Author Topic: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!  (Read 1269898 times)

Buffaloski Boris

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3950 on: September 29, 2020, 04:20:26 AM »

Another person who is almost dead on.  However, I wish to point out that there seem to be a lot of people gifted with altruism posting here.  Have you noticed it?  These folks have made their piles and now wish to help others.  There are exceptions to the rampant greed herein.

I also think the greed started about the time of Ronald Reagan.  I do believe the statistics will bear me out.  This is when the wages seemed to no longer be increasing in terms of the cost of living for the average person.

There are a lot of really good people here who I enjoy interacting with. And I’m not at all indifferent to the trends I’m seeing and noting. I just differ on identifying root causes and how they should be responded to, if at all.

History and cultural changes don’t operate cleanly. There are always exceptions, counter-trends, and people who decline to go along.

As for the Reagan years, yeah I do think that’s the point when greed became culturally acceptable. It’s also the point when it became fashionable to destroy organized labor, which in the long run I think has been more devastating. That said I don’t buy into this line that the regimes representing one faction are decidedly more wicked in contrast to the other.  And therein lies the dilemma; most people in our society (and in these forums specifically) default to explaining what they see through a political lens rather than a cultural or economic one.


Bateaux

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3951 on: September 29, 2020, 09:47:18 PM »
After watching that shitshow debate, I'm glad I've saved every freaking dollar I have.  I'm also glad as Hell I'm still working.  How did we get to such a point. 

Taran Wanderer

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3952 on: September 29, 2020, 11:03:27 PM »
@Bateaux ... this is the first comment I’ve seen that makes me actually want to go watch the s$&*show.

Buffaloski Boris

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3953 on: September 30, 2020, 07:03:14 AM »
After watching that shitshow debate, I'm glad I've saved every freaking dollar I have.  I'm also glad as Hell I'm still working.  How did we get to such a point.

Nikki was right! (See below)

Buffaloski Boris

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3954 on: September 30, 2020, 07:06:50 AM »
@Bateaux ... this is the first comment I’ve seen that makes me actually want to go watch the s$&*show.

I get criticized by folks who think I’m too negative towards partisan politics and elections. That’s not true! I think it’s the best gallows humor we‘ve got going!

SwordGuy

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3955 on: September 30, 2020, 07:08:01 AM »
After watching that shitshow debate, I'm glad I've saved every freaking dollar I have.  I'm also glad as Hell I'm still working.  How did we get to such a point.

Because too many people believed that jackass con man and they voted for him.  They apparently still do, God help us.   That's why.   That and 30 years worth of right wing poison propaganda spewing out of proto-alt-right infotainers that preceded the election.

2sk22

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3956 on: September 30, 2020, 09:23:35 AM »
Its my last day of work - almost exactly 29 years to the day since I started work at my first job. Even though I am so done with work, it was a bit harder than I expected as I have been making bank for the past ten years. It still feels a bit unreal after so many years of employment.

pecunia

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3957 on: September 30, 2020, 09:30:29 AM »
Its my last day of work - almost exactly 29 years to the day since I started work at my first job. Even though I am so done with work, it was a bit harder than I expected as I have been making bank for the past ten years. It still feels a bit unreal after so many years of employment.

@2sk22 - Congratulations! 

@ Swordguy - "Because too many people believed that jackass con man and they voted for him.  They apparently still do, God help us.   That's why.   That and 30 years worth of right wing poison propaganda spewing out of proto-alt-right infotainers that preceded the election."

I think you are dead on right.  Trump has made many of us see the power of Right Wing propaganda.  Joe Goebbels sees that stuff and has a big smile.



soccerluvof4

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3958 on: October 01, 2020, 03:29:49 AM »
Its my last day of work - almost exactly 29 years to the day since I started work at my first job. Even though I am so done with work, it was a bit harder than I expected as I have been making bank for the past ten years. It still feels a bit unreal after so many years of employment.

@2sk22 - Congratulations! 

@ Swordguy - "Because too many people believed that jackass con man and they voted for him.  They apparently still do, God help us.   That's why.   That and 30 years worth of right wing poison propaganda spewing out of proto-alt-right infotainers that preceded the election."

I think you are dead on right.  Trump has made many of us see the power of Right Wing propaganda.  Joe Goebbels sees that stuff and has a big smile.


I will say I rushed home and watched the Debate with all 3 of my Sons 21, 16 and 15 and I was embarrassed as a parent that they had to witness that. To have to explain to them the behavior and disrespect and how the World is laughing at us just felt like a gut punch. Being older and having lived through alot of presidents, debates etc... Shitshow doesnt even begin to explain what had happened BUT more importantly to me is I want folks to come together again and not feel this thing in the air that just because I might disagree with you we cant be friends anymore. Thats the sad part of all this and if it doesnt change and in a hurry this country is going to be in trouble. But having said that as a whole we have been in bad places before and come through it so we just need to pull together and do it again. Can and will we without a Civil war or to much damage is the million dollar question

Car Jack

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3959 on: October 01, 2020, 08:48:50 AM »
Didn't watch the debate.  Won't.

It seems to me that the Tea Party set the stage for the current political stalemate.  They came in with a decidedly NO COMPROMISE strategy.  This, of course led to gridlock.  Today, the Congress and Senate would not even agree that it's Thursday.  I have no idea what the solution is besides voting out all the bums.  Problem is, most people think their bum is fine....it's all the other bums that need to be gone.

Buffaloski Boris

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3960 on: October 01, 2020, 02:44:54 PM »
Another one who skipped the debate.  What's the point?  I don't vote.  If I wanted to watch clowns, I'd buy the tickets and go to the circus instead. 

I wanted to address an earlier post about politics needing to change in the US.  It's not going to change absent an external factor or significant change in the culture.  The political duopoly that runs the US has run it for the last 170 plus years is not going to change on their own. There's no incentive. If they do nothing, they still keep power.  If they're completely incompetent, they still keep power. If they're completely malevolent twits, they still keep power.

Our duopoly is very, very good at making sure that no other faction is able to compete and that they and only they have political power. 

To draw an analogy, if there were only two brands of beer sold in a country for 170 plus years with no competing brands allowed, what would you expect the beer to taste like?  There's no incentive to improve the quality of the beer.  And so long as people continue to line up to buy whatever swill they're peddling, there's no reason to think about changing. 

Taran Wanderer

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3961 on: October 01, 2020, 08:18:29 PM »
Thank goodness for microbrews...

Do you realize what an imposition it is to travel outside of the PNW? I mean, it’s better than it was 5 or 10 years ago, but most of the country doesn’t realize how limited their beer options are.

Funny story... several years ago, a 2nd cousin was getting married. Another second cousin and her boyfriend flew in from across the country. Having heard he was interested in beer, we had a selection available and put several out on the counter for him to select. He said, sort of sheepishly, “I’m sorry, but I’m interested in local beers. Are any of these local?”

I replied, “Um, how local?”  We had a range from our local county to 2-3 counties away. He was pretty funny. He had landed in beer heaven and didn’t even know it!

2sk22

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3962 on: October 02, 2020, 02:54:49 AM »
Thank goodness for microbrews...

Do you realize what an imposition it is to travel outside of the PNW? I mean, it’s better than it was 5 or 10 years ago, but most of the country doesn’t realize how limited their beer options are.

Funny story... several years ago, a 2nd cousin was getting married. Another second cousin and her boyfriend flew in from across the country. Having heard he was interested in beer, we had a selection available and put several out on the counter for him to select. He said, sort of sheepishly, “I’m sorry, but I’m interested in local beers. Are any of these local?”

I replied, “Um, how local?”  We had a range from our local county to 2-3 counties away. He was pretty funny. He had landed in beer heaven and didn’t even know it!
[/quote

Not quite at the PNW level but even here in NJ, there are a couple of excellent microbreweries within my county alone. Lots of decent choices in the New York City area (pre-covid at least). There was a genuinely amazing brewery in Brooklyn right across the street from my office - this was one of my main motivators to go in to my office periodically :-)

soccerluvof4

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3963 on: October 02, 2020, 03:19:53 AM »
Another one who skipped the debate.  What's the point?  I don't vote.  If I wanted to watch clowns, I'd buy the tickets and go to the circus instead. 

I wanted to address an earlier post about politics needing to change in the US.  It's not going to change absent an external factor or significant change in the culture.  The political duopoly that runs the US has run it for the last 170 plus years is not going to change on their own. There's no incentive. If they do nothing, they still keep power.  If they're completely incompetent, they still keep power. If they're completely malevolent twits, they still keep power.

Our duopoly is very, very good at making sure that no other faction is able to compete and that they and only they have political power. 

To draw an analogy, if there were only two brands of beer sold in a country for 170 plus years with no competing brands allowed, what would you expect the beer to taste like?  There's no incentive to improve the quality of the beer.  And so long as people continue to line up to buy whatever swill they're peddling, there's no reason to think about changing.


Thats why we really do now than ever need a 3rd or 4rth beer! No one has ever gotten the traction in the past or if they do they fall behind one of the other two current beers. We truly need away to launch an independent that will go the distance. I totally agree with your analogy.

pecunia

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3964 on: October 02, 2020, 07:25:09 AM »
There is a beer in Wisconsin called Spotted Cow.  You can't get it where I live.  The stuff is great.  When this Covid thing dies down, it may be time to become a beer tourist.

Roboturner

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3965 on: October 02, 2020, 11:06:01 AM »
There is a beer in Wisconsin called Spotted Cow.  You can't get it where I live.  The stuff is great.  When this Covid thing dies down, it may be time to become a beer tourist.

+1 for spotted cow!

Buffaloski Boris

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3966 on: October 02, 2020, 03:26:54 PM »
So let's continue with the beer analogy. 

I think we'd all agree that in this analogous world where there is a 170 year old beer duopoly and only two brands of beer sold that it would be much better to have a third competing beer brand.  Even better to have a fourth!  And happily, every now and then a new beer company comes in and wants to compete. 

Well, that's a problem for our beer duopoly.  They might disagree on some things, and have marketing that would lead you to believe that they're vigorously competing.  But one thing the beer duopoly absolutely agrees on is that there should be no other competing brands of beer.  And over the space of 170 years, the beer duopoly become very adept at eliminating any potential competition.  As it turns out, there are rules about becoming a beer company that must be followed before you're allowed to compete.  Oh and by the way, the beer duopoly wrote those rules.  So let's look at the rules more closely.  Any new beer company that wants to sell beer has to petition thousands of beer drinkers to be allowed to sell a new brand of beer.  And any new beer company has to demonstrate that it can maintain at least a 5% market share in order to be allowed to stock their new beer on the shelves.  We don't want to confuse the beer consumer with too many choices, now do we?  Oh but it gets better.  If a new beer company wants to distribute its beer, it has to use a beer distributor.  And guess who owns the only beer distributors?  None other than our beer duopoly.  And guess who employs the only people who are allowed to sell beer?  As you can see, becoming a successful new beer company in this sort of environment is almost impossible.  And of course the quality of the beer sold by the beer duopoly just gets worse over time.

Now, beer drinkers want improvements.  And they'll send letters to the beer duopoly. They'll march in the streets. And they'll get all excited to participate in a once every four year market survey that the beer duopoly grudgingly submits to.  But the beer drinkers just can't seem to fathom why the quality of the beer just seems to get worse and worse.  And they come back, like clockwork, to buy whatever beer that the duopoly is selling.

Now in our analogous world, there are some people who see the duopoly for what it is. Some complain about it, and some try to start new beer companies.  And there are others simply stop drinking.     

« Last Edit: October 02, 2020, 03:29:36 PM by Buffaloski Boris »

deborah

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3967 on: October 02, 2020, 03:43:24 PM »
It can be done. Look at Turkey. They didn’t want the Kurds in parliament, so they wrote several rules. No party can have any seats in parliament unless they win more than 10% of the national vote. If a party wins less than 10% of the national vote, all the seats they would have won are given to the candidate who would have come next in the election.

For many years Kurdish candidates ran as independents (who can retain the seat they won). But, one year, the Kurds decided that they actually might have enough national votes to compete as a party, and they won 14% of the national vote.

Many other countries have done it. They have changed from authoritarian rule to being democracies. Many democracies have had gerrymanders and have overcome them. While authoritarianism is currently increasing, and democracy is reducing world wide, twenty years ago the opposite was happening. But it takes citizens who are prepared to stand up for democracy and to take responsibility for helping democracy to flourish.

Buffaloski Boris

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3968 on: October 02, 2020, 05:08:19 PM »

Many other countries have done it. They have changed from authoritarian rule to being democracies. Many democracies have had gerrymanders and have overcome them. While authoritarianism is currently increasing, and democracy is reducing world wide, twenty years ago the opposite was happening. But it takes citizens who are prepared to stand up for democracy and to take responsibility for helping democracy to flourish.
170 years of history says otherwise. Many have tried, many have failed. And in any case putting effort into it is putting means above ends.

The unifying idea of 244 years ago was liberty and self governance. OK. That’s great. I like it! So self-govern already. Or have we sunk to the point that we believe we must have people like the current political “luminaries” to lead us around by the nose?

soccerluvof4

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3969 on: October 03, 2020, 02:26:40 AM »
There is a beer in Wisconsin called Spotted Cow.  You can't get it where I live.  The stuff is great.  When this Covid thing dies down, it may be time to become a beer tourist.

+1 for spotted cow!
There is a beer in Wisconsin called Spotted Cow.  You can't get it where I live.  The stuff is great.  When this Covid thing dies down, it may be time to become a beer tourist.


+2 We always have it in our fridge. We have well over 30 Micro breweries just in my area and ones that have been around a bit

https://www.sprecherbrewery.com/
https://lakefrontbrewery.com/

Lake Front is probably the most popular but many many good ones.


Fomerly known as something

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3970 on: October 04, 2020, 06:38:41 AM »
Thank goodness for microbrews...

Do you realize what an imposition it is to travel outside of the PNW? I mean, it’s better than it was 5 or 10 years ago, but most of the country doesn’t realize how limited their beer options are.

Funny story... several years ago, a 2nd cousin was getting married. Another second cousin and her boyfriend flew in from across the country. Having heard he was interested in beer, we had a selection available and put several out on the counter for him to select. He said, sort of sheepishly, “I’m sorry, but I’m interested in local beers. Are any of these local?”

I replied, “Um, how local?”  We had a range from our local county to 2-3 counties away. He was pretty funny. He had landed in beer heaven and didn’t even know it!

You’ve obviously never been in Michigan then.  Um how local, walk, bike ride or less than a half hour car trip?

Also I have one spotted cow left from my last business trip to Wisconsin.

Taran Wanderer

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3971 on: October 04, 2020, 10:29:24 AM »
True, I haven’t been to Michigan since before I was drinking beer. My reference points are Wisconsin and Minnesota, and I have to admit, the beer scenes there have really changed and improved in the last 10 to 15 years. Still, I haven’t seen the variety and quality of beers in WI and MN that we have in the PNW.  Is Michigan different?

Buffaloski Boris

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3972 on: October 04, 2020, 12:38:43 PM »
If you want awesome beers, Virginia holds its own. There are roughly 10 breweries in a 4-5 mile radius of me. Lots of good and eclectic choices.

Dancin'Dog

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3973 on: October 04, 2020, 06:30:55 PM »
NC is loaded with plenty of good breweries too. 


It's actually become a problem for me.  I figured out which beers I like & with so many brands & flavors on the market now it can be hard to find the ones I like.  I guess you'd call that "too much of a good thing"! 

pecunia

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3974 on: October 04, 2020, 09:09:08 PM »
True, I haven’t been to Michigan since before I was drinking beer. My reference points are Wisconsin and Minnesota, and I have to admit, the beer scenes there have really changed and improved in the last 10 to 15 years. Still, I haven’t seen the variety and quality of beers in WI and MN that we have in the PNW.  Is Michigan different?

Grand Rapids, Mich. was apparently voted Beer City USA.

https://www.experiencegr.com/things-to-do/beer-city/

Trifle

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3975 on: October 05, 2020, 06:56:22 AM »
Asheville, NC also labels itself "Beer City, USA."  https://www.exploreasheville.com/stories/post/asheville-beer-history/

There are currently ~50 breweries, and a slew of mighty fine beers.  We moved here from Wisconsin five years ago and thought we would be taking a step down in terms of local beer quality.  We were thrilled to be so wrong.     

LWYRUP

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3976 on: October 05, 2020, 07:21:18 AM »

This year has been a catastrophe in terms of 'spreading it around' though.  Folks like Bezos and Musk are sucking up billions per day, while 'regular folks' manage to make rent payments.  The rich don't have anything left to soak up all the money sloshing around in their accounts, and the poor are drying out and starting to feel the drought.  At some point, the government will have to rely on the economy actually paying for the country to stay solvent, instead of borrowing and spending trillions with no end in sight.

OK. I’ll bite. Why does the economy have to pay at all? Our national debt to GDP ratio is somewhere north of 107%.  Compare that to Japan at above 235%. 
...

I keep hearing this refrain and can't help but wonder, do you want America to follow Japan's Nikkei Index post-1990?  That's 30 years of break even, after a really terrible crash?  Sure, Japan isn't looking as bad as Greece on the surface, but it's a homogenous culture.  On the flip side, there is Norway, similarly homogenous, with surplus for years. 

America cannot continue to borrow as it has indefinitely without seriously knee-capping its options to continue to borrow.  We are far from a stable, homogenous society, in case you haven't noticed lately.

Given that I try to keep my exposure to US equities low, I can’t say that it much matters to me what US equity markets do, other than the US markets have a nasty tendency to correlate with other global markets. But I don’t think that’s the real concern here. I think it’s more of a concern that the US won’t be able to sell its debt at favorable terms and that the US will somehow, in some way suffer some horrible malaise as a result of profligate state spending.

I’ve been hearing this argument my entire adult life and you know what? The malaise hasn’t happened yet. The Government has been spending to beat the band for decades now. The national debt hasn’t been a problem from the perspective of being able to service the debt. It has been a problem in that the spending has tended to benefit the already ultra-wealthy at the expense of everyone else. Not that surprising when you have a multimillionaire Congress and a never ending  succession of corporatist presidents.

What concerns me though is this logic that says that the national debt is like personal debt. It isn’t. Personal debt has to repaid at some point, public debt doesn’t. And it never will be. But what ends up happening is that well meaning people in their zeal to try to repay what can never be repaid start coming up will all sorts of not-so-bright ideas to pay it off. Like raising taxes on the ultra-wealthy. Sounds nice! It’ll never happen. Part of the reason the ultra-wealthy are that way is they have the systems and accountants and lawyers and, let’s face it, politicians to ensure that they will never pay more than a token amount. What a tax hike for the ultra-wealthy really means is that everyone else’s taxes get jacked up.

And when taxes don’t work, then we get into the really destructive ideas like selling off public assets to pay off the debt. And guess who will be buying them at fire sale prices?

The national debt is just one of those nonissues that we can largely ignore. Yeah, there probably is a point where issuing more debt won’t work. We’re not there. Given that we’re experiencing negligible inflation, we’re nowhere near that ceiling.

I'm responding at the point that I bolded.  I'll read the rest, but honestly, this is not in touch with reality.  In the 1990's, the US budget finally started  running a surplus and GDP was still growing.  We slipped in to some deficits and had bubbles burst, but the US GDP could have outpaced national debt for the most part, other than the financial crisis.  But we just went from bad to worse.  Nowadays, folks don't seem to care that GDP is meh and debt is the way to get more rich.  I very much feel that we are in the final throes of an instant gratification society and that this won't end well.  We hardly have the stomach to try to balance the budget, now that hard times are upon us.

You say that you invest internationally, but there aren't many other places that had the US patent system and 'brain power' advantages of the US.  I think the global system is on a decline, until the reigns are fully handed over to whatever is next.  Maybe China, but they don't have the dynamism that the US had yet.  I think we are in for a whole lot of stagnation as the engine of the global economy sputters and chokes.

Can we talk about this more? 

Back when I studied economics, it was pretty standard view that some debt was OK but too much debt was bad.  Debt denominated in your own currency was safer, but there was a risk of hyperinflation, which does damage the economy because it makes pricing unpredictable and so throws off allocations of good and services, as well as because in general instability damages economic growth.  Now there is something called Modern Monetary Theory which I haven't had time to study but seems to me to basically be like Dr. Strangelove -- " How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb." 

I fully admit I don't understand it.  Instead I use general rules of thumb and wisdom I've picked up along the way, including:

-- Just because a bunch of the cultural elite that live in one part of the world in one particular time and place happen to believe something doesn't make it true.  They are always swayed by the intellectual fad of the day and if you look at the arc of history these ideas go in and out of fashion.  So the argument from authority, "this guy has a Nobel Prize and he believes it" doesn't always work for me.  This is especially true for any sort of theory that can't be tested in a lab, like MMT. 

-- People who say "this time, it's different" are usually wrong.

-- "You can run along for a long time, but sooner or later God is gonna cut you down." -- Johnny Cash  (Secular economic translation:  The negative consequences of dumb behavior may not be felt until far in the future, but that doesn't mean they aren't going to be felt.)

My instinct is that the developed world is going to look up and realize that huge piles of debt and declining worker to dependent ratios have put them in a bad spot, and so at some point our day of reckoning is going to come even if the powers that be aren't too worried about it now.  But there's very little... actual math or proof or whatnot in my analysis, so I leave it open for those better versed in the subject to explain where I've gone off track.

Corollary is that since we don't know how the fallout will occur or when, what do we do?  My best answers are pretty simple.  Don't overextend yourself with debt, invest globally, stay invested because you don't know the hour of when the other shoe may drop and the market can be irrational longer than you can be solvent, have the resources to ride out a storm for a few years without selling at the bottom, realize a portion of your wealth is illusory and is probably going to disappear at some point, be a little more liberal on spending on durable goods that will retain their value (or are just really well made and will last a long time -- buy them now and you can use them later when things are nutty), cultivate a broad range of skills so you can make (and, through your own efforts, save) money in various economic climates. 
 
« Last Edit: October 05, 2020, 07:25:21 AM by LWYRUP »

pecunia

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3977 on: October 05, 2020, 08:00:40 AM »

This year has been a catastrophe in terms of 'spreading it around' though.  Folks like Bezos and Musk are sucking up billions per day, while 'regular folks' manage to make rent payments.  The rich don't have anything left to soak up all the money sloshing around in their accounts, and the poor are drying out and starting to feel the drought.  At some point, the government will have to rely on the economy actually paying for the country to stay solvent, instead of borrowing and spending trillions with no end in sight.

OK. I’ll bite. Why does the economy have to pay at all? Our national debt to GDP ratio is somewhere north of 107%.  Compare that to Japan at above 235%. 
...

I keep hearing this refrain and can't help but wonder, do you want America to follow Japan's Nikkei Index post-1990?  That's 30 years of break even, after a really terrible crash?  Sure, Japan isn't looking as bad as Greece on the surface, but it's a homogenous culture.  On the flip side, there is Norway, similarly homogenous, with surplus for years. 

America cannot continue to borrow as it has indefinitely without seriously knee-capping its options to continue to borrow.  We are far from a stable, homogenous society, in case you haven't noticed lately.

Given that I try to keep my exposure to US equities low, I can’t say that it much matters to me what US equity markets do, other than the US markets have a nasty tendency to correlate with other global markets. But I don’t think that’s the real concern here. I think it’s more of a concern that the US won’t be able to sell its debt at favorable terms and that the US will somehow, in some way suffer some horrible malaise as a result of profligate state spending.

I’ve been hearing this argument my entire adult life and you know what? The malaise hasn’t happened yet. The Government has been spending to beat the band for decades now. The national debt hasn’t been a problem from the perspective of being able to service the debt. It has been a problem in that the spending has tended to benefit the already ultra-wealthy at the expense of everyone else. Not that surprising when you have a multimillionaire Congress and a never ending  succession of corporatist presidents.

What concerns me though is this logic that says that the national debt is like personal debt. It isn’t. Personal debt has to repaid at some point, public debt doesn’t. And it never will be. But what ends up happening is that well meaning people in their zeal to try to repay what can never be repaid start coming up will all sorts of not-so-bright ideas to pay it off. Like raising taxes on the ultra-wealthy. Sounds nice! It’ll never happen. Part of the reason the ultra-wealthy are that way is they have the systems and accountants and lawyers and, let’s face it, politicians to ensure that they will never pay more than a token amount. What a tax hike for the ultra-wealthy really means is that everyone else’s taxes get jacked up.

And when taxes don’t work, then we get into the really destructive ideas like selling off public assets to pay off the debt. And guess who will be buying them at fire sale prices?

The national debt is just one of those nonissues that we can largely ignore. Yeah, there probably is a point where issuing more debt won’t work. We’re not there. Given that we’re experiencing negligible inflation, we’re nowhere near that ceiling.

I'm responding at the point that I bolded.  I'll read the rest, but honestly, this is not in touch with reality.  In the 1990's, the US budget finally started  running a surplus and GDP was still growing.  We slipped in to some deficits and had bubbles burst, but the US GDP could have outpaced national debt for the most part, other than the financial crisis.  But we just went from bad to worse.  Nowadays, folks don't seem to care that GDP is meh and debt is the way to get more rich.  I very much feel that we are in the final throes of an instant gratification society and that this won't end well.  We hardly have the stomach to try to balance the budget, now that hard times are upon us.

You say that you invest internationally, but there aren't many other places that had the US patent system and 'brain power' advantages of the US.  I think the global system is on a decline, until the reigns are fully handed over to whatever is next.  Maybe China, but they don't have the dynamism that the US had yet.  I think we are in for a whole lot of stagnation as the engine of the global economy sputters and chokes.

Can we talk about this more? 

Back when I studied economics, it was pretty standard view that some debt was OK but too much debt was bad.  Debt denominated in your own currency was safer, but there was a risk of hyperinflation, which does damage the economy because it makes pricing unpredictable and so throws off allocations of good and services, as well as because in general instability damages economic growth.  Now there is something called Modern Monetary Theory which I haven't had time to study but seems to me to basically be like Dr. Strangelove -- " How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb." 

I fully admit I don't understand it.  Instead I use general rules of thumb and wisdom I've picked up along the way, including:

-- Just because a bunch of the cultural elite that live in one part of the world in one particular time and place happen to believe something doesn't make it true.  They are always swayed by the intellectual fad of the day and if you look at the arc of history these ideas go in and out of fashion.  So the argument from authority, "this guy has a Nobel Prize and he believes it" doesn't always work for me.  This is especially true for any sort of theory that can't be tested in a lab, like MMT. 

-- People who say "this time, it's different" are usually wrong.

-- "You can run along for a long time, but sooner or later God is gonna cut you down." -- Johnny Cash  (Secular economic translation:  The negative consequences of dumb behavior may not be felt until far in the future, but that doesn't mean they aren't going to be felt.)

My instinct is that the developed world is going to look up and realize that huge piles of debt and declining worker to dependent ratios have put them in a bad spot, and so at some point our day of reckoning is going to come even if the powers that be aren't too worried about it now.  But there's very little... actual math or proof or whatnot in my analysis, so I leave it open for those better versed in the subject to explain where I've gone off track.

Corollary is that since we don't know how the fallout will occur or when, what do we do?  My best answers are pretty simple.  Don't overextend yourself with debt, invest globally, stay invested because you don't know the hour of when the other shoe may drop and the market can be irrational longer than you can be solvent, have the resources to ride out a storm for a few years without selling at the bottom, realize a portion of your wealth is illusory and is probably going to disappear at some point, be a little more liberal on spending on durable goods that will retain their value (or are just really well made and will last a long time -- buy them now and you can use them later when things are nutty), cultivate a broad range of skills so you can make (and, through your own efforts, save) money in various economic climates.

@LWYRUP - I believe you are right. 

“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”–George Santayana, The Life of Reason, 1905.

I remember when I was a teenager.  A high school teacher had a big smile on his face and said something to the effect that the kids always think that what they've got is different than what their parents had.  I think this applies to this economics stuff.

You can't make something out of nothing.  You can lie and cheat with all sorts of mathematics and statistics.  In the end, I don't think it will end up different this time around.

EscapeVelocity2020

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3978 on: October 05, 2020, 08:45:41 AM »
Snip

OK. I’ll bite. Why does the economy have to pay at all? Our national debt to GDP ratio is somewhere north of 107%.  Compare that to Japan at above 235%. 
...

I keep hearing this refrain and can't help but wonder, do you want America to follow Japan's Nikkei Index post-1990?  That's 30 years of break even, after a really terrible crash?  Sure, Japan isn't looking as bad as Greece on the surface, but it's a homogenous culture.  On the flip side, there is Norway, similarly homogenous, with surplus for years. 

America cannot continue to borrow as it has indefinitely without seriously knee-capping its options to continue to borrow.  We are far from a stable, homogenous society, in case you haven't noticed lately.

Snip

Snip

Can we talk about this more? 

Back when I studied economics, it was pretty standard view that some debt was OK but too much debt was bad.  Debt denominated in your own currency was safer, but there was a risk of hyperinflation, which does damage the economy because it makes pricing unpredictable and so throws off allocations of good and services, as well as because in general instability damages economic growth.  Now there is something called Modern Monetary Theory which I haven't had time to study but seems to me to basically be like Dr. Strangelove -- " How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb." 

I fully admit I don't understand it.  Instead I use general rules of thumb and wisdom I've picked up along the way, including:

-- Just because a bunch of the cultural elite that live in one part of the world in one particular time and place happen to believe something doesn't make it true.  They are always swayed by the intellectual fad of the day and if you look at the arc of history these ideas go in and out of fashion.  So the argument from authority, "this guy has a Nobel Prize and he believes it" doesn't always work for me.  This is especially true for any sort of theory that can't be tested in a lab, like MMT. 

-- People who say "this time, it's different" are usually wrong.

-- "You can run along for a long time, but sooner or later God is gonna cut you down." -- Johnny Cash  (Secular economic translation:  The negative consequences of dumb behavior may not be felt until far in the future, but that doesn't mean they aren't going to be felt.)

My instinct is that the developed world is going to look up and realize that huge piles of debt and declining worker to dependent ratios have put them in a bad spot, and so at some point our day of reckoning is going to come even if the powers that be aren't too worried about it now.  But there's very little... actual math or proof or whatnot in my analysis, so I leave it open for those better versed in the subject to explain where I've gone off track.

Corollary is that since we don't know how the fallout will occur or when, what do we do?  My best answers are pretty simple.  Don't overextend yourself with debt, invest globally, stay invested because you don't know the hour of when the other shoe may drop and the market can be irrational longer than you can be solvent, have the resources to ride out a storm for a few years without selling at the bottom, realize a portion of your wealth is illusory and is probably going to disappear at some point, be a little more liberal on spending on durable goods that will retain their value (or are just really well made and will last a long time -- buy them now and you can use them later when things are nutty), cultivate a broad range of skills so you can make (and, through your own efforts, save) money in various economic climates.

Thing is, economics is more of an art as opposed to a science.  Folks bring up Debt/GDP ratios as though there is a threshold, but I'd argue that every nation and every point in time is a sample size of one.  When the rest of the world thinks that a country will pay back its debt (like Japan), they can continue to issue debt and enjoy low inflation.  When the rest of the world wants nothing to do with the debt (like Venezuela), the world charges exorbitant rates of return or outright avoids it (leading to the country cutting programs and trying to print its way out of insolvency).  A lot depends on how stable the country is, which depends a lot on the leaders.  Trump has been a double-whammy on that front - jacking up national debt faster in both good times and bad, and destabilizing the domestic political landscape.

But yeah, no one knows exactly when the US will hit its limit of international goodwill and reputation.  The Fed is also running up a massive balance sheet which I don't fully understand, I must admit.  It sounds a lot like a company using 'off balance sheet' accounting, which is acceptable until it isn't (e.g. Enron).

I agree with asking yourself what to do, all of our answers will be different.   

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3979 on: October 06, 2020, 09:13:43 AM »
True, I haven’t been to Michigan since before I was drinking beer. My reference points are Wisconsin and Minnesota, and I have to admit, the beer scenes there have really changed and improved in the last 10 to 15 years. Still, I haven’t seen the variety and quality of beers in WI and MN that we have in the PNW.  Is Michigan different?

Grand Rapids, Mich. was apparently voted Beer City USA.

https://www.experiencegr.com/things-to-do/beer-city/

Where Founders was local.  Well it still is but it doesn’t feel the same as it did 10 years ago.  And yes there is a ton of variety.

wannabe-stache

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3980 on: October 06, 2020, 11:22:13 AM »
this thread seems to have morphed into a political discussion.

let's refocus on the topic for a second - how is everyone doing in their "race"?  i received some long awaited carry/promote last week for a PE fund, which put us above $5.5mm which is hard to believe even as i write it.

$1.0m is in home equity but still.

anyone getting surprises (to the upside) during the pandemic?  i can't help but feel guilty about our good fortune, we are definitely not hurting like many others in the world right now.

are we all a case of the rich getting richer?

Dicey

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3981 on: October 06, 2020, 11:45:47 AM »
this thread seems to have morphed into a political discussion.

let's refocus on the topic for a second - how is everyone doing in their "race"?  i received some long awaited carry/promote last week for a PE fund, which put us above $5.5mm which is hard to believe even as i write it.

$1.0m is in home equity but still.

anyone getting surprises (to the upside) during the pandemic?  i can't help but feel guilty about our good fortune, we are definitely not hurting like many others in the world right now.

are we all a case of the rich getting richer?
Not so sure I'd agree with your characterization. There has also been much discussion of beer of late, does that make this a boozer thread? I don't think so.

Funny, I think of this thread as a "race" in name only. By any reasonable mustachian metric, we have won our race. This is more of a companionable group amble than an actual race, IMO. You want to see hard work? Go check out the "Race to 10k" thread. We're all past the point where we're actually doing any heavy lifting. Mostly we just watch our investments work for us and talk about other stuff. It's usually a friendly discussion that occasionally includes politics and lots of other things, like beer. Did anyone say beer? Hell, I don't even drink and I find it reasonably interesting.

Congratulations on making your number. When are you pulling the trigger to GTFO?

SwordGuy

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3982 on: October 06, 2020, 12:15:27 PM »
As some of you may know (and even remember!), we moved into an awesome home last January and retired a couple years before that.

That gave us 2 mortgages to pay for, the old and the new home.

We sold the old house in August.   

Yesterday we sold the third of three houses we had bought to help folks out. 

I'm sending in the final payment on our mortgage tomorrow when the funds become available in our account.

Between shedding two mortgages, plus taxes, utilities and insurance on 4 houses, we've just cut our annual expenses by over $55,000 a year, plus we don't have renovation expenses on any of those houses (other than anything we choose to do to our new home).

Woot!

Now I feel rich.

2sk22

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3983 on: October 06, 2020, 12:35:31 PM »
Now I feel rich.

Net worth often feels abstract but cash definitely feels concrete :-)

Buffaloski Boris

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3984 on: October 06, 2020, 12:40:37 PM »
The race? Funny you bring that up. When I was younger, my goal and the measure of wealth for me was whether or not I could buy any beer I wanted and not care at all about the price. Against that measure, I’m still not wealthy yet. True, I can afford pretty much any beer I want. But I still look at the price tag and will sometimes change my choice accordingly. Or skip it entirely. Either old habits die very hard or I just need to get filthy, stinking rich. Probably a combo of both. So beer is an extremely important subject to discuss!

The rich do seem to get richer unless they get caught out due to a black swan, or they’re way overleveraged.

rmorris50

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3985 on: October 06, 2020, 12:52:23 PM »
Here’s what I want to know. How can I be more stressed and miserable at 46 (spouse 51) with $2.4m NW, yet be as unhappy as I’ve ever been in my life (job stress and money worries). Whereas at 22 and broke I was carefree and not that stressed, even tho I was working hard at a staring salary of $35k a year. I thought that was rich. But now I feel poor at $2.4m.


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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3986 on: October 06, 2020, 12:53:05 PM »
Now I feel rich.

Net worth often feels abstract but cash definitely feels concrete :-)

Yep!   It does!

I went on Social Security last January but that extra $24k a year was swallowed up by a new, additional mortgage payment.   Plus we were cash flowing renovations on a property, paying the old house mortgage, and covering taxes and insurance and utilities on 3 additional houses.

Now, suddenly, that $55,000+ in annual expenses is no longer in our budget.   Plus we're not renovating properties so there isn't that cash drain either.

I'll be able to start investing again if I want to.    Not sure I want to, I may just let the portfolio grow and otherwise enjoy the money.   

Exflyboy

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3987 on: October 06, 2020, 01:39:29 PM »
Here’s what I want to know. How can I be more stressed and miserable at 46 (spouse 51) with $2.4m NW, yet be as unhappy as I’ve ever been in my life (job stress and money worries). Whereas at 22 and broke I was carefree and not that stressed, even tho I was working hard at a staring salary of $35k a year. I thought that was rich. But now I feel poor at $2.4m.


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Hmm.. At 22 I guess it boils down to not knowing enough. I mean probably your sum total of responsibilities was to keep your car going and feed yourself. Healthcare was cheap and probably fully funded by your employer. You probably didn't have much concept of your own mortality or that you would be looking at $1000/month just for HC for you and your spouse when you get to Medicare age.

Life was good.. eat what you want, drink yourself into oblivion at the weekend with no consequences.

Now its a different deal. You know your NW could (although its unlikely) vapourise in a heartbeat. You/spouse could get cancer and easily cost you 10% of your NW for a single course of treatment. You now have to watch what you consume and life probably looks a lot more fragile than it did at 22.

I'm guessing that you also look at how happiness has degraded in 24 years and might be thinking.. "shit, whats it going to be like in another 20 years?"

At 59 (10 days from now) I'm now looking at blood test results that skirt with some upper limits and my Cholesterol numbers require some lifestyle changes.. Which sucks because I already work out and watch my diet!

I look in the mirror and honestly I look like an old man! Some of my friends have died younger than me and its starting to be a question of "who's next?".

The only thing we can do is protect ourselves from financial ruin, which you have done very well. The problem is, a huge bucket O money does very little to prevent really bad things from happening. If Steve Jobs can die from Pancreatic cancer then you I certainly can.

I guess if I have any advice it would be to look at what you're doing and make some changes that make you both happier. I mean at $2.4M do you have to be working in the job you're doing right now? Are you still doing it because it pays well and you can't walk away from that firehose of cash?

How important would that job/income/stress be if either of you received a terminal diagnosis.. I mean this really could happen!

I am also the worlds biggest hypocrite when it comes to OMY so I'm not saying I got it all together.. But I sure don't miss the stress of work!


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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3988 on: October 06, 2020, 02:47:38 PM »
this thread seems to have morphed into a political discussion.

let's refocus on the topic for a second - how is everyone doing in their "race"?  i received some long awaited carry/promote last week for a PE fund, which put us above $5.5mm which is hard to believe even as i write it.

$1.0m is in home equity but still.

anyone getting surprises (to the upside) during the pandemic?  i can't help but feel guilty about our good fortune, we are definitely not hurting like many others in the world right now.

are we all a case of the rich getting richer?
Not so sure I'd agree with your characterization. There has also been much discussion of beer of late, does that make this a boozer thread? I don't think so.

Funny, I think of this thread as a "race" in name only. By any reasonable mustachian metric, we have won our race. This is more of a companionable group amble than an actual race, IMO. You want to see hard work? Go check out the "Race to 10k" thread. We're all past the point where we're actually doing any heavy lifting. Mostly we just watch our investments work for us and talk about other stuff. It's usually a friendly discussion that occasionally includes politics and lots of other things, like beer. Did anyone say beer? Hell, I don't even drink and I find it reasonably interesting.

Congratulations on making your number. When are you pulling the trigger to GTFO?

actually i don't really have a number.  i think that's just a way of making it easy to keep doing OMY.  i probably have enough to pull the plug BUT there are still some things i want that i wouldn't be comfortable buying at our current net worth.

i do really want to change jobs though. i think the people i work for are negatively impacting my stress levels, self perception, etc. 

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3989 on: October 06, 2020, 04:56:00 PM »
Here’s what I want to know. How can I be more stressed and miserable at 46 (spouse 51) with $2.4m NW, yet be as unhappy as I’ve ever been in my life (job stress and money worries). Whereas at 22 and broke I was carefree and not that stressed, even tho I was working hard at a staring salary of $35k a year. I thought that was rich. But now I feel poor at $2.4m.


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What are your money worries, exactly?

I FIREd at 46.  Liquid net worth at the time was less than yours -- lots of equity tied up in a very expensive property at the time.  We sold that when I was 48, bought another expensive but not quite as ridiculously expensive property, and have been living off the cash difference since then.  Plenty in retirement savings to ride the market until the cash runs out (at least 8-10 years from now).  I have had no worries during the recent market gyrations because if things really tank I can use it as a buying opportunity.  No, I'm not optimizing every penny, but I don't have to.  I already have enough. 

Dicey

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3990 on: October 06, 2020, 07:04:52 PM »
Here’s what I want to know. How can I be more stressed and miserable at 46 (spouse 51) with $2.4m NW, yet be as unhappy as I’ve ever been in my life (job stress and money worries). Whereas at 22 and broke I was carefree and not that stressed, even tho I was working hard at a staring salary of $35k a year. I thought that was rich. But now I feel poor at $2.4m.
Dunno, but with a 'stache that big, you can afford a lot of therapy to figure it out.

Dicey

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3991 on: October 06, 2020, 07:10:38 PM »
this thread seems to have morphed into a political discussion.

let's refocus on the topic for a second - how is everyone doing in their "race"?  i received some long awaited carry/promote last week for a PE fund, which put us above $5.5mm which is hard to believe even as i write it.

$1.0m is in home equity but still.

anyone getting surprises (to the upside) during the pandemic?  i can't help but feel guilty about our good fortune, we are definitely not hurting like many others in the world right now.

are we all a case of the rich getting richer?
Not so sure I'd agree with your characterization. There has also been much discussion of beer of late, does that make this a boozer thread? I don't think so.

Funny, I think of this thread as a "race" in name only. By any reasonable mustachian metric, we have won our race. This is more of a companionable group amble than an actual race, IMO. You want to see hard work? Go check out the "Race to 10k" thread. We're all past the point where we're actually doing any heavy lifting. Mostly we just watch our investments work for us and talk about other stuff. It's usually a friendly discussion that occasionally includes politics and lots of other things, like beer. Did anyone say beer? Hell, I don't even drink and I find it reasonably interesting.

Congratulations on making your number. When are you pulling the trigger to GTFO?

actually i don't really have a number.  i think that's just a way of making it easy to keep doing OMY.  i probably have enough to pull the plug BUT there are still some things i want that i wouldn't be comfortable buying at our current net worth.

i do really want to change jobs though. i think the people i work for are negatively impacting my stress levels, self perception, etc.
Actually, I meant the $4.5M + $1M home equity you quoted. Isn't that enough? I never had an exact number either, because it didn't come with my crystal ball, dammit! However, Dec. 5, 2020 will be my Eight Year FIREversary and it's been glorious!

rmorris50

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3992 on: October 06, 2020, 08:14:47 PM »
Here’s what I want to know. How can I be more stressed and miserable at 46 (spouse 51) with $2.4m NW, yet be as unhappy as I’ve ever been in my life (job stress and money worries). Whereas at 22 and broke I was carefree and not that stressed, even tho I was working hard at a staring salary of $35k a year. I thought that was rich. But now I feel poor at $2.4m.


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What are your money worries, exactly?

I FIREd at 46.  Liquid net worth at the time was less than yours -- lots of equity tied up in a very expensive property at the time.  We sold that when I was 48, bought another expensive but not quite as ridiculously expensive property, and have been living off the cash difference since then.  Plenty in retirement savings to ride the market until the cash runs out (at least 8-10 years from now).  I have had no worries during the recent market gyrations because if things really tank I can use it as a buying opportunity.  No, I'm not optimizing every penny, but I don't have to.  I already have enough.
I don’t need therapy,I need to retire from soul-sucking megacorp USA :-) We are retirement rich, and cash poor, with only 100k in cash. Vast majority of NW is in pre-tax retirement accounts and deferred comp. I just shoved money into deferred accounts most of my career and didn’t focus on retiring early. So how to get to age 55 most effectively if I don’t work is the big question. Will probably just bite the bullet and surrender my sizeable pension from a prior job and live off that to 55. Spouse will also keep working and provide a supplemental income and most importantly health care. But he needs to find a new job first.

Otherwise we will be on perpetual cruises in our old age trying to spend our retirement since we don’t have heirs if we don’t start spending some of it now.

It’s the cash flow over the next few years that stresses me. Once we get past that we are in a much better spot.

I am still in awe how I had 10 dollars in my pocket graduating college and yet was so care-free. Guess that’s youth for ya, ha!


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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3993 on: October 06, 2020, 09:05:10 PM »
Question for all of you thoughtful individuals... would you count any of this stock in your net worth calculation?

Backstory: husband & I each work for the same Fortune 100 company. We have stock as a part of our compensation. My stock vests at the end of each month, and auto sells. I have no plans to currently leave the company within the next year. My husband's stock vests similarly, but upon vesting, he can hold or sell. He has no plans to leave at all, and in fact, would like to keep working (not necessarily at current employer) indefinitely. I have ~$600k in unvested stock, and will be getting likely another $150k or so this year. He has a similar amount.

I've thought of adding a year's worth of that stock value into our net worth, to give us a better projection into the future. But, it's not keeping me up at night. I currently don't include any unvested stock in our net worth calculations. Oh, and it all auto vests immediately should either of us die while employed at the company.  (This came up as a discussion, as we were calculating our assets for paperwork to update our wills.)

Thoughts?

Exflyboy

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3994 on: October 06, 2020, 09:11:07 PM »
@rmorris50 Rule of 72(t)...

Exflyboy

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3995 on: October 06, 2020, 09:14:21 PM »
Question for all of you thoughtful individuals... would you count any of this stock in your net worth calculation?

Backstory: husband & I each work for the same Fortune 100 company. We have stock as a part of our compensation. My stock vests at the end of each month, and auto sells. I have no plans to currently leave the company within the next year. My husband's stock vests similarly, but upon vesting, he can hold or sell. He has no plans to leave at all, and in fact, would like to keep working (not necessarily at current employer) indefinitely. I have ~$600k in unvested stock, and will be getting likely another $150k or so this year. He has a similar amount.

I've thought of adding a year's worth of that stock value into our net worth, to give us a better projection into the future. But, it's not keeping me up at night. I currently don't include any unvested stock in our net worth calculations. Oh, and it all auto vests immediately should either of us die while employed at the company.  (This came up as a discussion, as we were calculating our assets for paperwork to update our wills.)

Thoughts?

Yeah I have one. I worked for a Fortune 500 company that fell in the toilet and all my stock options expired virtually worthless!

rmorris50

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3996 on: October 06, 2020, 09:16:15 PM »
@rmorris50 Rule of 72(t)...
Yes I didn’t say that but is what I would like to do. Surrender pension and the then following year start 72(t) to supplement it every year. Damn financial advisor won’t like it but oh well.


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MaybeBabyMustache

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3997 on: October 06, 2020, 09:40:07 PM »
Question for all of you thoughtful individuals... would you count any of this stock in your net worth calculation?

Backstory: husband & I each work for the same Fortune 100 company. We have stock as a part of our compensation. My stock vests at the end of each month, and auto sells. I have no plans to currently leave the company within the next year. My husband's stock vests similarly, but upon vesting, he can hold or sell. He has no plans to leave at all, and in fact, would like to keep working (not necessarily at current employer) indefinitely. I have ~$600k in unvested stock, and will be getting likely another $150k or so this year. He has a similar amount.

I've thought of adding a year's worth of that stock value into our net worth, to give us a better projection into the future. But, it's not keeping me up at night. I currently don't include any unvested stock in our net worth calculations. Oh, and it all auto vests immediately should either of us die while employed at the company.  (This came up as a discussion, as we were calculating our assets for paperwork to update our wills.)

Thoughts?

Yeah I have one. I worked for a Fortune 500 company that fell in the toilet and all my stock options expired virtually worthless!

Stock is currently over ~$1400/share. Anything can happen of course, if 2020 has taught me nothing else. The stock would have to drop to $0 for me to have no value. But, it's a valid concern. Is there no time horizon with which you'd calculate part of the stock? We all calculate our investments in our net worth... Also, these are RSUs.

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3998 on: October 07, 2020, 02:40:42 AM »
let's refocus on the topic for a second - how is everyone doing in their "race"?  i received some long awaited carry/promote last week for a PE fund, which put us above $5.5mm which is hard to believe even as i write it.

I just did my latest tally, and if I convert to USD I'm at $4.4m NW, $3.6 excluding my home, $1m of which is pension (which I can't access until I'm 57, or could go a year or two higher by the time I get there).  I'm 45 and even with childcare expenses that would reduce if I stopped work, my half of household expenses is $75k (yes, we are spendy: but almost exactly half of this is nanny and school fees - more than a third is my share of our nanny's salary and pension contributions alone - so it's a very specific kind of lifestyle inflation!)  So even with fairly extravagant expenses, I should be good to go (3% of $2.6m gives me about $80k per annum, and if I stop work obviously the nanny expenses would stop too).

I'm currently negotiating to move onto a flexible freelance contract with my employer from 1/1/21, which feels exciting, scary and a bit underwhelming all at the same time.  Part of me wants to just cut the cord altogether, but I do worry I could get depressed if I make any too sudden transitions.  I have been at the same firm my whole career (over 20 years).  I am not a person who thrives on change.  I so worry that working part time will give me all the stress of constantly watching e-mail and dealing with fall out from high maintenance colleagues, with only part of the compensation.  But anyway, the idea is it's a gradual transition as a learning process: by summer next year I am hoping to figure out whether I am aiming at zero hours or whether I think I can achieve some kind of "best of both worlds" working a few hours a week while the kids are at school/nursery or in the evenings.

Despite being a naturally anxious person, at this point I am close to accepting that money is not really the issue for me any more.  Which is not to say that I couldn't run out of it, of course, or something terrible couldn't happen.  If my country moves away from state healthcare provision before I hit retirement age, or introduces a chunky wealth tax, I could be in some trouble, and obviously a major financial crisis could in theory wipe anybody out - but it would have to be something that we've never seen before.  Then of course there is the risk of war, climate change, all the myriad other things that could go wrong. 

But there are always "what ifs" and at this point my "problem" is dealing with my own psychology and anxiety, rather than the actual "things" that trigger the anxiety.  There will always be something.

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Re: Race from $2M to $4M...and Beyond!
« Reply #3999 on: October 07, 2020, 07:55:58 AM »
Here’s what I want to know. How can I be more stressed and miserable at 46 (spouse 51) with $2.4m NW, yet be as unhappy as I’ve ever been in my life (job stress and money worries). Whereas at 22 and broke I was carefree and not that stressed, even tho I was working hard at a staring salary of $35k a year. I thought that was rich. But now I feel poor at $2.4m.


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I was you just seven weeks ago. Actually I'd say we have slightly less stability than you all do because we still have two kids (8 and 11) under our roof to worry about. Our stash is humming along at $2.8M invested yet upthread some pages ago you'll see me worrying over walking away from $135k-$150k job with a great boss that let me work from home. I knew I had it all yet I was completely miserable. And posters on this thread kept encouraging me to just do it.
It's been the change I needed. And the change we needed as a family. It's the strangest thing, I no longer have a paycheck coming in yet I worry LESS about money than I ever have. Now I have time to take care of myself and the people I love. And that has given me the ability to see that whatever comes our way we will figure it out. I don't know why I had to leave work to see it, but I did.
There are days when I'm on my morning run and the sun is on my face and I'm so fucking happy that I'm not sitting in front of my laptop that I have to nearly stop and cry. It's that good.
Or the other night when I was helping my son with his 6th grade math and he told me "mom, you explain it better than my teacher". I know I couldn't have spent that time with him while I was still working. I was just too tired to give that time to him.
I care so little about money now that I've only logged into my investment account to send a check to the food pantry and the local teen shelter. The balance just doesn't matter that much.
Oh, and before I FIRE'd, I was so worried that I would never have an opportunity to make more money if needed. I've been out seven weeks and I've had a job opportunity of some sort each week. I'm sure those will start to decrease as I turn more and more away but the opportunities are there.

All this to say that you should make a change. Maybe you don't feel ready to FIRE but you could change jobs, or go part time or do something. You felt rich at 22 despite being broke because you felt the future is bright and the opportunities were endless. That is still true. You are just in a rut. Time to make a big change.


Full disclosure- my spouse is still working which provides us with a buffer and insurance. Next step for us is to find a change for him. Maybe a less stressful job, or maybe FIRE. We are very concerned about finding affordable healthcare though, that is the ONE thing that keeps us both from FIREing. but maybe after the election we'll see some changes in the next year that will make us more comfortable.

 

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