Are We Very Rare?

[heybro]

When I was in college, during an Economics lecture, with a room filled with about 700 students, the professor asked, "Who would work less if you got paid more?"  My hand shot up instantly.  I was the only one to raise my hand.  The next question was, "Who would work more if you got paid more?"  Almost everyone's hand went up.

Are we so rare?

[Paul der Krake]

Not surprising at all. The younger you are, the less valuable your time. And in college, nobody has really worked yet. It's all very abstract.

I suspect you'd get a very different answer with a room of 700 middle-aged professionals.

[AMandM]

Assuming they keep their spending in check, your classmates' strategy would boost their stash faster and let them retire earlier.

[Villanelle]

As a college student I absolutely would have worked more, assuming that meant working more hours in a week and getting paid more for doing so,  in order to speed my way to FIRE. 

[ixtap]

Every time my husband gets a raise or promotion, he works a little bit harder to prove that he deserves it. I would even venture that he works more, given how little I have seen of him over the last couple of months. It is ingrained in him.

And he plans to retire by 40.

[bacchi]

Assuming they keep their spending in check, your classmates' strategy would boost their stash faster and let them retire earlier.

Nah. They'd work more to buy a larger house, nicer car, and more expensive vacations.

[thesis]

I guess that's the whole point of experience :) . You don't have to work more but you are more capable, and can therefore command a higher salary.

I salute you for actually raising your hand for that, because you were probably the most honest person in that room. If you got paid more, to work less? Steal of a deal! I know everybody here is talking about working more to build the stache, I guess you have to figure out at what point in your life you would choose to do one or the other. While building the stache, more so that you can retire, but from a more general, philosophical perspective, why would you want to work more? Your classmates are probably chumps who are shooting for the hamster wheel :).

How rare are we? Not THAT rare. I think using your college class is maybe a bit too much selection bias (wanting to say the 'right' thing in front of others and the teacher, probably don't have much perspective on life and work), but there are various brands of frugality. I happen to work in an office full of people who are doing really smart things with money (but we are predominantly white, middle-class software folk, so there's more selection bias for ya). Rare enough, though. A generous and completely gut-feel would tell me about 1 out of 4 people I know does decently well with money; maybe 1out of 10 of people I know have a real strategy. I know two people who have mentioned that they read or have read MMM. I guess nobody else has admitted to having a high savings rate, but not many share that sort of thing anyway.

[GuitarStv]

Assuming they keep their spending in check, your classmates' strategy would boost their stash faster and let them retire earlier.

Nah. They'd work more to buy a larger house, nicer car, and more expensive vacations.

Yep.  Then they'd make arguments that they have to hire cleaners/maids, chefs, contractors to do work around the home . . . and could never do it themselves because they make so much at work that it's not worth it to learn basic skills that every other human being needs.

[BigMoneyJim]

Yes. In the U.S., at least. I don't know about other cultures.

But there is a huge 'nurture' bias in our culture towards working more, working harder. I don't even know how much 'nature' is involved in the difference.

[NOVAMustache]

Thanks ya'll

Was hoping for some genius alternatives :) But I get the message. None to be had :)

[Villanelle]

Reading the responses, it seems we may be talking about different things.  I'm imagining someone saying that instead of $50 an hour, you will make $60.  Do you work more hours?  And my answer (as a college student, especially) would be absolutely yes unless I was entirely miserable at that job.

It seems like others are imagining someone saying that your salary is going from $50k year to $60k per year, do you put in more hours at the office, to justify the higher salary, earn your keep, whatever?  My answer there would be a hard no.

[AnnaGrowsAMustache]

Everything costs either time or money. You get to pick which. A job, on the other hand, costs you time but gives you money. The trick is to get the most money for your time, because then you have more time to spend.

[jlcnuke]

Reading the responses, it seems we may be talking about different things.  I'm imagining someone saying that instead of $50 an hour, you will make $60.  Do you work more hours?  And my answer (as a college student, especially) would be absolutely yes unless I was entirely miserable at that job.

It seems like others are imagining someone saying that your salary is going from $50k year to $60k per year, do you put in more hours at the office, to justify the higher salary, earn your keep, whatever?  My answer there would be a hard no.

Good differentiation. I think the premise was the pay per hour was going up and you had the option to either work fewer hours (thus keeping the income the same but work lss) or to choose to work more hours (thus increasing both income and working more hours). Most were choosing the latter option, thus making more money and working more. Whether they're choosing to work more because they're making more money (per hour), or because they'd earn more (in total with the increased hours and higher hourly rate) is unclear to me though.

I think it would have been nice to have been presented with three options:
Your equivalent hourly pay rate is increased, do you choose to:
1. Work fewer hours to keep your overall pay the same,
2. Work the same number of hours and earn the higher salary,
or
3. Work more hours, increasing the number of worked hours and reaching the highest total income possible at that rate (with the hours allowed anyway)?


I look at working hours slightly different from many people, as I'm single and have no kids. As such, an 8 hour work-day leaves me with 5-8 hours (depending on how long lunch/commuting/etc take) each day during the week. What I'm actually going to do with most of that time is sit around and play video games, watch TV, etc (as opposed to the "better myself with education, workouts, etc" that I keep telling myself I'll do). So, working more to drop those numbers to 2-5 hours of free time still gives me time to work out etc if I choose to, as well as more than enough time to play video games or rot my brain in front of the TV but pushes my income up, and accordingly raise my savings amounts without having much of a negative impact on my quality of life, since the things I really enjoy doing most (sailing, scuba diving, etc) aren't something I can do during the week where I live anyway. And I still get to go do those on the weekend.

As such, I generally choose to "work more hours". Now, if I was coming home to a wife and kids that I could/would want to spend time with every day, then the negative impact of not having that time (due to working) would likely make me choose to either work the same or fewer hours instead. Thus allowing me to maximize doing the things that were important to me in that scenario (spending time with family, raising kids, etc).

If I was single and the things I enjoyed doing most were available in the evenings during the week (such as when I regularly went out with friends during the week) then maybe my priorities would have chosen option 2 instead.

I think it all comes down to what makes life enjoyable for you, when you can do that, and how you want to balance those things with earning money to pay for your goals (whether enjoyment now or retirement later).

[MrThatsDifferent]

One of the things I’ve learned from MMM is that what you earn isn’t nearly as important as what you spend, save and invest. The consistent message, particularly in America, is: more money, more things. The other implicit message is: your value as a person is linked to your work. I definitely didn’t understand that younger, and I’m still not at MMM level. Mustachianism is very rare, it should be, but it doesn’t have to be.

[Fomerly known as something]

Yes, in my office most of us have the ability to retire with a pension earlier than the standard 65.  I am the only person not planning on getting a "retirement job."

[clarkfan1979]

My dad's side of the family is full of union construction workers with an average education level of "less than high school." About 50% graduated high school and 50% did not.

The term "overtime" carried a special meaning at family parties. People's eyes would light up and smile when talking about "overtime" because it meant you would earn a 50% higher hourly wage. Family members would brag and try to out compete everyone else on "overtime hours". However, year after year everyone was always broke and never had anything to show for it. I noticed that more overtime equated to a worse life. Less time with friends and family, more body aches and pains and more drinking to numb the pain. What did they do with the extra money? Mostly lottery tickets, alcohol and cigarettes.

It seemed silly to brag about the hours you worked. People would shout, "I got 65 hours this week!" At 16 years old, I wanted to brag about how little hours I can work and still live a great life. Teaching community college, I average around 1,040 hours/year, which is 20 hours/week spread over a 52 weeks. If I include benefits (health and 403b contributions), I make around $70/hour based on total compensation.

[ender]

Keep in mind if you enjoy or love your job, the answer to this question is very different.

[jojoguy]

I would say that we are rare. I have personally only known one guy who saved to become FI. He tried getting me into budgeting, saving, and investing 13 years ago, and I ignored him, sadly.
He is waaaay past FI at this point(60 y/o and millionaire). He works at fedex part-time(20 hours a week) for the insurance benefits and he still likes his job after already doing it for over 25 years. His job isn`t physical, pays well,
and it is easy money. Him and his wife are very health conscious of the Jack Lelanne type and run 10 miles every morning. I really admire the guy.

[happy]

I kind of did this once. I was working part-time and earnings wise sitting just below a few thresholds for income tax, childcare and single family tax benefits. My boss offered me a slight increase in my hours which I was happy to take until I did the math. Yikes the fairly small amount of additional income would have been taxed at a higher marginal rate and dropped me down a heap as far as childcare and family benefits went. I would have ended up with less in my pocket.

My boss looked at me with a weird squinty look when I explained that I wouldn't take it  but happily accepted my explanation.

[Paul der Krake]

The term "overtime" carried a special meaning at family parties. People's eyes would light up and smile when talking about "overtime" because it meant you would earn a 50% higher hourly wage. Family members would brag and try to out compete everyone else on "overtime hours". However, year after year everyone was always broke and never had anything to show for it. I noticed that more overtime equated to a worse life. Less time with friends and family, more body aches and pains and more drinking to numb the pain. What did they do with the extra money? Mostly lottery tickets, alcohol and cigarettes.

I think it's one of those deeply primal desires that are largely irrational.

Years ago my wife took a 60% paycut or thereabouts to try something new. No big deal, we had plenty of money to go around every month, what she got paid was completely irrelevant. Still, she would get excited at the prospect of overtime! Even though that was still significantly less than her old pay rate. Even though she gets real cranky when working long hours, and knows it.

The idea that you're going to be getting stuff "for free" if you go just over an arbitrary but very bright threshold? That's powerful stuff, regardless of much money you have.

[BigMoneyJim]

The idea that you're going to be getting stuff "for free" if you go just over an arbitrary but very bright threshold? That's powerful stuff, regardless of much money you have.

Gamification of labor. Huh, I never noticed that before.

I have wondered more than once if the whole economy is a mind game, though.