Newspaper Page Text
Financial
Focus
Reported by Sonny Doehring
Go beyond employer’s life and disability policies
If you work for an employer who
offers a benefits package that includes
life insurance and disability income
insurance, consider yourself fortunate.
But you can’t necessarily consider
yourself fully protected. And if you
don’t have appropriate life and disabil
ity insurance, your long-term financial
goals could be at risk.
Life Insurance:
How much is enough?
The amount of hfe insurance you’ll
require will change throughout your
life. When you’re starting out in your
career, and you’re single and living in
an apartment, you probably need a lot
less insurance than you might a few
years later, when you have a spouse,
children and a mortgage.
Because your life insurance needs
will evolve over time, you can’t really
use a “formula” to determine how much
insurance you should own. The only
way to determine your true needs is to
take stock of your individual situation.
How big is your mortgage? How much
will it cost to send your kids to college?
How much income is your spouse likely
to bring in over time?
By answering these and other key
questions, you should be able to get
a good sense of how much life insur
ance you’d need at any point in time.
From there, it’s just a matter of seeing
how much insurance your employer is
offering and then purchasing enough
coverage on your own to make up the
shortfall, if one exists. And you’ll find
other benefits to owning your own
policy: It may be more cost effective,
and you’ll keep the coverage even if you
change jobs.
If you purchase a term hfe policy,
you’ll find it quite affordable to receive
a substantial amount of coverage.
Eventually, to help yourself meet goals
beyond just protection, you might want
to consider some type of permanent
insurance, such as whole life or univer
sal life, which contains an investment
component in addition to the death
benefit.
Disability Insurance: Go Long
An illness or accident will keep one
in five workers out of work for a least
a year during their working careers,
according to the U.S. Census Bureau.
And Social Security Disability Insur
ance (SSDI) might not help, because, in
any given year, most claims are denied.
In fact, in 2007 only about 38 percent of
the 2.2 million people who applied for
SSDI benefits actually received them,
according to the Social Security Admin
istration.
So, while you are healthy and work
ing, ask some questions about your
employer’s disability insurance plan.
What does it cover and for how long?
Many employers provide short-term
disability plans because they are rela
tively inexpensive, but as we’ve seen,
many disabilities last a year or longer.
Find out if your employer offers any
long-term disability coverage, which
can provide benefits until you reach
age 65. If so, think about purchasing as
much as you can.
If you can’t get enough coverage at
work, consider a policy from an outside
provider. Basically, you need enough
of a monthly disability insurance ben
efit to replace your net take-home pay,
so that your current lifestyle does not
Brunswick Family Dental
Ivan Goldner D.M.D.
"GUM DISEASE AND BONE LOSS"
If you have a gum disease problem, one of the
first things your dentist will want to know is how
much tooth-supporting bone loss it may have
caused. He will probe for pockets of bacteria in
the gum lining surrounding your teeth to find
out how deep the pockets are. In some instances,
root planning may be sufficient to shrink the
pockets enough to keep them free from harmful
bacteria.
He will want to know the kind of gum tissue
he will be working on, for example, whether it is
thin, thick, fragile, dense, or fibrotic. He will also want to determine the
shape, thickness, and density of the bone surrounding the tooth. He will
probably x-ray the tooth to get the information he needs.
Where there is bone loss, he will want to know if the loss extends
around the roots. Teeth that have multiple roots may need root canal
treatment. In this way the diseased pulp in roots with extensive bone
loss can be removed before treatment for gum disease begins, while still
saving the tooth.
Prepared as a public service to promote better dental health
from the office of Ivan Goldner, D.M.D.
159 Altama Connector (across from Wal-Mart) • Phone (912) 264-8408
Go to www.howarddentalgroup.com for new patient discounts
THE ISLANDER, OCTOBER 13, 2008, PAGE 3
Business Upda
Oglethorpe Power plans to build up to three 100
megawatt biomass electric generating facilities
Oglethorpe Power Corporation
(OPC), the nation’s largest power sup
ply cooperative, has announced plans
to build as many as three 100 mega
watt (MW) biomass electric generat
ing facilities in Georgia. Designed as
carbon-neutral and to utilize woody
biomass, one of state’s most abundant
renewable resources, the power plants
will provide baseload power to OPC’s
38 member cooperatives, which supply
electricity to nearly half of Georgia’s
population.
OPC has secured options for five
potential sites in Appling, Echols, War
ren and Washington Counties. The
first two biomass power plants are
scheduled to be built and placed into
operation in 2014 and 2015; however
which of the five sites will host the first
plants is still to be determined. A third
unit could also be completed and placed
into service in 2015 if all elements of
the plan for that facility come together
on schedule.
change. Disability insurance policies
vary widely in coverage and premium,
so shop around before purchasing one.
Take full advantage of your employ
er’s life and disability insurance plans.
But if this coverage isn’t enough, get
what you need on your own. You’ll be
making a smart investment. □
Capital investment in the biomass
plants will range from $400 million
to $500 million per facility with each
providing approximately 40 good pay
ing, full-time jobs. In addition, each
plant will require an annual invest
ment of more than $30 million for fuel
stock alone and will create a need for
potentially hundreds of new jobs in the
state’s forestry industry.
The power plants will be steam-elec
tric generation stations using conven
tional fluidized bed boiler/steam tur
bine technology. Fuel for the plants will
consist of a woody biomass mixture,
including processed roundwood (e.g.
chipped pulpwood), primary manufac
turing residue (e.g. wood waste from
sawmills) and harvest residue (e.g.
wood remaining in forest after clear
ing). The plants will be designed to
allow for the co-firing of other types of
biomass, including pecan hulls, peanut
shells, chicken litter and more. No fos
sil fuels will be used.
Depending on the location, water
would be obtained either from onsite
wells, nearby surface waters, from
municipal sources or grey water from
nearby industries. Each plant would
be developed on a minimum of 200-400
acres of land to ensure an adequate
buffer between the plant and its sur
roundings. “I
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