To the editor:

Regarding Mehlville Superintendent Terry Noble’s $200,000 annual pension that he looks forward to in three years’ time, it’s difficult to refrain from calculating in one’s head the amount of principal the average person would need to generate the retirement income Mr. Noble will be enjoying courtesy, mostly, of we Missouri taxpayers.

With interest rates so low, if we assume an annual interest rate of 2.5 percent, a person would need around $8 million in a certificate of deposit to generate the $200,000 annual retirement income Mr. Noble would begin receiving for life beginning in 2013 if he elects to retire then.

Bravo for him.

If we estimate that he contributed $250,000 toward his pension over 30 years, the state added another $250,000, and we add in compounded growth, an annual income of $200,000 for life still seems like a stellar return on investment, and privately employed taxpayers should quickly beat a path to the state of Missouri’s door to get in on the action.

Indeed, why should not everyone be allowed to invest with the state of Missouri in order to look forward to a relatively generous $200,000 annual pension for life after 30 years of working, similar to Mr. Noble’s situation, or half of that income if we remove the state-funded portion?

Not practical you say? Well, is sustaining the kind of retirement income that persons such as Mr. Noble will enjoy, funded mostly by taxpayers, very practical?

No one begrudges private-sector wage earners from saving their money and investing it to generate income during their retirement.

But the begrudging starts when pseudo-public retirees use taxpayer dollars to enrich themselves beyond what should be considered normal and appropriate, and when taxpayers who fund the largess are in the dark as to how these retirement incomes are generated so that taxpayers can begin achieving similarly generous retirement incomes.

After all, you paid for it.

Celeste Witzel

Oakville

Editor’s note: Celeste Witzel serves as the Oakville Township Re-publican committeewoman.