Posted on 02/23/2018 6:58:53 AM PST by daniel1212
CORONA, Calif.—Roberta Gordon never thought she’d still be alive at age 76. She definitely didn’t think she’d still be working. But every Saturday, she goes down to the local grocery store and hands out samples, earning $50 a day, because she needs the money.
“I’m a working woman again,” she told me, in the common room of the senior apartment complex where she now lives, here in California’s Inland Empire. Gordon has worked dozens of odd jobs throughout her life—as a house cleaner, a home health aide, a telemarketer, a librarian, a fundraiser—but at many times in her life, she didn’t have a steady job that paid into Social Security. She didn’t receive a pension. And she definitely wasn’t making enough to put aside money for retirement.
So now, at 76, she earns $915 a month through Social Security and through Supplemental Security Income, or SSI, a program for low-income seniors. Her rent, which she has had to cover solo since her roommate died in August, is $1,040 a month. She’s been taking on credit-card debt to cover the gap, and to pay for utilities, food, and other essentials. She often goes to a church food bank for supplies...
Today, about 12.4 percent of the population aged 65 or older is still in the workforce, up from 3 percent in 2000,... In 2014, older women received on average $4,500 less annually in Social Security benefits than men did....
In America in 2016, nearly half of all single homeless adults were aged 50 and older, compared to 11 percent in 1990....
Roberta Gordon, in Corona, was barely scraping by when I talked to her. A few months later, she was much more stable. Why? She’d gotten off a wait list and been accepted into the housing-voucher program known as Section 8
(Excerpt) Read more at theatlantic.com ...
As one now 65 who has been blessed with generally good health and a faithful God, and never used gov. health care or needed/used its welfare programs as a believer (but have received abundant free will charity over the years in working for free in the Lord's work), this article led me to do some research, and learn some things I never knew:
" she earns $915 a month through Social Security and through Supplemental Security Income," which to be precise, means she receives money she earned thru SS, while it turns out that SSI [not SSDI/SSD] is funded by general tax revenues (not Social Security taxes), and is for those 65 or older, as well as for those of any age, including children, who are blind or who have disabilities (according to the SSA definition) and can demonstrate their financial need (insufficient or no income and less than $2,000 in assets). People do not need to have worked in the past to get SSI.
Then there is SSDI , which is funded through payroll taxes: "The main difference between Social Security Disability (SSD, or SSDI) and Supplemental Security Income (SSI) is the fact that SSD is available to workers who have accumulated a sufficient number of work credits, while SSI disability benefits are available to low-income individuals who have either never worked or who haven't earned enough work credits to qualify for SSD." "The amount of the monthly benefit after the waiting period is over depends on your earnings record, much like the Social Security retirement benefit."
To meet the SSI income requirements, you must have less than $2,000 in assets (or $3,000 for a couple) and a very limited income. But, you cannot receive SSDI Benefits if you are working and making more than $1,170 per month in 2017 (or $1,920 if you're blind) There are exceptions to this rule. However , "there is no limit to how many cars you can own [under SSDI]."
However, what the Atlantic article also does not state is (research shows ) that the state of California provides a State Supplemental Payment (SSP) For most people, the maximum possible SSI benefit (including the SSP) is $910.72 for an individual and $1,532.14 for a couple. In California, people who qualify for SSI also get Medi-Cal benefits automatically.
Plus she would be eligible for Medicaid, ans , if having a Gross Income under $1,276 then she would be eligible for up to $194 in Food Stamps.
(if she works 50 Saturdays days a year at $50 a day then she makes 2,500 a year, and the Social Security earnings limit for people age 65 and younger increased from $15,720 in 2016 to $16,920 in 2017.)
In addition , Seniors are offered help for " special-needs housing and affordable rentals, as well as get assistance with your utility bills and more. You or your elderly loved one can get a low-income tax credit from HUD. Through the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit Database, you can find affordable housing or rental properties .."
And this lady was accepted into Section 8 housing, for which "you must be a low-income person (below 50% of the Area Median Income). The voucher will pay anything above 30% of your adjusted monthly income up to an established limit. For example, if you earn $2,000 per month and the home you want rents for $900 per month, you would pay $600 and the voucher would cover the difference of $300 as long as the Fair Market Rent for your area is equal to or greater than $900."
Thus while the Atlantic want to burden the taxpayers more, it would seem there is substantial help for a lady such as this. Yet if any class of persons should be prioritized it should be the elderly who worked and the disabled ( I have a friend who was left a paralytic after getting hit by a drunk, and has a hard time getting reliable help), beginning with veterans, versus subsidizing indolence and unmarried and fatherless families, and students who do not pay off loans, or forgiving their remaining debts if they work for the gov. or secular non-profits steadily for 10 years and make 120 required continuous payments during that time.
So marriage and the stability it creates and having kids and the stability it creates may actually be a good thing ( sarc ).
My mother in law lives with us. My wife and I provide ALL the meals to my folks who live nearby.
The old ways definitely work.
The Fast Food industry used to be exclusively teenagers and younger people.
Now it’s the opposite..................
Gonna need to be a lot of Golden Girl living situations. No way can a typical single senior afford $1000/month rent, like the one in the story who then got into Section 8 housing.
Getting accepted for Sect. 8 is not the same as getting into a Sect. 8 apartment, while being om SS means the senior can move anywhere in the US without losing that income. Thus she could escape CA for a lower cost apt, such as
Wichita, Kansas: $470
But being where God wants you to be, as an instrument of His grace and Truth, as one bought by the sinless shed blood of the Son of God (see tag), is most important, and God will provided what is needed to do that work, if we see 1st His kingdom and righteousness, and repent for our failures to do so as we should. .
Yes, before The Pill population bomb, children were the only real social security, if raised right.
Yes, I agree being a poor senior in CA seems like a bad choice. I guess some people don’t feel they can make a change so late in life.
Posted earlier.
Thank God I don't live in CA, and all my kids are out of there at last. (Denver is bad enough...)I am seeing the first real--but small--increase in my SS income since Mr. Redhead died in 2003. At that time, the retirement from his union widow's benefit was half of his, and still the same amount 15 years later.
But selling a townhome in MN gave me enough to buy a smaller, older house in AK and buy a small annuity for $24,000. It's not great, but it's better than being on the street or in Sec8. You learn to live on your income, be satisfied with enough, and take care of things that need it, without going overboard.
Same hippies and stoners...just at retirement age.
The national debt is the worst plague to seniors. The feds will never go broke- they just print more money. But the resultant inflation robs seniors silently.
Your comment is way off base and generalization that barely warrants a response
Unless you have more than a passing understanding of the situation I would ask you keep your snarky responses to yourself. I have spent a lot of time helping people in this situation and know many of them and they are not there by choice.
As a former resident of Texas I say look into your own heart and ask what would God say to you if you expressed this attitude to him directly.
The answer is obvious
“The Fast Food industry used to be exclusively teenagers and younger People.”
It blows my mind that actual adults (with dependents!) believe that they are entitled to a “living wage” for themselves and their family, for work that high school students did 40 years ago for pocket money or savings.
Most of the time, it comes down to bad choices and planning.
In the meantime, generations of young people develop zero work habits or sense of responsibility because they can’t get these jobs.
I actually expect to and want to work until 70 and should be able to retire and afford to live well past 100, though I doubt I will live that long.
I will still work part-time even if it is volunteer work a few days a week because I think it’s important to have to be somewhere daily.
“Gonna need to be a lot of Golden Girl living situations. No way can a typical single senior afford $1000/month rent, like the one in the story who then got into Section 8 housing.“
It is VERY expensive to live single.
“I will still work part-time even if it is volunteer work a few days a week because I think it’s important to have to be somewhere daily.“
My grandfather warned me, that some of his friends who retired with the idea of drinking beer and watching sports on TV were dead within a year after retiring. I think that I’ll “retire” when I stop breathing.
I think of Bear Bryant, said he wouldn’t last long after he quit coaching, and he was right.
I worked Fast Food jobs in my teenage years, 70-73, before I went into the Marines. The older people were supervisors and managers, the rest were teenagers like myself.
Now, you go into Fast Food places and the people behind the counters are OLD PEOPLE LIKE MYSELF..................
For all of my adult life, I have paid into the Social Security System, served 32 years in the military, worked for the same company for 28 years, and faithfully put 8% of my pay into 401ks, and now that I am 71 years old, I have two pensions, Social Security and my required minimum dispersements to live on.
I think of all of the years that my co-workers laughed at me for “wasting” my money on 401Ks because we would be taken care of by social security.
Now, I had to retire because it wasn’t worth it to keep on working when looking at taxes. Of course, Crumbles Pelosi believes that I need to have my 401k funds must be taken over by the government as I am not capable of handling my finances. Yeah, that is why I have a financial planner!
I planned ahead. I don’t feel a bit guilty!
Of, good for you! You must feel so morally superior!
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