Is Joe Biden the middle class’ Santa Claus?

The vice president-to-be is being pegged by the incoming Obama administration as the savior of working people everywhere. He will head a new government group that will have bolstering the middle class as its top priority.

In a statement released yesterday Biden says:

“Our charge is to look at existing and future policies across the board and use a yardstick to measure how they are impacting the working and middle-class families. President-elect Obama and I know the economic health of working families has eroded, and we intend to turn that around.”

The initiative, named the White House Task Force on Working Families, will be headed by Biden and will include help from the secretaries of Labor, Education, Health and Human Services and Commerce. The goals of the group:

* Expanding education and lifelong training opportunities
* Improving work and family balance
* Restoring labor standards, including workplace safety
* Helping to protect middle-class and working-family incomes
* Protecting retirement security

Big guns. Big plans. But will the incoming administration be able to turn the tide for so many hard-working Americans?

I’m in the Christmas spirit this morning so my gut answer right now is, maybe.

The rank and file in this country have seen their earnings stagnate in the last decade; they’ve seen their nest eggs and pensions dwindle; and they’ve been asked to work harder and harder.

And, with this recession, you better believe it is the middle class getting the screws put to them.

I’ve written before in this blog about how employers are squeezing employee pay and benefits. The New York Times reports on this today with a story on how “More Companies Cut Labor Cost Without Layoff.” And now we hear that more firms are asking workers to put in ridiculous hours because people are just not shopping enough. There’s a story about this in the Wall Street Journal today title “Retailers Look to Capture Night Owls.”

No one has really cared about the working stiffs behind the news stories and numbers. Indeed, the WSJ story doesn’t even mention the toll these hours put on the workers.

So, back to Biden-o-Claus. I’m too old to think a task force, or any special government group can really make a major difference. But it is a step in the right direction. At least somebody’s noticed that there haven’t been a lot of work-place presents under the Christmas trees of middle-class Americans.

Time for some ho, ho hoing, no?

VS

Maybe if Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson had been a former CEO of General Motors instead of a former CEO of financial powerhouse Goldman Sachs, this tale of two bailouts would be playing out differently.

There seems to be little sympathy in this country for the U.S. auto industry right now.

“Let the sick patient die already,” seems to be the refrain among politicians, pundits and economists. The big three automakers want bailout money just like their banking counterparts but the bar seems to have been set way higher for the Motor City than it was for Wall Street.

“They’re a dinosaur,” Richard Shelby, senator from Alabama, told Tom Brokaw on “Meet the Press” on Sunday, about why the auto industry should be allowed to fail. And an analysis in the Wall Street Journal on Saturday titled “Just Say No to Detroit” by renowned economist David Yermack suggests: “We would do better to set this money on fire rather than using it to keep these dying firms on life support.”

Strong words for an industry that has in many ways created the middle class in this country.

Clearly, the auto industry has made some bad mistakes in the past 20 years, most notably, not moving fast enough to compete with foreign auto makers who made better cars.

But the banking sector — that almost everyone acknowledges created its own disaster because of greed that led to the subprime mess the whole country is now suffering from — got better treatment when it put its hand out for billions of dollars in taxpayer money.

When the $700 billion bailout was proposed, few went after the fat paychecks or retirement plans of the mortgage brokers or financial traders who helped navigate the mess. And CEOs — well they had to keep the millions they already pocketed and get the money they were promised because they had contracts with the companies they ran.

On the flip side, it seems to be open season on the compensation of middle class auto workers, with many suggesting union contracts should be renogotiated and payments slashed for existing workers if a bailout were to happen.

To that, United Auto Workers President Ron Gettelfinger, told a Detroit TV station over the weekend:

“Let’s go to AIG, Bear Stearns, active and retired workers: Did anybody go in and ask them to give back wages and benefit levels? What about the bond traders? Did anybody ask them? What about the cleaners in the building? Why would the UAW be any different?”

“We made an agreement, and we made major concessions,” he said. “So how can you blame the autoworkers?”

It’s an interesting question.

What do you all think? No matter where you stand on whether we should be bailing out corporations at all, do you think there is a double standard here?

Adding insult to injury, in his Wall Street Journal piece, Yermack — a finance professor at New York University’s Stern School of Business — actually suggests the government should just cut a $10,000 check to the workers instead of trying to bailout GM, Ford and Chrysler.

I’m not sure if Yermack has checked lately but veteran assembly line workers make about $1,200 a week and many own their own homes and are able to send their kids to college. While newer workers entering the industry will make less than that, there are few places in our economy where these people will be able to find equivalent paychecks.

Someone should inform Yermack that his generous $10,000 offer would mean little if these men and women lose their well-paying manufacturing jobs, jobs that are already few and far between in this country.

I know most of you have been watching members of Congress, the president and a host of financial regulators scrambling to figure out how the bail out Wall Street. And many of you are probably wondering — “What the heck does this mean to me, the average working stiff?”

OK, here’s the low down:

1. If you have a retirement plan with your employer, basically a 401(k), and you’re retired or about to retire, this financial mess will hit your investments hard. (This is why getting rid of traditional pensions was a stupid idea.)

2. Collapsing financial firms, including some of the biggest investment houses in our nation, immediately led to job losses and more are on the way.

3. Layoffs in other sectors have also increased, everything from autos to technology, and alas, more tightening is expected.

4. Finding a full time gig right now will be harder because many employers are opting to hire temps instead of taking the plunge and hiring a permanent employee that gets benefits like health care. And if you have health care through your employer, expect to start picking up more of the tab next year.

While most workers will keep there jobs, get ready for a financial squeeze. “Average workers will mostly be feeling the crunch from personal finance concerns and household budgets; within the workplace, employees will likely see decreased bonuses, annual reviews and perks. As employers are trying to cut costs and spend only as necessary, the only employees who are likely to see substantial compensation increases will be the highest performers,” says Michael Jalbert, president of MRINetwork.

And it’s not just Wall Street bankers that will face problems.

“Most workers will care because these problems trickle down hard to the lowest wage earners,” says Michael Hayes, owner of Momentum Specialized Staffing, that specializes in recruiting employees for industrial, clerical and sales. “When capital is tight, sales slow, companies lay people off and this put undue pressure on their household budget. You can see the result with food banks and charities running out of food baskets and money.”

Lynne Eisaguirre, a workplace consultant, offers her tips for dealing with the dive:

1. Hold onto your job! Now is not the time to be changing jobs, unless you have a clearly better option. It is the time to network your heart out by going to industry events, conferences and lunches, meeting people who might help you get your next job or improve your status in your current job.
2. Focus on relationships. When job cuts arrive– as they may with this Wall Street crises– those who survive the layoffs will be those who have clearly understood their boss’ goals and helped he or she achieve them. Studies show people would choose to work with someone more likeable over someone more competent.
3. Turn off the media. It’s easy to panic and be unable to do a good job at work. Limit your media diet and focus on things you can control, such as doing your very best every day in your current job.

And for those workers that aren’t nearing retirement, it’s time to face the reality that we’ll have to be bankrolling our golden years and not necessarily be able to just rely on our employers or the government.

It sucks folks, I know. You come to work everyday, do your best to support yourself, your family, and then whammo! Smart guys that should have known better allowed greed to take over and we’re all paying for it now.

You can be mad. But don’t act like victims. Keeping, searching and doing well at a job all require strength and a positive attitude that tells you — “I’m going to make it.”

There’s been a lot written on the impending labor shortage in this country that’s expected as the Baby Boomers barrel towards retirement. I’ve even done my share of these stories.

But more and more I’m starting to think there is going to be a surplus of workers in the years ahead. Why? Because people can’t afford to retire.

The crummy U.S. savings rate, the death of pensions and the growth of 401(k)s, many of which are now in the toilet because of Wall Street’s stupidity, are all conspiring to create a class of workers heading for their golden years that won’t be able to afford retirement.

Already we’re seeing a growing number of the 65-plus crowd continuing to punch a clock. About 15.4 percent of people aged 65 and older were still in the labor force in 2006, a jump from 12.1 percent in 1996, according to the most recent Bureau of Labor Statistics’ most recent figures.

There are two scary story in major newspapers this morning related to this problem.

One in the New York Times about older Americans who are faced with the diminishing value of their 401(k)s and are terrified about what the future holds:

“There’s a terrified older population out there,” said Alicia H. Munnell, director of the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College. “If you’re 45 and the market goes down, it bothers you, but it comes back. But if you’re retired or about to retire, you might have to sell your assets before they have a chance to recover. And people don’t have the luxury of being in bonds because they don’t yield enough for how long we live.”

Today’s retirees have less money in savings, longer life expectancies and greater exposure to market risk than any retirees since World War II. Even before the last week of turmoil, 39 percent of retirees said they expected to outlive their savings, up from 29 percent in 2007, according to a survey by the Employee Benefit Research Institute, an industry-sponsored group in Washington.

“This really highlights the new world of retirement,” said Richard Johnson, a principal research associate at the Urban Institute in Washington. “It’s a much riskier world for retirees, because people don’t have defined-benefit plans. They have pots of money and they have to worry about making it last.”

And a story in the Wall Street Journal on how retirees are being forced to take money out of their 401 (k)s to pay for living expenses because of the struggling economy:

With stocks falling, credit tightening and unemployment rising, small investors have been raiding their 401(k) accounts or slashing contributions to the popular retirement plans, according to the latest tallies of plan administrators. Others, eager to shield their portfolios from further damage, are reducing their exposure to stock mutual funds to near record lows.

The behavior — described by some market watchers as panicky in the past week — has led to worries that the retirement prospects are dimming further for Americans, most of whom no longer have private-sector pensions to rely on.

Recent 401(k) winnowing is coming in the form of “hardship withdrawals” — removing cash from the fund, with a 10% tax penalty, for exigencies such as job loss, the prospect of losing your home to foreclosure or a big medical expense.

It’s a sad state of affairs for the individuals that have worked all their lives to provide for their families and also keep this nation running.

This week, Congress is debating whether to bail out Wall Street’s elite who, by their own greed-inspired stupidity, have brought down the financial system in the United States.

Everyone saw the markets as the economy’s savor. The Bush Administration even considered pinning Social Security to the stock market during the heydays just a few years ago.

And businesses didn’t want the burden of pensions, opting instead to push their workers into the riskier 401 (k) options. But now it seems pretty clear — the traditional pension system wasn’t such a stupid idea after all.

Can we bring pensions back? Some of that $700 billion that Congress is considering sending to Wall Street might be better served shoring up a new national pension system, or infusing Social Security with some much needed funds. No?

I typically focus on ways to enhance your career and your work-life balance in my blog, but I’ve decided to start adding occasional posts on the other end of the spectrum…retiring.

OK, many of us may be too young to consider it, and still others may want to work until the day we drop dead. But most of us look forward to the day we don’t have to dress up and attend another meeting, or performance review, etc.

As a kickoff to my retirement coverage, I decided to include a guest post from a woman, who was once a high-powered executive, and is now in retirement nirvana.

I interviewed Janet Banks recently about an article she co-authored for the Harvard Business Review about layoffs and middle managers. I wrote about it for MSNBC.com. But our discussion veered off a bit. We talked about what she faced having left the Corporate World behind, and the many people that have been asking her about her experience, so I suggested she write a post for me about her step into retirement.

Banks was a managing director at FleetBoston Financial; a former vice president at Chase Manhattan Bank; and she was an executive coach and organizational consultant.

Her retirement story is unique to her experience and her financial and personal lot in life, but I believe we can all learn from what she learned about retirement.

Here’s her post:

“Four Questions to Consider Before Retiring”

I began preparing for retirement during my mid-fifties so that I could leave corporate life and live my sixties with the level of personal freedom I’d been craving. I’m looking forward to what I can create, not backwards to what I used to have. Emotionally supportive family and friends, financial security and challenging goals that keep me learning, are the reasons that I’m enjoying retirement.