The great characters of Goodluck Jonathan and Gen M. Buhar (Rtd)- Odunze Reginald C

Today as we celebrate the triumph of democracy we are not putting up economic, financial or any related articles in pension but in politics.

Abraham Lincoln, one of the greatest American presidents once said “that politics is too good a vocation to be left alone for politicians”.

And Machiavelli in his monumental book, “The prince “noted that power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely”. And that is the main reason, politicians stick to power. Though Machiavelli was dubbed the devil, by his enemies, associates and intellectual hypocrites but he definitely made a point and such point to my greatest amazement has still been relevant till today, even though Machiavelli was writing during the time of Mussolini of France and Adolf Hitler of Germany. 

But what he opined has been relevant in most African countries, where there is sit tight syndrome. The depose of Mubarak of Egypt, the death of Col Gadaffi of Libya  on what has come to be termed as Arab spring are still fresh in our minds. But why do politicians sit tight?  

The conduct of election in Nigeria dates back to 1923, when the colonial masters conducted elections in Calabar and Lagos cities.

But I am in interested in this years elections because of the characters of two individuals, the president Dr Goodluck Jonathan  and General M Buhari.

Their characters remind us of two great American presidents, George Washington, who at a time he was supposed to be re elected  decided to step down for others to partake in the running of the state, and the great American President Abraham Lincoln who in spite of all odds, failures, went ahead to become the 16^th president of American, Gen Buhari has shown that he quitters never win  and winners never quit.

President Goodluck  Jonathan, portrays the act of statesman by congratulating the winner few minutes after the result, by that singular act, he has clearly exemplified the life of a great man. This is a man who once stated that the position he is occupying is not worth the blood of any Nigeria.

AS we celebrate the triumph of Gen Buhari (Rtd), lets us all bear in mind that the real success of this election goes to the electorates who in spite of all odd went ahead to do their civic duties.

Honda says to invest 200 million pounds in UK plant

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A sign is seen outside the Honda manufacturing plant in Swindon, western England January 30, 2009. REUTERS/Stephen Hird

 

TOKYO (Reuters) - Honda Motor Co said on Tuesday it would spend more than 200 million pounds to upgrade its UK plant, turning it into a global production hub for the next-generation five-door Civic.

In a move that secures the medium-term future of the under-utilised factory in Swindon, Japan's No.3 automaker said it would invest in advanced production technologies and processes, bringing cumulative investment in the plant to more than 2.2 billion pounds.

The new five-door Civic to be produced there would be sold in Europe as well as exported to other markets. As it produces more Civics, production of the next-generation CR-V crossover would be moved to its factory in Ontario, Canada, for export to Europe, it said.

The Swindon plant has the capacity to produce 250,000 cars per year, and built just under 120,000 cars in 2014.

(Reporting by Chang-Ran Kim; Editing by Chris Gallagher)

Culled from Reuters

How Social Security benefits are calculated - By Mandi Woodruf

Most American workers are entitled to receive a monthly Social Security retirement benefit by age 62. The average monthly Social Security check in 2015 is $1,328.  

But how does the government figure out how much each worker should receive?

The key to calculating someone’s Social Security benefit is to first figure out their Primary Insurance Amount (PIA).

The PIA is the baseline amount for your Social Security benefits. The amount of your benefit depends on many factors, including how long you worked, your income and how old you are when you retire.

To come up with each worker’s specific PIA, they start by figuring out how much you earned on average per month during your working years — called your Average Indexed Monthly Earnings (AIME) — and then use a formula to determine how much of that amount you'll get in retirement.

To get the AIME, the Social Security Administration looks back at all the years you worked up until the age of 60 and then adjusts your earnings to account for wage inflation over the years. Then, they zero in on your 35 highest-earning years and average them to get your AIME. Which works to your advantage — no one wants to have their benefit based on the few years they spent slumming it at a part-time job or the time they were laid off and weren’t earning anything for a while. Those super-low earnings would skew your results and drive your benefit down.

Before you get too excited, your AIME is NOT how much you can expect to get on a monthly basis in retirement. The SSA only gives you a fraction of your actual lifetime earnings. How big or small that fraction is depends on a formula the SSA uses:  

You will receive 90% of the first $826 of your indexed monthly earnings (AIME).

For earnings between $826 and $4,980, you'll get 32% of your indexed monthly earnings.

Above $4,980, you'll get 15% of your indexed monthly earnings.

So, let’s say Joe Public had an AIME of $6,000 a month. He would receive 90% of his first $826 ($743); 32% of his next $4,154 ($4,980-$826=$4,154) indexed monthly earnings ($1,329); and 15% of the last $1,020 ($153) for a grand total monthly benefit of $2,225.

Timing is everything

If you were born between 1943 and 1954, your full retirement age is 66 (to figure out your full retirement age, check out this handy tool). If you retire exactly at the current full retirement age, you can expect to get exactly however much your PIA turned out to be.

But if you file for benefits early, your benefits will be reduced by 25% for the rest of your life.

If you wait to start taking benefits until after age 66, your benefits will increase by 8% for each year you wait until age 70. For example, if you start taking benefits at age 67, you would receive 108% of however much your PIA came out to. If you wait until age 68, you’ll get 116% and so on.

Don’t worry about the math

You can easily find your SSA monthly benefit without having to do the math yourself. Just head over to My Social Security, create an account and look up your Social Security statement. This statement gives a detailed snapshot of how much you can expect to earn in monthly benefits when you hit retirement age, plus your estimated disability and Medicare benefits. If you'd rather not check online, the government will mail workers over the age of 25 a paper statement mailed to them once every five years until they reach age 60. 

Culled from Yahoo Finance