Shadow Empire

Chapter 1190 Abyss
After greeting his coworkers, George squeezed into the crowd and saw a young man in his mid-twenties standing there, loudly expressing his views.

He took out a pack of cigarettes, pulled one out, and offered it to a friend he knew. "Who is this person?"

His friend took the cigarette, lit it, and shook his head. "I don't know him. He was already standing here when I arrived. It seems like nobody knows him, but I agree with what he said."

"To solve the problems we are facing now, we must make it visible to people at higher levels."

George glanced at the people watching from the factories in the distance, where work hadn't started yet. His expression was slightly unnatural. "But they're not willing to stand with us. With just our small group, we can't cause any trouble."

His friend agreed, "So now this guy is telling us to unite, and I've heard that some other factories are facing the same problems we're facing now."

"Some problems have been solved, but others haven't."

George looked at the young man speaking loudly in the crowd, listened to what he said, and remained silent.

He wasn't too keen on attending such gatherings, partly because getting to Redstone (the capital of Indenor State and home to the state government) would require transportation and accommodation, all of which cost money.

Moreover, he couldn't guarantee what would happen while he was away from here. His wife wasn't in good health and had some chronic illnesses, so he couldn't be away for too long.

It's not easy for two people to get to where they are today. He didn't think about what would happen in the future. He only thought about making sure his wife could hold on, at least... pass away before him.

That way, when he gets old and is powerless, he won't worry or have any regrets.

His friend asked him, "Are you going?"

George snapped out of his daze. "Me?"

"No, I don't really want to go. You know my wife isn't in good health, and... going might not even solve the problem."

"You know, the problem lies with the governor."

He glanced again at the workers watching the commotion in the courtyard, "It also comes from them."

"We can't really unite as one, so it's still very difficult to solve."

His friend sighed, "Although I know what you're saying is true, I will go and do my best to do it."

"No matter the outcome, at least I tried."

George smiled, showing encouragement at his decision, but he was unlikely to go along.

This is actually a very difficult problem to solve. Historical issues that exist in any factory or enterprise are hard to resolve because these factories and enterprises may have faced some difficult and important choices during their development.

In places where the federal economy was most severely affected before the outbreak of war, some capitalists made many promises to their employees in order to ensure the survival of their factories or businesses and to gain their support by voluntarily reducing their wages.

These things are impossible for the Wade family to acknowledge after taking over. They are unlikely to provide these workers and employees with those extravagant treatments, so the differences between the two sides are irreconcilable.

Capital is always a cold, indifferent thing. It won't be more lenient with you just because you're old, sick, or a woman. It will only exploit and oppress you more ruthlessly, and eventually throw you into the garbage dump as waste for the development of factories and enterprises.

Moreover, they cannot form a real, threatening strike. The people still working in the factory will not strike because of them; they will only work even harder.

After George and his colleagues were laid off, they found themselves in a completely different place from the factory workers and their former colleagues.

They hoped the people inside would empathize with them, but the people inside just treated them as a spectacle.

Without the support of those inside, there can be no strike, and it's impossible to really sit down and talk.

His current outburst is, to some extent, just his "efforts".

As time went by, he saw some workers who, like them, had been laid off, put on their work clothes again and quickly entered the factory as if trying to avoid them.

There was a slight commotion in the crowd, with some people calling the people traitors and cursing them and their families.

Some people had shifty eyes, as if they were considering something.

George's friends joined the mainstream in cursing these people, but after a while they realized it was pointless and stopped.

"What do you think these people are thinking?"

"You pay to work just for your future retirement pension?"

"I really can't understand their thinking. Will they really live to see the moment they collect all their pensions?"

Federal retirement benefits are not so easy to obtain. If a worker fully meets all the retirement requirements and reaches the threshold for receiving retirement benefits.

He then faces two choices.

You can either receive all your retirement benefits in a lump sum, but about 40 percent of that will be subject to taxes according to current federal tax standards.

When George retires, he will probably have around four or five thousand dollars in his retirement account.

That's because they haven't contributed for many years to begin with; it's only been about twenty years since the pension-related legislation was first introduced.

This portion of retirement income comes from three sources: 5% to 10% of the worker's own salary deposited into retirement funds, 7% of the income subsidized by the employer into retirement funds, and a portion of the interest or profit generated in the account.

If you withdraw it all at once, you can only get about two or three thousand yuan. After the tax reform, the lower limit is very low and the upper limit is very high, and the amount collected is also very large.

Therefore, most people choose to receive the money in installments, taking out twenty yuan each month for eighteen or twenty years. Although taxes are still payable, they are paid at the lowest tax rate, so the deduction is minimal.

This is also the choice of the majority of people, the vast majority of people.

To receive the full amount of their retirement benefits, they would need to live for another twenty years after retirement, which is a challenge for the poor in the federal government.

Furthermore, under the current retirement pension plan, if the person receiving the pension dies, the pension account will be deducted from the employer's contribution, leaving only the worker's own contribution and the accrued interest, and the pension will be subject to taxation upon withdrawal.

The pension system, including the Social Security system, promoted by the federal government and capitalists is certainly not truly designed to take care of everyone.

Or rather, these systems are not as wonderful as people imagine. The federal government and capitalists need to use certain means to stabilize society and prevent people from becoming unruly, but they also stipulate some rather harsh conditions, allowing only a very small number of people to benefit.

When the average lifespan in the federal government is less than sixty, expecting them to be over seventy before they can truly benefit from businesses just shows how conservative the experts are.

So he had to pay for his own job to earn this money... George sighed. He didn't know if it was worth it or not, but in these people's eyes, it probably was.

They need to live to at least 65 years old before they can recoup their costs and then take advantage of the company.

Now they have to pay for their own work and pay for their own retirement, which means they have to live to be seventy before they can start to benefit from it.

Thinking about this, he was unsure whether to continue; he felt a little lost.

The commotion in the morning didn't have any good results, but the factory did arrange for some lawyers to help everyone collect evidence, saying they would take it to the board meeting for discussion, which reduced the scale of the disturbance.

When it was time for lunch, he said goodbye to the others and returned home. On the way, he kept thinking about the matter and whether he should continue to cause trouble.

Before he could figure it out, he had already arrived at his door. He knocked, but no one answered.

His expression changed slightly, becoming a little serious. He then took out his key, opened the door, and quickly went inside.

His wife doesn't work, and because of her poor health, she rarely goes out.

For so many years, no matter when, as long as he came back and knocked on the door, his wife would open it for him, but today something unexpected happened.

Without even changing his shoes, he rushed into the living room, covered in snow and mud, and immediately saw his wife lying in the dining room, her face contorted in pain.

He rushed over and turned off the fire on the stove, then picked up his wife and ran outside.

Twenty minutes later, in the hospital, he stroked his wife's forehead, looked at her calm face, and let out a long sigh of relief.

After a while, there was a soft knock on the door. He turned around and saw the doctor standing outside, gesturing for him to come out.

He glanced at his wife again, then went outside the room. "Thank you for your help. She looks much better now."

The doctor nodded noncommittally. "Her condition is not good. Because she hasn't received any real treatment over the years, her condition has actually been deteriorating, just at a very slow rate."

"But after so many years, even if the speed is slow, it has begun to exert its destructive power."

"You have three options now. I hope you listen carefully and discuss them with her, since this concerns her life."

The doctor no longer uses the word "healthy," as it simply doesn't exist in her current state.

"First, we should actively treat her. We can try to repair her body to some extent through surgery. This technology has already gone through the process from theory to practice, and there are successful cases in many hospitals."

"Secondly, if we use a conservative treatment plan, we might switch to some new medications, which could be more expensive, and I can't guarantee that her condition won't continue to deteriorate rapidly."

"Third..." the doctor paused for a moment, "If we give up treatment, I'm not sure how long she can live. If she's lucky, she might live for two or three years, or even three to five years. If she's unlucky, she might only live for six months to a year."

"Leave everything to God to decide!"

Hearing this, George felt a tickle in his throat. "May I ask how much surgery and conservative treatment cost?"

The doctor gave George a quick look and said, "The surgery will cost about ten thousand dollars. This is the discounted price I'm giving you because this surgery has practical and educational value."

"Of course, you can go to a better hospital and find doctors with a higher success rate, but the price may be 20,000 yuan or more."

"If the surgery is successful and she recovers well, she will only need to take some medication to extend her life by at least ten years."

"If she receives conservative treatment and uses medication, it will cost at least twenty yuan a month. Her condition will not be too bad for at least five years."

“You know, some diseases are like this. As people age, some problems start to accelerate. If you can’t hit the brakes at the very top of the downhill slope and let it accelerate, then it’s almost impossible to stop it later.”

George's mind was in turmoil. He glanced back at his wife lying on the hospital bed and said, "I'll think about it."

The doctor didn't rush him; he just comforted him for a couple of minutes and then left.

George sat down on a chair in the hallway, holding his head in his hands, his mind blank.

The thought of Sisi, who had been with him for many years, suddenly leaving him reminded him of a dog he had when he was a child.

When he was about four or five years old, his father brought him a dog, and he thought that dog would accompany him for the rest of his life.

When he was sixteen, the dog died of old age without any external intervention. He cried so hard he could hardly breathe, feeling like the sky had fallen.

After his father and mother passed away, he had no relatives left.

He clutched his clothes tightly to his chest, his breathing becoming rapid. He couldn't help but stand up, his body trembling slightly as he paced back and forth over the chicken soup. He wouldn't let his wife leave him like this!

He returned to his ward to check on his condition again, and then went to a nearby bank to give his wife the best treatment plan, surgery.

While he still has the ability to do something, he should give her the best treatment. If he waits five or seven years to consider surgery, let alone whether his wife's body can withstand it.

At that time, he had basically lost all ability to work; he couldn't earn money or have surgery!
He first checked his savings and found he only had a little over a thousand dollars, which was quite remarkable for a federal citizen his age. He was ahead of 80 percent of people, maybe even more!

He then inquired with a real estate agent and learned that their apartment wasn't worth much, only about a thousand dollars. This was after several years of economic growth; before the war, the apartment would have been worth at most five or six hundred dollars.

But the cost of the surgery was still far off, so he went to the bank to ask if he could get a loan, but the manager gave him a negative answer.

“Unless you have a stable job that lasts until the day you retire, I noticed you said you are contributing to the triple retirement pension.”

“If your retirement fund is fully available, I can give you a loan of four thousand five hundred dollars based on your retirement fund.”

“But now…”, he pushed the form back and shook his head. “I’m sorry, Mr. George.”

(End of this chapter)