Hold Out

I am still an AARP hold out. I started getting direct mail from them before I turned 55. I am not convinced they are really in the corner of our senior citizens because I get way too much sales material from them. Are they a lobbying group or and insurance and credit card company? My friend Rodger is a member because he says the savings on AARP discounts with hotels and rental car companies are pretty good.

I was reminded of all this today when I stopped to get my car washed at the trusty Rain Tunnel at Rio Grande and Central. This sign is actually pretty funny to me. I will be sixty in about a month and will then enjoy a $1 discount from my car wash price tag. I am getting a dollar because I lived to be sixty?

Well, it is the thought that counts and little things like this might really be important before long. There are a lot of people who are going to need every penny they can get their hands on because private pension plans are underfunded and failing. I think it is mostly because of incompetence in the Business and Labor sectors.

I am a member of the Public Employees Retirement Association in New Mexico. It is the public employee retirement system for state, city and county employees and others. It is without a doubt a very good system and it is well funded. I have cobbled together 20 years of service under the system and that means at the age of 60 I can retire. It will provide me with a decent retirement check every month and a great survivor benefit for Bobbi if I check out before her. I could actually retire in January if I wish, but that is up in the air right now. I enjoy working with Bill Richardson. There is a good article on him in Salon.com today. See it here.

Government employees all over the country should be pretty thankful. Most government retirement plans are in a solvent state, so they will undoubtedly become a target for the right wingers who think only of their corporate bottom lines. Yes, their tax money helps fund these systems. Keep your guard up! They might shift their focus from Social Security to Government pensions.

This is Luisa Casso, one of my former sacrificial communications officers when I was Mayor. She is now the President of the Downtown Action Team and is one of those folks largely responsible for the creation of the Downtown Business Improvement District.

I had to chuckle when she made the comment that if she were to look for new challenges it would either be running for Congress or selling condos in Puerto Vallarta. Everyone should have options like that.