“The gov’t 1%’ers”, I like that description. Having a family filled with teachers, I have been arguing for years that they are the wealthy ones, not me. Even though I make significantly more than they do, I pay more in SS & Medicare tax, am limited in the tax advantaged 401k at work, and pay far more in income taxes.
They make less money now, but all the back loaded retirement benefits the accrue are not taxed at all and if the $25K or so in untaxed pension and health benefits were added to their taxable income, they would be howling like I do every year when I do my taxes.
Whats that stampede sound I hear! I think it’s the “1%” leaving New York and heading for a friendly southern Red State. We’ll be happy to have you all spending your money and creating jobs in our states.
At a MINIMUM each $40,000 per year worth of retirement benefits after age 60 or so has a present value of over $1,000,000. Probably a lot more than that since the benefit is guaranteed by the tax payer, there is little market risk to it.
The younger you retire the more you need to have socked away.
the taxpayers are going to have to tighten their belts some more to keep the public servants comfortably maintaining their millionaire status. Who would have thought the easiest way to becoming a millionaire in NY would be to get on the government payroll.