When I first graduated from an engineering college, I went to work for several large companies. After a few years, theArmy offered me a higher salary to work for them. I did not realize until I received my first pay that I had to pay for my retirement and health insurance. This was not so when I worked for private industries. When I started with the government, I was contributing 7.5 percent of my salary toward my retirement. When I retired, I was paying 12.5 percent with the addition of the thrift savings plan. I was amazed to find the government raiding this fund to balance the budget many years. They even devised a method of income tax deductions that would take me 24 years to get my own money back in deductions.
Now I keep hearing from politicians that I’ve had it too soft and I am going to have my pension reduced and pay more for my health insurance. I am tired of the media ploy that federal workers are lazy and incompetent and the skewed lie that they make twice the amount that private industry employees do. I am proud of the work I did and I encourage every federal worker who feels the same to write his legislators, as I do constantly, and tell them howyou feel and how you will vote.
Richard Oehling
Hazlet