Thursday, January 12, 2012

Don't Begrudge My Pension--I Earned It



I was talking to a guy on the beach and I told him I am a retired teacher.  He told me I must be doing really well, living high and mighty on a big fat tax payer subsidized pension.  I told him I am living comfortably on money I worked hard for and saved.

This man owns his own business and two huge houses with swimming pools. He is staying in a penthouse suite with 4 other people.  He is paying for everything.

I don't begrudge him the money he earned.  He got it doing business with people like me, people who might have a little more if he only charged a lot less for what he did for them.  I didn't earn anywhere close to what he earns and my pension is not even close to his income now.  He, and others like him, shouldn't begrudge my pension now.  I contributed to it and earned it and I am entitled to what it buys me now.

(Pictured is what I am looking at as I post.)


7 comments:

Anonymous said...

FABULOUS POST- mind if I link it to mine? The point is made very well.

Anonymous said...

I wish we could take every businesman especially the mayor and put them in a classroom for an undefined amout of time. I am sure they would appreciate us after 1 hour!
I love my job too but am sick and tired of everyone thinking we are baby-sitters.

ChiTown Girl said...

Are you serious?!?!? What an assbag!! I hope you told him to fuck off.

Oh...wait...that's what I would have said.

Anonymous said...

Chi Town Girl- you definitely do not mince words..cool!

Schoolgal said...

Horrible on many levels. It was not necessary to try to you (teachers) down like that. And frankly it's none of his business.

zulma said...

If he's a business man, then he has the Bloomberg mentality - more for the rich or the 1% and let the 99% suffer and take away their hard earned money.

I'm with ChiTown. I would have said the same thing but in Spanish.

Enjoy your retirement; enjoy your life. Never allow anyone to make you feel uncomfortable about having a pension.

burntoutteacher said...

The week after I retired this past September, I was in my neighborhood bar/restaurant celebrating with my husband and some friends. It is a tiny place and the few patrons that sit at the bar always talk to one another. An older man caught my eye and congratulated me and then said something very very similar to what you were met with. He then said something about all that overtime I must have raked in as well. His buddy was aghast and said, "teachers don't get overtime and they work very very hard." The two started arguing about teachers and their salaries and their pensions and I was amazed at the misinformation that this one guy was operating under. When I finally told him what my pension is, after 23 years in the system and another almost 10 (non-pensionable) years teaching out of the system, he was shocked into silence. I told him that when I started teaching everyone had two jobs because the salary was so low. It is only the last few years that teachers have started to earn almost what they should. As we paid our bill and left I said to him, "Please don't believe all the negative hype you hear. Remember what teachers were viewed as when you were young -- we are still the same hard-working, selfless souls were were then -- but teaching has gotten infinitely harder." I hope he heard me. When did we become the reason for all the evil in the world?