Self-sufficiency

Many people believe that America was founded and succeeded with a lot of grit, hard toil with diligent labor, and a benevolent helping hand from our Great Provider.  While this is ultimately true for the most part, it didn't start out that way as the Pilgrims upon creating the Plymouth Colony in 1620, were seeking to create a socialist utopia in which all shared equally in a communal society in which the population joined together in growing crops, hunting, washing, feeding, child rearing, and creating shelter.  While on the surface this seems to be a formula for equality and justice, in practicality, the Pilgrims were barely able to sustain themselves, and so in 1623, as chronicled by William Bradford, the land was divided up into parcels and each family was given dominion over its own area and its progeny.  Bradford wrote: "This had very good success; for it made all hands very industrious… The women now wente willingly into the feild, and tooke their litle-ons with them."

The primary reason the Pilgrims went from starvation to a successful and striving community is that they now had incentives to take responsibility for their own welfare, for their own success, and the impact of their success or lack of, would be immediately noticed in their bellies, in their family, and on their property.  On the surface, it seems fair, that all of God's nature should be shared equally but when you find that your hard work is being shared with peoples that have done nothing to contribute to it, and have no interest in doing their part, despite their capacity to do so, your work ethic, your desire to push yourself through dangerous conditions, bad weather, or poor health, is severely diminished. 

On the other hand, give a man an incentive, gave a man 'skin in the game', and you will see the mark of that man.  Yes, not everyone is capable of doing certain work because of their health, their mind, their abilities, or their age, but each person is capable of doing something of worth.  For instance, on a farm, children are quite capable of milking cows, collecting eggs, and tending the vegetable patch, while older adults can cook, give wisdom, and sew.   Teamwork consists of various members working together for a common goal or purpose.  When you are responsible for your own success, when you know that it is you that must answer the call, you will do so, tired or not, strong or not, hungry or not.  You will do so because you know the consequences for repeated failure and this is something that you will make all efforts to avoid.

America has fallen far away from its ideal of self-sufficiency.  Certainly, if you tell virtually anyone, even those that have to date worked hard, have high intelligence, or are diligent, that you don’t need to do a thing, you don't need to study, you don't need to push or test yourself, that 'daddy' or 'mommy' or 'big government brother' will take care of anything and everything for you, this will change you for the worst.  This will put you on a path of complacency and laziness, and when you find that the silver spoon has been taken or wrested away from your mouth, you won't have a clue what to do except perhaps to have a temper tantrum and hope that the world will continue to cater to you.

Rights

President Obama and his minions would have you believe that each of us has rights which are not inalienable, that is to say are not God-given but Government-given.  Because these "rights" are government provided, it also means four very important things:

1.      The government can arbitrarily give as well as arbitrarily take away your rights

2.      The government has the right to tell you what to do and how to behave and the government can change its mind about these rights at any time

3.      Your inalienable rights are superseded by government rights

4.      Government is your god, and there is no god but government

The falsehood and fallacy of the above can be demonstrated easily, our Declaration of Independence in which we the people declared our freedom from King George, was created to overthrow a tyrannical government and to assert that when our inalienable rights were oppressed and taken from us that the governed had the fundamental right to rebel against this said authority.  In short, the purpose of legitimate government is to protect our inalienable rights, not to subvert them.

When the President declares in regards to health care that "…it should be a right for every American," he is wrong.  When the President declares in regards to wages that "… in the wealthiest nation on earth, no one who works full-time should have to live in poverty, and raise the federal minimum wage to $9.00 an hour," he is wrong.  When the President declares in regards to housing that "Congress should give every American the chance to refinance at today’s low rates," he is wrong again. 

President Obama is wrong about health care because your liberty and your life will no longer be sovereign to yourself, but instead will become sovereign to the government.  Your freedom of choice will be compromised; medical costs and premiums will rise because of an unnecessarily bloated bureaucracy and mandated inefficiencies, restrictions will be implemented, demands will change based on corrupted incentives, poor health lifestyle choices will be perversely rewarded and subsidized by those who make good choices, and medical personnel will bow to the government and not to the Hippocratic oath. 

President Obama is wrong about the minimum wage because he suffers from the vision of "good intentions" but fails to recognize that businesses operate with a profit incentive.  When minimum wage salaries are increased as mandated by law, those that do not produce in labor the value of that wage will be terminated, therefore the very people that Obama purports to help are the people that are fired or will no longer be hired.  Instead, the bar to become employed will be raised higher and only those that merit the minimum wage as mandated will be employed; in addition, private business management will take steps to reduce minimum wage numbers in aggregate by replacing workers with machinery and taking tax advantage of capital investments in lieu of raised labor costs.

Finally, President Obama is wrong about housing.  The housing fiasco occurred for several reasons, not least of them, the congressional charted corporation (Freddie Mac) and the chartered government-sponsored corporation (Fannie Mae) in which as reported by the Atlantic: "Of the 19.2 million subprime and low quality loans that were on the books of government agencies in 2008, 12 million (about 62%) were held or guaranteed by Fannie and Freddie."  In which the taxpaying public is stuck with losses from subprime mortgages which are estimated at $250 billion.  The chance to refinance is not a congressional responsibility, but the responsibility of the borrowers' income, credit rating, and the price of the housing in question.

Lastly, it would be wise to remember that rights from governments, come and go, inalienable rights that come from our Creator do not.  Also, "a government big enough to give you everything you want, is a government big enough to take away everything that you have."   

Prisoners living well

According to povertyusa.org "more than 46 million Americans are living in poverty", yet somehow we have the means to provide prisoners shelter, food, and medical care--free of charge to the imprisoned person.  Boingboing.net reports that Victor Conte a former musician with the Tower of Power served four months at the Taft Correctional Institution, a privately-run minimum security federal prison in which he stated the following: "The first morning, when I woke up it was a kind of university-campus like setting…" and "I looked over I saw the rec center. And I walked over to that and looked in and there were six pool tables, six foosball tables, six ping-pong tables." "There's no fences around the place, about every 200 feet they have a sign on a stake that says 'Out of Bounds.'"

Further, as reported by the ACLU, "Prison officials are obligated under the Eighth Amendment to provide prisoners with adequate medical care," and that "Restrictions on prisoners’ access to publications cannot be arbitrary; they must be “reasonably related to legitimate penological interests.”"  While there isn't any doubt that prison conditions will vary widely from city to city, state to state, and jurisdiction to jurisdiction, the above serves to demonstrate that prisoners have Constitutional rights and further that prisoners have organizations that help to support them in receiving access to those rights.

But the right to something implies also an obligation to that right.  Prisoners in America are given free room and board, but what do they contribute in return for this largess which comes from the taxpayers in America?  Prisoners cannot be legally compelled to work or to do anything of merit while incarcerated, and while America has an obligation to be humane towards those that are imprisoned, a fair prison system would provide the means for prisoners to "pay their keep" while incarcerated, subject to a governing review for extenuating circumstances such as mental health, physical health, and disabilities.  Additionally, the original intent for prisons was for those imprisoned to pay penance for their crimes, both spiritually and physically.  Today, that sentiment for the most part seems to have been thrown out the window and prisons appear instead to be nothing more than a way to take certain peoples off of the street and away from the general population; meaning that monies spent on prisoners is mainly money spent in order to have the convenience and safety of not having to deal with them on the outside.

Still none of that answers the question as to why or how people that are incarcerated do not have to carry their own weight while in prison.  That being the case, you can make a very strong argument that all victimless crimes in which as part of your punishment you have been incarcerated, that these prisoners should be immediately released.  (Some examples of victimless crimes are drug usage, prostitution, and gambling, in which the overriding principle is if there are no unwilling participants there are no victims to protect or that have been violated.  Instead, you are imprisoning people for 'the crime' of treating their body and/or their mind as their own.) 

According to libertariannews.org their September 29, 2011 article stated: "Roughly 34% of all prisoners in the U.S. are incarcerated for victimless crimes."  There isn't any good reason why we as taxpayers should pay to keep these people in prison, since they have harmed nobody but themselves.  Taking this first major step in prison reform by releasing those presently incarcerated for victimless crimes will then allow us to better concentrate our reforms on the other criminal inmates to come up with meaningful solutions that are fair to the public, the prisoners, and especially to our good citizens whose only 'crime' is being impoverished.

Closing your eyes for concentration and a little more

It just seems natural for me to close my eyes when I'm in the process of lifting weights while exercising, or if I'm having difficulty I close my eyes to help unscrew that annoying jar top, or if I'm thinking about a problem in which I'm puzzled, but it also intuitively seems strange.  We count on our eyes for so much, to take in visual information, to know where we are going, to see what is around us, so that to give up vision, even temporarily, in order to accomplish something doesn't seem initially to make much sense, yet closing your eyes seems to be necessary in order to get certain things done, as if you need that extra effort, that extra concentration, to help push you across that finish line and get that problem resolved.

The main reason for closing our eyes to improve our concentration has got to do with the fact that vision brings us a multitude of information, in which while working on the particular problem at hand, we don't need our eyes open continually in order to complete that task.  For instance, the weight is heavy enough already, we have a good grip, and we just want to lift it up; we don't need nor do we desire seeing other objects in our peripheral vision, not until we've actually lifted the weight and are now bringing it back down.  With our eyes open, we appear weaker, and therefore we close them intuitively, feeling that we're better able to perform and to concentrate on the task at hand. It's the exact same weight with our eyes open or with our eyes closed, but the task is accomplished easier with our eyes closed.

That leads us to a general premise, that just because you have your eyes closed while listening to a lecture, you aren't necessarily tuning the lecture out, you may in fact be tuning the lecture in to absorb it better.  Yes, you may miss out on some pertinent visual cues, but more importantly you are probably not being distracted by visional items that are taking your attention away from the lecture.  Closing your eyes allows you to get engrossed in the task at hand, to reduce the multi-tasking that your brain is processing and to stay focused on the real point.

Taking this premise further, one would think that people born blind, are more capable at processing and understanding speech and Scientific America confirms this by stating: "Blind people can easily comprehend speech that is sped up far beyond the maximum rate that sighted people can understand." Further they state: "Vision is such an important sense for humans that a huge portion of the brain is devoted to visual processing—far more gray matter than is dedicated to any other sense. In blind people all this brain power would go to waste, but somehow an unsighted person's brain rewires itself to connect auditory regions of the brain to the visual cortex."

The above study is absolutely fascinating and demonstrates that something as important as vision, which we use every day has its flip side.  Great yogis' understand this and that is why their eyes are typically closed in joyful meditation in order to envision the radiance, the divine eye of God, and our Bible propounds this further in John 1:1: "In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God, and the Word was God."  The Word can only be one thing, the Divine Consciousness spoken into each one of us.

Bombing

First off, I will admit that I'm in general agreement with General Patton who believed that the object of war was to let "…the other poor dumb bastard die for his country," and I'm sympathetic in principle to the Rumsfeld Doctrine in which the thought is that a combination of superior high-technology information used strategically with advanced weapons systems and overwhelming air power, would best allow us to accomplish our military objectives without putting in harm's way an abundance of our ground troops and thereby would keep our fatalities and war injuries to a minimum while accomplishing the goal(s) at hand.

Having said this, one of the major problems with being so technically adept and so technically advanced, is that it becomes easier to not see the enemy as fellow human beings because the physical distance between us is so great in modern warfare.  Additionally, soldiers are indoctrinated to not see the enemy as anything other than targets, combatants, they, them, and of course there are plenty of racist terms to dehumanize the enemy combatants further.  Further, soldiers are instructed that they are the good guys and that they and they alone are fighting for right, justice, and the American way.  In the world of war, there isn't any room for nuance, it's often broken down into the basics of a kill or be killed scenario and soldiers on the ground directly experience the complete ramifications of deadly force and its effects and aftereffects while doing battle.

However, up high in the air the view of the enemy is far different and the higher you are the more surreal the ground, buildings, countryside, people (if you can even see them) appear.   (I've been to the top of skyscrapers and when you look down at the people and automobiles below, they don't seem real, even though you know that they are.)   The height that you are at, changes your perceptions, and things that you might not normally consider, are far easier to consider, and unless you or your country is held accountable for its actions, you will make decisions that appear valid on the surface but are far from it in reality.

Bombing is a shortcut.  Instead of boots on the ground, infantry, artillery, and other important armaments, why not make a surgical strike to decapitate or to effectively destroy your enemy's military-industrial complex.  The first problem is that it usually can't be meaningfully done without significant collateral damage, that is to say, without killing innocent civilians, destroying private property and taking out institutions that are necessary for the normal intercourse of human affairs.  Killing civilians should be a last recourse, especially by a country as military adept as we are, and that prides itself as being known as the land of the free.  It shouldn't be a crime to be born in a country that in some sort of way or manner is at 'war' with the United States, and you as a resident of that enemy country shouldn't have to pay with your limbs, your livelihood, your blood, your sanity, or your life.  America is better than that and should be held accountable for that.

Technology keeps getting better and better and sophisticated drones that put no American in danger makes it even easier for a military technician to push buttons, move military pieces, and to drop bombs on designated targets against certain countries, wreaking havoc and destroying lives.  Our greatest general and two-term President who knew war far better and more intimately than virtually anyone else alive today said in 1953: "Every gun that is made, every warship

launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed." President Eisenhower

The forty hour work week

In the present day, the forty hour work week is the norm in the United States but it hasn't always been that way.  At the beginning, life in America was life in the wilderness in which you, your family, and your society worked as many hours as were required in order to provide food, shelter, and to survive.  Back then, this was primarily an agrarian society, a farming society, in which the overriding concern was subsistence and an attempt to create a stable life on the land that you worked and developed.  Over time, however, America became industrialized and it became quite common for people to work for someone else other than family because the efficiency of farms had reduced the needs for labor and the price of land was unaffordable for most, therefore people gravitated towards jobs that would pay them a wage. 

While those jobs entailed working long hours and often under arduous conditions, the average standard of living for Americans increased steadily during the industrial age to wit that people ate better, were clothed better, lived longer, and were able to afford more goods in which thanks to industrialization, competition, and market forces; goods were priced competitively and often cheaper than in previous time periods. The hours that the average American worked in the 1830s was estimated by the Week Report to be 69.1 hours per week, and by 1900 scholars estimated that it had dropped to just under 60 hours per week.   

Near the start of the 20th century, Henry Ford, of the Ford Motor Company, in 1914, more than doubled the pay of his assembly line workers from $2.34/day to $5/day (this pay encompassed a base pay, a bonus, and character requirements), and decrease the hours worked per day from nine hours to eight hours. Far from being altruistic, the pay increase on Ford's part was a necessary move and brilliant way to slow down his costly turnover rate in personnel, Ford's gamble was that a more than fair salary would encourage a more stable workforce and therefore ultimately provide his company with additional profits and growth, in which he got both as well as the public benefiting from the price of the Model-T dropping after the aforementioned pay raise!

Henry Ford than followed this up in 1926 with the forty hour work week.  It was Ford's belief that in return for a reduced work week his employees productivity would actually increase and Ford said: "just as the eight hour day opened our way to prosperity, so the five day week will open our way to a still greater prosperity."  While Ford Motor was not the first company to go to a five-day work week, they were the largest company heretofore to do so and became an industry and trend leader by accomplishing this important change.  Under FDR, the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 passed, which established minimum wage standards, overtime pay, and the forty hour work week which is still the standard that we adhere to today.

Is it time for our labor laws or our visions of prosperity to be revisited?  Henry Ford said: "we try to pay a man what he is worth and we are not inclined to keep a man who is not worth more than the minimum wage." Ford also said: "business is the exchange of goods. Goods are bought only as they meet needs. Needs are filled only as they are felt. They make themselves felt largely in leisure hours."   

Forty hour work week?  Eight hour work day?  For change to come, it's going to have to come from a huge market leader thinking outside the box and being bold.

Supreme Court 5-4

One of my favorite quotes and I don't know who to attribute it to and I'm also paraphrasing it goes something like this: "If the law is so straightforward, why is it that five Supreme Court Justices have to teach the other four Supreme Court Justices the law every year."  Not only is that true, what is also true, is that Supreme Court Justices will overturn cases with similar circumstances at different times, or simply make new law which is not in keeping with previous precedents.  This makes it rather problematic for us to blindly follow the law.

For instance of the former, in which the basic legal principle is "stare decisis" which roughly translates into "the decision remains", we will take the case of Plessy v. Ferguson of 1896 in which the Supreme Court overwhelmingly ruled (7-1) that the Louisiana state provision that mandatedracial segregation in public facilities was in fact, constitutional.  This was overturnedby an unanimous Supreme Court in 1954 in Brown v. the Board of Education in which it was declared that "separate educational facilities are inherently unequal" because they violated the 14th Amendment Equal Protection Clause.  Yet, the 14th Amendment was ratified in 1868 and Justice Brown writing for the majority in the Plessy v. Ferguson decision specifically stated that " The object of the amendment [14th] was undoubtedly to enforce the absolute equality of the two races before the law, but, in the nature of things, it could not have been intended to abolish distinctions based upon color…"   While, the Justice Brown majority decision of 1896 reeks of absolute hypocrisy, that was the law of the land until 1954 and those that tried to violate the "separate but equal" clause that Justice Brown affirmed, paid the price with jail time, beatings, discrimination, and a lesser status in their own country.

For an example of the Supreme Court making new law, we need not look further than the infamous Miranda v. Arizona of 1966.  It is upon this case, the 'Miranda warning,' was created.  Chief Justice Warren wrote: "In order fully to apprise a person interrogated of the extent of his rights under this system, then, it is necessary to warn him not only that he has the right to consult with an attorney, but also that, if he is indigent, a lawyer will be appointed to represent him... Once warnings have been given, the subsequent procedure is clear. If the individual indicates in any manner, at any time prior to or during questioning, that he wishes to remain silent, the interrogation must cease."  This later was summarized and became known as the Miranda warning which is familiar to anyone that has watched a Law & Order television program or has been arrested in the real world.  In the dissent of this 5-4 majority decision, Justice Harlan wrote: "To incorporate this notion into the Constitution requires a strained reading of history and precedent and a disregard of the very pragmatic concerns that alone may on occasion justify such strains."   The upshot being that prior to this Court's decision of 1966, the police were free to receive and act upon non-coerced confessions but after this decision, the police were mandated to provide appropriate warnings of both counsel and silence or that evidence was subject to being dismissed.

The law is not always right, even the Supreme Court gets it wrong from time-to-time, that's why every year five Supreme Court Justices have to teach the other four Supreme Court Justices the law.

Student loan Crisis

There are three basic categories of student loans that are outstanding:

1.      Students that have graduated

2.      Students that are in school and will probably graduate

3.      Students that are out-of-school, have not graduated and probably will never graduate

I just want to concentrate on #3, the students that have outstanding college loans and have not and will not graduate, although all three situations are in crisis, the latter one is especially troublesome.

First off, there is a misimpression that all students or nearly all students in high school should go on to get a higher education in order to best secure themselves a good paying job and future relevancy.  That policy is pure rubbish and does a great disserve to those students and to society at large.   Admission to college should primarily be based on students that are qualified to go to college and the most straightforward way to determine that is via standardized test scores, and grade point averages.  If a student has not excelled in either area, he is not qualified to go to college and should not be admitted until such time that he has demonstrated that his aptitude and proficiency has increased by improving his score to an acceptable level on a standardized test.  This policy is for the benefit or both the student and the college itself.

Unfortunately, that isn't the case for college admissions in America in which the qualifications to gain admittance to many schools are quite soft.  For instance, U.S. News & Report found that thirty-nine colleges accepted students at an acceptance rate of 99% or above for the Fall 2012 applications, out of the colleges that they surveyed. You might ask, what's wrong with a high percentage of students being accepted, after all, doesn't everyone deserve the opportunity of a higher education and the benefits thereof.  I disagree with that spurious thinking but for sake of argument let's say that I agree.  The problem then becomes two-fold when this happens:

1.      They fail to graduate

2.      They have massive student loans to repay

I have a good friend whose son has a student debt of $43,000 and in all probability will never get a graduate degree.  Fortunately, he is working, but since he is no longer in school, and six months have passed since he last was in school, he must make mandatory payments against his student loan, this despite having never graduated and in all probability never benefiting from attending college.  Nobody in their right mind would have loaned him $43,000, but somehow he was able to incur this debt.  How?

Part of his student debt comes from federally backed subsidized Stafford loans, part from unsubsidized Stafford loans, and finally part from federally backed Perkins loans.  The key word here is federal.  Essentially that means that you and I, the taxpayers are responsible for any defaults produced from these student loans and with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau estimating a total of 1.2 trillion dollars in student loan debt as of 2013 we have ourselves a serious crisis. 

Specifically, the question then becomes as to how long anybody with high student debts and no graduation degree will go before simply calling it a day and not paying their loan, or short-paying their loan, or negotiating forgiveness of their loan, or filing a class-action lawsuit, or all of the above and then some. 

$43,000 is a lot of money and if you feel victimized, as you probably justifiably should, the payback of all that money will simply never occur.

Plastics

There is that great seminal line in "the Graduate" which was released in 1967 as follows:

            Mr. McGuire: I just want to say one word to you. Just one word…..

            Mr. McGuire: Plastics.

            Benjamin: Exactly how do you mean?

            Mr. McGuire: There's a great future in plastics. Think about it. Will you think about it?

Everybody remembers that line: plastics.  But that line wouldn't be remembered and it wouldn't be true if plastics hadn't been such a profound and fundamental change in not only America but also all over the world.  Instead of paper bags when we get our groceries, it's often plastic bags.  Instead of glass bottles for our soda, it's plastic.   Instead of glass containers for food items, it's often plastic.  Our detergent containers they are in plastic.  Game consoles are plastic as is the packaging itself.  Plastic surrounds us and is often a major component of the products that we use, consume, and integrate with.  For better or worse, plastic is an integral part of our everyday life.

Plastic is favored because of its awesome versatility as well as its cost and despite justified criticism over its non-biodegradability and ubiquitous polluting problems it’s the right product at the right time and it's definitely here to stay into the foreseeable future because there isn't anything available to easily replace it with.  Therefore the better part of valor and realism is learning to deal appropriately and responsibly with plastics as compared to trying to legislate it out of existence with an ill-timed attempt to replace it with products that often will have the same issues of environmental damage and inconvenience but simply of a different flavor, along with the requisite increase in cost to the consumer at large for the switchover to products that are less versatile and cost more to produce in time and energy.

According to theguardian.com, Japan in 2010, recycled: "77% of plastic waste" which compares quite favorably to the United States paltry rate of just 20%.  The type of steps that America needs to take are similar to what has been accomplished in Japan in which the waste-processing plants work in conjunction with the manufacturers of the plastic material to best come up with solutions that are economic, recyclable, and practical.  Taking a longer term perspective and getting all parties to sit down at the same table is often more conducive to solutions that will be of a much greater net benefit for the public at large.  Consumers are only too willing to do their part to recycle plastic if properly educated and encouraged to do so.

As The Graduate put it nearly fifty years ago, plastics not only had a great future back then but they have a great future going forward.  We take plastics for granted in such common household items such as hoses, household plumbing pipes, cups, cell phones, toys, syringes, computers, and many others.  Plastics have help make our modern world a better place to live in and therefore the successful and prudent recycling of plastic at a much higher rate than currently heretofore produced, is a mandatory step for our continued enjoyment and our stewardship of our planet.

Home affordability

The most important material possession that you will ever own in your life is your home.   Your home is your castle, your sanctuary, and your own private domain.   How important home ownership is to you, depends upon the person, but I consider the ownership of your own property to be a fundamental desire and a universal right.

The Census Bureau reported a home ownership rate of 65.4 percent for the 1st quarter of 2012, but I would like to compare that percentage to the home ownership rate of Eisenhower's first administration which was about 55 percent.  That seems like a very nice percentage increase over the ensuing sixty years but that increase is very deceptive because the nuclear family has changed significantly over these last sixty years in the sense of duties and structure.

According to bls.gov the:  "share of married-couple families with children where both parents worked was 59.0 percent in 2012."  In 1953, that percentage would have been around 12.0 percent.  That is an increase of nearly 500 percent in sixty years.  Therefore it seems safe to assume that it takes in aggregate more overall labor to afford a home in 2012 than it did in 1953.   That isn't progress by any stretch of the imagination. 

However, we aren't exactly comparing apples to apples, since homes today are not the same as homes in the 1950s in the sense of size and often attributes.  In the 1950s the average home size in America was approximately 1000 sq ft, whereas the median size of a new home in 2010 was 2,169 sq ft.  What is puzzling is that during this time of increasing home sizes, the average size of an American family has declined from 3.59 per household in 1955 to just 2.63 in 2009.

Additionally, according to mybudget360.com the median income for 1950 was $3,319 with the median home price of $7,354 and the median car price of $1,510.  In 2009 those numbers were respectively: $52,029 for income, $197,000 for housing, and for your car $23,050.  So that we find in 1950 the median home price to the median income was a ratio of 221 percent, whereas in 2009 that ratio now sits at 379 percent which is a substantial increase.

With middle class budgets being stretch to the limit and with dual-incomes already achieved, what can be done to alleviate this overburdening of the American dream?  It would seem that the wisest thing to do is to create more housing which is smaller, denser, designed more practically for today's world, and also more cost efficient in regards to materials, in order to make that housing more affordable for our citizens. 

Buying a home is an important step in establishing yourself as a resident with roots within your community.  This financial decision has important and critical lifetime ramifications and therefore the decision should be carefully considered, discussed, and contemplated before the signing of the documents.  Housing is illiquid, and doesn't always appreciate, nor does it always keep up with inflation.  It is however a place to live, to make memories, and to enjoy.

E-cigarettes

My first real experience with e-cigarettes was going to a restaurant in which I saw a man 'light' up his e-cigarette and he began puffing on it as if he was in some sort of ecstasy.  He 'smoked' one and then he began vaping another.  I sort of sat in amazement watching him because we were in a non-smoking restaurant but nobody bothered him in any way.  Right then and there, I thought, with America in a totalitarian non-smoking attitude against cigarettes which seemingly prohibits smoking anywhere, anytime, at anyplace attitude policed by the Nanny state, that e-cigarettes are going to be absolutely HUGE.

As reported by CNBC, a top tobacco analyst projects sales of $1.7 Billion in the United States this year for e-cigarettes which an absolutely phenomenal growth rate considering that e-cigarettes weren't first introduced to the United States until 2007.  Additionally, cigarette ads have been banned in the USA since 1970, but e-cigarettes are not subject to that ban, so radio and television advertising has been allowed and utilized for e-cigarettes.  Also, e-cigarette sales are not subject to the "Tobacco Master Settlement Agreement" because they are not tobacco products, and neither are they therefore taxed as tobacco products.

The only real false step the e-cigarette industry has made is allowing their product to be labeled as a cigarette as that connotation brings some positives in the sense of name recognition, but that is largely outweighed by thehuge negatives such as cancer, dirtiness, disease, toxicity, and the like which cannot at this time be directly applicable to e-cigarettes.  E-cigarettes are a mixture of water, glycogen, chemicals, and often nicotine; and do not have tobacco, tar, or emit carbon monoxide in its mixture.

While the FDA is in the process of regulating the e-cigarette industry, one should expect some give and take, adjustments to their rulings, and length litigation to also take place.  The tobacco industry showed its moxie by coming to terms with their class-action lawsuits by settling their differences with anational legislated agreement which set the ground rules for their continuing business practices and in consequence the tobacco industry committed to paying a minimum of $206 billion over twenty-five years as part of their settlement.  With big tobacco on the cusp of a product with massive potential in both sales and in profits, and with each of the big tobacco players having already purchased an e-cigarette manufacturer and/or in the process of coming out with their own e-cigarette, one should expect a spirited debate between these companies and the FDA.

For better or for worst, e-cigarettes are staged to be a big player in the vice area of human desires.  While critics may rail against e-cigarettes, the Royal College of Physicians stated:

"Electronic cigarettes and other nicotine-containing devices offer massive potential to improve public health, by providing smokers with a much safer alternative to tobacco."  The choice of engaging with cigarettes or e-cigarettes, or foregoing them altogether is up to the individual.  The fact that a new product has come out that reasonably appears to be both cheaper and safer, while providing the smoker with something that gives him satisfaction is the type of choice adults should be able to make without government prohibition.

Death Tax

I just love calling the Estate Tax, the Death Tax, it just sounds so much more dramatic and somewhat sinister.  Benjamin Franklin said it best:  "In this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes."  The thing is for some of us death and taxes are in fact, synonymous, and since we know that we can't take our material wealth into the spiritual realm with us, and subsequently that taxes are a form of wealth redistribution and an agent used to help run government entities a tax upon our death seems on the surface to be quite fair.

As a reference point, in 2001, the Estate Tax exclusion was $675,000 with a tax rate of 55% above that amount.  After the passage of the American Taxpayer Relief Act of 2012, the Estate Tax exclusion was not only indexed to inflation but for 2013 the amount excluded was $5.25 million with a tax rate of 40% above that amount.  This is an increase of 777% since 2001 which is incredible, especially considering the massive deficits the federal government has been running over these same years.  To put it in further perspective, according to the WSJ Blog as reported by Robert Frank, in 2011, there are: "1,078,000 households worth $5 million or more." So the estate tax will not be affecting in aggregate very many households at all and certainly those that are subject to the tax can definitely afford to pay it and it would take a tremendous amount of imagination and outright distortion to state that somehow this Death Tax which doesn't even come into play until after $5.25 million has been excluded to imply that this tax is thereby "unaffordable" or "unfair" or "unmerited".

The biggest argument against Death Taxes is that since you have already been taxed on the money as you earned it any additional taxation is unfair.  While you could call it double-taxation when the monies that you have earned through a payroll-deducting salary are then taxed again upon death, there are other assets that are not taxed at all, until they are sold.  For instance, real estate and equities, if unsold, are untaxed, yet these are assets that can appreciate significantly over time so the only opportunity to tax them is upon your death when you are no longer the living owner of these assets.

Additionally, when it comes to taxation of your assets upon your demise, I would just say that during your life on earth, you were allowed to spend your money pretty much as you pleased, to get whatever value out of it, to utilize it any way that you desired, to appreciate it for what it got you, to increase it because often money makes more money, and perhaps you also showed great stewardship with it.  You've had your day with your money, but when the bell rings and your time here on earth is at its end, you should gratefully relinquish a portion of those monies to the country that you have called home. 

Ultimately, the Death Tax should be looked upon as if hitting the reset button on the computer of life.  Politicians, CEOs, Presidents, will come and they will go to be replaced by a new generation of leaders, so shall money be like the tides of an ocean.  Further, Frederick Lundberg warned us of the dangers of concentrated wealth in his seminal book, The Rich and the Superrich as follows: "So, concentrated asset-wealth not only brings in large personal incomes, but confers on the owners and their deputies a disproportionately large voice in economic, political and cultural affairs. Thus the owners may make or frustrate public policy, at home and abroad."

Therefore the Death Tax is an important and fair tax to ensure us that this doesn't become a country of the few and the privileged but a country that embraces life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness to all those who yearn to breathe free on our shores.

Corporations hide Taxes

Most employed workers have to pay payroll taxes from payday to payday, so your state (if applicable), federal, local (if applicable), social security and Medicare taxes are directly taken out of your paycheck.  For some people, this means that come tax season they might be due a refund for various reasons, but typically when you get a refund, you are merely getting back taxes that have already been taken from you, so you are simply getting your own earned monies back!  For other people, that didn't have enough withheld, or for other  reasons, they will instead have to  pay additional taxes on top of the taxes already withheld, while for others that aren't receiving a steady paycheck but perhaps making their monies thru dividends, there will be quarterly estimated taxes due.  In any event, if you work in America, there is a good chance that you are paying taxes to the Man, and that's the way it has been for a while.

Let's consider though publically owned for-profit corporations and their tax liabilities.    Corporations, for their own reasons, like to be considered legally to be people, in which corporations received this extraordinary ruling from the misapplication of a headnote to a Supreme Court Case of 1886, in which the headnote stated “Corporations are persons within the meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States.”  As they say, be careful what you wish for, as these types of dubious rulings can be dual-edge swords.  Corporations have benefited, profited and become more powerful because of this legal designation, allowing corporations the freedom of speech, or an undue and unmerited influence to lobby and undermine; corporations are able to defend themselves better against libel because their resources and power are nearly unlimited in regards to their legal powers and legal maneuvering as compared to their opponents who are limited and circumspect often due to their inabilities of  proper funding, time, and legal experience; and finally large corporations which have global footprints are often beyond the control and the powers of their own home national government and consequently corporations will set the national standards as to their own benefits and desires and therefore corrupt and compromise national sovereignty.

However, the IRS makes it clear in regards to the Foreign Income Tax Exclusion that "If you are a U.S. citizen or a resident alien of the United States and you live abroad, you are taxed on your worldwide income."   Instead, corporations hide their overseas profits through foreign subsidiaries in which these profits are taxed at either a significantly lower tax liability, or if the profits are held overseas they might not be subject to U.S. taxes at all.  The WSJ reported on March 10, 2013 that in its: "survey of new regulatory filings found that the total earnings held by the 60 companies' foreign subsidiaries rose 15%, to $1.3 trillion, from $1.13 trillion a year earlier".

There isn't any doubt that these truly massive and powerful corporations have the world's best lawyers, lobbyists, & accountants, and are expertly skilled at avoiding, delaying, hiding, and moving any corporate tax liabilities for their own corporate benefit.  It shouldn't be that way.  If they are people, as they previously have been legally defined, their tax obligations should be the same as the people's tax obligations and it is high time for America to throw down the gauntlet and therefore to bring back home more fairness to our tax code.

Consumption Tax

Most everyone is in agreement that our current tax code is confusing, unfair, corrupt, complicated, and woefully inadequate in doing its true job which is to collect taxes fairly without dubious tax dodging or special tax shelters for well-heeled individuals.  However, our current tax code with its assorted lobbyists, accountants, brokers, and lawyers is too well entrenched to be overturned or vanquished in the near future.  For instance, businessinsider.com reports from a chart created by The Tax Policy Center that in 2011 there were: "491,000 Americans who made more than $100,000 a year who paid no income tax."  With our country running massive deficits it would seem worth our while to take a look at other forms of taxation that might pull their weight and thereby provide us some leverage for needed tax reform.  My suggestion is a modest consumption tax to be applied forthwith,

The http://data.worldbank.org estimates that in 2011 the United States Final Consumption Expenditure was $13,323,400,000,000.  That is a massive number and if there was a consumption tax on everything that we consume or purchase such as homes, medicine, food, boats, phones, and automobiles, and we were to tax those items to the full estimate of our annual consumption at the rate of 2 percent, that would bring in estimated revenues of $266.5 billion.   I consider 2 percent to be a reasonable percentage in which it is high enough to produce meaningful revenue but low enough not to be an oppressive burden on the public at large.  No doubt, there would be an outcry for this industry or that product to not be taxed, or to tax some items at one rate and others at another, but for sake of simplicity, this is the 2 percent flat consumption tax, and this consumption tax should tax everything without exception and that would simply be the way it would be and people and businesses would eventually adjust to it--with perhaps both parties having to sacrifice some small part on either end.

Some would cry that this form of taxation is regressive, I would counter that it is fair.  A tax that offers no end-arounds, workarounds, and no dodges, and furthermore only taxes you when you consume or purchase something is reasonable.  A family that spends $100,000 will have to pay $2.000 in consumption taxes and a family that only spends $20,000 will have to pay just $400 in consumption taxes.  One family bought more and so they rightly pay more in aggregate, and the other family bought less and therefore paid less.  A consumption tax would also encourage a modest increase in our savings rate, since this tax is not applicable to people that save money, and with our savings rate having been in a downward spiral since the 1980s this is an important and needed step in the right direction for Americans when it comes to financial responsibility.

Finally, a consumption tax puts all Americans in the same boat, from coast-to-coast, from youngest to oldest, from richest to poorest, it is a form of tax democracy in which no favors are given out and no angles can be played.

Chinese in Africa

When I read about the truly massive Chinese investments into Africa, I wonder as to whether this is the new version of the colonization of Africa, or outright cronyism between China and oppressive dictators, or perhaps a lustful drive for the precious minerals and resources that Africa has in its possession.  China and Africa have historically not been trading partners, typically do not interbreed with each other, and when living together in the same country they are by design segregated from one another.

The United States has double the GDP of any other country in the world, and also has a long-standing, meaningful, and historic interest in Africa, but according to CNNMoney trade between China and Africa: "… hit $198.5 billion in 2012. By comparison, U.S.-Africa trade volume was $108.9 billon, and is slated to fall further behind: Research from Standard Chartered estimates that trade between China and Africa will hit $385 billion by 2015."  Africa is truly the final frontier in regards to growth, youthful population, and potential.  It is a continent that has abundant natural resources including: oil, gold, silver, and other precious metals.  While all Africa's resources have their importance, it's most vital natural resource to foreigners is oil.  The Chinese are there for a lot of reasons such as agriculture, mining, industrialization, but their most important and most urgent need is oil.

The United States was the #1 oil importer in the world, but its importation and consumption has been declining since 2005, while its production of oil has been increasing.  While China's production of oil has increased since 2005, this production has been falling far short of its consumption increase and therefore China's importation of oil has been growing and will continue to grow because China is a rapidly maturing nation developing at a high single-digit growth rate.  According to ABC news: "Chinese oil consumption outstripped production by 6.3 million barrels per day, which indicates the country had to import that much to fill the gap, the Energy Information Administration said this week."China's steady growth in oil demand has led it to become the world's largest net oil importer, exceeding the United States in September 2013,'" the agency said in a report."

There is little doubt that oil, the access to oil, and the extraction of oil is the economic engine of growth and often of war.  While China may have many good reasons for being in Africa and may be doing many good things for African nations, the Chinese are there primarily to get access to oil and to a lesser extent other precious minerals and assorted trading activities. You could probably say that China is in Africa because it's good for China.  Further, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration in 2010 China: "…imported 1.5 million barrels per day, or 30 percent" from Africa.

Whereas in America our President is African-American, and there are African-Americans in other high profile political offices, as well as there are African-Americans in executive offices at our largest and most prolific public corporations and throughout our society, the same cannot be said of China and its relationship with Africans.  For peoples of African origin in America, it has been a long, arduous, and difficult road of often uneven progress with sweat, bloodshed and tears from all parties, but the righteous light of true justice shines on the road for us ahead.

As Muhammad Ali famously quipped: "No VietCong ever called me nig..r". What say China?

Atheists and agnostics

I certainly can have some respect for someone that is honest enough to say that they don't know or they aren't sure whether God exists.  Although I don't agree with those sentiments, at least one can say that they aren't claiming omniscience; and by definition their mind is still open to accepting God as their Creator.  I do take exception, however, to those that command absolute knowledge to state the God doesn't exist.  Their position is nonsensical, egotistical, bull-headed, misguided, and a gross and deliberate misstatement of known fact.  In addition, atheists, in order to be true to themselves are compelled to the following moral guidelines:

1.      If God doesn't exist, then your creation came by the union of your mother and father, therefore they are your god(s).  Everything that you create, accomplish, and become must be done on behalf of your parents.  You owe them your allegiance, your protection, your faithfulness, your money, your labor, and everything that you create of value.  For things that you do that are negative, your deserved punishment by your parents shall be whatever that they deem necessary, be arbitrary or not, because you would not exist except for their creation of you.  Without your god(s) you would be void, nothing, non-existent, and therefore your creation mandates an unending servitude to your god(s).

2.      Upon your parents' death, everything that you do, accomplish, and create is owed to the State.  Your rights, even if limited rights, are provided by the State, and they are entitled to everything that you have earned without limit and without end.  Nothing is yours, since it is the State that gave you the rights that you have, it is the State that you will serve.  Failure to voluntarily provide everything to the State, even if unrequested, is your obligation to the State, to which all your rights have been created from.

I suppose one could then say, for those that believe in our Creator, that the same basic moral guidelines should apply to them as to the atheists.  But as Christians we are told to uphold Mark 12: "'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.'"The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.'"  In regards to our responsibilities as representatives of the State, fortunately our Declaration of Independence states that our rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness are unalienable Rights granted to us from our Creator and not by the State.  So the paths of Christians and atheists are not the same.  Being an atheist encompasses a far more stringent and more circumspect set of guidelines because their god is of this world and of this state, and thereby atheists must live up to that standard in order to be true to their professed creed.  Failure for atheists to uphold their obligations is a de facto admission that atheists hold themselves above their parents and above their State.  This cannot be so, because their creation was by their parents and their rights are by the State.  Atheists cannot be a law onto themselves, to do so, would be anarchy, hypocrisy, and apostasy.

Therefore all true atheists must bow their heads before their gods.  To not do so is truly an egotistical delusion.

Televising criminal trials

In today's modern world I believe that it is imperative that the public have the right to see that criminal trials are televised, subject to prior court approval,  proper decorum, and the rule of law.   Transparency is a net benefit to society at large and is an important foundation when interacting with public servants.  By law, our trials are public trials and what better way to present trials in today's world but by television.  Although I cite television as my preferred mode of viewing, I would also be a proponent of a radio broadcast, podcast, or even updates via twitter or similar.  I do believe that it's important to present criminal trials to the viewing public utilizing media that is cost-effective, prevalent, relevant, flexible, and easily affordable.

Having criminal trials available to the public will help to get the public more engaged in our overall criminal justice system in which most citizens are willfully ignorant of.  It's common to have City Council meetings televised, so it certainly isn't much of a stretch to be able to provide certain criminal trials in the same type of format.  Criminal trials need not be shown "live", they could be tape delayed, edited, or the such, as long as the interests of the public are served and kept foremost in mind than the results should echo those facts.  Therefore if there was a particular concern, for instance that the televising of a certain case might influence the jury in some way, form, or manner, the trial broadcast could be delayed until a verdict had been reached.  While that would certainly take away from the day-to-day drama because the case outcome would now be known, it would still attract interest from the general public, especially "armchair quarterbacks" and those that just have a certain fascination with trials that pique their interests.

Another segment of the population that would definitely have a vested interest in current criminal trial broadcasts would be lawyers, or law students, or the like.  Using broadcast criminal trial media, you would be able to get past the theory and get into particulars.  Debates between students or students and their Professor could be done in 'real-time' and would be very practical given the circumstances of their profession or professed profession.  In theory, the watching of real trials may whet certain students' interests, or for some, it might put them off and perhaps they would re-evaluate their life goals and direction.  The real world is not the same as something that you picture in your mind, or read in a book; the real worlds' nuances and drama are something that must be experienced in order to appreciate and comprehend.

Additionally, court cases and trials are a practical example of your tax dollars being put to work and importantly the application of constitutional principles in our everyday life.  The public has not just the right to know but the need to know and therefore should have access to know.  The barrier to entry to present criminal trials in some sort of media format has never been lower than it is today and therefore this is another valid reason as to why these trials and their availability must be a choice that informed citizens can avail themselves of.

Semantics

The Department of Defense, the Department of Homeland Security, the Uniting (and) Strengthening America (by) Providing Appropriate Tools Required (to) Intercept (and) Obstruct Terrorism Act (aka USA Patriot Act) are just examples of semantics that sell us the illusion that our government is all about protecting us, protecting the American Way of life, and providing us with life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

The United States Department of War was renamed the Department of Defense in 1949, but why?  To whom is the United States defending itself against?  I would submit: no one. Whereas, the United States and its proxies has waged war against several countries since 1949 such as North Korea, North Vietnam, Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, and a host of others.  None of these countries attacked the United States mainland and none had any real intention of doing so.  The Department of Defense is a misnomer and should be properly renamed the Department of War.  Our soldiers, our materials, our logistics invade other countries, that is war, not defense.

The Department of Homeland Security is something that sounds distinctly Orwellian but unfortunately is also absolutely real, in which the DHS submits that "…has a vital mission: to secure the Nation from the many threats we face." Incredibly, this essential department wasn't created at the time of Washington's first administration, but had to wait until 2002.  My goodness, how was the United States able to secure and protect itself against a myriad of threats and actionable offenses for so long without this department!  In fact, the DHS is a redundant bureaucracy, serving no useful purpose, and accomplishing little or nothing of merit, while violating the civil rights of its citizens and Constitution it has sworn to uphold and protect.  The DHS' ultimate goal is to impose upon its citizens a quasi-police state in order to best protect us from events that are unknowable, undefined, unseen, and ever changing in which every year homeland security is something that is perpetually unsecured. 

My most scathing disgust has to do with the Uniting (and) Strengthening America (by) Providing Appropriate Tools Required (to) Intercept (and) Obstruct Terrorism Act (aka USA Patriot Act).  This act which purports to combat terrorism is essentially another tool to monitor and surveil our domestic activities. I despise the Patriot act because of their misuse and misallocation of a great word: patriot, which has a profound historic importance in this land of the brave and home of the free.  A patriot is a man who stands up unstintingly for truth and justice as Clarence Darrow said: "True patriotism hates injustice in its own land more than anywhere else."  And G.K. Chesterton adds: "“My country, right or wrong,” is a thing that no patriot would think of saying except in a desperate case. It is like saying, “My mother, drunk or sober.”"  A patriot's purpose is to do and stand up for the right thing against all odds if need be.  A true patriot is a man of integrity, he is neither a summer soldier nor a sunshine patriot, and he is a patriot through-and-through.  A nationalist, however, will do whatever it takes in "defense" of his country because his country is always right, always just, and always best, even if all the evidence clearly demonstrates that this is not the case.

"Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!" Patrick Henry

Red light cameras

Communities are always trying to come up with creative ways to increase revenues and certainly on the surface one of the better ways is a system in which a machine takes pictures of vehicles that have run a red light.  This seems like both a valid safety device and a very profitable way to increase revenue because of the cost-effectiveness of the cameras, their accuracy, and the fact that you don't need to draw upon the resources of your police department.  Yet, this program has fundamental structural flaws which have resulted in pushback from drivers at large.

One of the most glaring annoyances of the automated red light camera scheme is that the photos produced simply shows images of your vehicle and its license plate but no images of the driver of the vehicle at the time of the violation.  In Georgia, the ticket is sent to the owner of record of the vehicle who is presumed to have been driving the vehicle, and although you have the right to dispute that you are not the driver, you must then as part of your defense identify the actual driver of the vehicle.  But what if the actual driver was your spouse?  Doesn't your legal spousal rights/privileges supersede an automated red light enforcement program?  I'm not sure of that answer but I find the thought to be quite intriguing.

The next problem with red light cameras is the fact that you are not actually ticketed by a human law enforcement officer in real time.  While city and state legislatures presume that their tickets have legal validity that may or may not be upheld by courts over the long term.  The main legal issues would be your right protecting you from self-incrimination, your right to due process, and the equal protection clause of the U.S. Constitution.  All of these may be valid against a traffic ticket issued without a law officer present.  The state workaround is shown, however, by the wording of the infraction itself.  For instance, in Georgia, the ticket states "the imposition of a civil penalty is not a conviction for any purpose, including: insurance rates.  Payment of a civil penalty is not reported to the department of public safety."  This pretty much gives up the game as distinctly indicating that the automated red light enforcement is all about increasing revenue and that the state knows that they are on a somewhat legally shaky ground.  To prove the point beyond any reasonable doubt, running a red light and being ticketed by an actual police officer would result in a 3-point penalty assessment against your driving record.

Additionally, there is the issue of the ticket being received by the owner of the vehicle.  When a driver is ticketed by a police officer, their signature on the ticket is proof positive that they received notice of the ticket and that they are the infringing party.  An automated ticket is mailed and because people move, travel, mail is lost, thrown away, and such, there isn't any guarantee that it was received.  Therefore, in Georgia it is mandated by law that the recipient of the automated ticket must be notified by certified mail or the traffic fine is uncollectible and invalid.

Finally, red light cameras were put into place ostensibly to improve public safety, and the fines were merely a means to pay for the equipment and to penalize drivers that infringed upon that public safety.  However, studies have consistently proven that by extending the length of a yellow light by one second and/or delaying the onset of a green light will do more to improve traffic safety than an automated camera.

By the way, a good friend of mine, got not one but two red light automated tickets, incredibly, at the exact same light although on different dates, $70 each, was never served by certified mail, and therefore never paid them, not that she had the money, and she is doing just fine. 

It pays to do a little research.

Pensions

What happened to pensions in the private sector which by 1960 covered nearly30% of all private employees?  They have primarily been replaced by Social Security and the 401(k) but that's not been a real good deal for employees.  Pensions are defined benefit plans with very specific rules and payments in which your employer makes a commitment to make those payments to you based on your length of service, salary, and some other miscellaneous factors.  Not only is this something that is specific but it is also definable, consistent, and understandable.

So presently we find that while payments from Social Security use a fairly straightforward formula, one's 401K is completely in the employee's hands.  You can contribute nothing or up to the legal maximum towards your 401K but in absence of any employer matching of your 401K, that contribution is essentially you saving money from your salary.  If your employer matches your 401K contribution it is often worth your while to try to maximize this contribution by contributing the maximum that you are allowed to put into your 401K in which you are receiving the same amount of monies from your employer as matching funds.  These matching funds are essentially the only monies that you will directly receive from your employer as part of your "retirement" benefit and your employer contribution will fall far short of providing you the type of financial benefits that you would have previously received under a valid and more preferred pension.

Perhaps one significant reason that pensions fell out of favor with corporations is that they found that their overall commitment to employees was no longer sustainable and in lieu of employee benefit plans they moved onto stock options, incentive bonuses, and the like in which the employer can maintain better control of the overall compensation and cost to the corporation.  Also, corporations wanted to maintain flexibility, durability and sustainability in which it was perceived that pension commitments took away from those options. Additionally, stock options and incentive bonuses were met with approval and appeal to the "I want it all right now" mentality in which employees are ensnared into a belief that with just the right moves at just the right time that they too can make a lot of money in a hurry, so why worry about tomorrow.

The employees that are benefiting most from pensions in today's world are government employees.  In particular, civil servants are not only able to earn wages that are comparable or typically higher than the private sector, they also have better job protection, and far superior defined benefit plans.  This hardly makes them servants in the true sense of the word as their overall pay package and benefits are simply superior on average to the private sector.  However, certain government pensions in numerous cities, counties, and some states have come under increasing strain in not being able to stay solvent or are running huge deficits to their pension commitments and payments.

Solvent pensions work best in cities in which there is a broad-base tax base, cities that are growing in both population and employment, and cities that are fiscally conservative.  Pensions do not work well in cities that are losing population and employment, suffering from a recession, or negative changes in their tax base, and cities fare poorly that have made fiscally unsound decisions based on pie-in-the-sky projections or worst.  In those types of situations, those that have counted on their pensions may just find how insecure their pensions are and suffer the consequences at an age in which they are effectively unemployable and on their own.