Retirees

In a 1998 letter from his former boss, David George was promised health insurance for the rest of his life. In a letter in May, the same boss told him those benefits will be yanked at the end of August. For George, a former employee of Schmidt Baking Co. in Fullerton, the company's move to terminate health care benefits for him and 66 other retirees has left him and others angry - at the bakery and his union - and grasping for options. The situation has grown so touchy that the company felt compelled to craft another letter telling retirees that the Aug. 31 deadline will be extended while Schmidt seeks less costly health benefits for them, an official said yesterday.

Constance Kihm writes that she is leaving Maryland because she "can no longer afford to support fiscal and social programs with which we do not agree" ("Farewell, my Maryland, farewell to taxes, farewell to extreme liberalism," May 10). She resents that Maryland "feels it is entitled to increase the tax burden on our hard-earned retirement income. " I am a pensioner who turned 65 last year. I discovered that Maryland does not tax the first $27,100 of retirement income! This saved my wife and me about $4,000 in state and local income tax for 2012.

A lifelong Democrat, I now find myself taking issue with the Obama administration in general and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke in particular as it pertains to current Fed policy. What seemed to have been a good idea at the onset, to keep interest rates low to stimulate the economy, has been counterproductive and harmful to many of us who need help the most, the retired, the elderly and the poor. The funds this group depends on come mostly from savings. This was the way many of us were directed over time by the prevailing wisdom on how to prepare for the future.

The inmates' requests often start small, former corrections officers say: a ballpoint pen, for example, or a sandwich from beyond the prison walls. "You may think it's insignificant," said former Cpl. Sheila Hill, who retired last year from the Patuxent Institution in Jessup. "But it's not. " Even small gifts cross the clear line that should be drawn between inmates and officers, Hill and others said Tuesday. It's a line that federal officials say was flagrantly broken at the Baltimore City Detention Center.

Pope Benedict XVI retires Thursday, and he leaves the workplace the way many of us would like to - on his own terms. He wasn't laid off at 50 with few transferable skills, required to retrain or reinvent himself and then compete for work with people half his age. His job wasn't outsourced (although the conclave set to choose his successor may elect someone from another country to do his job). He is 85, but he didn't have to keep working because the recession wiped out his meager 401(k)

I must disagree with letter writer Neil L. Bergsman's view that high taxes don't drive people out of Maryland ("Tax rates have a negligible effect on people's decision to move out of state," Dec. 29). My wife and I retired from the federal government, and it puzzles us why Maryland is taxing our retirement income when states like Texas and Florida do not tax retirement income or Social Security benefits. Maryland is not a tax-friendly state for retirees, even though Social Security benefits are not taxed here.

I grew up in Baltimore, attended school here, and after graduating Hopkins, moved to New York City. I've spent my adult life working in New York, and I'm thinking of retirement in several years. The excitement and glamour of New York are counterbalanced by the high cost of participating in that excitement and glamour. Then there's the astronomical rents. Rents in Baltimore are retiree-friendly. There's the symphony, art museums and my extended family who live here. I am seriously considering Baltimore.

In its coverage of the reactions to the negotiated changes to the state's pension plans ("State workers decry new pension plan", April 6), the changes described the financial help given to state employees due to the increase from 5 to 7 percent in their withholdings for pension contributions. Not mentioned in this increase is that deductions are pretax and part of the increased withholding will be offset by a reduction of payroll withholding taxes to this increase. But we also read that employees will be receiving a $750 bonus to help "smooth the transition" to the new plan.

The IRS and Maryland's comptroller are warning of a new scam that targets military personnel and retirees as well as civilian workers. The emails, which seem to come from the Defense Finance and Accounting Services, claim that recipients of disability compensation from the VA may be entitled to more money from the IRS. Not true. The email, which has a “.mil” domain, instructs recipients to send copies of their income tax returns, 1099-Rs, Retiree Account Statements, VA award letter to a colonel in Florida, officials say. With that kind of information, a con artist can steal an identity and wreak all sorts of havoc on a victim's finances.

In response to letter writer Susan Brown, I would like to offer her an invitation to visit Mays Chapel Park so she can get an idea what is involved ("Mays Chapel school would be an asset to the area," March 11). First, she will not see many school children in the area during the day, nor many school buses since it is an adult community around the park, and most people are retired. Second, she will see a 20-acre park that is busy this week because there are lacrosse games going on for school children from all over the area.

The president and a few other prominent Democrats are openly suggesting that Social Security payments be reduced by applying a lower adjustment for inflation, and that Medicare be means-tested. This is even before Democrats have begun formal budget negotiations with Republicans -- who still refuse to raise taxes on the rich, close tax loopholes the rich depend on (such as hedge-fund and private-equity managers' "carried interest"), increase capital gains taxes on the wealthy, and cap tax deductions or tax financial transactions.

A lifelong Democrat, I now find myself taking issue with the Obama administration in general and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke in particular as it pertains to current Fed policy. What seemed to have been a good idea at the onset, to keep interest rates low to stimulate the economy, has been counterproductive and harmful to many of us who need help the most, the retired, the elderly and the poor. The funds this group depends on come mostly from savings. This was the way many of us were directed over time by the prevailing wisdom on how to prepare for the future.

The statistic was so attention-grabbing that Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake stopped and repeated it: Nearly half of Baltimore's municipal employees and retirees have a "critical or chronic" illness Rawlings-Blake emphasized the statistic as part of last month's speech at the Walters Art Museum , during which she released a consultants' report about the city's long-term finances. The unhealthy state of Baltimore's workforce contributes to the high cost of municipal health care, the mayor said.

Pope Benedict XVI retires Thursday, and he leaves the workplace the way many of us would like to - on his own terms. He wasn't laid off at 50 with few transferable skills, required to retrain or reinvent himself and then compete for work with people half his age. His job wasn't outsourced (although the conclave set to choose his successor may elect someone from another country to do his job). He is 85, but he didn't have to keep working because the recession wiped out his meager 401(k)

In 1931, economist John Maynard Keynes lamented, "A sound banker, alas, is not one who foresees danger and avoids it, but one who, when he is ruined, is ruined in a conventional way along with his fellows, so that no one can really blame him. " Substitute "state treasurer" and "pension board member" for "banker" in the quote and it describes someone who oversees a state retirement and pension system whose 350,000 members either rely on it in...

The confetti from Tuesday's Super Bowl parade was hardly cleared before Baltimore's fiscal health jolted everyone back to reality. Warning of impending "financial ruin," a new report from the advisory firm Public Financial Management tallied Baltimore's cumulative 10-year deficit at a stunning $750 million, driven largely by the city's pension and retiree health obligations. While sobering, the report hands city leaders a rare opportunity to remake Baltimore into a championship city.

The next several years will see a flood tide of a new kind of retiree — the rollover retiree. Millions of baby boomers will be transitioning into retirement without the comfort of the old-fashioned monthly pension check, but rather with a lump sum rollover check from their employment 401(k) or 403(b) retirement account. Ready or not, each rollover retiree will start a new career as an investor. Most will not be ready. For the fortunate few who have been able to accumulate large retirement accounts, the transition to retiree investor is eased by the legions of financial planners, investment advisers, money managers, etc. who are ready — for a fee — to advise and shepherd these rollover retirees into the world of investing.

The statistic was so attention-grabbing that Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake stopped and repeated it: Nearly half of Baltimore's municipal employees and retirees have a "critical or chronic" illness Rawlings-Blake emphasized the statistic as part of last month's speech at the Walters Art Museum , during which she released a consultants' report about the city's long-term finances. The unhealthy state of Baltimore's workforce contributes to the high cost of municipal health care, the mayor said.

I must disagree with letter writer Neil L. Bergsman's view that high taxes don't drive people out of Maryland ("Tax rates have a negligible effect on people's decision to move out of state," Dec. 29). My wife and I retired from the federal government, and it puzzles us why Maryland is taxing our retirement income when states like Texas and Florida do not tax retirement income or Social Security benefits. Maryland is not a tax-friendly state for retirees, even though Social Security benefits are not taxed here.

We are now hurtling toward the so-called fiscal cliff, a package of automatic tax increases and spending cuts for 2013 designed to stampede Congress and the president into a "grand bargain" on deficit reduction, to include new revenues (translation: taxes) and entitlement reforms (translation: cuts to Medicare and Social Security). Social Security constitutes roughly 20 percent of the federal budget. Deficit hawks insist that the U.S. cannot afford benefits at the current level. They are wrong.