If the Planning Commission said those who live above Rs 5,000 a month are not at poverty line, obviously there is something wrong with the definition of poverty in this country. How can anybody live at Rs 5,000?
It's hard to have any idea of how much money is enough to finance an appropriate lifestyle in retirement. But if a lump sum is translated into a monthly income, it's much easier to determine whether you have enough put away to afford to stop working.
Here in Havana where families make about $20 a month, fewer than 5 percent have Internet in their homes, they are prepared. But it's hard to predict how sweeping this change will be, if the people of Cuba are even ready for it.
When you are facing the wilderness on your own, you have a totally different attitude to someone who works in government or who has a monthly cheque.
It's nice to be in a situation where the two books that I write for a sort of regular monthly income are also works that I enjoy immensely, rather than them being some kind of bread and butter, do it because you have to do it.
I would fight every month. Think about the finances I would have. That would be financial freedom.
It really depends upon how much money you have in your account. Having a monthly paycheck come in for the rest of your life is extremely important. So it would probably be smart to put some of your money into an annuity, which is a way of buying a monthly pension check.
Live long enough and you'll come into pensions, a lovely thing. Presents every month from people you didn't know cared.
The older you are when you buy an annuity, the shorter your life expectancy will be - so the greater a monthly paycheck the same sum of money will buy you. When interest rates are higher, the size of the paycheck for the same sum of money will rise also.
