I believe this will give me valuable presentation experience (just like Toastmasters). Also, assuming I get selected, it doesn’t hurt getting a few extra promotion points when applying for any promotions!

Per the information that was provided in the email, people that are selected to be a guest instructor will first attend an Instructor Workshop prior to instructing and then they will help instruct three one-week classes in FY 2011.

• It is prohibited for employees to work more than 48 hours per week or 8 hours per day
• Employees get 14 days of holiday per year
• Sick Leave policy:
  • First 15 days – get paid 100% of salary
  • Next 10 days – get paid 75% of salary
  • Next 10 days – get paid 50% of salary
  • Next 10 days – get paid 25% of salary
  • Final 30 days – do not get paid salary
• Employee gets 30 days of paid annual leave per year AND the employee is entitled to be paid in advance for their annual leave before going on leave
• If the employer terminates the employment contract the employee shall be entitled to the terminal indemnity (which means more money!)
• It is prohibited to employ females at night from 10 PM to 7 AM
• Female employees are entitled to a 2 hour break during work hours to nurse their babies

Now, if you have been keeping track, you can see that Kuwait employees get (14+15+30) 59 days off per year that are paid. Furthermore, their normal work week is from Sunday to Thursday (their weekend is on Friday and Saturday). This means 59 days off is just about 3 months off!!! That’s crazy, it’s almost a teacher’s schedule! And, if you really do take another 30 days off (which is about 1.5 months) due to being sick then you still get paid on average 50% of your salary.

Unfortunately, I don’t get these perks because I work for the government (only foreign and Kuwaiti companies have to comply with them). But dude, seriously these labor laws make me want to look for a position here with a private company. Imagine that, taking three months off in a year! I could fly back to LA and relax my butt off. They also don’t work more than 8 hours a day! And they also get paid much better than any government worker does (I know cause I audit their books and records). I’ve never seen such employee-friendly labor laws before in my life.

Now let’s first figure out why some news outlets are saying the unemployment rate is 9.9% while other ones are stating a much larger 17.1%. The reason is because they are based on different unemployment numbers from the Bureau of Labor and Statistics. The 9.9% is the U-3 number while the 17.1% is the U-6 number. Here is where it gets kinda sketchy. According to the Labor Department, you are only considered unemployed if (a) you are currently out of work and (b) you have looked for work within the prior four weeks. So only if you meet that criterion then you show up in the U-3 rate, which is considered the “official unemployment rate”.

On the other hand, the U-6 rate includes all of the people that are discouraged (unemployed people who have stopped looking for work because they couldn’t find any) and all of those who want to work full time but can only find part-time work (underemployed workers). The U-6 rate represents actual real world conditions and isn’t as sugar-coated as the U-3 rate.

But hey, conditions can’t really be that bad right? Can’t we just use the U-3 rate? It feels a lot safer and doesn’t make me worry as much. Well, consider this, during the depression era there weren’t these cavity-inducing calculations such as the U-3 rate. The doom and gloom catch-phrase generating 25% unemployment rate during the Great Depression was based on the U-6 rate. And what do we have now? We’re already up to a heart-stopping 17.1%. So things are not as bad as the Great Depression yet, but it’s important to keep in mind that the unemployment rate didn’t reach 25% until four years after the market crashed. In 1930, the year after the crisis, the unemployment rate was 8.9%. That’s about half of what it is today. It’s only been two years since the markets crashed… we got another two years to see how bad things are really going to get.

No matter what the talking heads say, we are definitely not out of the woods just yet. Especially since I’ve started hearing people saying “Hi Greece. Welcome to America.” Personally I believe things are going to get a lot worse before they get better. And I’ll keep an eye on the reality-based U-6 rate instead of the incomplete U-3 rate.

There are some biggies and small ones that will be free. They include:

• Lodging – Pretty nice one bedroom type hotel room with full-sized bed, tall cabinet, desk & chair, television w/ cable, three 4-drawer plastic dressers, rugs, mirror, sink, and air conditioner/heater. I have a bathroom that I share with one housing mate.
• Meals – Buffet style food basically throughout the day and at three different locations. Food is damn good compared to home. There is the classic meat and potatoes (sometimes steak and lobster), salad bar (sometimes avocados), soda/juice bar, milkshake bar, cereal post, ice cream section, other desserts section, fruits section (peaches, apples, oranges, etc…). Not only this, we get another $3.50 per diem everyday if we want to get something else to eat. Not a lot but an extra ~$100/month is nice.
• Utilities – Water and electricity at work and at my lodging. No gas since we don’t cook here.
• Transportation/Fuel – Get a leased car that can be gassed up at any free gas station.
• Laundry – Can drop it off with a TCN (third country national) and they will wash and iron for you! Just pick it up two days later. I was amazed by this service.

And there will be some expenses that I accrue:

• Calling Card – So I can call home when I am not available to Skype.
• Skype – So I can call home when I am not at work.
• Internet – Around $35 a month in order to get service in my lodging area.
• Personal Laptop – Sucks that the one I shipped broke down the second day I got here.
• Name Brand Food Stands – I’ll eventually get semi-sick of the meals they provide and get homesick for food back home. In that respect, I might spend some money on the Starbucks, Pizza Hut, Burger King, Kentucky Fried Chicken, Carl’s Jr., etc… stands they have sprinkled throughout the area I am staying.
• Misc. Junk and Useful Stuff – Though I try to save money I will more than likely spend some money on things that range from useful stuff (shampoo, power converter, tissue boxes) to misc. junk I might not even send home (mink rugs, iffy jewelry, shiny new things).

So far it looks pretty good. This TDY seems to agree with my checkbook. And making loads of money from overtime doesn’t hurt either.

It’s funny now that I think about it, I’ve told quite a bit of my friends and co-workers about my plan to retire by the time I am 35 and surprisingly, basically all of them have been supportive about it (or at least not try to discourage or make me feel guilty about it). I have read various blog posts from people also marching to the same drummer as me and they touched upon the subject of dealing with cynics and guilt-trippers. But this is the first time I have ever stumbled into this phenomenon. It is the first time someone actively told me it is a bad idea and discouraged me from going down this path.

So what was his premise? Basically it all started when I asked my father if he liked the job that he has been working for the past twenty some years. He told me he liked it. He then continued to tell me that you can like any job that you work as long as you have the right mindset. I was skeptical at this suggestion and bought up the examples of miners and field-pickers. I wanted to also say prostitutes as an example, but it didn’t seem like proper family discussion. He persisted in saying that it is still about the attitude and that you can like your job as long as you have the right mindset. At this point I interjected that what he seemed to be saying is to settle for mediocrity, basically accept your lot in life and not strive for any better. I believe that if you adapt the attitude that you should always like your job then you won’t ever take any action, even if deep down you are actually dying a little everyday. Only when you truly dislike your circumstances will you actually take any action for change and have real growth. My father still said no, you should just work hard at your job and try to enjoy it. Apparently the last twenty years of the self-improvement industry has been for naught. Anyways, in regards to job fulfillment, I was already butting heads with him.

A few days later I told him that I had a early retirement plan. Of course next came the question of when. So I told him I wanted to retire by 35 (just to let you know, I had long ago already told my mother and she was semi-supportive, just worried if I could make my money last that long). My father immediately told me that was crazy and a very bad idea. I told him my justifications of doing so: I value my time more than money; I plan on living way below my means in a minimized lifestyle when I retire; I have saved up quite a nut and will continue to do so; I have already created goals, budgets, and projections for the future so I know I can do it. I even told him that I don’t plan on just wasting my time away when I gain financial independence, I would instead go do something meaningful with my life like help various non-profits, join the Peace Corps, travel to other countries, and learn new skills I don’t have the time to do currently. And it doesn’t mean I won’t use the skills I have learned so far, I might do some consulting on the side or brainstorm new ideas/businesses. Retirement for me means I can finally quit my job and go do my own thing, on my own terms, with the freedom I desire. It means I can finally leave the rat race and not have money rule my life.

But my father couldn’t see that. He couldn’t see the forest for the trees. He could only see the possibility of failure. He couldn’t see the opportunities or the freedom it promised. He couldn’t grasp that I have actually structured my life around attaining this goal: I am saving as much as possible while still enjoying my life right now; I am consuming books about investing, finance, and accounting so I will be more knowledgable in the future; I have already projected how I will live in the future so it can be sustainable. Even so, all my father wanted to talk to me about were the dangers of not having a full-time job. He said I should keep the job for as long as I could. If I wanted to do other things then just do it during the weekends. He said catastrophies could strike at any time and so it is of absolute importance to maintain a steady paycheck. He basically said it was impossible to survive without a job on your back. Not even if you have set up multiple streams of income to displace that job. No matter what I said, I couldn’t convince him that I could do it.

In the end we just came to a stalemate. I believe nothing is impossible and he thought nothing was possible without that white collar around your neck. It is disappointing that one of the most important people in my life can’t share the excitement I have about my future, but I am still glad I was able to have this talk with my father and understand how he feels. Even so, I still need to persist in attaining my goals and living out my dreams because nobody else will walk in my shoes or experience my life but myself.

I plan on staying with the same health, dental, and vision plans that I had this year because of how satisfied I was overall with the plans. And that’s definitely saying something. I hated my PPO from the year before (they wanted me to pay $200 for routine/yearly blood tests!! Heck no was I doing that again!).

I have to admit that I love Kaiser and this love affair started a year ago. Right now, all I need to pay is the $15 copay for all office visits, x-rays, examinations, lab work, immunizations, etc… and the $10 copay for generic prescription drugs. To me, that’s heaven. No more costs that are based on a wacked out percentage of some sky-high drug or procedure price. No more pushing brand-name drugs on me when generic is available — actually Kaiser persuades you to use generic to keep costs down. No more fighting with insurance companies to pay for routine health examinations. No more lies from doctors about how a certain thing is covered and have it bite me in the @$$ a few months down the road when I get payment due because they “uh… just found out” that it isn’t covered by my insurance company; rather Kaiser knows exactly what is covered and isn’t covered so no surprises there. No more having to run from the doctor to the lab to the x-ray to the pharmacy all across town because Kaiser has it all in one facility. Kaiser focuses on prevention rather than cure and I think that is much more healthy and cheaper for me in the long run.

Differences between the Biweekly Numbers for 2009 and 2010:

• Health (Kaiser High Option) – $51.15 to $52.84 – increase of $1.69
• Dental (High Option) – $17.49 to $18.06 – increase of $0.57
• Vision (High Option) – $5.39 to $5.81 – increase of $0.42

Total: Increase by $2.68/biweekly (or $69.68/year)

To put this into perspective, in 2009 I am paying $74.03 biweekly (or $1,924.78 yearly) and in 2010 I will be paying $76.71 biweekly (or $1,994.46 yearly). Thus, benefit premium costs have increased by 3.62% from 2009 to 2010. Overall this seems to be pretty good, costs have not gone up wildly in the span of one year, but one can argue that I might be paying too much to begin with (~$2k is not chump change).

Yes! I got picked to go work overseas for six months. Starting January. In Kuwait. With lots of overtime and pay differential.

No worries though, not going to be on the front lines. I do something much more passive and safe. More with numbers and less with fighting.

The company pays for living expenses and I get a personal trainer to boot! Could be buff when I get back. I’ll continue to update this blog on my personal laptop when I get there but I’m sure my frivolous expenses will drop down close to nil since I will no longer pay for food ‘n stuff. Only necessary expenses will be the condo mortgage. With the overtime and pay differential I should be able to save up quite a nut. Now what to do with it…

ETA: I noticed that I have started one of the goals on my Goals for 2010 (1st Draft). I’ve updated that post to show it and will cross it off once I’m offically done with the TDY. I’m glad that I’m getting a kick-start off my goals for 2010! Also, I think I’ll end up saving the nut for another downpayment on a real estate property. Seems to be a good time to do that since the price range is still rather depressed in my area.

This has been going on for more than a year… so now I’m thinking of contacting our union representatives to get some help on this matter. I know that recently unions have gotten a very bad rep (from UAW to SEIU to AFT) but maybe they can be very helpful too? I’ve never dealt with union people before and will find out today…

Think about it, our current administration told us that we need to spend spend spend in order to save save save our economy. Of course, nobody in their right mind would spend their own money now that:

1. stocks/401Ks have on average lost more than 40% of their value
2. one in four houses are underwater as prices continue to plummet
3. foreclosures and short sales are on the rise
4. Alt-A and Option ARM loans crisis is escalating
5. unemployment rates have continued to climb
6. credit is significantly harder to obtain

Never mind the fact that spending money we don’t have was exactly what got us into this whole mess. So what does our current administration do instead? Brilliantly they decide that if you don’t spend it then we’ll spend it for you! So they go to their little printing presses and print out hundreds of billions of dollars. Of course that is just figuratively. These days you don’t actually need to print anything; with electronic transfers there really isn’t a difference between $100 and $1,000,000. It’s just a couple of zeros on the end (what is that? less than 3 bytes I think).

So our administration promised us that if they spend, they will come… I mean our economy will be saved, unemployment rate will stay steady, and the stock market will magically rise. Well I don’t know whether the stock market is okay now, but its volatily certainly has not subsided (+100/-200 changes daily cannot be healthy for anybody’s portfolio). What I do know is that our economy is no better off and the unemployment rate definitely has gone to hell.

The administration told the public that if all of their legislation was passed quickly (and with barely any scrutiny), unemployment would not go higher than 8 percent. Well, just a few months down the road the unemployment rate has skyrocketed past 8 percent and is now nearing 10 percent (in California it is already past 10 percent). They need to admit that they were wrong and don’t know what the heck they’re talking about. Though any good that does, the money has already been spent. Hundreds of billions of dollars spent and hardly anything to show for it. Except impending inflation that is.

Even worse, now Mark Zandi, the chief economist for Moody’s Economy.com says “Unemployment won’t peak until this time next year, and then it will remain very high through next year. It won’t get back to full employment until 2013 or 2014.” So you’re saying that we haven’t even hit the peak of unemployment yet? Good to know. I just hope that they got it right this time and won’t be revising the numbers again in another few months. I mean, if these highly educated people don’t even know if they got their numbers right then what hope do we common folk have?