I have finally figured out to host photos on a website that will allow me to provide you with a link for viewing:
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Now these are scans that I have made this morning of my mine and my wife's most recent paystubs (censored to discourage the creeps that whip talks about). Now some of you, namely Tex and whip will begin questioning the validity of the scans, claim I have some program for creating them, etc.. (and these are the people that ban me from their posts because I wil simply NEVER see that I am wrong). To the conspiracy theorists who believe my sister is my alter ego (how's that ip check going whip?) and that I have created my personal history, these scans will be a lesson in futility (the idea that I would create a fales history, a phantom sister and now falsify pay stubs to illustrate a point is laughable). But to those who give me just a tad of credibility regardless of my view points let me illustrate the following from my pay stubs:
First, yes my wife and I work together and we commute together as well. To the dismay of the ladies here, yes my stub is the one that is paid salary and my poor wife is slaving away as the hourly wage employee making $10.00 per hour. As you can see from her paystubs, we both work hard, around 60 hours per week. We are both here from 6am until 5pm mon-fri and for a few hours in the morning on Saturdays. As my stub shows, I have worked here for 11 and 1/2 years. It does not show that I started as a driver and worked my way through shipping receiving, the front office, accounting and now my current position as the number two of the company as operations manager. I was not born with a silver spoon, I worked my way up in this company through hard work and dedication.
To those of you who say I work to much, only worry about money and am distant from my children: My wife and I are home around six in the evening mon-fri. I have the privelge of being able to bring my girls into the office with me on Saturdays. They can color and draw in my office, mess around on one of the computers or watch TV in the conference room. They love it because we stop in at Dunkin Donuts on the way in and we go out for lunch when we leave. I make enough money to swing by the house after work, pick up the boys and go out to the mall, go see a movie, hit Chuckie Cheeses or what not. Maybe we just go home and play in the backyard.
Now let's look at the stubs and the real reason I posted them. These stubs are not to illustrate that I am rich (as many of you would surely say). No, these stubs are to show at least partially what it costs to raise a a family and to begin preparing for retirement in a manner that will allow us to not be a burden on our children later in life (a subject that not one of you has had the stones to address).
We have discussed health care and I've had everyone tell me about how much I have inflated the real costs. Again, I don't know what world you people live in, but see my stub for my reality. Oddly enough, it is cheaper for me to pay for an adult with dependents and have my wife pay the individual rate, than it is for one of us to simply pay for a full family (one of the mysteries of the world of insurance). My stub shows my weekly deduction as $78.50 or $2,9830.00 year to date. My wife pays $26.85 weekly and $751.80 year to date. By the time this year is over we will be out of pocket $5,478.20 in premium alone. The plan is an HMO, so while we don't have a 20-80 plan, we do have co-pays for every visit. I've also included a scan of my insurance card.:
Please note, this is Aetna, not some rip-off only takes peoeple with bad credit health plan. Aetna people and a small group at that (supposedly we get better rates because the company get's a volume discount). However, my wife and I STILL pay $105.35 per WEEK just for premiums. My card shows that the doctor deductible is $20.00, $40.00 for a specialist. Prescriptions range from $10.00-$45.00. It does not show that emergency room visits are $100.00 co-pays. You have a newborn that get's sick in the middle of the night, well Tex, out here in the real world we have to decide between paying the $100.00 emergency room fee or making our little newborn tough it out until the morning (I guess you'll say she should not be so weak, it builds character right??) and pay the $20.00 rate (if I can get a same day appt at the doctor's office).
I repeat $5,478.20 annually just for PREMIUMS!! This not a luxury, not some fanciful expenditure of the rich, this is what each and every person who plans to have children should be prepared for. If you make 35k per year, you health insurance premiums will be over 15% of your pre-tax income.
Now, on to the next subject on my stub. While I was already doing so independently, my company has recently begun an optional IRA contribution. I am deducting $75.00 weekly and my $40.00. That's $115.00 per week or $5,980.00 per year that we are putting away so that we will not be a burden on our children or our fellow citizens. So far, we are up to $11,458.20 per year in insurance premiums and savings for retirement alone, almost 1/3 of the total annual earnings of you 35k'rs. Now some of you will try and try hard to make these expenditures seem wasteful and reserved for the rich. I have said it many times, if I am rich and elitist because I can pay for my own children's health coverage and plan for my retirement while still knocking out newborns, then I guess I'm guilty as charged. I don't know if insurance rates are a regional issue, but I see no reason why an Atlanta resident should have higher healthcare costs. However, if it is the case, then I guess my point should be that residents of Atlanta should not have two children while earning less than 35k. However, I sincerely doubt that health cost and saving for retirement are any less expensive based upon where you live.
But I am dying to see you Tex, you whip, you drmiler and you Baker and all of the other bleding heart "poor is great crowd" explain to me how you can afford two children on 35k per year, if you can't even provide proper healthcare or plan for your retirement. Heck, I'm at 1/3 of 35k and we haven't begun to discuss housing, utilities, food and clothing or gasp!! entertainment expenses. For that matter, what is the tax on 35k anyways??
