After working for 50+ years, 45+ years in corporate employee benefits, 17 different employers (including four Fortune 500 employers), and encountering tens of thousands of workers over that period of time, I’ve found that there is no one best way to achieve financial resilience, or adequate retirement preparation – and, while I don’t envy those two young golfers and the decisions they made, I made different choices and I don’t regret those I made.

I am reasonably confident they won’t regret their choices, as those are experiences that may, in fact last a lifetime, paying “memory dividends” – especially once they are so old that swinging a golf club is no longer fun. I relive and enjoy just as much the “jokes” and “stumbles” that are part of my golf game, playing crummy courses that match my skill level with my older brother Joe, and younger brothers Jim and Mike … especially Jim (who was once a much better golfer, but who no longer plays due to physical issues) … the exploding golf ball, the broken ankle, Jim’s $20 bet where I chipped up on to the green, only to have the ball run away from the hole, but then, magically, it hit my Brother Mike’s ball already on the green and it careened into the cup (a “Snowman”)!

I do worry about sentiments like: “… their generation has been screwed by the older generation and they will never be able to catch up. …” As a Baby Boomer, I feel the same way, but it wasn’t the older generation, the Silents or the Greatest Generation to blame, it was (and is, and continues to be a la Biden and Trump) the politicians who spent tons of money that must be collected from future taxpayers (including me, yesterday, today AND tomorrow, far in excess of any “entitlements” I will ever receive) to buy votes:

• Medicaid expansion (Obama, Trump, Biden), where at one time, in less than 15 years, we more than doubled the number covered by taxpayer-funded coverage (without explicit, dedicated new funding … a significant component of the $1.5 – $2+ Trillion in annual deficits),
• Social Security expansion (Roosevelt, Truman, Johnson, Carter), only to run it into a ditch and force Reagan to make changes and cutbacks once the trust funds were all but exhausted,
• Medicare (Johnson, Nixon, Ford, Carter) failing to accumulate sufficient assets for Part A and failing to accumulate any assets for Part B, then funding Part A in such a way that Congress could “invest” the trust fund monies to buy more votes and send the bill to future taxpayers, forcing Reagan, Obama, Biden to make changes (such as cutting back provider reimbursements to shift expenses to others whose health coverage doesn’t “benefit” from price controls, to push HI trust exhaustion from 1983 to 2026, and more recently, from 2026 to 2036),
• And the most obvious, and egregious violation, Bush II with the addition of Medicare Part D to buy votes, with no, absolutely no, identified additional revenue.

I’m not at all surprised to see that younger individuals, including the golfers, feel they have been screwed. As a taxpayer, still working, I’m also screwed, financially.

Whether or not you adequately prepared for retirement, I hope the golfers, all of you, have as many and as varied and enjoyable “outcomes” that pay “memory dividends” for as long as you live … I have many myself, and by memorializing family stories and experiences as a gift for my children, I’m hoping the dividends they receive, along with pictures, will continue for the rest of their lives.

I am blessed from a decision my Grandmother Marie made when she left Slovakia, got on a boat in Bremen, and brought my mom, Mary, a baby of 7 months, to America back in 1925 … the best legacy, one of incalculable value, the best gift, ever.

I will never forget the wonder on my two children’s faces, then ages 9 and 6, when we toured Ellis Island, did the Park Service tour on the perils of immigration, saw Marie and Mary’s names on the Wall of Fame … making a memory that will pay them an invaluable dividend for maybe a hundred years.

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