Joe’s daughter listened to her father speaking about not having a job or income source, and she couldn’t help but wipe away a tear. This highlighted the cultural differences between the East and the West.
In Eastern cultures, it is mainstream for women to have jobs and achieve financial independence. However, in the West, the prevalence of stay-at-home mothers is astonishing by Eastern standards.
Despite being highly educated, even women who graduate from prestigious universities often choose to become housewives after getting married.
The traditional Western view holds that men are the breadwinners, while women manage the household and care for the children.
Now, an eighty-year-old man resorted to robbing banks, while a capable middle-aged woman without any ailments stays home, a common scenario in the West. Bella has no grounds to criticize this choice.
She decided not to delve into issues of feminism—too broad a topic—and instead comforted old Joe.
“Let’s calm down, and anger won’t solve the problem. We can turn to legal channels for the pension issue. Let’s talk later about how West Bank convinced you to buy financial products.”
This topic also greatly interested Joe, who began to passionately describe how the bank’s employees sweet-talked him into purchasing these financial products, which not only resulted in the loss of his principal but also put his house at risk.
Joe was moved to tears as he spoke, and Bella felt sympathy.
The steel factory and Stark Industries were just playing dirty, delaying paying out pensions bit by bit.
The bank was reprehensible, confusing Joe with jargon and tricking him into buying financial products when he was most vulnerable.
People here lack the habit of saving—thirty percent don’t even have a thousand dollars saved. Joe’s entire family depends on his pension; what savings could he possibly have?
After hearing how the bank staff seduced him with promises of no risk, high returns, quality projects, and even national policy support, what discernment could an eighty-year-old out of touch with modern times have?
Joe and many of his coworkers used their houses as collateral to buy financial products that even the bank staff wouldn’t buy themselves.
Bella and Natasha left Joe’s house with heavy hearts and visited eighty-five-year-old Willie. They found his house empty and learned that he had been hospitalized due to kidney failure and was on a ventilator.
The last of the trio, eighty-one-year-old Al, was more talkative, but his girlfriend urged him to cut the visit short after just ten minutes.
“Eighty-one and still finding a girlfriend?!”
They saw the old man, seemingly in his seventies, sweetly holding the hand of eighty-one-year-old Al, which surprised Bella.
Natasha held up three fingers, indicating Bella’s naivety, “What’s so strange about that? Old Al has always boasted that he and his girlfriend can still do it three times every morning!”
Bella took another good look at old Al, who had difficulty walking and moved only short distances with small, shuffling steps. “Can he manage three times in the morning? I don’t understand your American elders!”
“You all are such kind people!”
“May God bless you.”
“Good kids, few like you are willing to help.”
After speaking with several more elderly people with similar experiences and promising to help them seek justice, Bella and Natasha received ample praise.
While such accolades didn’t mean much to Natasha, they were significant for Bella.
Encouraged by the elderly people’s sincere appreciation, Bella promptly revised her initial plan.
In the evening, she and Natasha deliberately picked a fight with two other groups of high school students who were also conducting social investigations. Despite Natasha’s modest claim to knowing “a bit” of karate, her strength and agility were sufficient for the fight, and with Bella’s support, they quickly “convinced” a few high school students.
After completing their first day of social investigation, they gained thirteen followers.
Protesting, demonstrating, and suing became the three main tactics of their social practice phase.
Natasha volunteered to organize the protests, while Bella used the connections she had made during the Flight 180 incident to pursue legal avenues to secure the futures of the steel factory’s elderly workers.
Even the most stubborn Texans would admit that New Yorkers excel in litigation. The lawyer they found for the aviation accident case was from New York.
Bella called the law firm handling the Flight 180 case, and despite being told that she couldn’t pay much in the way of legal fees, the firm still warmly recommended a lawyer named Jerry Hogarth.
Upon meeting the young female lawyer, Bella felt somewhat deceived.
Jerry looked too young with her black hair, suit dress, and high heels—meticulously dressed but barely older than Bella.
Without an assistant and with only a “lawyer” title on her business card—not a partner at her firm—it was clear she was just out of law school.
Jerry took on the case to sue the steel factory and Stark Industries over
The pension issue was a bit troubled by the case of the elderly losing everything to bad investments.
“Ms. Swan, I understand your intentions, but legally speaking, buying financial products involves risks, and there’s nothing illegal about that.”
Bella, not versed in law and unaware of the legal differences between states, didn’t know whether illegality was involved.
“Couldn’t this involve fraud?” she asked.
Jerry shook her head and smiled gently. She would have dismissed the question from anyone else, but seeing Bella’s earnest face, she patiently explained the distinctions.
“If the signatory is of sound mind, not coerced, and not deceived or misled, then the investment agreement signed under these conditions has a legal basis. Investing comes with risks. Unfortunately, the elderly have their homes taken by the bank, but as a lawyer, I advise against spending too much energy on this.”
Bella scratched her head, understanding the lawyer’s clear explanation.
Her initial goal was to prevent the elderly from buying financial products—at their age, why manage money at all? But since financial management is mainstream here, she couldn’t think of any counterarguments.
“Alright, let’s focus on getting the pensions paid out first. What should we do?”
Jerry thought momentarily, “Ever heard of a class action lawsuit? Try to find as many victims as possible and go that route.”
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