would be in much better shape. The reality is that current recipients
of SS are getting MUCH more back than what they put in plus any
reasonably earnings. That is why the system is going broke.

There are poeple who've recovered everything they put into SS within the
first five years of their "retirement".

If it
weren't for the fact that it will go broke at some point, SS is a great
deal from an investment perspective assuming you live very long in
retirement.

That's why it's appropriately called a _Ponzi scheme_.

Even so, I'd still rather have personal control of the money I put into
the SS system, but that is for reasons of security, not effective rate
of earnings.

If you don't have control of it, it's not YOUR money, or your property as
the case may be....it's called fascism (ie, private "ownership", but
governmental control).


Matt
---------------------
Matthew W. Barrow
Site-Fill Homes, LLC.
Montrose, CO

"Matt Whiting" wrote in message
...
Matt Barrow wrote:

My wife is the financial type in our family (16 years with Merrill-Lynch
before she "retired" to run our business), but she would probably
recommend
minimizing your 401K contribution and go with an investment account (NOT
with one of the big brokerage firms) on your own. That's what we did,
when I
got laid off in 1997 -- she rolled our account into a separate/private
account, mainly tied to index funds and some growth funds. Our returns
since
have been very good and we "missed" the dot.com collapse in 2000.

Hopefully, she wouldn't recommend minimizing (whatever that means) his
401K. She should recommend that he contribute to the 401K only enough
to capture the full employer match

That's what she means...minimizing contrabution to the 401 plan to maximize
tax benefits as an EMPLOYEE.

and then turn to a Roth IRA and max
that out before looking at other alternatives.

WIFE: "If he can't manage his own portfolio, that would be
advantageous...I'm too long out of the field to be up-to-date with the
current laws".

My wife manages ours through TradeStation -- her PC has dual monitors, one
of which has our account status going all day long.

As I estimate that Stan is fairly young, he should have a mix in his
portfolio weighted more towards growth than safety.


Matt
---------------------
Matthew W. Barrow
Site-Fill Homes, LLC.
Montrose, CO