When I was working, it seemed that the climb toward our FIRE escape from MegaCorp was slow and steady. Each year our nest egg grew bigger. Sometimes faster, sometimes slower. Even in a very bad year like 2008, we managed to eek out some growth. It felt like the cards we were being dealt were always resulted in a pretty good hand. That has not … Continue reading Retirement Savings Volatility
Readers were pretty negative when the year 2019 began – with good reason. The financial markets had sunk severely at the end of last year, the government went into a budget shutdown, and many so-called experts were saying that the next recession had already begun. If you like stability, there was very little to feel optimistic about on New Year’s Day when I published this … Continue reading Fast Start On 2019
I’ve noted before that the media loves to create hysteria & fear about early retirement. From Suze Orman’s cautions that the FIRE movement is “the dumbest personal finance decision people can make” to this recent article from CNBC focusing on the ‘Downsides of Early Retirement That No One Tells You About’. I thought it might be good to offer my own experience as a counterpoint … Continue reading FIRE: Everyone Has Their Own Reaction
Kiplinger’s recent published an article that is getting a lot of buzz about their description of three different phases of retirement. They are proposing that retirees plan on spending more early – during your ‘Go-Go Years’ – versus later in retirement, when your energy & desire to be very active may decline. Calling the later two stages ‘Slow-Go’ and ‘Won’t-Go’, they propose people plan to … Continue reading Extra Spending For ‘Go-Go’ Years
I have written in the past about my interest in cryptocurrencies and their potential to be a more sound store of value than government currency. Recent geopolitical economic instability (tariffs, currency devaluation, Brexit) has resulted in BitCoin prices surging. BC has broken the $9K per coin mark in the last couple months – more than double what I paid when I jumped in with a … Continue reading Libra: A Big Step For Cryptos?
One topic I write very infrequently about is Social Security. As someone who retired before my 50th birthday, it has always been something that seems too far off. Recently at an update with our financial advisor, we talked a bit about the timeline that Social Security is structured around. 62 is the earliest age at which one can take a Social Security benefit and almost … Continue reading Keep Your Benefits Locked In Social Security?
Once again, vacation time is in the news with a new study by the US Travel Association showing that most Americans forfeit almost a week of paid vacation per year. The study – based on a survey of over 7K workers – says that people earn an average 23.4 paid time off days/year, but take only 17.2 days off. The time forfeited equals $66.4B in … Continue reading Vacation Days – Take Them All!
