Here's a statement of the obvious: The opinions expressed here are those of the participants, not those of the Mutual Fund Observer. We cannot vouch for the accuracy or appropriateness of any of it, though we do encourage civility and good humor.
Reply to @Mark: You didn't "take that wrong", and you don't need any forgiving. Those comments are consistent with many others made over quite a number of posts.
MJG's response to yours is quite interesting, in a way-
• "You imply that I have established some people pecking order that is grounded in occupation. That’s completely wrong."
• The quote in question: "Not only does experience matter for the elite worker classes (doctors, scientists, engineers), but also for the more mundane, but essential, groupings (bakers, electricians, lumberjacks, plumbers, gardeners)."
MJG is quite indignant about perceived "personal attacks", but he has absolutely no problem advising you that you are "arrogant" for taking him at his word regarding "elite" vs "mundane". Note that he sees no problem at all classifying himself as "elite"... he would have us believe that this is merely his "perceived writing style", the implication of course being that our perception is somehow flawed.
• "You guys need more diversified hobbies."
Our elite expert on all things has no problem belittling how someone else may spend a portion of their time, with absolutely no knowledge of the details of that situation.
Perhaps some definitions are in order here-
• Elite (noun) "a group of people considered to be the best in a particular society or category, esp. because of their power, talent, or wealth"
• mundane (adjective) "lacking interest or excitement; dull"
• smug (adjective) "having or showing an excessive pride in oneself or one's achievements"; "self-satisfied, self-congratulatory, complacent, superior, pleased with oneself, self-approving"
• pontificate (verb) "to express one's opinions in a way considered annoyingly pompous and dogmatic"
• dogmatic (adjective) "inclined to lay down principles as incontrovertibly true; opinionated, peremptory, assertive, adamant, doctrinaire, authoritarian, imperious, dictatorial, uncompromising, unyielding, inflexible, rigid"
I'll leave it to others to conclude what definitions fit best. I vote for "annoyingly pompous", myself.
Thanks for your lightening fast response; it is likely you could function well as a high speed market trader. You seem glued to your computer.
I concur that we share many common experiences and beliefs. That’s why I’m puzzled by your personal attacks.
Initially you asked a simple question about senior employment challenges. I offered an optimistic and honest appraisal. Apparently my reply was not enthusiastically received by you. That’s okay. I anticipate some controversial areas that have not, and can not, be settled. Respectful debate on the merits and shortcomings of my arguments are expected and encouraged. Certainly everyone’s opinions are biased by their accumulated experiences. Experience is forever an important contributor.
But you attacked me on a personal level. Why? It does not advance the senior employment question by any measure. Some might suspect that attempting to claim the moral high ground is a concession to a superior argument.
You imply that I have established some people pecking order that is grounded in occupation. That’s completely wrong. My most influential criteria in judging folks is my assessments of their trustworthiness and honesty. Those criteria are entirely independent of education level and profession. I am totally puzzled by how you can make such a assertion devoid of any evidence to the contrary. It is arrogant to do so.
You only know me through my postings. I do make an effort to be precise, to provide references, and to end with a very definitive conclusion or endorsement. It is merely one honest opinion. By all means, if you disagree with my opinion say so. But attack my logic and facts, not my perceived writing style.
You may well be more people oriented than I am; it is equally likely that I am more people sensitive than you are. The probabilities are likely to be nearly equal. They will never be proved one way or the other on this forum. It is a non sequitur for the purposes of these discussions. It is simply not relevant to the senior employment issue. So, why introduce it, why pursue it?
It is off-target, just as your challenge for me to provide one example of a medical catastrophe. Again, this is not relevant, but suggests that you question my real world experiences, especially of the negative kind. Well, just to satisfy your morbid curiosity, our family lost a son at age 31 to melanoma cancer. He acquired that deathly disease while working on a construction site in Arizona. Our family will never fully recover from that gut wrenching misfortune; we will carry it with us to our graves. Most families experience tragedies of this magnitude, and painfully survive.
That story has no place in these discussions; it serves no useful purpose here other than to respond to your insidious suggestions.
I expect to here from you quickly. I’m finished here now so I will allow you the last word. I’m sure Mini-Me eagerly awaits your reply so he can append some inane, indirect, and misguided comment.
You guys need more diversified hobbies. You also need to read and interpret the postings in their full context. Much of your critique centered on false Maureen Dowd-styled ellipses. That is dishonest.
I really do want you to have a great holiday in the Keys. Enjoy yourself.
I gather that my use of the terms Elite and Mundane offended you. You read more into these terms socially than was intended. The terms were chosen as simple single word identifiers to separate higher income work positions from poorer paying occupations. They were not deployed in a pejorative or derogatory sense. No societal judgments were implied. I also appreciate that any pay scale is only one dimension in a multi-dimensional occupation selection decision.
Old Joe, once again you are highly focused on my vocabulary. You seem to be enamored with the wordsmith process. That’s a fine skill for your purposes, but at odds with my submittal objectives. I wanted to contribute to the burning senior citizen employment issue. The substance of what I said is of dominating importance, not how I said it. Since you did not specifically address or criticize that substance, I suppose you more or less concur with my opinions on the subject. That’s what the debate should be centered on.
Certainly there are more attractive (elite) and less attractive (mundane) job opportunities and classifications, and even more or less attractive positions within any classification. In a capitalistic economic system what often makes a job attractive is typically characterized by the pay structure. In an overly simplistic manner, the pay structure should reflect value added. I fully understand and am sensitive to the issue that the US pay schedule is distorted with unnecessary nonlinearity. But that’s the reality. See, I am connected.
At the time I was listing sample occupations to illustrate my two categories, I was guesstimating at their salary structure. I thought it would be an enlightening and fun task to research actual average yearly salaries for the occupations I casually selected. So I visited the US Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) website. I recognize that you sometimes find statistical data sets troublesome, but bear with me in this instance.
The BLS lists salaries for over 800 job classifications. “Data are classified using the Standard Occupational Classification (SOC) System” whatever that means. When the categories did not precisely lineup, I took reasonable representatives as substitutes.
From the BLS, the following average annual salaries were given for the examples I provided: physicians ($184,650), physicists ($112,090), aerospace engineers ($103,870.), cafeteria cooks ($24,230), electricians ($52,910), logging workers ($33,760), plumbers ($51,830) and service workers ($23,100). I make no judgments that these are proper or deserved salaries, but that is what the marketplace is currently delivering.
The salary schedule speaks for itself relative to the general public’s perception of value added. The salary differential does not in anyway characterize the goodness or the badness of individuals. Their arête (here used in the virtue sense) is a self-determined attribute.
The BLS website is terrific. It includes a flood of data, much geographically. Here is the Link to it:
George Clooney makes substantially more than Kevin Bacon. Yankee third basemen Alex Rodriguez earns substantially more (like 29 million this year, bur slightly decreasing in the following years) than our President and vice-President combined. Go figure. But that’s the marketplace in action.
I am not unique in using “Elite” terminology to simply identify a class. Here is a Link that also uses that term as a grouping header for Corporate Elite:
Old Joe, take a deep breath and relax. I am not your enemy; we’re all friends here regardless of our separate and sometimes diverging viewpoints. Those favoring a divergent viewpoint are not bigoted devils from hell committed to destroying you. We simply have a different assessment and are free to express it, just like you are. We have not abandoned this planet.
Reply to @MJG: Truthfully I just like rattling your cage. Interesting that you have once again adopted the Michele Bachmann style of debate but not surprising since you have always been consistent in that regard i.e. "Here's my sermon for today kids - blah, blah, blah, data set, blah, blah, data set blah, blah, blah." When someone challanges you or disagrees with you, even to the point of offering an alternative data set you pat them on the head, insinuate that they are merely misguided fools for failing to see your wisdom or point of view and refuse to engage them any further ala "I’m finished here now so I will allow you the last word." You have done this time and time again, at least twice to me before on those rare occasions where in need of self abuse I was actually able to wade through your writings. Frankly most of the time I ignore you but the topic of elderly people needing to remain in the work force concerns me since so many boomers (me included) are now reaching the age and time in their lives when they should be able to just sit back and watch the grass grow and the paint dry rather then worry about whether they are going to open up a can of Alpo or a bag of Meow Mix for that days meal.
However, mealtime, investment decisions, spending habits and work habits are not strictly germane to the original topic of whether or not it is reasonable to expect to work beyond the age of 65. Pertinent possibly but not "the" issue. Your initial response referenced a data set and you, not me, also included classifications such as gainful/meaningful, life's choices, procrastinators/lazy, elite/mundane topped off with your CA aside and ending with how great you are because you avoided all of that senior employment nonsense because you worked hard, changed jobs or locations, made the smartest investments known to mankind and felt quite smug in doing so. Geez, how could I not shoot at that target as none of that belonged in the discussion.
So out of my response to your posting all you could focus on was me calling you an ignorant slut, whining about how I had attacked you personally and why did I feel the need to do so. Even after I explained that it was not a personal attack but merely an inference that you were out of touch you chose to ignore your misperception of my writing style and felt the need to dwell on it in your follow-up. At this point all I can do is quote you "Too bad'" You expect others to perceive your writing style as something they just misunderstood or plainly don't understand but those who disagree with you are not allowed the same leeway in their writings. I challenged your data set, you said nothing. I challenged your hypothesis, you said nothing. All you could do was be concerned about why I attacked you on a personal level followed with your own labels arrogant, insidious, handcuffed to my computer, in need of more diversified hobbies, morbidly curious, a personal slam at Old Joe near as I can tell and "I'm done here." . The pot calling the kettle black? Do as I say not as I do? You tell me.
The medical catastrophe was mentioned as one example of how even the hardest working, smartest people could get thrown for a financial loop by just one single event. I had no interest in your personal condition. Go reread the sentance in its context.
Finally my work anecdote had nothing to do with my level of experience it has to do with the degree of perfection I bring to my craft. As soon as those employers find someone who will do the job cheaper at the same quality level my experience will not matter and I'll be back in my cardboard box under the overpass.
Comments
MJG's response to yours is quite interesting, in a way-
• "You imply that I have established some people pecking order that is grounded in occupation. That’s completely wrong."
• The quote in question: "Not only does experience matter for the elite worker classes (doctors, scientists, engineers), but also for the more mundane, but essential, groupings (bakers, electricians, lumberjacks, plumbers, gardeners)."
MJG is quite indignant about perceived "personal attacks", but he has absolutely no problem advising you that you are "arrogant" for taking him at his word regarding "elite" vs "mundane". Note that he sees no problem at all classifying himself as "elite"... he would have us believe that this is merely his "perceived writing style", the implication of course being that our perception is somehow flawed.
• "You guys need more diversified hobbies."
Our elite expert on all things has no problem belittling how someone else may spend a portion of their time, with absolutely no knowledge of the details of that situation.
Perhaps some definitions are in order here-
• Elite (noun)
"a group of people considered to be the best in a particular society or category, esp. because of their power, talent, or wealth"
• mundane (adjective)
"lacking interest or excitement; dull"
• smug (adjective)
"having or showing an excessive pride in oneself or one's achievements";
"self-satisfied, self-congratulatory, complacent, superior, pleased with oneself, self-approving"
• pontificate (verb)
"to express one's opinions in a way considered annoyingly pompous and dogmatic"
• dogmatic (adjective)
"inclined to lay down principles as incontrovertibly true; opinionated, peremptory, assertive, adamant, doctrinaire, authoritarian, imperious, dictatorial, uncompromising, unyielding, inflexible, rigid"
I'll leave it to others to conclude what definitions fit best. I vote for "annoyingly pompous", myself.
Hi Mark,
Thanks for your lightening fast response; it is likely you could function well as a high speed market trader. You seem glued to your computer.
I concur that we share many common experiences and beliefs. That’s why I’m puzzled by your personal attacks.
Initially you asked a simple question about senior employment challenges. I offered an optimistic and honest appraisal. Apparently my reply was not enthusiastically received by you. That’s okay. I anticipate some controversial areas that have not, and can not, be settled. Respectful debate on the merits and shortcomings of my arguments are expected and encouraged. Certainly everyone’s opinions are biased by their accumulated experiences. Experience is forever an important contributor.
But you attacked me on a personal level. Why? It does not advance the senior employment question by any measure. Some might suspect that attempting to claim the moral high ground is a concession to a superior argument.
You imply that I have established some people pecking order that is grounded in occupation. That’s completely wrong. My most influential criteria in judging folks is my assessments of their trustworthiness and honesty. Those criteria are entirely independent of education level and profession. I am totally puzzled by how you can make such a assertion devoid of any evidence to the contrary. It is arrogant to do so.
You only know me through my postings. I do make an effort to be precise, to provide references, and to end with a very definitive conclusion or endorsement. It is merely one honest opinion. By all means, if you disagree with my opinion say so. But attack my logic and facts, not my perceived writing style.
You may well be more people oriented than I am; it is equally likely that I am more people sensitive than you are. The probabilities are likely to be nearly equal. They will never be proved one way or the other on this forum. It is a non sequitur for the purposes of these discussions. It is simply not relevant to the senior employment issue. So, why introduce it, why pursue it?
It is off-target, just as your challenge for me to provide one example of a medical catastrophe. Again, this is not relevant, but suggests that you question my real world experiences, especially of the negative kind. Well, just to satisfy your morbid curiosity, our family lost a son at age 31 to melanoma cancer. He acquired that deathly disease while working on a construction site in Arizona. Our family will never fully recover from that gut wrenching misfortune; we will carry it with us to our graves. Most families experience tragedies of this magnitude, and painfully survive.
That story has no place in these discussions; it serves no useful purpose here other than to respond to your insidious suggestions.
I expect to here from you quickly. I’m finished here now so I will allow you the last word. I’m sure Mini-Me eagerly awaits your reply so he can append some inane, indirect, and misguided comment.
You guys need more diversified hobbies. You also need to read and interpret the postings in their full context. Much of your critique centered on false Maureen Dowd-styled ellipses. That is dishonest.
I really do want you to have a great holiday in the Keys. Enjoy yourself.
Best Wishes.
Hi Old Joe,
I gather that my use of the terms Elite and Mundane offended you. You read more into these terms socially than was intended. The terms were chosen as simple single word identifiers to separate higher income work positions from poorer paying occupations. They were not deployed in a pejorative or derogatory sense. No societal judgments were implied. I also appreciate that any pay scale is only one dimension in a multi-dimensional occupation selection decision.
Old Joe, once again you are highly focused on my vocabulary. You seem to be enamored with the wordsmith process. That’s a fine skill for your purposes, but at odds with my submittal objectives. I wanted to contribute to the burning senior citizen employment issue. The substance of what I said is of dominating importance, not how I said it. Since you did not specifically address or criticize that substance, I suppose you more or less concur with my opinions on the subject. That’s what the debate should be centered on.
Certainly there are more attractive (elite) and less attractive (mundane) job opportunities and classifications, and even more or less attractive positions within any classification. In a capitalistic economic system what often makes a job attractive is typically characterized by the pay structure. In an overly simplistic manner, the pay structure should reflect value added. I fully understand and am sensitive to the issue that the US pay schedule is distorted with unnecessary nonlinearity. But that’s the reality. See, I am connected.
At the time I was listing sample occupations to illustrate my two categories, I was guesstimating at their salary structure. I thought it would be an enlightening and fun task to research actual average yearly salaries for the occupations I casually selected. So I visited the US Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) website. I recognize that you sometimes find statistical data sets troublesome, but bear with me in this instance.
The BLS lists salaries for over 800 job classifications. “Data are classified using the Standard Occupational Classification (SOC) System” whatever that means. When the categories did not precisely lineup, I took reasonable representatives as substitutes.
From the BLS, the following average annual salaries were given for the examples I provided: physicians ($184,650), physicists ($112,090), aerospace engineers ($103,870.), cafeteria cooks ($24,230), electricians ($52,910), logging workers ($33,760), plumbers ($51,830) and service workers ($23,100). I make no judgments that these are proper or deserved salaries, but that is what the marketplace is currently delivering.
The salary schedule speaks for itself relative to the general public’s perception of value added. The salary differential does not in anyway characterize the goodness or the badness of individuals. Their arête (here used in the virtue sense) is a self-determined attribute.
The BLS website is terrific. It includes a flood of data, much geographically. Here is the Link to it:
http://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes_nat.htm#25-0000
George Clooney makes substantially more than Kevin Bacon. Yankee third basemen Alex Rodriguez earns substantially more (like 29 million this year, bur slightly decreasing in the following years) than our President and vice-President combined. Go figure. But that’s the marketplace in action.
I am not unique in using “Elite” terminology to simply identify a class. Here is a Link that also uses that term as a grouping header for Corporate Elite:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_class_in_the_United_States
Old Joe, take a deep breath and relax. I am not your enemy; we’re all friends here regardless of our separate and sometimes diverging viewpoints. Those favoring a divergent viewpoint are not bigoted devils from hell committed to destroying you. We simply have a different assessment and are free to express it, just like you are. We have not abandoned this planet.
Best Wishes.
However, mealtime, investment decisions, spending habits and work habits are not strictly germane to the original topic of whether or not it is reasonable to expect to work beyond the age of 65. Pertinent possibly but not "the" issue. Your initial response referenced a data set and you, not me, also included classifications such as gainful/meaningful, life's choices, procrastinators/lazy, elite/mundane topped off with your CA aside and ending with how great you are because you avoided all of that senior employment nonsense because you worked hard, changed jobs or locations, made the smartest investments known to mankind and felt quite smug in doing so. Geez, how could I not shoot at that target as none of that belonged in the discussion.
So out of my response to your posting all you could focus on was me calling you an ignorant slut, whining about how I had attacked you personally and why did I feel the need to do so. Even after I explained that it was not a personal attack but merely an inference that you were out of touch you chose to ignore your misperception of my writing style and felt the need to dwell on it in your follow-up. At this point all I can do is quote you "Too bad'" You expect others to perceive your writing style as something they just misunderstood or plainly don't understand but those who disagree with you are not allowed the same leeway in their writings. I challenged your data set, you said nothing. I challenged your hypothesis, you said nothing. All you could do was be concerned about why I attacked you on a personal level followed with your own labels arrogant, insidious, handcuffed to my computer, in need of more diversified hobbies, morbidly curious, a personal slam at Old Joe near as I can tell and "I'm done here." . The pot calling the kettle black? Do as I say not as I do? You tell me.
The medical catastrophe was mentioned as one example of how even the hardest working, smartest people could get thrown for a financial loop by just one single event. I had no interest in your personal condition. Go reread the sentance in its context.
Finally my work anecdote had nothing to do with my level of experience it has to do with the degree of perfection I bring to my craft. As soon as those employers find someone who will do the job cheaper at the same quality level my experience will not matter and I'll be back in my cardboard box under the overpass.
Backatcha, I'm done here.