This is my first diary although I've been a reader of daily cause for many years so please excuse me if I have omitted any of the finer points; I'm still not clear about the tip jar and such. I know that I am in a position that many people out there would welcome, and if I sound ungrateful please forgive me. I have a very well paying federal job with wonderful benefits, the most important being a wonderful health-care plan.
Yet for many reasons I would like to retire and have the possibility of a number of part-time jobs given my specialty. But, due to a number of circumstances, I need another year of service to retire and keep my health care benefits until Medicare begins. Even using cobra, which would be exorbitantly expensive, it would not take my husband and me to Medicare age. We both have pre-existing conditions; thankfully none of them life-threatening, but any type of insurance we could buy would be risky and prohibitively expensive. If the Medicare buy in for 55 year olds+ were passed, I would retire tomorrow.
I work for one of the government agencies that have not frozen positions and are not likely to do so anytime in the near future. What that means in terms of jobs being filled is that they could replace me with someone in a more entry level position and still have money left for another one half a position. Or to put it another way, if two persons like myself were able to retire, three jobs would be created for well-trained entry level professionals. In reviewing the statistics, there are over 2 million Federal employees and approximately 50% are expected to retire within 10 years. I am sure that many of those jobs will go unfilled but some agencies, such as the Veterans Administration, will continue to operate at current levels. With so many people having difficulty starting jobs in their professions I would love to give them this opportunity tomorrow but feel trapped by the current circumstances. I wonder how many people there are like myself who would retire and create new job openings if there were a early Medicare buy in? Again, I do count my blessings but can see so many benefits to "passing the baton". Any comments/suggestions or recommendations are welcome. I am fairly burned out and this long drawn out health care reform has had me on an emotional roller coaster.