I’m not saving ninety percent of my income for myself • Hacker News Board

Re: I’m not saving ninety percent of my income for myself

#201

Post by mynameishere » Sat, Jun 08, 2019, 10:15 PM UTC

temp129038 wrote: post #180

I just went to a talk by a software engineer in SF who was talking about effective altruism and how he personally donates 33% of this income to charity every year... The one thing about personal finance blogs that consistently bother me is that they always feel incredibly selfish. How much do they donate to charity every year? Given the attitude of scrimping every penny I’m guessing very little to none.

A group declares themselves a charity, gets a foolish government to go along with it, and suddenly they deserve, for free, the money that other people worked for? Okay...

Believe it or not, some people see through this rather obvious scam.

Re: I’m not saving ninety percent of my income for myself

#202

Post by skinnymuch » Sat, Jun 08, 2019, 10:21 PM UTC

alecco wrote: post #22

cercatrova wrote: post #3

When I read stories like this, I always think of the systemic factors that are creating this behavior; that America, and indeed many countries in the world, do not have the social safety nets to take care of its own people when they can't work anymore. It would be better and more efficient for a nation as a whole to take care of its children so that they can choose their own avenues of success rather than needing to…

> It would be better and more efficient for a nation as a whole to take care of its children What exactly do you mean by that? State raising children? No families? That sounds dystopian to me.

That’s an interesting jump to make. I’ve never heard any one say that’s the way to go. You’d have to have a 99.99% extremist view to be serious about no families.

They likely mean what is the more obvious assumption. We take taking care of all children as a serious problem and try to have certain benefits happen for all children. IE they shouldn’t be going hungry or not going to school.

Re: I’m not saving ninety percent of my income for myself

#203

Post by skinnymuch » Sat, Jun 08, 2019, 10:24 PM UTC

elamje wrote: post #183

skinnymuch wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ve been unemployed for a significant time period. The pressure to work is huge. I’d bet with a safety net, most people would still be working a similar amount of time.

Possibly, but there are a lot of people unlike yourself that don’t feel a major pressure to work, some might continue but there would be more currently employed people that would choose not to work as much, than currently unemployed people that would choose to start work under a big net IMHO. Just with the arithmetic of 5ish% of unemployment. People who start working under a net can only be 5% of population. People w…

Sure. Other comments in this thread are throwing out numbers like 99% of people would chill at home with tv on all day just because of a safety net. I wasn’t sure what sort of degree you were going with things.

Of course more people would take advantage of the system, but Americans overall as a society don’t like excessive laziness and put pride in some amount of work being done. Not working and being poor is frowned upon generally. To keep things loose, this is true for at least greater than 50% of the country.

Re: I’m not saving ninety percent of my income for myself

#204

Post by Retric » Sat, Jun 08, 2019, 10:31 PM UTC

eropple wrote: post #166

Retric wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The ROI from vacations when your younger vs much earlier retirement seems to favor early retirement.

...and then you die at 35. Live while you're alive. You don't know when the bus is going to come around that corner a little too fast.

That’s more convincing if you ignore interest. I do take long breaks between jobs, but I also avoid debt and save a huge percentage of my income.

Re: I’m not saving ninety percent of my income for myself

#205

Post by Retric » Sat, Jun 08, 2019, 10:34 PM UTC

ademup wrote: post #144

Retric wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The ROI from vacations when your younger vs much earlier retirement seems to favor early retirement.

I emphatically disagree. If your job has high stress, then relaxing and checking out can pay huge dividends; up to and including the ability to maintain your high stress job. Additionally, for those of us who take more exploration-learning-bucket-list style vacations, the memories and knowledge offer more value the earlier in life you take them, as they contribute to lifelong education. Finally, the vacations provide…

You don’t need to travel to Hawaii to destress or make interesting memories. I simply recommend cheap vacations in your youth.

Re: I’m not saving ninety percent of my income for myself

#206

Post by username90 » Sat, Jun 08, 2019, 10:50 PM UTC

mwfunk wrote: post #191

nothal wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just look into the FIRE community. Many people are opting out of blatant consumerist attitudes because they realize compulsive frugality is a means of prioritizing what you want.

I guess that seems really materialistic and self-destructive to me as well, just from the opposite direction. Obsessing about everything that one could possibly spend money on (early retirement in this case, I believe), then spending one's entire young adulthood obsessing over how to accumulate and not spend money to get it? It's just consumerism and materialism in another form, obsessing over which things to save up…

I buy everything I want to buy and still save around 85% of what I earn. I don't obsess with discounts or so, I buy things when I want them. I can happily live like the poorest few percent while earning like the top few percent so it doesn't make me miserable.

In my opinion spending money is usually more work than it is worth, even without considering the time it takes to earn said money. Like, you have to go to the store, keep track of another item in your home which you basically never use, throw it away etc. Or go to a restaurant, order things, wait for 30 minutes just to eat and then wait to pay and so on. Or going on trips to exotic places, which mostly entails wasting a day sitting on a plane just to visit a country with barely functioning infrastructure.

So to me it looks like people work hard to spend their money for no reason at all and that is what keeps them miserable.

Re: I’m not saving ninety percent of my income for myself

#207

Post by tyrust » Sat, Jun 08, 2019, 11:16 PM UTC

barrkel wrote: post #199

tyrust wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Working hard is only good if the work in itself is rewarding, or the money buys you things that are rewarding. This is a pretty restricted view of turn power of money. Charity and/or helping one's family is rewarding. Also rewarding, as the other commenter pointed out, is the freedom to not chopse between non-rewarding work and poverty.

Charity is something money buys. The freedom to choose doesn't require enough income for a frugal lifetime without work. It just requires enough income to find a more rewarding job. The marginal benefit declines, the longer you look the more likely you are to find what you're searching for. That's why I only keep a year's worth of takehome on easy access (apart from my pension, house equity, etc.) A life without a jo…

I pretty much disagree with every point here, but we don't need to get into it. You do you.

Re: I’m not saving ninety percent of my income for myself

#208

Post by cercatrova » Sat, Jun 08, 2019, 11:49 PM UTC

OCASM wrote: post #87

cercatrova wrote: post #3

When I read stories like this, I always think of the systemic factors that are creating this behavior; that America, and indeed many countries in the world, do not have the social safety nets to take care of its own people when they can't work anymore. It would be better and more efficient for a nation as a whole to take care of its children so that they can choose their own avenues of success rather than needing to…

More likely the freeloaders would just spend their time doing activism to get even more hand outs from the producers.

Given time, everyone would become producers in some form or fashion. There are studies regarding boredom and people would rather electrically shock themselves than sit still. If you had no job and money coming in, sure you would binge Netflix or do some other mindless activity, but how long can you keep that up? A week? A month? A year? Sooner or later you're going to get up and do something interesting. Humans have innate natural curiosity, like when you were a child, touching and noticing everything. Through excess work, that wonder is taken away because people must work to survive, but imagine an endless summer where you're tinkering in the garage, or writing code for a new project. Imagine the possibilities that people could come up with, new inventions and new ideas that eventually will propel the human race forward.

Re: I’m not saving ninety percent of my income for myself

#209

Post by cercatrova » Sat, Jun 08, 2019, 11:52 PM UTC

isoskeles wrote: post #20

cercatrova wrote: post #3

When I read stories like this, I always think of the systemic factors that are creating this behavior; that America, and indeed many countries in the world, do not have the social safety nets to take care of its own people when they can't work anymore. It would be better and more efficient for a nation as a whole to take care of its children so that they can choose their own avenues of success rather than needing to…

What does it mean for a nation as a whole to "take care of" its children? Or specifically, what is it beyond public schools that we'd want to satisfy that? Is it simply better public schools where they're doing poorly, or something else I am missing?

I meant children as in its citizenry, metaphorically, as one could see the country as a maternal manifestation of the will of the people. Literally though, sure, we would need better public schools that are more equalized in teaching science and philosophy, or other such disciplines. I admit I haven't delved too deep in thinking about that part.

Re: I’m not saving ninety percent of my income for myself

#210

Post by Balero » Sun, Jun 09, 2019, 12:37 AM UTC

ab8 wrote: post #174

badpun wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Buy a Gucci bag and it’ll feel like half the world is dripping bespoke Hermès. You can’t win. This is fascinating. I suspect 99% of people simply don't care and can't even tell a $50 purse from $5000 one, and this Gucci vs Hermes rivarvly is only relevant for a tiny minority of sad snobs. Like the other poster said, good for you for ditching this.

You would be surprised how many people care deeply about this. And they can tell a lot about the purses and their owners. Those that care put in a lot of time to research them - like some people do cars.

Or shoes, or watches, or hats, or trousers, or shirts, or suits or anyone one of thousands of expensive items and brands.

They make their money by telling people that owning them sends a signal to others.