Hank Kingsley

Grasshopper,
Not all eggs in one basket, and never eat from popcorn bag on neighbors lap in porno theater.
It's called deferred compensation, we all saved outside of that defined benefit. But a large part of our total compensation was directed there, we had no choice. If it had been in our Defined contribution, in our names, we'd be long gone.
Now that's TVM.

Hank
ne.

RetiredFTS

Sure am missing my 8/0/3/3 right now.

orvil

I'll play nice, Jawww.

I started on the B-scale. I served an almost 5 year sentence of B-scale right before we got rid of it. I didn't chase airplanes and upgrades. I lived simply, have no real hobbies, kept the same wife, didn't have children and saved with diligence. I've always had an interest in finance and trading. Eventually, I was a young captain on a shiny new airplane with expectations if a big, fat pension and million dollar plus lump sum payment. I didn't go into the reserves because I was sick of being in the military and I didn't think I was going to need the insurance or pension.

If anyone is going to be okay with the loss of pension, it should be me. That is, if I don't end up on disability. As of today, I'm just going to squeak by. Anyone else is going to be in big trouble.

With the loss of Braniff, Pan Am, Eastern, USAir, I tried to be prudent. I tried to learn from those mistakes. I tried to be pro-active in my investing.

You don't know what you don't know. Ask me how it turns out in about eight years.

badflaps

In the olden days, there were few places to invest, even real estate was cheap. DAL stock barely moved 2 points in months. Your CO. retirement was considered part of your pay package. Who knew?

BobZ

Your failing is in the presumption a lot of us old guys entered this deal a long time ago with a substantially less skeptical pov than yourself.

I knew the pension was a Ponzi on day one. I'm not alone in that group. We had entire subgroups in this pilot population who recognized what was what.

This is and will always be an unstable industry. Hopefully you won't end up divorced. Or experience base closures and contraction, or another 911, or another bankruptcy.

Or a career retarding or ending medical event.

Most of all, I hope you are not saddled with a CBA that behaved in a most determined way to trade away the value in your PWA without so much as lifting a finger to fight...and for peanuts. And even overtly acting against your best interest.

You know......I bet if we offered management to have you and all the next generation of pilots a 5 year pay scale that is half of what it is now, and with no PS..... Us old guys probably could have gotten our pension back.

RetiredFTS

I think we call this, "doubling down".

Jaww

Haha. No. I'm outta my element here Donny. Didn't mean to strike a nerve and obviously I don't have to experience to weigh in. I want us all to get ours and just wasn't getting it. Thanks for paving the road for guys like me. If they took the AF retirement away, I'd be hosed so I guess that makes me a hypocrite.

Hank Kingsley

I think the almost 50% pay cut put even the most prudent of us behind the curve. Learn, but most of all enjoy the time off.

RetiredFTS

I was fortunate enough to have the furlough occur in my first year with NWA. It recalibrated my ideas of making a retirement. But I certainly was excited about that multi-million dollar pension that was waiting for me 30 years down the road.

Scoop

Jaww,

No worries. You obviously touched a nerve with your original post but appear to be a quick learner. Many opinions on here and all are welcome.

Scoop