After 41 at Ralphs, I finally pulled the pin. As a full time clerk, will I miss the $57,000 a year pay? Hell, NO.
I have 2 bothers who work for Kroger in Mgmt. positions, one being an Ops Coordinator (ADM), the other a store manager making well over $100,000. While they make great money, I chose the union clerk route as the pension is superior to theirs. Yes, I now have to pay $200 a month for medical and dental, I know longer have to pay $700 a year in dues and no more State Disability Ins, and having taxes withheld, my take home is $1769 a month. In 3 years I will take Soc Security at $1649 a month, age 62, which is $45,000 a year. Not bad. Having been a Union member, I don't receive the stock grant, options, and a Kroger matching 401k, but many years, I did join the Kroger 401k also, although they didn't match at all and never received stock options. That's OK . As of today there is over $800,000 in that 401k. Since retired, I will no longer be contributing to this plan, but with my Union Pension of $27000 a year and my Soc Sec at $18,000 a year, I will be in great shape!!
The job was grueling toward the end and pulled the pin when the job was not enjoyable any more.
To all Union members, stick it out as it will be well worth it.
Former Ralphs Employee. ( PS ) As retired, I still get the employee discounts and fuel points
I would have done the same thing had I been in your shoes. You're in really good financial shape right now, so why continue working if you're no longer enjoying the job? Working in retail has changed a lot over the years and sadly, it's not been for the better and it's only going to become more unpleasant as the years go by due to the way companies are run nowadays. No way am I going to be able to get my pension up anywhere near as high as yours, but I'm still grateful for the $300 a month I'd get upon retirement if I quit today. A pension in retail is pretty much unheard of nowadays in retail, so that's one upside to working for the Kroger Company.
The problem is I cared too much, where the company didn't care at all about the rank and file of yesteryear. We used to be well paid, but here in Calif. the job starts out at minimum wage with very little incentive anymore. When I started, it took only 1 year to be a journeyman clerk. For decades, journey man clerks made 3x what a boxboy made. Alas its no longer the case. The only advantage was accrual of pension credits.
This is the first time in 41 years I can enjoy the 4th without the BS of the grocery store.
That is why very, very few people nowadays will put in the years that you did and also why the company continues to lose people like you that cared and knew the ins and outs of the job, and then some. All that's left is a high turnover rate and a majority of people that don't care that much about how they perform while on the job. This is why conditions in stores have deteriorated as much as they have and why stores have as many problems as they do nowadays. Companies like Kroger have forgotten the value in investing in its workforce and fail to treat its workforce like the necessary component it is in the success of the company.
If the company today was still the company it once was when you first started with it, you might have not left just yet, but the company does not care about that. In all likelihood, the company is probably glad that you're gone because now you can be replaced with much cheaper labor that hasn't accumulated any benefits.
This is good motivation for people but it just won't be the same for most starting the last 10 years. People won't be getting Social security when it goes dry and Kroger will kill the pension, as well as insurance rising to the thousands in a few years. You were very lucky to start when you did in retail. Have fun during retirement!
After 41 at Ralphs, I finally pulled the pin. As a full time clerk, will I miss the $57,000 a year pay? Hell, NO.
I have 2 bothers who work for Kroger in Mgmt. positions, one being an Ops Coordinator (ADM), the other a store manager making well over $100,000. While they make great money, I chose the union clerk route as the pension is superior to theirs. Yes, I now have to pay $200 a month for medical and dental, I know longer have to pay $700 a year in dues and no more State Disability Ins, and having taxes withheld, my take home is $1769 a month. In 3 years I will take Soc Security at $1649 a month, age 62, which is $45,000 a year. Not bad. Having been a Union member, I don't receive the stock grant, options, and a Kroger matching 401k, but many years, I did join the Kroger 401k also, although they didn't match at all and never received stock options. That's OK . As of today there is over $800,000 in that 401k. Since retired, I will no longer be contributing to this plan, but with my Union Pension of $27000 a year and my Soc Sec at $18,000 a year, I will be in great shape!!
The job was grueling toward the end and pulled the pin when the job was not enjoyable any more.
To all Union members, stick it out as it will be well worth it.
Former Ralphs Employee. ( PS ) As retired, I still get the employee discounts and fuel points
This is a very nice penis to wipe in the faces of all the young people new, and relatively new to the Kroger career game. You're a dinosaur relic that comes from a day and age in America when menial, nothing jobs chimpanzees can do actually provided a decent, feasible income you could support not only yourself, but a FAMILY on.
So now you get retirement and a fat ass pension and you get to sail off into your golden years with nothing but the best of times ahead of you......while the younger generation slaves and wastes away earning less and less, suffering more and more and every year having that much lower work motivation, and NOTHING to look forward to in the way of retirement.
Yeah. Have a cuppa cum with that gangster was....wouldn't want you to choke, you toad.
I am glad you are getting a real good pension from Kroger. I have 29 years with Kroger and I am going to check into my pension in 2017 and see if I can retire. My Union let Kroger cut our pension so bad I will be happy and hope I come out with at least close to $1100 a month plus social security I hope I come out with over $2000 a month. Kroger has changed so much in the last ten years they do not want long time employees anymore. Plus my body is breaking from standing on concrete floors.
