The Great Depression, from 1929 until World War II, was probably one of the worst times — financially — in the history of the United States.

It was a time when one was lucky to have a job and even luckier to bring home a wage of $50 a month. No one was able to accumulate enough money for a decent retirement plan, and the elderly ended their lives at “poor farms.”

I am of the generation of the Great Depression, so I know something of which I write.

Today, I hear people complaining about the Affordable Care Act, saying that it won’t work, that it’s not working, that it will turn our country into a socialistic state, and that the government is interfering in our business.

Yet, these same people are all too happy to collect their Social Security checks and benefit from Medicare. Do these people not know these programs originated with the government in the Roosevelt and Johnson years? Most likely people were also strongly against them at the time.

Social Security was meant to benefit those who worked and contributed to the fund. It would have been self-sustaining if the Treasury had not dipped into that fund for other social programs.

As for the ACA, we may be surprised at how beneficial it may turn out to be when the time comes and we need it. We’ve all heard stories of how tests or certain treatments were denied to people, even after they had paid into private health insurance for years.

Katherine Lawler, Mexico