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Well, obviously this is pretty divisive, but I remember one of the more important realizations of university being that I wasn't accountable to anyone for my performance. I didn't have to show my parents my report card, for better or worse. It took about two years to pay off the 18k of student loans and 13k of credit card debt that college left me with, and I don't think I'd trade that two years of moderate sacrifice to be under my parents' thumb. But I moved out when I was 18 because independence is very important to me, and for other reasons. Edit: And yes, I understand that my debt is paltry compared to the total that Americans have to deal with. If I was American I may not feel the same way. I was also extremely lucky to have a job right after university that paid an above-average salary and had awesome benefits. tuyop fucked around with this message at 22:32 on Nov 4, 2013 |
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Nov 4, 2013 22:10
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tuyop posted:Well, obviously this is pretty divisive, but I remember one of the more important realizations of university being that I wasn't accountable to anyone for my performance. I didn't have to show my parents my report card, for better or worse. It took about two years to pay off the 18k of student loans and 13k of credit card debt that college left me with, and I don't think I'd trade that two years of moderate sacrifice to be under my parents' thumb. But I moved out when I was 18 because independence is very important to me, and for other reasons. No Wave fucked around with this message at 22:28 on Nov 4, 2013 |
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Nov 4, 2013 22:21
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I would have gladly showed my parents my college "report card" in exchange for them paying my student loans. In fact I showed them my grades every semester anyway because I was/am generally proud of my accomplishments in school and usually shared it with my parents. I paid my own tuition (and am still paying it off). But they aren't really the overbearing type to begin with and I'm pretty much an A-B student in general so yeah, I guess I would have traded that slight bit of inconvenience for decades of loan payments. They did give me a couple grand for school, maybe 10% of my total college expenditure, and I'm thankful for that. Now the fact that my mom told all her friends that they paid for my tuition in some sort of weird "Keeping Up With The Joneses" scenario since literally ALL of their friends paid for their kids' tuition so my mom felt she had to lie about it... that's another story haha  What I would do for my hypothetical kids is moot because my husband and I aren't having kids. What I like to think I would do is to set aside a small amount each month. Say, $100 for each kid, and they could use that for college when they were old enough if they wanted to go to college. I'm sure ~18 years from now, $20k isn't going to go that far but it would definitely put them leagues ahead of those students whose parents didn't help them out at all, with pretty much no sacrifice on my part (what's $100 a month, you know?). And if they decided to go to a state school and got a couple small scholarships who knows, they might hypothetically come out of college debt-free, especially if they had a part-time job while in college (like I did).
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Nov 4, 2013 22:47
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razz posted:But they aren't really the overbearing type to begin with and I'm pretty much an A-B student in general so yeah, I guess I would have traded that slight bit of inconvenience for decades of loan payments. They did give me a couple grand for school, maybe 10% of my total college expenditure, and I'm thankful for that. Now the fact that my mom told all her friends that they paid for my tuition in some sort of weird "Keeping Up With The Joneses" scenario since literally ALL of their friends paid for their kids' tuition so my mom felt she had to lie about it... that's another story haha
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Nov 4, 2013 23:35
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No Wave posted:Ok, this is hideous. God drat. Did she ever do that in front of you? I would be pretty tempted to, in a friendly, non-combative manner, laugh and reveal the truth as if you thought she were kidding.
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Nov 4, 2013 23:38
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I mean, if you're so ashamed of your actions, what kind of life are you living? This western culture thing is going down the crapper.
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Nov 4, 2013 23:41
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Jeffrey posted:Did she ever do that in front of you? I would be pretty tempted to, in a friendly, non-combative manner, laugh and reveal the truth as if you thought she were kidding. Actually I found out when a couple of their friends were in town (I was already in grad school at the time, moved away and all that) and they offered to take me out to dinner. We were talking about my grad program and how I got a tuition waiver and one of them said something like "Well it sure is nice that you went through all this schooling with no debt!" and I was like, no actually I have $20,000 in debt from my undergrad degree. And he said that my mom had told them that she paid for my tuition and he was really, really shocked when I told him that did NOT happen. My parents didn't even co-sign on my loans, they weren't Parent PLUS loans, they are regular old Sallie May loans that are 100% under my name. I really think she just wanted to commiserate with her friends about it being SO HARD financially having a kid in college or whatever, even though me being in college cost them very little but their friends' kids' college cost them all a great deal. I kind of laughed it off at the time, I guess it does bother me a little bit but my mom is totally the "gotta have/do everything my friends have/do" type. I definitely would never bring it up. It's really bizarre but whatever makes her feel good. My parents are great people and I had everything I wanted growing up and beyond. I seriously grew up in this totally generic Midwestern middle-class nuclear family, parents never fought, my whole family is great, all that jazz. Like, my mom is just the nicest person that would do anything for me. I think she just went a little crazy for a while with money or something. Her and my dad are and always have been good with money, they buy a lot of useless crap but they save a lot too. What's funny is I think my mom does feel guilty about it (she also took money from me in other ways, by claiming me as a dependent for too long and she did it to my little bro too and we had a slight falling out a few years ago) but now she and my dad like, go out of their way to help me and my husband out with money. I think my parents have given me more money in the last 3 years than they have in my whole life combined. My mom paid off my car a while back for my birthday which was like $1500, paid for my wedding (was cheap, but still), and last month gave us $1,000 to fix our broken truck. They take us out to eat, my mom secretly puts gas in my car when we visit, she always has a new shirt or dress that she found on sale for me, that sort of stuff. So you know. I'm not complaining. And I definitely don't ever want to talk poo poo on my mom. She made mistakes as a parent as they all do. I think she's more than made up for being a doofus 5 years ago. But no I would never bring it up to her, haha. She would be mortified if she knew I found out she lied! Now I feel bad for talking crap on my mom. I love my mom. She did pay for my textbooks though! razz fucked around with this message at 00:13 on Nov 5, 2013 |
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Nov 5, 2013 00:05
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razz posted:What's funny is I think my mom does feel guilty about it (she also took money from me in other ways, by claiming me as a dependent for too long and she did it to my little bro too and we had a slight falling out a few years ago) but now she and my dad like, go out of their way to help me and my husband out with money. I think my parents have given me more money in the last 3 years than they have in my whole life combined. My mom paid off my car a while back for my birthday which was like $1500, paid for my wedding (was cheap, but still), and last month gave us $1,000 to fix our broken truck. They take us out to eat, my mom secretly puts gas in my car when we visit, she always has a new shirt or dress that she found on sale for me, that sort of stuff. So you know. I'm not complaining. And I definitely don't ever want to talk poo poo on my mom. She made mistakes as a parent as they all do. I think she's more than made up for being a doofus 5 years ago. Regardless, glad you are happy with your relationship.
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Nov 5, 2013 01:21
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Absolutely. And besides, I've never expected my parents to give me money, not even for college. I learned good money handling skills early on. I've had at least a part-time job since I was 14 in order to buy whatever useless crap kids want to buy in high school and somehow managed to save up over $6,000 of my own money by the time I moved away for school. So yeah any money I get from my parents is like an unexpected bonus! They've also given me a car and a truck for free and matched my down payment when I bought my next car so there you go. They've definitely supported me in other ways besides paying my college tuition. They're good people, we're good friends.
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Nov 5, 2013 01:50
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My parents told people they paid for my college tuition too and they didn't. The weird thing was they had it, but we've never had a good relationship and I didn't really want their help. Probably because my 2nd year I had applied for an exchange and they both agreed to co-sign a small loan to take care of expense for the rest of college and then backed out of it because they were divorcing. We don't really have a relationship now and that's fine. I don't really want one. Some people just kind of "release" their children at a certain point, I guess. My position at worked has been bumped down to a part-time professor so I'm taking a pay cut but if I get another full-time job I'm going to start putting money away, I only got married in June and probably won't have kids for a few year but I'd like to start saving early, because I definitely want adopted kids. Not necessarily for college, but if they want to live in Paris and be inspired for produce art or music, or work on their own projects or work or travel, just "life enriching" money for when they graduate high school
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Nov 5, 2013 01:52
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No Wave posted:"just because we happen to be related?" Like, part of your rationale is that it would be too much of a pain in the rear end? You are not ready. Human lives cost around $1800 to save from preventable diseases. I know that FI and ethics make for strange bedfellows, but in what ethical system is your child's student loan debt worth the actual lives of 90 other children? edit: picked a less-good quote at first Mofabio fucked around with this message at 02:40 on Nov 5, 2013 |
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Nov 5, 2013 02:32
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Mofabio posted:Human lives cost around $1800 to save from preventable diseases. I know that FI and ethics make for strange bedfellows, but in what ethical system is your child's student loan debt worth the actual lives of 90 other children? Oh poo poo, you better sell all of your possessions and live in a tiny studio apartment and donate all your money to charity then.
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Nov 5, 2013 02:45
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neaden posted:Oh poo poo, you better sell all of your possessions and live in a tiny studio apartment and donate all your money to charity then. That studio apartment could hold at least ten somalian refugees, you capitalist pig.
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Nov 5, 2013 02:47
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Mofabio posted:Human lives cost around $1800 to save from preventable diseases. I know that FI and ethics make for strange bedfellows, but in what ethical system is your child's student loan debt worth the actual lives of 90 other children?
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Nov 5, 2013 03:36
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Mofabio posted:Human lives cost around $1800 to save from preventable diseases. I know that FI and ethics make for strange bedfellows, but in what ethical system is your child's student loan debt worth the actual lives of 90 other children? I don't think that this makes for very productive conversation, and I have a degree in international development. There is simply no way to square the circle of balancing your own life and priorities with the insane relative costs of the most basic of luxuries or conveniences if you frame it this way. You cut cable and opt for netflix so that you can donate an additional $50/month to your pet charity. But still, if you could just make do with less TV or movies, you could give another 14%! And what about the cost of food? Better go vegetarian, maybe you can find another 60 bucks to send to starving naked brown children who are covered in flies. I think someone coined it Schindler's syndrome? There is only so much that you can do, and your own sanity depends on finding a definition of "enough" that allows you to sleep at night and also live well.
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Nov 5, 2013 03:49
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In the game Borderlands 2, one of the guns you can get (The Morningstar) will chide you whenever you reload, kill someone, get a critical hit, or swap weapons. A few things it will say, all suddenly relevant to this thread: "There are children on Promethea who can't afford ammo, you know!" "You don't talk to your parents as often as you should." "By not donating to charity, you indirectly murder thousands of people every day!"
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Nov 5, 2013 04:24
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tuyop posted:I don't think that this makes for very productive conversation, and I have a degree in international development. There is simply no way to square the circle of balancing your own life and priorities with the insane relative costs of the most basic of luxuries or conveniences if you frame it this way. You cut cable and opt for netflix so that you can donate an additional $50/month to your pet charity. But still, if you could just make do with less TV or movies, you could give another 14%! And what about the cost of food? Better go vegetarian, maybe you can find another 60 bucks to send to starving naked brown children who are covered in flies. I think someone coined it Schindler's syndrome? I guess I'm mostly curious about the ethical system that would make the things you listed bad for the world. I get that they would be slightly bad for the giver, but how would they be bad for the world? I used to read MMM with gusto, and I still like his anti-consumerism tactics. But (for instance) he refuses $4000 ad dollars per month that he claims would easily support his living expenses (or, cough, another family's), because he wants to swear on his site. quote:Maybe I should be more like Bill Gates and start doing something involving vaccines in India instead of building yet another kitchen or front porch for someone? [snip] Was I really willing to give up all that cash over one [swear] word? Do you guys think this is ethically defensible behavior? Mofabio fucked around with this message at 08:36 on Nov 5, 2013 |
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Nov 5, 2013 08:34
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(this was a double post, but...) A side note, it's kind of interesting how you guys are mocking things like replacing cable with netflix, going vegetarian, delaying or not having kids, making due with fewer possessions, and living in a small studio. The context here is charity, but these are common sense paths to FI, too. I understand where the compartmentalization is coming from here, just thought I'd point out the disconnect. Mofabio fucked around with this message at 09:11 on Nov 5, 2013 |
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Nov 5, 2013 08:35
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Mofabio posted:(this was a double post, but...) I don't think having to read your posts is worth 1/180 of a person
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Nov 5, 2013 12:45
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Mofabio posted:I guess I'm mostly curious about the ethical system that would make the things you listed bad for the world. I get that they would be slightly bad for the giver, but how would they be bad for the world? Mofabio posted:(this was a double post, but...) MMM would not find the blog to be worth doing without swearing. He places importance upon his own feelings, because it is his life. I expect you to do the same. Have you ever seen a thread here - "How do I live my life more justly?" Are your expectations of what people are supposed to want maybe flawed? Given that this is something that, quite literally, nobody does, the idea of judging people through that lens seems unproductive. No Wave fucked around with this message at 13:38 on Nov 5, 2013 |
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Nov 5, 2013 13:29
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Mofabio posted:Do you guys think this is ethically defensible behavior? You would need to define "ethically defensible" so that we can imagine a reasonable lifestyle that is also immune to ethical criticisms for this to make any sense.
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Nov 5, 2013 13:54
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I'm not really big on donating money to charity but if I was truly financially independent I would definitely volunteer my time in some way. Habitat for Humanity for example. If I was extremely wealthy I still wouldn't just throw money at a charity instead I would try to do something that actually changes people's lives for the long term.
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Nov 5, 2013 13:59
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Mofabio posted:(this was a double post, but...) OK, this argument is bad for two reasons. 1. It is reductive. Seriously you could come in here and start this argument on any thread. Even if we were all getting together to try to save the after school program for at risk teens you could come in and tell us we were being ethically indefensible for trying to help these teens when we could be helping people dying of parasitic disease. I mean sure they might not graduate high school but at least they don't have malaria! 2. It is both an indictment of our current paradigm of neoliberalism/capitalism/consumerism and an endorsement of it. You realized that our current system has winners and losers and that some people, because they had the bad luck to be born to poor people in poor countries are the losers of the system. Your solution to it though doesn't ultimately change anything, you are not trying to change the culture, the government, get any sort of collective responsibility for the conditions of the poorest among us but instead using the neoliberal paradigm to say that we should all work as individuals to acquire as much capital as possible so we can go in there and cure these peoples parasitic diseases without ultimately changing anything. This is a problem because the fact that our system has these winners and losers isn't an accident, it is part of the whole purpose and as long as our society is structured the way it is someone is going to be on the bottom getting hosed.
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Nov 5, 2013 14:28
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Orange_Lazarus posted:I'm not really big on donating money to charity but if I was truly financially independent I would definitely volunteer my time in some way. Habitat for Humanity for example. This doesn't really make sense, there are plenty of people who are happy to throw their time at charity, I'm pretty sure most charitable action is bound by money not volunteer-hours. It's be one thing if you had a special in-demand skill that you could give to a charity on the cheap, but if you're FI chances are you could do much more good by working and donating your salary than you could by spending time on it.
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Nov 5, 2013 14:49
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[qulot ofote="Jeffrey" post="421412030"] This doesn't really make sense, there are plenty of people who are happy to throw their time at charity, I'm pretty sure most charitable action is bound by money not volunteer-hours. It's be one thing if you had a special in-demand skill that you could give to a charity on the cheap, but if you're FI chances are you could do much more good by working and donating your salary than you could by spending time on it. [/quote] A lot of financial independence stuff has either an implicit or explicit attack on consumerism and capitalism. A big part of mmm it's too point out how rich the middle class and upper middle class in western society is and how easy it is to get off the treadmill. This is just another way to get back on the treadmill only instead of shiny toys it is moral obligation. Participating in the capitalist system becomes a moral good and the systems flaws are overlooked.
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Nov 5, 2013 15:06
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neaden posted:OK, this argument is bad for two reasons. This is very well-said.
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Nov 5, 2013 15:31
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neaden posted:OK, this argument is bad for two reasons. Thanks for responding seriously. FI'ers and the somalian-refugee-roommaters have similar attitudes to consumerism and dollar efficiency. I'm just figuring out what separates the people who put the money in their Vanguard, and the people who give it away. For 1, the difference in marginal value of the dollars diverted to an after school program from FI, and an after school program to malaria eradication, is huge. It's apples to oranges, and weighted for marginal value, the apple is part of a raffle where you have to guess its weight, and the orange is a kumquat. So it's reductionist only if you reduce what I'm saying (i.e. why not give?) to something I'm not saying (only give perfectly!) .edit: I'd also be careful of reductionist arguments against giving. As in, arguing against the extreme case. The extreme case would be the person maximizing income in the US, and equalizing expenses to the global poorest, at say a dollar a day. But if the poorest become even poorer (say 50 cents a day), obviously the problem got larger, but your argument against giving gets even stronger, because $0.50/day in the US is even more absurd than a dollar/day. (what's next, refugee roommates?!). For 2, that presents a false choice between collective action and individual action. Why not both? It's also true that America's least popular program is the "foreign aid" category, so I'd question whether lobbying is an effective use of one's time. We also live in a world where the Gates Foundation gives about half of what the country he pays taxes to does. Because it only takes a couple philanthropic billionaires to equal the collective output of the country, I'd worry about emphasizing collective action over individual. Also, lobbying for new laws, or trying to overthrow global capitalism, is pretty high risk/high reward, like putting all your giving on red, but with worse odds. But again, the right answer is "all of the above". Mofabio fucked around with this message at 18:35 on Nov 5, 2013 |
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Nov 5, 2013 17:44
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Mofabio posted:Thanks for responding seriously. FI'ers and the somalian-refugee-roommaters have similar attitudes to consumerism and dollar efficiency. I'm just figuring out what separates the people who put the money in their Vanguard, and the people who give it away. What's cool about FI is that it frees you to do what you want to do. It can be argued that capitalism distorts generous impulses somewhat - this does not mean that human beings only contain generous impulses, however. FI allows you to experience all of your impulses with all of your time. No Wave fucked around with this message at 18:26 on Nov 5, 2013 |
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Nov 5, 2013 18:10
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Mofabio posted:I'm just figuring out what separates the people who put the money in their Vanguard, and the people who give it away. 1) The people who put the money in their Vanguard are selfish and honest about it. 2) The people who give their money away are selfish and deluded.* *The exception being that a lot of people give to charity because it makes sense tax-wise but you could argue they belong in the first category. Like others have said above, if you're going to donate anything then donate your time. Haplessly throwing money at people in the hopes that you can change the laws of nature is just foolish. In the end, all altruism is inherently selfish so instead save your money, be responsible, and take care yourself and your loved ones.
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Nov 5, 2013 20:49
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People not being able to afford arbitrarily-priced TB or malaria drugs isn't a law of nature bud. But why is this even being discussed here?
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Nov 5, 2013 21:13
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Lightning Zwei posted:1) The people who put the money in their Vanguard are selfish and honest about it. I didn't want to get involved in this thread, but come on this is ridiculous. There's lots of great charities out there that can be identified by thorough research and communication. Sure, volunteering your time is great, but they need money too. You don't have to choose between keeping 100% of your money for yourself and donating 100% of your money. Plenty of us aggressively save as well as donate regularly to charity. Nobody is telling you that you have to do the same, but don't call my decisions foolish when you don't know how I reached them. As has been said before, Financial Independence is about being able to make decisions for yourself.
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Nov 5, 2013 21:21
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Goons literally giving their money away ITT.
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Nov 5, 2013 21:33
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MrKatharsis posted:Goons literally giving their money away ITT. Have you seriously never given anything to anyone? You've never done somebody a favor or helped out a friend? I guess that's in line with frugality, but it's not a life I'd want to live.
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Nov 5, 2013 21:52
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This thread certainly took a weird turn from financial independence and early retirement to libertarianism and philosophy.
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Nov 5, 2013 23:24
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koolkal posted:This thread certainly took a weird turn from financial independence and early retirement to libertarianism and philosophy. No Wave fucked around with this message at 01:31 on Nov 6, 2013 |
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Nov 6, 2013 01:29
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MrKatharsis fucked around with this message at 02:30 on Aug 18, 2015 |
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Nov 6, 2013 02:04
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Oh boy, a derail that gets reports. Stop it.Nail Rat posted:People not being able to afford arbitrarily-priced TB or malaria drugs isn't a law of nature bud. But why is this even being discussed here?
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Nov 6, 2013 02:25
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Getting back on track, my path to financial independence is taking shape thanks to taking a job in Singapore. What a crazy place... It's like the mecca of consumerism. For the price of a car, I could retire to Philippines (which is my current goal. May decide against it eventually, but I have a harder time saving without a concrete goal in my head.) You really can't talk to most people about this. My parents are the only people I can celebrate hitting my $50k savings goal. Financial planning is awesome. So back to the Philippines! I could retire comfortably there for less than $18k/year, which I could theoretically do by the time I'm like 32 (so ~5 years). I would also like to invest in the Philippine stock market. While currently it might be volatile, I think they're a promising up-and-coming economy with much to offer the world. I totally have a crush on the Philippines. Any thoughts on this? And on the college financing note, I think who you are as a parent will be far more important on how your kid turns out than whether or not you make them struggle paying for school. My education was paid by my parents, and is the only reason I'm in such a great spot now, although I worked 3 jobs through college to pay for food/cigarettes/weed/gas/fun so I guess that was a valuable/motivating lesson. I don't think my friends who are struggling with $30k+ in debt are at all better off for it. They did not get better grades, nor do they have stronger work ethics or "character" to aspire to. Paying for my theoretical kid's education would be a very high priority for me. Of course, degrees from an accredited Philippine university are quite cheap!
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Nov 6, 2013 11:23
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Switchback posted:Philippines I've heard that that's a pretty common strategy, expatriating to somewhere cheap, but isn't there a ban on landowning for expats or something?
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Nov 6, 2013 13:52
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Switchback posted:Getting back on track, my path to financial independence is taking shape thanks to taking a job in Singapore. What a crazy place... It's like the mecca of consumerism. For the price of a car, I could retire to Philippines (which is my current goal. May decide against it eventually, but I have a harder time saving without a concrete goal in my head.) Are you Filipino sir? As I stated earlier in this thread, this is also our plan. I don't have any opinion on the stock market but it's still an investment avenue. I'd rather invest in index funds here in the States. I don't think index funds exist in the Philippines. Mutual funds and VULs are the vogue and they both suck with their front/back load fees and exorbitant annual fees. The home mortgage industry is not yet matured so a "good" annual interest rate starts at 7% which is pretty absurd. That's why we plan to save a lot of money to eventually be able to construct our own home purely with cash. In the next five years, we're planning to buy a piece of land somewhere NOT in Manila (don't live in Metro Manila because it's already congested as gently caress) and build a home 20-25 years down the line to be able to retire comfortably. Tuition fees in the Philippines are dirt cheap compared here in States. Both me and my wife finished college by spending "only" around $12,500 TOTAL (tuition and miscellaneous) for our four year degrees in a prestigious university (by Philippine standards, one of the Big 4). Thanks to our culture, it's the parents who shoulder their children's educational expenses so we don't have any student loans to deal with. My wife and I both appreciate this after seeing the horror stories of people being saddled with huge student loans here in the US. Please take note that tuition fees for expats/foreigners are more expensive than local residents for whatever reason so plan accordingly. As far as we're concerned, we believe we got quality education. We were able to get our CPA licenses here without trouble so I believe the program in our university (at least the Accounting program) is on par with what's prevalent here in the US. Living in the Philippines is awesome. Everything is dirt cheap (except electronic items). Just be prepared to deal with the traffic especially if you're in Metro Manila.
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Nov 6, 2013 14:11
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