Jim Berrie took a buyout from his newspaper in 2008, discovering the U.S. had changed even more dramatically than he had imagined: Retirement is stretching out of reach.
“Even after the stock market crash, I fully expected I would get another job right away,” he says from his New Jersey home.
It wasn’t a voluntary buyout, but at least Berrie kept benefits and a small pension, after almost 20 years as a copy editor-paginator.
“They kind of had the gun to our heads,” he recalls. “They said if we stayed, we could get re-assigned, as security guards at a warehouse. Or the paper would be sold and the new buyer would fire everyone and we would have to re-apply for our jobs, at lower salaries.”
Berrie wasn’t unemployed long before he was invited to return part-time. His $1,700 weekly salary was cut by two-thirds, and the only shift offered was at night, adding a 70-mile commute that was “rough”, partly because the extra miles meant a monthly surcharge on his leased car.
It’s ironic that the newspaper section Berrie was helping produce was called Good Times.
Soon, he was promoted to arts and entertainment editor, doing all the editing, layouts and pagination for two sections, working with five freelance writers.
“I was making a fraction of the money I used to make, but then they set me up so I could work at home, and only commute one day a week. I like what I’m doing, and the hours are more flexible.”
The financial hardship, however, was tough to accept.
Berrie’s wife, a speech pathologist, was working from contract to contract, as social services were slashed. She often went without income for weeks. Then their son graduated from college and the family had to start paying back his loans.
“It was tough,” Berrie acknowledges. “There have been times ….” His voice trails off.
“Times when we fell behind on the mortgage a month or so,” he adds, admitting the three-career family didn’t expect that. “We’re caught up now.”
At 60, Berrie is scrambling to continue applying for jobs in public relations and advertising, “just trying to get my foot in the door.” But the skills of a copy editor — “people who know language” — are diminished “when there are no standards on the Internet.”
Berrie boosts his income by proofreading and copy editing at a community newspaper one day a week, and proctoring tests for the Princeton Review.
Baby Boomer nostalgia: ‘America’s most prosperous time’
“It’s certainly scary. There’s a kind of disconnect in the U.S. now,” he says. “The economy doesn’t seem to be rebounding the way it should, and a lot of people are losing their homes and jobs. I’m a Baby Boomer and I grew up in America’s most prosperous time. It doesn’t look like it will ever be that way again.
“It seems we’ve decided a middle class is a luxury we can’t afford.”
Berrie, 60, figured he would be retiring at 65, and now admits he can’t plan for retirement, financially or psychologically.
“We spent all our 401Ks keeping up the mortgage,” he says. “I might be desperate enough to start collecting Social Security at 62” if family income doesn’t improve.
“I fully expected I would be at (my paper) until I retired, so we feel very threatened,” Berrie says. “That stock market crash in ’08 really killed.”
Still, he’s boosted his pessimism with exercise, losing 60 pounds with the help of a personal trainer. Berrie was so successful in maintaining a strong workout routine, that he aims to become a certified personal trainer too.
After interviewing a contestant from his town who appeared on NBC’s The Biggest Loser, Berrie is keen to turn private weight loss success into financial gain.
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