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The Rise of Men Who Don’t Work, and What They Do Instead

nytimes.com

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Re: The Rise of Men Who Don’t Work, and What They Do Instead

#61

Post by caseysoftware »

learnstats2 wrote: post #35
Omniusaspirer wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a subreddit dedicated to this idea, although I warn you it's largely terrible. http://www.reddit.com/r/financialindependence Basically the only reason most people struggle financially in the US is due to their own financial illiteracy and living above their means. If you manage not to fall victim to either of those then you can save a substantial portion of your income towards a very early retirement should y…

People on or below median income (i.e. "most people") live above their means, because they have little choice.

Some portion of them, yes. But something as simple as cutting cable can save $500+/year, usually over $1k/year. And to someone who is below the median, either of those numbers is non-trivial.

Exclude a few other optional behaviors and the numbers shift more positive pretty quickly. Examples: smoking, iphone plans, pets.

Someone doesn't have to go without those things forever but cutting out all the non-necessities for a few years to stabilize and build a little savings is a great thing everyone should be encouraged to do.

Re: The Rise of Men Who Don’t Work, and What They Do Instead

#62

Post by bigtunacan »

Rapzid wrote: post #28
Omniusaspirer wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a subreddit dedicated to this idea, although I warn you it's largely terrible. http://www.reddit.com/r/financialindependence Basically the only reason most people struggle financially in the US is due to their own financial illiteracy and living above their means. If you manage not to fall victim to either of those then you can save a substantial portion of your income towards a very early retirement should y…

Mr Money Mustache also also comes to mind. It's too late for my 30s being 31, but this stuff has really woken me up and I'm shooting for FIRE close to 40.

Mr Money Mustache is good; I also really like Budgets Are Sexy.

Re: The Rise of Men Who Don’t Work, and What They Do Instead

#63

Post by fweespeech »

kidsthesedays wrote: post #48
fweespeech wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Basically the only reason most people struggle financially in the US is due to their own financial illiteracy and living above their means. If you manage not to fall victim to either of those then you can save a substantial portion of your income towards a very early retirement should you choose to do so. That is really only true for households above the median income. So "most" is not a factual statement. About ha…

I agree that most is silly. Certainly many though. Consider: When I was single I lived a very very very comfortable life on $22,000 a year (cash, not income). I put that much in my checking account and everything else in savings and investment. This was after I spent several years putting the majority of my pay on loans to become debt free and paid off the $60,000 in student loans and a very small car loan. If someon…

> If someone makes a salary of $30,000 a year than they probably take home around $22,000 after taxes and insurance. It would be much less comfortable for them to have a lot of savings. True, not impossible, but much much harder than me since their takehome pay is equal to my "frugal" pay. They would have to give up much more than I do. Obviously you can't max out your 401(k) and IRA on that salary, maxing those out would be more than your take home pay!

Yes, but the amount they'd save is "a few thousand a year". I doubt they'd save more than $3,000/year after the big expenses and random things happening [e.g. dental, medical]

You'd need around $1,000,000 to produce $30,000 a year [3% "safe return"] indefinitely.

http://www.bloomberg.com/personal-finance/calculators/401k/

You'd need to save for 35 years to retire before 60 [using the defaults, no employer match since you need access before you could access a IRA/401k, etc] which is what /r/financialindependence is about.

Mr Money Mustache and all of their idols retire early [by 40] and that is what they emphasize. That simply isn't possible on $30k/year in the US.

EDIT:

> Which was exactly my point. :)

Ah okay. I thought you were like the guy I was replying to who is completely 100% convinced that they can retire in their 30s like /r/FI aims for if they'd just "save more money".

Re: The Rise of Men Who Don’t Work, and What They Do Instead

#64

Post by huxley »

mrybczyn wrote: post #19
enraged_camel wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He's referring to the fact that men lose a significant portion (usually half, sometimes more) of their financial assets during divorce. Protection in this case refers to signing certain agreements before or during marriage.

Also, they always lose custody of their children, one of the main points of marriage...

No, in fact it's becoming less common as time goes on.

In the US by 2008, maternal sole-custody had declined to 42% of custodial arrangements (from 80% in 1986), while equal shared custody rose to 27% (from 5%).

http://psychcentral.com/news/2014/05/22/joint-custody-becomi...

Re: The Rise of Men Who Don’t Work, and What They Do Instead

#65

Post by Clanan »

Omniusaspirer wrote: post #27
jasonkester wrote: post #25

It seems a lot more possible these days, both socially and economically, to go into "partial retirement" at around age 30. Developers can pull this off without much effort. 2-20X the pay for our work, little expectation of company loyalty nor stigma for resume gaps or job hopping, crazy skewed market to ensure that a new contract is only a Facebook/LinkedIn/Twitter update away. Why would anybody spend their 30s not t…

There's a subreddit dedicated to this idea, although I warn you it's largely terrible. http://www.reddit.com/r/financialindependence Basically the only reason most people struggle financially in the US is due to their own financial illiteracy and living above their means. If you manage not to fall victim to either of those then you can save a substantial portion of your income towards a very early retirement should y…

As a parent I've found that "kids are pricey" can easily stem from financial illiteracy as well. It's easier than people think to have kids and not blow the budget. Don't go crazy on Christmas gifts, limit eating out, buy secondhand clothes (which are usually in great condition), etc.

We always chuckle when our friends talk about how expensive their kids are, right before mentioning their three cross-country trips. Financial literacy can apply to child-rearing too!

Re: The Rise of Men Who Don’t Work, and What They Do Instead

#66

Post by caseysoftware »

matthewmacleod wrote: post #42
M8 wrote: post #12

Partially related to having a family becoming more risky for men. If you are not protected in case of a separation, you are less likely to want to commit to a family. If there is no family, there is less motivation to earn more.

I find that a pretty suspect statement, and I'm not sure I've ever encountered any man who's decided to avoid starting a family for that reason.

The numbers are there to support it. I don't believe it's getting widespread coverage because it's considered anti-feminist to believe that women want to find a man to marry or have kids. Look at how Joss Whedon was thrashed for having Black Widow even suggest that.

Check out "Men on Strike" by Helen Smith. She highlights the trends and proposed a number of theories to explain it.

Re: The Rise of Men Who Don’t Work, and What They Do Instead

#67

Post by TheLoneWolfling »

caseysoftware wrote: post #61
learnstats2 wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People on or below median income (i.e. "most people") live above their means, because they have little choice.

Some portion of them, yes. But something as simple as cutting cable can save $500+/year, usually over $1k/year. And to someone who is below the median, either of those numbers is non-trivial. Exclude a few other optional behaviors and the numbers shift more positive pretty quickly. Examples: smoking, iphone plans, pets. Someone doesn't have to go without those things forever but cutting out all the non-necessities fo…

As a student, I've gotten laughed at for having a prepaid (and cheap) cell phone. Saves me several hundred a year, easily.

Ditto: I don't drink, and I don't have a car. And I still struggle.

Don't know how some students do it.

Re: The Rise of Men Who Don’t Work, and What They Do Instead

#68

Post by ghettoCoder »

Dewie3 wrote: post #9

Nice numbers, but what's the point? Times they are a changin'?

Not sure why you're getting downvoted for this. The fact is that individuals act in ways so as to maximize their allocation and use of resources within a particular set of social mores is not new. The fact that social mores change over time to reflect resource abundance, mate availability, technology, life expectancy etc... is also not new.

Times they are a changin', always have been, always will.

Re: The Rise of Men Who Don’t Work, and What They Do Instead

#69

Post by draz »

Clanan wrote: post #65
Omniusaspirer wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a subreddit dedicated to this idea, although I warn you it's largely terrible. http://www.reddit.com/r/financialindependence Basically the only reason most people struggle financially in the US is due to their own financial illiteracy and living above their means. If you manage not to fall victim to either of those then you can save a substantial portion of your income towards a very early retirement should y…

As a parent I've found that "kids are pricey" can easily stem from financial illiteracy as well. It's easier than people think to have kids and not blow the budget. Don't go crazy on Christmas gifts, limit eating out, buy secondhand clothes (which are usually in great condition), etc. We always chuckle when our friends talk about how expensive their kids are, right before mentioning their three cross-country trips. F…

Agreed on all the of above.

However, when the going rate for daycare in NYC is $3K/month per child, you need to make an extra $50K/year (pre-tax) to just cover that (if you were to maintain your pre-kids lifestyle). Then there are other expenses. Point it, kids aren't free.

That's where you need to start making choices (less eating out, etc.)

Re: The Rise of Men Who Don’t Work, and What They Do Instead

#70

Post by cryoshon »

Uhh, I'm not sure that this article is useful.

Plenty of the "men who don't work" are simply unemployed but are not counted on the unemployment numbers because they've been unemployed for a long time. This population isn't depicted in the article, which looks like a major oversight.

The only reason that there was a "rise of men who don't work" is that there was an economic collapse which we haven't recovered from, and possibly won't ever recover from by the pre-crash definitions of recovery.

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