With a home in the woods, wild animals for neighbors and a recreational vehicle to take on quickie vacations, Tony Hill and his wife are enjoying a comfortable, if not luxurious, retirement.
But Hill, a resident of Palestine, Tex., is still far from satisfied with the economy, especially because of the implications of the deficit for his children and grandchildren.
Comfortably retired, Tony and Donna Hill sit at one of their favorite spots, by a small pond on their property near Palestine, Tex.
(Herb Nygren Jr. For The Washington Post)
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_____Economy in Real Life_____
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Introduction: Ground-Level Views of What Needs Fixing
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Teaching, Mothering, Managing to Save (The Washington Post, Nov 14, 2004)
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Disability May Force an Unwanted Move (The Washington Post, Nov 14, 2004)
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A Career Change, but No Savings for Tuition (The Washington Post, Nov 14, 2004)
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Seeking a Hedge Against Health Bills (The Washington Post, Nov 14, 2004)
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Piling Up Equity, Planning for College (The Washington Post, Nov 14, 2004)
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Considering his personal economic circumstances, Hill can't see much to complain about. A former terminal manager for a trucking company, he retired in January 2001 at age 57 because of heart problems, and his wife, Donna, retired in February from the state school system, where she had been a teacher, most recently of prison inmates. They bought the RV three years ago, and live on a 22-acre patch of land in a double-wide mobile home.
"We have deer in our yards, bobcats sometimes, and hawks nesting right where we can see them," Hill said. Now that Donna has retired, they are starting to make good use of the RV by tooling around to visit friends and family.
All this is financed from Donna's pension, which gives them about $1,900 a month, supplemented by withdrawals of about $1,000 a month from Tony's former employer's 401(k) plan. He will soon start collecting about $1,250 a month from Social Security. With living expenses covered at that point, the couple plan to rely on Tony Hill's nest egg strictly for big-ticket expenditures, such as the $1,100 riding lawn mower they bought a few days ago, and the new car they plan to buy next September.
Idyllic as his golden years may sound, Hill is worried about the debt that the government is building up, which he fears is leaving an unsustainable burden to the seven children and 14 grandchildren that he and Donna have between them.
"I've always wanted my kids to have a better life than I had," he said. "My parents were dirt farmers. We borrowed money to plant crops in the spring, and then we had to pay the bank back, and there was barely enough to get through the winter. I had an easier life than my parents did, and I would like for my kids' life to be easier than I had. I don't see that. . . . The deficit is certainly something that's going to have to be taken care of."
And although the health problems that he and Donna have are reasonably well covered by the retirees' health insurance she got from her job, Hill thinks about the difficulties facing other people.
"When I had heart surgery, the total cost was around $90,000, and that was automatically reduced to something like $30,000, but if I was an individual with no insurance I would be expected to pay the full amount," he said. "It's a good system for people with insurance, but there are too many people in this country who don't have insurance. . . . There's something wrong somewhere."
-- P.B.
