What do you remember?

Ever wonder, when looking back at your life, why it's easier to remember the good than the bad, the pleasant than the unpleasant, the laughs than the cries? Some could say that it's simply because there's always a lot more of the former. That may be true, in every life. 

How do we allocate our time in life, assuming we live for the average age, which in Canada is 81. 

We live a total of 29,565 days or 709,560 hours
of those we spend (on average);
206,952 hours sleeping, 
88, 680 hours eating, 
90,000 hours working, 
10, 800 hours commuting,  
7,200 hours in K to 12 
21, 600 hours on social media
5,472 hours in quality time with family
312 hours in the hospital
65,688 hours watching TV
60,000 hours on the phone
2, 208 on the toilet

and the list can go on to include things that we do that are out of the realm of those who find statistics interesting. By the way, each of the above statistics was found by doing a google search. I find it remarkable that people study us that much. 

The point is that we have very little time, so when we cast our minds back we remember the good times because they force their way through the routine of life into our long-term memory. As people, we move away from pain and toward pleasure which means that as we recall our lives, we remember the good times not the bad.

The Newfie Millionaire

 My wife's family comes from Newfoundland, so I am sure they will appreciate the humour in this post. The spelling is my attempt to imitate the Newfie's way of speaking, which is probably way off base, but it is the best I can do

The Newfie Millionaire

Jarge, from Newfoundland, appeared on 'Who Wants to Be A Millionaire'

And towards the end of the program had already won 500,000 dollars.

"You've done very well so far," said Chris Tarrant,

The show's presenter, "but for a million dollars

You've only got one life-line left phone a friend.

Everything is riding on this question. will you go for it?"

"Yes, Buy," said Jarge. "I'll have a go Aye!"

"Which of the following birds does NOT build its own nest?

a) Sparrow

b) Thrush,

c) Magpie,

d) Cuckoo?"

"I ain't gatta a clue." said Jarge,

''so I'll use one-a dem dare loif-loins and phone my friend Charlie back home in Carner Brook."

Jarge called up his mate, and told him the circumstances and repeated the question to him. 

"Fookin hell, Jarge!" cried Charlie. "Dat's simple......

It's a cuckoo."

"Are you sure?"

"Lard Je'sus Buy I'm fookin sure."

Jarge hung up the phone and told Chris,

"I'll go wit Cuckoo as my answer Aye cause Charlie gots a grade eight

dee-ploma."

"Is that your final answer?" asked Chris.

"Yes  it is, Buy"

There was a long - long pause, and then the presenter screamed, "Cuckoo is the correct answer!

Jarge, you've won 1 million Dollars!"

The next night,

Jarge invited Charlie to their local pub to buy him a drink.

"Tell me, Charlie ole cock?

How in da Lards name did you know it was da Cuckoo that don't build its own nest?"

"Because he lives in a Fookin clock!"

You can do it, what ever it is

"At age 23, Tina Fey was working at a YMCA.
At age 23, Oprah was fired from her first reporting job.
At age 24, Stephen King was working as a janitor and living in a trailer.
At age 27, Vincent Van Gogh failed as a missionary and decided to go to art school.
At age 28, J.K. Rowling was a suicidal single parent living on welfare.
At age 28, Wayne Coyne (from The Flaming Lips) was a fry cook.
At age 30, Harrison Ford was a carpenter.
At age 30, Martha Stewart was a stockbroker.
At age 37, Ang Lee was a stay-at-home-dad working odd jobs.
Julia Child released her first cookbook at age 39, and got her own cooking show at age 51.
Vera Wang failed to make the Olympic figure skating team, didn’t get the Editor-in-Chief position at Vogue, and designed her first dress at age 40.
Stan Lee didn’t release his first big comic book until he was 40.
Alan Rickman gave up his graphic design career to pursue acting at age 42.
Samuel L. Jackson didn’t get his first movie role until he was 46.
Morgan Freeman landed his first MAJOR movie role at age 52.
Kathryn Bigelow only reached international success when she made The Hurt Locker at age 57.
Grandma Moses didn’t begin her painting career until age 76.
Louise Bourgeois didn’t become a famous artist until she was 78.
Whatever your dream is, it is not too late to achieve it. You aren’t a failure because you haven’t found fame and fortune by the age of 21. Hell, it’s okay if you don’t even know what your dream is yet. Even if you’re flipping burgers, waiting tables or answering phones today, you never know where you’ll end up tomorrow.
Never tell yourself you’re too old to make it.
Never tell yourself you missed your chance.
Never tell yourself that you aren’t good enough.
You can do it. Whatever it is."

The link between income and pension

The idea for this workshop came from an article written in 2014 by Richard Denniss.

Women have a problem when it comes to saving for retirement in all countries. In most countries around the world, women earn around 17% less than men who perform similar work. In addition to lower pay, women are far more likely than men to take time out of the workforce to raise children; to care for elderly parents; and to work part-time. All of these factors impact on the ability of women to accumulate retirement savings. 

It’s important to acknowledge the link between the pension and wage gaps. Statistics Canada, for example, found women’s average hourly wages were 88 percent of what men earned in 2014, although that doesn’t necessarily take into consideration factors such as occupation, age, union status and location. But when it comes to annual pay, that drops to 74 percent, because women work far fewer hours. And pension contributions, of course, are based on total salary and not hourly wages.

So, when you’re looking at an employer contribution into a pension, that percentage will be pounds and pence, or dollars and cents, if you will, less in a woman’s pension than a man’s because she actually receives less in her salary.

The gap between the retirement incomes of men and women will never be solved by information campaigns, decision-making tools or new websites. Better information may help some women (and men) avoid the exorbitant fees charged by many pension plans, and may enable better investment decisions, but information will not overcome the underlying structural flaws in the system which disadvantages women.

For example, calculations by The Australia Institute show that an average woman who worked full time would have around $200,000 less in their superannuation savings than the average man, a hypothetical nurse who took time to care for her children and parents would have around $538,000 less and a hypothetical lawyer who took time out for caring would have around $457,000 less. A recent study by Zurich Insurance Co. Ltd. found that over the course of her career, the average British woman would earn 47,000 pounds less in employer pension contributions than the average British man. In Canada, women need to save 26 percent more than men for retirement. 

If we are serious about improving the retirement incomes of women then tinkering with pension programs or superannuation has a very small role to play. Millions of women have already made 'bad decisions' such as having children, working parttime and caring for their elderly parents. Indeed, all women made the mistake of being born into the gender that gets paid between 17 and 26% less than a man

The only way to help women in retirement, as opposed to making them feel guilty for having made 'bad decisions' is to increase the age pension. While such an increase would be expensive, the cost is trivial compared to the enormous, and rapidly growing, cost of helping women in poverty survive.

If we wanted to spend money to help boost the retirement incomes of women, or all retirees, we could do so. Instead we have chosen to run seminars and provide information for women on how to make better decisions, and make women feel guilty about the choices they make for their family.