Living work, Seniors are not ready to stop contributing

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Living work, Seniors are not ready to stop contributing

By Charlie Hall

New Bern Sun Journal, August 31, 2003

Work has been a simple fact of life for Buck Miller since he worked in the fields near Comfort in Jones County, more than 60 years ago.

"Daddy farmed and I was working tobacco when I was 5 or 6 years old," he said.

At 72, he's still working -- driving an asphalt roller for APAC, a construction company.

"I love the hot weather," he says. "I enjoy my work. We've got a good crew and I've got a good boss. I might retire in 10 or 12 years."

He gave retirement a passing thought a few years ago, but thought better of it and continued his 49-year career in construction and road-building.

"A lot of the guys who retired are dead and gone," he says. "It didn't do anything for them."

Miller is among an often overlooked group -- older workers.

In 2001, about 557,000 North Carolinians 55 and older were in the paid work force, according to the U. S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

They either continue to work past Social Security retirement age, or return to new jobs to supplement pensions and health care costs, or just to earn extra money.

It is a generation that considers work part of living.

"You die if you sit on the porch," says Grovner Barber, a 73-year-old former school teacher who is now dock master at Pecan Grove in Oriental. After 30 years in Raleigh schools, he has done restoration carpentry and painted houses and boats.

When a demolition company wanted $3,000 to tear down the old house on his property, he decided to do it himself.

"I thought it would be great fun to tear a house down," he says. "I got a hammer and a hard hat and went at it."

Craven and Pamlico counties are plentiful with retirees, but many of them have returned to a second career on a part-time basis.

Charlie Natalello drove a tractor and trailer for Weyerhaeuser Co. in Rochester, N.Y., for many years before retiring to Fairfield Harbour six years ago. He's behind the wheel again as a part-time driver for Craven Area Rural Transit System, whose clientele includes the elderly.

He's one of 14 CARTS part-time drivers over the age of 50. Transportation coordinator Phyllis Toler says there are many positive aspects to hiring older workers.

"I like the older person's work ethic, because they are responsible," she says. "They understand showing up on time.

"They have retired, but they still want something to do. And a lot of them just want to give something back to the community."

With a starting salary at $1 an hour above minimum wage, the part-time positions attract people with free time who want to earn a little money, not make a living.

He tries to make the van trips to senior centers and doctor's offices enjoyable for his riders and himself.

"It's a pleasure to help them," Natalello said. "We joke and kid a lot and they appreciate what CARTS does for them."

Attitude is one of the positives that older workers bring to the table, according to Pharonda Cannon, an older worker specialist with the Craven Employment Security Commission. Job placement is not limited, with medical, manufacturing and service occupations among the employment opportunities for the "seasoned" worker.

"They enjoy what they do, and as most employers know, attitude can make or break your business," she says.

"And, they don't have a lot of the problems that younger workers have -- like child care and transportation."

At Moen, one of Craven County's largest employers, 11 percent of the workforce is 55 or older.

Human Resources Manager Bart Rovins says one employee who recently retired was in her 70s.

"Their experience is more diverse," he said. "We have veterans, and whether they have worked for one of the big three auto makers or mom-and-pop operations in Detroit or New York or Chicago, they bring experience that fits well."

Older workers also make up a large segment of local government workers. Craven County's 560 full-time employees includes 93 over the age of 55, including 61 between ages 55 to 59; 22 between ages 60 to 64; and 10 65 and over.

New Bern's 435 employees include 52 over age 55, including 40 between ages 55 and 60; 9 between ages 61 and 65; 2 between ages 66 and 70; and one over 70. Pamlico County's 135 employees includes 79 between the ages of 40 and 60, and 11 who are 60 and older. Havelock's 102 full-time employees include 10 who are 55 or older.

Older worker issues

Determining at what age a person passes into the older worker category is subjective.

The Age Discrimination and Employment Act of 1967 actually identifies workers 40 and over as older, protecting them from discrimination. During the mid-1990s, the Governor's Older Workers Task Force determined that age to be 55.

From a Social Security standpoint, retirement can begin at age 62. There is an earnings limit of $11,520 without loss of benefits until you reach full retirement at 65. Thereafter, there is no earnings limit.

AARP, whose membership begins at 50, considers the issue of an older workforce a major part of its agenda. There are about 76 million "baby boomers" born 1946 to 1964 -- in the United States, according to AARP President Jim Parkel.

North Carolina AARP state director Bob Jackson says working comes naturally to that generation.

"We have been raised working," he says. "It is part of our life. It is our connection with people, with our own feelings of productivity."

There are varied reasons older people either continue to work past retirement or return to jobs.

"Retirement costs are up and their pensions and social security are not what they thought, and in many cases their investments are down," he said.

AARP touts three pillars of retirement: Social Security, pension and savings. A fourth pillar -- health security -- has been added.

"In addition to just wanting to go back to work, they are facing tremendous health care and insurance costs," he says.

Many 50-plus workers retire, only to return to work in hopes of getting a job with healthcare benefits. Those benefits are worth a lot of money each month, says Debbie Brantley, chief of the Elder Rights Section of the N.C. Division on Aging.

There are also older workers who simply have not prepared for their retirement years.

Some retirees carry on their company insurance benefits -- but at a cost that forces them to work at least part time to pay the premiums.

There are also workers who fall victim to downsizing, long before they plan to retire.

Still others go back to work just to pay for their prescription medicines.

"That is another reason AARP is pushing so hard to get a good, strong and adequate national Medicare prescription plan," Jackson said.

Low-income training

For workers over age 55 who fall into the federal poverty guidelines on income, finding a job can offer special challenges -- lack of education and skills for a modern workplace.

The Community Service Employment Program, funded under Title V of the Older Americans Act, is a federally funded program that pays older Americans either state or federal minimum wage during a maximum 18 months of part-time community service and government work. Job training and education are two of the components.

It is administered through seven national contractors, including the Division on Aging and AARP.

"We try to find organizations that can offer viable training opportunities to give them the skills they need to work in the workforce today -- for instance computer training," explains Tonya Cedars of the East Carolina Council Area Agency on the Aging. "Sometimes they don't have the skills, and today's workplaces seem to be very skill-oriented."

Six local counties that come under the Title V program currently have 44 people enrolled, including a dozen in Craven, Pamlico and Jones counties.

The job assignments vary.

Keep on working

Perrytown native Ben Blount, who now lives near the back gate of Cherry Point Air Station, is between jobs. He's 68 and taking a break.

He joined the Navy and was in the Seal program. He retired at age 37 while stationed in California, where he remained for four years working on ESSO offshore oil rigs.

Returning to North Carolina around 1980, he worked for the next 10 years at a local hospital and later in the moving and storage business.

"I was packing and helping load furniture -- whatever they needed," he says.

With summer and yard-mowing winding to an end, he says he'll probably find a new job sometime next month.

"I'm going back to work. No reason not to," he says. "I'm just taking a break."

Working is in the blood

There's a remarkable generation of folks, born in the 1920s and 1930s, who came into the world and ran head-on into the Great Depression.

There were no luxuries, per say. Necessities were cherished and hard work at an early age was commonplace.

A number of men and women from that era have some common threads 70-plus years later -- living in the New Bern area and working at Wal-Mart.

Agatha Johnston hails from Havelock, Marjorie Foye is from New Bern and Martha Parker grew up in nearby Jones County, while co-workers Doris Hall, Al Ripka and Lando "Red" Carroll hail from as far away as Idaho, Alabama and West Virginia.

They are a diverse group except for their age, shared experiences and values. There is a common theme -- their working time clocks are on cruise control.

"Working keeps me able to move," says Hall, an 80-year-old greeter. "I feel like if I didn't work, I would just die."

"My theory is that as long as you can get your feet on the floor, you need to get out and go," adds Johnson, 71. She retired from retail work, but decided to put her feet back on the floor 13 years ago.

"If you just stay home, you have more time to think about all of your aches and pains. Working is a great way to meet people and talk with them, every day."

Idaho native Ripka, 75, retired from the Navy in 1967, worked for McGraw-Edison and settled in New Bern after visiting. He has worked at Wal-Mart in sporting goods for five years. Not working has never entered his thoughts.

"Those people back home worked in the woods and the mines until they died," he recalls.

Everyone on the group nods. It brings up some of their concerns about the current younger generation, and if they will have similar recollections 70 years from now.

"Credit cards and TV are the worst things that ever happened to this country," says Ripka. "TV could have been a great thing if we had used it for educational purposes -- but they didn't."

He recalls the long summer vacations from school . They were spent in the fields planting crops for harvesting in late summer.

"In cities and residential areas, they don't know what that is," he says. "There are a lot of kids who don't know where their meat or their milk comes from. They know t o go to the grocery store and get it, but they don't know where it came from before that."

Hall, who grew up on a farm in Alabama, knows.

"When we were growing up we didn't have running water. We didn't have electricity. All of those things are now at everyone's disposal and children don't have anything to do," she says. "They come home and just sit down.

"I would come home and I didn't have time to sit down. I had to cook and get in wood and get the water. It was dark before I would sit down."

Foye, 71, has been back at work for 15 years, and she is concerned that while work is the love of her life, there is no such motivation for today's youth.

"They have nothing to look forward to except a TV and a computer," she says. "When we were growing up, fun was when we went outside and shot marbles and jumped rope. This generation's fun is to go shopping -- and fast food."

Good, hard work is the motivator for life, this group says.

"This is us," says Johnson. "We're not happy if we're not working."