Archive for August, 2010

Thinking About “Borrowing” Some of Your Retirement Money? Stop Now!

August 31st, 2010

The problem is that you will live to regret it
When I was young, healthy, working hard and pulling in the dough I never thought about retirement. I never had time for such a boring subject and it was so far away that it was totally irrelevant. Hey, who’s going to retire anyway?

Next time around
If those early years come around again I am going to make some changes. Retirement fund will move to the top of the list, even before the New Car Fund, the House Renovation Fund and the Overseas Travel Fund. It will be number 1 on the list where it should have been all the time.

The others
It is reported that most Americans have saved less than $50,000 for retirement and only about 11 percent have $250,000 or more saved. This is really bad news. Worse news is that even $250,000 is not going to give you a great retirement. If you invest that amount and hope to retire on the interest or income… you work it out.

And the rest
The extra-worse news is that thousands of workers are raiding their retirement-savings plans to pay their bills. Sure times are bad, jobs are scarce, interest is down and money is tight. The money you have stashed away in a 401(k) plan is sacred money. It is there for your retirement. If you use it now how will you live after you stop working?

Look at me
10 years ago when I was 67 years old, I was managing a small but select engineering company. We had lots of work consulting in the semi-conductor industry. We were working day and night and making good money, hiring engineers, buying cars for them, paying bonuses and having a great time. Then the semi-conductor industry hit a bump and our work stopped overnight. We began laying off men, selling the cars, closing down all sorts of money-gobbling facilities but in the end we had no choice, we closed. I found myself retired overnight.

My retirement fund
I called in my retirement fund, gulped when I saw the small monthly amounts I would be receiving and began scouting around for other work. And to my delight, I found it. It wasn’t what I was used to and the pay was terrible; I spent hours in my car instead of my air-conditioned office, my clients argued with me, delayed or simply never paid my bills. Our home lives changed, no more eating out, no new clothes and worst of all no new shoes for her… But here I was, retired, 67 and working.

It got better
I was happy. We adjusted our lives to our new circumstances, we managed a short holiday and slowly ‘change’ turned into ‘normal’. But I have to tell you that it’s a struggle. Had I put away for retirement as I should have, I would be living the life of Riley, cruise liners and all. Instead I get up every morning and go to work.

Posted in Employment, Finance | No Comments »

Would You Believe It – Match Fixing In Cricket

August 30th, 2010

Money talks everywhere, even inside the gentlemen’s game of cricket
In Pakistan the people are busy dealing with human tragedy arising from its worst-ever recorded floods in one part of the country and trying to combat the violent terrorism that is raging in other parts. Meanwhile in the UK the Pakistani cricket players, far from home, are pulling in the money by the foulest of means, namely, the ‘fixing’ of cricket matches. Cricket is the national sport of Pakistan and the population is as devastated by the cricket news as they are by the floodwaters and the suicide bombings. Money, as always, is a powerful motivator.

How it works
Someone with a criminal mind approaches a member of the Pakistan team and offers him large sums of money to bowl a couple of ‘no-balls’ at certain points in the match. The bowler, with one eye firmly fixed on the rewards, does as he is paid to do. The initiator then places huge bets with a bookmaker on the fact that ‘no-balls’ will occur at a particular time. He gets huge odds from the bookie as the occurrence of a no-ball is rare and the bet that it will happen at a particular moment in the game is almost a non-starter. He places large bets and cleans up accordingly. We haven’t heard from the bookmaker yet, but presumably he is no longer in business after the giant payouts he made.

The game
All this occurred in Thursday’s opening day of the fourth test that England went on to win by an innings and 225 runs.

Imran Khan
Former captain Imran Khan said that if the players are proved guilty, their punishment should be swift and substantial. “The loss to cricket, if media reports are true, will be immense,” Khan said. “The players involved should be punished so heavily that no other players dare to try it again.” Khan, under whose captaincy Pakistan won the 1992 World Cup in Australia, said he could not understand how Pakistan players would do something like match fixing. “They are so talented then why would they feel the need to do this? But if true this cannot and should not be forgiven.” Money, Imran, money!

Not a first
This is not the first time Pakistan players have been at the center of match fixing allegations. Several Pakistan players were banned and fined during Justice Abdul Qayyum’s inquiry into match fixing allegations against former captain Salim Malik in the 1990s.

Nor the second
An official said that allegations of match fixing were also raised earlier this year when Australia routed Pakistan both in test and one-day series. “Had the Pakistan Cricket Board taken some tough actions in March this year, maybe it could have sent some strong message to the players,” he said. “Instead the PCB started to distort the facts.”
It is hoped that the Pakistan government should now cooperate with Scotland Yard in the investigation.

Posted in Finance, Personal / Internet | 1 Comment »

James Bond’s Aston Martin Db5 Expected To Fetch $8 Million

August 27th, 2010

Can you scrape together enough money to attend this auction?
The 1963 Aston Martin DB5 was an improved DB4. The DB5 is famous for being the first and most recognized cinematic James Bond car. It has been featured in several films, most notably Goldfinger, Thunderball, GoldenEye, Tomorrow Never Dies, and Casino Royale.

The world’s most recognizable car
This has to be one of the most famous and maybe the best known car in the world – the 1964 Aston Martin DB5 driven by Sean Connery in the movies ‘Goldfinger’ and ‘Thunderball’. And on October 27, in an auction room in London, it is expected to sell for anywhere up to $8 million. At the time of the making of the movies, two standard Aston Martins were modified for Goldfinger with what “Q” would have described as “all the usual refinements”: pop-up machine guns, tire shredders, bullet-proof screen, revolving number plates and ejector seat. But this one – FMP 7B – is the only survivor.

History
American DJ and radio-station owner Jerry Lee bought the car from Aston Martin in 1969 for a bargain $12,000. He has owned the car ever since and has only shown it twice in public since 1977. It has spent most of its life on display in his house and has never been restored. So it’s reassuringly tatty. The grey leather seats graced by the young Connery are worn to a beautiful patina, and the long, heavy tire shredder – which doesn’t pop out, but needs to be attached by hand, lies casually tossed in the back, along with the big hammer needed to fix it in place. Knowing its next owner will want to drive it, the auctioneer has given the mechanics and the gadgets a makeover.

It goes
So the 210kW, four-liter straight-six motor starts instantly, makes a hard, loud howl when worked and provides acceleration that still feels fairly urgent even by modern standards. As you drive, your thumb keeps flipping up the lid that covers the ejector seat trigger in the gear knob; fortunately for your passenger, it’s one of the few gadgets that doesn’t work. The phone hidden in the door won’t get you through to M, but the “radar scanner” hidden behind a
The secret panel hidden in the armrest controls the good stuff. The switches marked “oil”, “nails” and “smoke” don’t do what they promise, but “m-gun” really does make the front machine guns poke out, “bullet-screen” erects the rear shield and the rotary switch marked S, B and F rotates the Swiss, British and French plates. It’s these details that mean this car could sell for more than 30 times what you’d pay for a standard DB5.

Bumpers
Is it worth it all this money? Watch the reaction of other road users when you extend the ramming bumpers in traffic and $8 million will feel like a bargain.

Posted in Personal / Internet | No Comments »

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