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Don't Waste the Good Days

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Re: Don't Waste the Good Days

#251

Post by inglor_cz »

gchamonlive wrote: post #93
bluedevil2k wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> is still privilege The guy worked hard and earned his year off, don’t dismiss it by calling it privilege. He has the skills and intelligence and hard working habits to earn the year off, this is not privilege. Successful people aren’t successful because of privilege, that’s just a label for an excuse by those who aren’t successful. You get what you earn in life.

Can everybody earn a year off after working hard? No, because this is privilege. To be born in a rich country. To have family structure to study and go to college, to have a stable job and a successful career after graduation. To be lucky enough to choose a career that is in demand. Or to open a business that is successful. People underestimate A LOT how much of a role luck plays in successful careers. Sure hard work…

This seems to me "glibly trivial". Of course most of us are relatively privileged to someone who was born blind and got cancer at the age of three, but it is a shallow observation.

Luck is something that happens to a lot of people, including the unsuccessful ones, but few of us, successful or not, are willing to admit that we burnt some chance, or several of them. It is easier to blame someone else or something else (absence of necessary luck) for unsatisfactory results. It is easier to attribute certain satisfactory results in other people to their luck, without discussing the effort necessary to exploit that luck or even recognize a lucky set of circumstances and act on them (because these tend to be fleeting).

We are more of a rationalizing species than a rational one, and we are really good at framing things in a way that strokes our egos.

Re: Don't Waste the Good Days

#252

Post by consilla »

staticassertion wrote: post #165
nightowl_games wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'd have played fewer video games, traveled less, and relaxed on the beach less. This seems totally opposite of what old people say on their death bed. You sound so obsessed with money here. My guess is your probably very wealthy relative to the average peer and your too naive to realize it. You have to keep telling yourself this philosophy to justify not wind surfing in Bali. You think your gonna wind surf when yo…

Lots of people I know in a generation or two above me regret not saving when they were younger. Now they're nervous about being 70 and having to retire soon but not feeling stable, or feeling that they may financially burden their children. Compounding interest on money means, as previously mentioned, money you earn at 20 will be 10x as valuable compared to money earned towards a typical retirement age. With tech hav…

I think many experiences do compound. Most people who take the traditional path of working straight after school trade security for reference experiences which help in understanding what they want, and helping deal with challenges further down the line. For some this is fine, security is what they want and the 'what ifs' and opportunity cost on growth experiences will not bother them. For others this may cause more existential problems down the line.

As a generalising anecdote, some of the greatest people I have worked with had very non-traditional paths early on, and I find them to have a greater 'big picture' sense, more resiliency and more humour in the face of adversity. But are not as rich in their 40s as others.

Re: Don't Waste the Good Days

#253

Post by rowanajmarshall »

randallsquared wrote: post #96
nightowl_games wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'd have played fewer video games, traveled less, and relaxed on the beach less. This seems totally opposite of what old people say on their death bed. You sound so obsessed with money here. My guess is your probably very wealthy relative to the average peer and your too naive to realize it. You have to keep telling yourself this philosophy to justify not wind surfing in Bali. You think your gonna wind surf when yo…

Old people on their death bed are telling us what they want to do now, couched as what they would have wanted to do. But they made the decisions they did for reasons that seemed good at the time, and it might well be that they'd make the same ones. Wishing things were different is not the same as a plan to make them different. Or, as I've said about this before: why worry about what death-bed you wants? That person l…

It's basically a local maxima problem. You optimise for what seems best at the time, not what will be optimal over a longer period of time.

Re: Don't Waste the Good Days

#254

Post by KineticLensman »

ryandrake wrote: post #41

I feel like there is wisdom in "Make hay while the sun shines." When you're young and unencumbered by responsibility and family, when your cognitive abilities are at their peak, when your energy is endless, when your body is strong and healthy, when your knees work, and your fingers can type without arthritis: that's the optimal time to work and earn. Min-max that salary and stay healthy. Due to compounding interest,…

> Life isn't short--it's LONG,

A counterexample. My father died when he was 59 after a decade of ill-health. He'd had to give up many of the things that he loved doing as an individual (sailing) and with us as a family (caravanning, long walks, etc). This made a big impression on me (I was mid-20s when he died) and I resolved to focus on things other than wealth maximization but still retire early enough to (hopefully) enjoy my health.

I'm now 60. I retired two years ago after working 3 day weeks for the two previous years. I then transitioned to volunteering for a conservation organisation, and started career 2.0 totally independently of my prior experience / education (software). It was a blast!

Then, five months ago, I had a cardiac arrest - ventricular fibrillation, from which I was de'fibbed and had an ICD [0] fitted. It seems to be a genetic thing rather than lifestyle as my cardiac health is otherwise good. Because of the UK's rules, I lose my driving license for six months from the date of the VF episode. I understand why, as once the VF starts I have less than ten seconds of useful consciousness before passing out, and, if the ICD operates, I get a painful kick in the chest. Thanks to underinvestment, the UK's driving agency currently has a backlog of at least three months in reissuing licenses, so I will likely have nine months not being able to drive (which means that I can't do my volunteering).

My point? Don't assume that you will maintain your youthful vigour for ever as life can throw curveballs.

[0] https://www.bhf.org.uk/informationsupport/treatments/implant...

Re: Don't Waste the Good Days

#255

Post by goodpoint »

imtringued wrote: post #231
serjester wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here’s an interesting thought experiment for you - if you could trade 20 years of your life for 10 billion dollars, would you? Just step in a room and walk out a billionaire. I have yet to meet someone that would accept the offer. So if you do the math, they value their time at a shockingly high rate. I’d argue, trading the best years of your life for an early retirement is the same proposal. Steve Jobs would have gi…

If I could use the money to reform all economies to have a land value tax and implement a -5% interest rate on cash then surely the importance of the bottom 95% of humanity's billions of years in aggregate would massively outweigh 20 of mine. Not to mention that I myself would benefit from peace and stability which could be worth 20 years if I were to die in a conflict that cuts my life short, not to mention all the…

A lot of people already sacrifice 20 years of their life to bring benefits to the world.

> -5% interest rate on cash

You mean a property tax specifically on cash? Why?

Re: Don't Waste the Good Days

#256

Post by popcube »

2143 wrote: post #239
mgh2 wrote: post #222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This advice seem to be for the typical tech affluent HN crowd, so don't take it personally.

I just felt like I walked into a Ferrari dealership :)

sigh, they can say "if you work hard, you can retired at 40!"

this make me want to give up anything and try any crazy way to get money:(

Re: Don't Waste the Good Days

#257

Post by taf2 »

jdironman wrote: post #120
taf2 wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I did a three day weekend in barselon- it was awesome I ported our windows app to Mac - 2004

So you spent your extended weekend working. Lol I only kid. I've always wanted to visit there.

It was amazing . There are all these tiny coffee shops on ever corner and I don’t think I slept once…

Re: Don't Waste the Good Days

#258

Post by dageshi »

ryandrake wrote: post #41

I feel like there is wisdom in "Make hay while the sun shines." When you're young and unencumbered by responsibility and family, when your cognitive abilities are at their peak, when your energy is endless, when your body is strong and healthy, when your knees work, and your fingers can type without arthritis: that's the optimal time to work and earn. Min-max that salary and stay healthy. Due to compounding interest,…

Life is only long if it all goes to plan...

Re: Don't Waste the Good Days

#259

Post by hericium »

staticassertion wrote: post #165
nightowl_games wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'd have played fewer video games, traveled less, and relaxed on the beach less. This seems totally opposite of what old people say on their death bed. You sound so obsessed with money here. My guess is your probably very wealthy relative to the average peer and your too naive to realize it. You have to keep telling yourself this philosophy to justify not wind surfing in Bali. You think your gonna wind surf when yo…

Lots of people I know in a generation or two above me regret not saving when they were younger. Now they're nervous about being 70 and having to retire soon but not feeling stable, or feeling that they may financially burden their children. Compounding interest on money means, as previously mentioned, money you earn at 20 will be 10x as valuable compared to money earned towards a typical retirement age. With tech hav…

> Do experiences compound? Will I enjoy an experience more at 25 than 45? Maybe, and there's always some balance, of course. No one should work themselves to death.

There are experiences you may be incapable of considering later in life. Doing stupid, immature shit is fun and forms a person in many ways. Some errors are also better made earlier.

Re: Don't Waste the Good Days

#260

Post by jacquesm »

throwoutway wrote: post #249
jacquesm wrote: post #247

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Due to compounding interest, a dollar made in your 20's is far, far more valuable than a dollar made in your 60's. Yes. But you'll be earning relatively little when you're young so there won't be too many dollars left at the end of your fixed expenses to pull that trick with, besides, the interest rates are negative at the moment. Whereas later in life you will likely make a multiple of what you make in your twenti…

> Yes. But you'll be earning relatively little when you're young so there won't be too many dollars left at the end of your fixed expenses to pull that trick with, besides, the interest rates are negative at the moment. I don’t think you understand it. The intent is to invest that dollar into a basket of investments for 40 years. The stock market is up this past year, not negstive. Sure Interest rates are negative bu…

Yes, I totally understood it, but thank you for saying it again.

Compound interest does not apply to the stock market, it applies to savings.

The only way stocks can compound is if you re-invest dividends, and that's not 'interest'.

Inflation eats at the value of the dollar, but not at the value of real estate, so that's one way to make this all work for you: buy a house when you're young at the current low interest rates so that you have a chance to pay it off, and better make sure that you do this in a place that isn't subject to boom/bust cycles.

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