[HN Gopher] America vs. Singapore: You can't save your way out o...
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America vs. Singapore: You can't save your way out of economic
shocks
Author : guardianbob
Score : 186 points
Date : 2026-02-19 14:52 UTC (8 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.governance.fyi)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.governance.fyi)
| rayiner wrote:
| A confounding factor here is that savings behavior is cultural
| rooted: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6135367/.
| Studies show that people within a country can have substantially
| different savings behaviors, robustly correlated with their
| origin countries, even among people who are third generation
| immigrants. It's a mistake to treat either the U.S. or Singapore
| as homogenous populations for purposes of this analysis.
| guardianbob wrote:
| Both sides see declines when hit with economic shocks
|
| We are talking about material impacts, not culture
| janalsncm wrote:
| 75% of Singaporeans are ethnically Chinese so based on what you
| are saying it would be worth comparing SG Chinese to Chinese CN
| on regret since China has a much less robust safety net.
| mothballed wrote:
| Singapore has a _regressive_ shock absorber model where something
| like half the country are immigrants that are ineligible for,
| say, public housing which even the better off citizens take
| advantage of in Singapore (maybe even disproportionately so since
| there can be a long wait to get in, you are older and more
| settled at that point). Immigrants that get milked dry and go
| broke and jobless during a shock are booted from the country
| before they can be polled.
|
| ------ re: below due to throttling -------------
|
| Vs say US, where immigrants and those funding public housing are
| generally _better off_ than the people getting subsidized
| housing. Public housing is more a progressive than regressive tax
| in the US, so quite dissimilar. Immigrants in US are on average
| far better off than those on public housing. Asking "but how is
| this any different" (after I already answered it, lol) over and
| over doesn't negate this, nor the fact that immigrants are like
| half of workers in Singapore vs only 10% in the US so the funding
| dynamic and dependency is far different.
| dangus wrote:
| That sounds quite similar to the US.
| joe_mamba wrote:
| _> Singapore has a regressive shock absorber model where
| something like half the country are immigrants that are
| ineligible for, say, public housing which even the better off
| citizens take advantage of in Singapore_
|
| It's similar in Vienna where only native Viennese are
| immediately eligible for social housing, but outsiders will end
| up paying into the system without being eligible.
| erichocean wrote:
| > _outsiders will end up paying into the system_
|
| By definition, outsiders don't have to pay into the system
| since they already have a gov't somewhere else that is
| dedicated to them, just like the Viennese do.
| joe_mamba wrote:
| _> By definition, outsiders don't have to pay into the
| system_
|
| They absolutely do pay into the system when they move to
| and work in Vienna. By outsiders in this context I meant
| foreign workers. I assumed that was clear from the context
| of the discussion.
| erichocean wrote:
| > _I meant foreign workers_
|
| So did I. Being foreign, they can work at home and not
| pay into a system they have no part of. Problem solved.
| joe_mamba wrote:
| When you move to live and work in Vienna you become part
| of the system since you pay income + other taxes, just
| like the locals, except unlike the locals, you don't get
| social housing.
|
| Unless of course ... your comment was just an anti
| immigration dogwhsitle from the start, in which case you
| should just said THAT instead, and not waste people's
| time with cumbersome allegories masquerading as
| arguments.
| eunos wrote:
| I think you can buy if youre PR and married (or old enough). If
| you are lucky you can receive your PR in 1 year.
| kccqzy wrote:
| The Singapore PR system is purposefully racist. If you are
| white, your probability of getting a PR and citizenship is
| way lower than someone of the Chinese race. The government
| does not want significant changes to the country's racial
| composition.
| finolex1 wrote:
| How is that different from the US? Immigrants also get booted
| here if they lose their job. They also pay social security,
| Medicare, and other taxes but usually don't get the benefits
| unless they stay here for long enough and get a green card.
| paxys wrote:
| The difference is the number. Workers on temporary visas make
| up ~1% of the labor force in the US. And a large chunk of
| them will eventually get citizenship or permanent residency
| and qualify for benefits later in life.
|
| Countries like Singapore and all of the Middle East meanwhile
| rely on a revolving door of cheap immigrant labor. In the
| extreme cases like Qatar 95% of the working population are on
| short term visas. Most of these countries don't have a
| pathway to citizenship at all for this worker class. You
| could live there, work and pay taxes for 10 or 20 or 50
| years, but the day you "retire" you need to pack up and
| leave.
| temp8830 wrote:
| The US also has a huge pool of undocumented immigrants who
| don't get any benefits, don't pay into the social security
| system, and can be paid below minimum wage (because
| officially they don't exist). Any time this labor supply is
| threatened, the construction and agriculture industries
| rise up (and probably sponsor all those massive protests
| you see in the news).
| u8vov8 wrote:
| No one is paying protesters, people like us in
| Minneapolis actually do organically hate the current
| regime and its apologists (you?) that much.
| u8vov8 wrote:
| And undocumented immigrants pay around 25 billion dollars
| annually into social security
| janalsncm wrote:
| > probably sponsor all those massive protests you see in
| the news
|
| Most Americans do not need to be paid to dislike fascism.
| Aperocky wrote:
| This article seem to be confounding external impact with internal
| motivation.
|
| Yes the jobloss impact caused the people to be unable to save and
| in turn they wished they have saved more.. but ignored is whether
| they _could_ to begin with.
|
| Of course external impact had little to do with internal
| procrastination.
| dangus wrote:
| Maybe I read the article too fast but I didn't get that
| takeaway at all?
|
| It's basically just saying that the uninsured catastrophic
| event risk in America magnifies shock events.
|
| E.g., if you have a major hospital visit in America you're way
| more likely to regret not saving enough, but in Singapore
| there's basically no effect since hospital stays don't drain
| your savings account.
| guardianbob wrote:
| That's what I also got from this article
|
| Not just healthcare stuff, but also apparently Singaporeans
| tend to have a lower unemployment rate, so they be able to
| recover from stuff faster
| ebiester wrote:
| It's not confounding at all. It's making the point that
| internal motivation, according to the study, has no major
| factor in savings regret.
|
| It says that understanding risk (as operationalized by
| understanding probability) has a larger effect.
|
| But it is also saying that the more external impact someone
| has, the more they regret saving more -- in the United States
| but not Singapore.
|
| The study is explicitly saying that internal motivation does
| not seem to matter. And the article is arguing the reason why.
| hnthrow0287345 wrote:
| >They're failing to save because the world is rough, and their
| institutions don't do enough to help them weather it.
|
| Well, America is rough. It turned on hardcore capitalism mode for
| itself because a significant portion of its population wants to
| try and solo socioeconomic hardships and hates any one who
| doesn't want the same challenge.
|
| But not to just blame the voter, lots of money is spent for
| setting up systems to be amenable to acquiring more money. The
| very richest have correctly made a bet that uprisings to displace
| the wealthy and politicians just don't occur here these days, and
| therefore there is no real threat or need to change the way
| things have been going for the last 25 years or so.
| vladms wrote:
| Isn't it more a cultural issue though? As a European, I think
| many Americans take pride and love to succeed "on their own"
| and accept they could "die trying" (exaggerating a bit, hence
| the quotes, but the feeling holds).
|
| Yes, the systems are amenable to acquiring more money, but I
| would claim that all that the richest need to do is to push the
| idea that "anyone can make it" - which was probably (more) true
| 50 years ago, but is probably an illusion today (some comments
| at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socioeconomic_mobility_in_the
| _...).
|
| Edit: I do not claim one model is better than the other; just
| that the culture influences the outcome more than other
| aspects.
| irishcoffee wrote:
| Most Americans I know in my middling years are counting on
| the government to support them in their old age, quite the
| opposite that you're exposed to via online manipulation
| hitpeices.
| bluGill wrote:
| And the government will - sortof. It is enough to eat and
| keep the heat on. However if you want anything other than a
| basic simple life (travel, hobbies...) it is easy to run
| out of money.
| nozzlegear wrote:
| Depends on which cohort of Americans you're talking about,
| but it's less that they see it as the government supporting
| them and more that they see it as the government "giving
| back what they owe." Social Security and Medicare have
| always been framed as something you pay into now and get
| back later in life, like you're lending money to the
| government. That's why most Americans don't view it as
| government support in the way Europeans do, and why they
| see no hypocrisy in spitting venom at "government handouts"
| while cashing their Social Security check and Medicare
| coverage.
| vladms wrote:
| I was talking mostly about Americans I met. What might be
| true though is that probably I met the well off ones and
| between 30 and 40, which might like the idea of "we are
| great because we made it". But they all seemed (to me) that
| they were extremely focused on work (like: no particular
| hobbies, no knowledge of fields outside their work).
|
| Some of my impression seems to be confirmed by data, for
| example (did not check in detail but I have seen similar
| ideas): "Even so, the average 40-hour-per-week employee in
| the U.S. is working 400 more hours annually -- the
| equivalent of 10 more weeks -- than employees in Germany."
| https://money.com/americans-work-hours-vs-europe-china/
| jorblumesea wrote:
| if by "culture" you mean rampant corporate propagandized
| media then yes. the US has historically been pretty close to
| europe over the last 100 years on many aspects. In the 70s
| there was legitimate debate about college being free. Now the
| debate is how much debt someone should take on. The overton
| window has shifted significantly since the 80s. We're now
| more like Russia with an entrenched oligarchy.
| eli_gottlieb wrote:
| > Isn't it more a cultural issue though?
|
| No. Culture is downstream of institutions.
| boelboel wrote:
| A large part of it is originally rooted in racism if you look
| how the US implemented its welfare state. Many benefits were
| skewed towards white americans (GI Bill, right to claim land,
| redlining and social security). I'm sure most Americans
| aren't nearly as racist right now as back then but the being
| 'on their own' is linked to the 'don't want 'lazy' african
| americans to get benefits'.
| CamperBob2 wrote:
| How were Social Security and the GI Bill skewed towards
| white Americans, exactly? I haven't heard that before.
| arolihas wrote:
| Like half of our budget goes to welfare (Social Security,
| Medicare, Medicaid, Income Security, etc).
| https://www.usaspending.gov/explorer/budget_function
| phkahler wrote:
| Social Security is a separate tax in a separate fund
| (invested in T-bonds). If you split that out of the budget,
| the budget looks even worse. The boomers retiring is just
| going to be bonds maturing without the holder (social
| security) reinvesting the money.
| arolihas wrote:
| Boomers are getting way more than they ever put in.
| danny_codes wrote:
| And yet that GINI keeps rising and cost of living outpaces
| inflation over the past 40 years in housing, healthcare, and
| education. If you are bottom quintile, maybe bottom 2, you
| are poorer now than 40 years ago on average. Recent policy
| changes seek to drop the third quintile as well.
|
| America is designed for rich people
| arolihas wrote:
| The bottom quintile gets everything handed to them and it's
| still not enough. We all live at the mercy of them and
| their dysfunction.
| bubblewand wrote:
| Seeing an actual "Lucky Ducky!" in the wild is always a
| trip.
| Herring wrote:
| Yes, the US spends by far the most on healthcare per capita,
| and still gets the worst outcomes. It's not about throwing
| money at problems. You have to actually solve them (and want
| to solve them).
| yoyohello13 wrote:
| What annoys me the most about this is I'm like 80% sure none
| of those programs will exist by the time I retire.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| The programs will exist, the purchasing power (or
| quantity/quality of the benefits) will not.
| supertrope wrote:
| https://www.whitecoatinvestor.com/social-security-is-not-
| goi...
| InkCanon wrote:
| Singapore's economic policies are complicated and often
| misdirecting. I'll break down the misconceptions.
|
| The primary purpose of CPF is not a pension scheme. It is
| structured as a massive _forced bond purchase scheme_ by
| citizens. Financially what happens is the 37% of citizen income
| buys a long term bond (till retirement age, on average decades)
| at rock bottom interest rates (it 's pegged to the overnight rate
| or a minimum of 2.6%). The returns are specifically decoupled
| from the real long term returns. This has historical roots in the
| government needing vast capital financing. They make enormous
| amounts of the delta between the short term interest rate and
| long term capital gains. Singapore has no oil or natural
| resources, but it's sovereign wealth fund has AUM in the regions
| of countries like Norway which do for this reason. It is not a
| shock absorber like the article suggests. The withdrawal terms
| are strict - housing, a significant medical expense and
| retirement are the only real ways to get money out of it.
|
| "Trying to keep people employed" is a goal, not a policy. In fact
| the Singapore government maintains a large worker supply through
| immigration. The foreign worker population, ~30%. The main goal
| of the government is to maximize the absolute number of people
| working.
|
| The reason it raising the retirement age is effective in
| workforce participation is because most people have no choice.
| Retirement only pays out after the age. The working life of an
| average Singaporean has seen 37% gone to CPF, maybe another 10%
| to income taxes, another 5% to GST, road tax, property tax, etc.
| After all this there's the astronomical cost of living. This is
| also intentional, to raise the number of employees.
| ecshafer wrote:
| The CPF sounds pretty clever. It covers a major individual cost
| and need (retirement, medical, housing) instead of just
| throwing it into a tax. It makes the government money. This
| sounds like a win win kind of policy.
| foxyv wrote:
| Why does the government get to decide when we retire?
| paxys wrote:
| You can retire whenever you want. The government decides
| when to start funding it.
|
| As for why - the same reason why they get to decide what
| side of the road you drive on and what laws you follow.
| They rule the patch of land you were born on, and if you
| don't like it you can either participate in the system
| (assuming it's a democracy) or leave.
| foxyv wrote:
| This boils down to a "Might makes right" claim. It
| doesn't answer the question why. Only how.
| paxys wrote:
| What question do you want answered exactly? Why we have
| governments and not anarchy?
| foxyv wrote:
| Why does the government get to decide when we retire?
| paxys wrote:
| Like I said, they don't. You can retire today. They
| decide when you get access to a national retirement plan.
| Citizens of the country vote for that plan and how it is
| implemented.
| foxyv wrote:
| I personally could retire today. Most people can't. There
| is no referendum I remember where we decided to raise the
| retirement age. It seems like our government just kind of
| decided to do so.
| seanmcdirmid wrote:
| Couldn't you say the same thing about social security or
| pensions? There is a lot of economic forces that direct
| people to work until a certain age, the government
| controlling a benefit is only one of them. As to why,
| you'll need to dissect representative democracies in
| Singapore's case.
| rayiner wrote:
| You can retire whenever you want, but you specifically
| would probably die in the wilderness.
| foxyv wrote:
| You apparently know very little about me.
|
| Edit: Although, when my time comes as it inevitably will,
| I think the wilderness would be a nice place to do it.
| Maybe in a tree.
| jonahx wrote:
| It _definitely_ answers why. You are asking for an appeal
| to some _moral_ justification. But there isn 't one, and
| it doesn't matter. _That 's_ the whole point of "might
| makes right".
| foxyv wrote:
| In an attempt to steelman, you are saying:
|
| "There is no moral justification for the government
| setting a retirement age, but they are able to. So it
| doesn't matter."
| philwelch wrote:
| The government doesn't set the retirement age. You can
| retire whenever you want. There are no laws against a 50
| year old retiring and living off his own savings, nor
| against a 70 year old continuing to work.
|
| There is a minimum age to collect old age benefits from
| the government. The justification for that should be
| obvious.
| mothballed wrote:
| But the CPF isn't represented as benefits from the
| government. It's represented and claimed to be your own
| savings that you have set aside. At gamed bond rates
| where the government skims off the top.
| foxyv wrote:
| The choice between working and starving to death is not a
| choice. If your savings have been taken by the
| government, then you don't have a choice.
|
| The justification is to force people to work until they
| are too old to do so. Then steal whatever they have left
| with medical bills and price hikes on necessities.
| philwelch wrote:
| And if I was emperor, I would abolish payroll taxes and
| phase out Social Security. Unfortunately, we live in a
| democracy.
| mothballed wrote:
| Social security was sold to the populace for purposes of
| voting as "insurance." Lawmakers _straight up admitted_
| they purposefully wrote the law in a confusing way[] --
| resulting in evasion of democratic scrutiny and the
| scrutiny of the constitution. Then they briefly switched
| to not calling it insurance just for the purpose of
| scrutiny of the courts.
|
| Social Security constitutionality was ruled on just
| months after the 'switch in time that saved 9' associated
| with a threatening to pack the courts and evade the
| checks and balances built into our "democracy." They
| ruled it was covered under 'general welfare' in a way
| that was totally historically inaccurate.
|
| Furthermore, FDR and congress purposefully had it
| packaged in an omnibus style bill to evade democratic
| scrutiny over the individual portions, by purposefully
| torpedoing other aid to needy individuals if SS didn't
| pass, so that lawmakers wouldn't be able to vote on
| democratic view of SS but rather being damned in a
| catch-22 where they'd be accused of not helping out the
| needy in other ways.
|
| Basically the whole thing was designed to not only evade
| democracy but also the constitution.
|
| [] Recollections of the New Deal, by Thomas H. Eliot, pp.
| 102-115 (Northeastern University Press, Boston, 1991).
| jcranmer wrote:
| > The justification is to force people to work until they
| are too old to do so.
|
| Actually, the justification is to _prevent_ old people
| from having to work. Retirement didn 't really exist
| until the creation of pension systems in the late 19th
| century, and the modern social security system was a
| poverty alleviation measure introduced in the 1930s.
| Hell, social security was initially _resented_ by older
| workers because of the cover it gave employers for firing
| them for being too old.
| jonahx wrote:
| I'm just saying it _is_ the answer.
|
| To make an overly dramatic analogy, if you were kidnapped
| and asked why the kidnapper was able to hold you against
| your will, the answer is because they've chained you up
| and they have the gun, and so on. That's literally the
| answer to _why_. The fact that what they 're doing is
| morally wrong is completely irrelevant.
| foxyv wrote:
| I know why they are able, what I want people to think
| about is "Why." The kidnapper has a reason.
| mothballed wrote:
| CPF makes a moral justification by arguing it is a
| "savings and pension plan" under the auspices of a moral
| justification of helping citizens set aside their own
| money. The very first thing you are greeted with on their
| website is that it's savings and an overview represents
| it as "setting aside" your own funds.
|
| The government makes a _moral justification_ of a savings
| plan but then when we dig down to it it 's all ether and
| really just a scheme for bond rate arbitrage for the
| government.
|
| The point isn't that might makes right is false, it's
| that the moral justification is a facade.
| forshaper wrote:
| When are moral justifications not facades?
| ecshafer wrote:
| The government decides when we can retire and they help us
| out. You can stop working today if you want, Government
| shouldn't pay you for it for no reason. Your _duty_ as a
| citizen is to work and build your nation, eventually the
| government pays back that service with benefits.
| foxyv wrote:
| This isn't something the government gives you. It is
| something they have confiscated and held on to.
|
| > Your duty as a citizen is to work and build your nation
|
| What about the duty of the trust fund babies and idle
| wealthy? What about the duty of the capital owners? Why
| is the retirement age going up instead of down as
| productivity increases?
| sam1714 wrote:
| Not for the majority of retirement savings in the US,
| where Social Security makes up only about 25%.
|
| In the case of 401(k)s/DC plans and private pensions/DB
| plans, the government allowed savings without
| "confiscation," i.e. immediate taxation. They gave us the
| benefit of deferred taxation if you wait until retirement
| age.
| foxyv wrote:
| What about the people who do not make enough to save and
| all their money goes to inflated living expenses? When do
| they get to retire?
| scottyah wrote:
| because lifespans are increasing much more, people are
| outliving what they used to and are using a lot more
| money in retirement than they used to. Old people used to
| sit in houses and watch grandkids, now they're flying to
| foreign countries for fun.
| goolz wrote:
| These days I wonder about that duty I have. It sure felt
| obligatory some time ago. I thought of myself as a
| patriot and that the rule of law was something we we
| should be proud of. A country whose own anthem spoke of
| "liberty and justice for all".
|
| The current trajectory makes my question a lot of things,
| including this whole "government pays back that service
| with benefits" as it will be some time before I ever see
| a penny of SSI.
|
| A lot of our taxes in this country seem like a giant
| waste or are grossly inefficient at best.
| autoexec wrote:
| > A lot of our taxes in this country seem like a giant
| waste or are grossly inefficient at best.
|
| It's our duty to elect people who use tax dollars wisely
| and to vote out officials who neglect their
| responsibility to the people and use tax money to enrich
| themselves and anyone else willing to bribe them. Our
| government is filled with grifters because we've failed
| to hold them meaningfully accountable for robbing us and
| failing to provide the benefits we're funding.
|
| Many of the grifters in government have been working hard
| to make it difficult to hold them accountable. They
| disenfranchise voters, they keep us afraid and our
| futures uncertain, they collude against efforts to reform
| the system they've established for their own benefit.
|
| Government was never going to just let us have "liberty
| and justice for all" the job was always on "we the
| people" to insist on it. We can't just pay taxes and
| expect everything to work out. We have to use the
| democracy we have to force the government to work for us
| and not just for themselves. If we've reached a point
| where that's no longer possible then it's our duty to
| "refresh the tree of liberty" until we have a government
| that works for us.
| c22 wrote:
| Psychologically the deterioration of _we the people_ 's
| power happens at an even more basic level when children
| are taught to resolve their conflicts by seeking out an
| adult.
| foxyv wrote:
| I wouldn't mind taxes if everyone paid their fair share
| and it went to improving the lives of everyone instead of
| the wealthy few. We live in the most productive times per
| capita that have ever existed. Why do we need to scrimp
| and save to buy food while the number of billionaires
| continues to climb?
| throwway120385 wrote:
| Because we're failing to hold those billionaires
| accountable to the system that allows them to accumulate
| their wealth.
| foxyv wrote:
| Bingo!
| carlosjobim wrote:
| There is no "we" and has never been. Anybody who talks to
| you about "we" or "us" or your "duty" is just seeking to
| exploit you, hoping that you're dumb enough to fall for
| it.
| foxyv wrote:
| There is in fact a we. It's just not based on race,
| religion, ethnicity, language, gender, or sexuality. "We"
| are the ones who create and work for a living instead of
| living off the backs of others. "They" are immensely
| wealthy oligarchs that exploit us using their ownership
| of land, buildings, communication networks and machines
| we need to survive.
| scottyah wrote:
| I live off your back yet am nowhere close to immensely
| wealthy. I know it's en-vogue to hate on shiny
| billionaires but reality is a lot less glamorous. It's
| just lazy gov workers not getting much done, then hiring
| more people to try to cover their work. By the millions.
| foxyv wrote:
| Your reality sounds suspiciously similar to the lies told
| on the media platforms owned by the shiny billionaires.
| scottyah wrote:
| Haha and yours sounds like the lies spread by
| communists/unions/etc attempting to wrest power from
| anyone who has it now. Your view leaves a lot of gaps. My
| view is easily verifiable by almost anyone working
| (barely) and getting paid by taxes. Or second and third
| parties getting that sweet, easy gov $$. It's also
| inclusive of your billionaires- many get money from the
| gov or gov policies too.
|
| Your media platforms may be owned by the shiny
| billionaires, but the laws they adhere to are created and
| enforced by mobs of average 10-4 workers.
| throwway120385 wrote:
| A lot of that here in the US is because we've lost the
| will to participate in the systems that establish these
| things. We leave that to other people, and those other
| people represent our interests poorly. The people in a
| democracy take a really long time to effect change. It
| can be a life's work for some people. But the premise is
| that if we can find common ground we can eventually see
| some of our ideas take shape. That does still work here,
| but we have to actually have real conversations with each
| other that respect each others' differences to get
| anywhere.
| scottyah wrote:
| After a bit it just comes down to motivation. Who wants
| to win more: 1. Someone who has everyone's best interests
| at heart so is unwilling to really run against anyone and
| is trying to balance out support for multiple conflicting
| groups all while learning the landscape and job or 2.
| Someone who knows they can use the position to get tens
| of millions of dollars, and are supported by a few large
| groups similarly motivated? This is how you get people
| like Va Lecia Adams Kellum and Karen Bass.
| coldtea wrote:
| It doesn't (you can retire early), but it does decide part
| of what you will need to be saving and how.
|
| And the reason it decides that, apart from "because it
| can", is because many societies have seen what happens when
| it's left to individuals to take care of this, and they
| fuck it up in massive numbers, and the outcome of that then
| fucks up society.
| foxyv wrote:
| It is really easy to "Fuck it up" when greedy assholes
| jack up the price of necessities like food, shelter, and
| medical care. 66% of bankruptcies are due to medical
| costs. We should just socialize necessities like food,
| shelter, and medical care so there is no chance of
| "Fucking it up." That would cover the possibility of
| disability as well.
|
| It sounds to me like we have built a system to exploit
| people as much as possible. Treating them like farm
| animals.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| >We should just socialize necessities like food, shelter,
| and medical care so there is no chance of "Fucking it
| up."
|
| How does socializing work if there are insufficient
| workers relative to non workers? I.e. the supply of
| food/shelter/medical care is insufficient to meet the
| demand?
| foxyv wrote:
| Why would there be insufficient workers relative to non-
| workers? Socializing health care, shelter, and food does
| not lead to a worker shortage. In fact, having a
| healthier and taken care of population leads to
| prosperity in general. In addition, it leads to reduced
| costs. Countries with socialized medicine pay a fraction
| of what America does for better health outcomes.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| >Why would there be insufficient workers relative to non-
| workers?
|
| The total fertility rate and the trends of that rate of
| basically every country, especially the ones with
| socialized medicine.
|
| https://www.populationpyramid.net/norway/2025/
| foxyv wrote:
| Fertility rates? The world population is growing.
| raw_anon_1111 wrote:
| Yes let's have "5 Year Plans" with centralized control
| instead of the free market, what could possibly go wrong?
| If only we had a large country that tried that and failed
| miserably to see what could go wrong.
| foxyv wrote:
| Or, hear me out, we could socialize health care and tax
| the rich rapists that are currently running the country
| to end poverty in the richest country in the world.
| krapp wrote:
| We don't have the free market. We've never had the free
| market. Every economy has always been under some degree
| of regulation and centralized control simply by virtue of
| existing within the context of a society and government
| that enforces laws and levies taxes.
| raw_anon_1111 wrote:
| The government has never controlled the means of
| production for the most part except for "natural
| monopolies" like utilities, cable etc where everyone
| should be served and it doesn't make sense to try to have
| two companies building out infrastructure
| stackbutterflow wrote:
| This question cannot be asked in good faith on a user
| board. It requires an 800 pages book on politics, history,
| philosophy, economics to be properly answerered and it
| would barely scratch the surface.
|
| You might as well ask similar questions about most basic
| laws and concepts behind how western societies work.
| foxyv wrote:
| Yes, you should be asking similar questions about most
| basic laws and concepts behind how western society works.
| stackbutterflow wrote:
| We should each ask ourselves such questions and review
| our view on them from time to time during our life
| because they're important, but mostly by doing our own
| research and self study. But asking point-blank strangers
| such a vague question is putting an unfair burden on
| them.
|
| There's maybe a few hundred people worldwide who could
| casually drop a proper answer to your question while
| casually browsing hn.
|
| I believe it'd be more fair to start answering your own
| question to show how far you are in your intellectual
| journey on that topic.
| foxyv wrote:
| My own answer is this. We have created a system of
| exploitation where we extract value from people's labor
| and transfer it to an oligarchicy that is slowly
| increasing in power. Governments are captured by that
| ruling class and are unwilling to do anything that
| threatens them. In addition, they are slowly reducing the
| rights and social mobility of the middle and lower class
| in order to expand the power and capital of the
| oligarchy.
|
| Any money that is possessed by the working classes is
| then taxed in the form of increased living expenses or
| directly by the government until they can barely afford
| the necessities that allow them to continue working. Once
| they are no longer able to do so, they are discarded and
| allowed to die of preventable illness, starvation, drug
| use or exposure.
| jcranmer wrote:
| The government doesn't decide when you retire. The
| government decides when it is willing to pay you to be
| retired.
| foxyv wrote:
| Social security is an entitlement. They have taken money
| from your paycheck to fund it. In fact, they have taken
| more from your paycheck than they will pay back to you in
| order to pay for an aging population. The extra goes to
| bonds which the government then uses to reduce inflation
| when they decide to invade random countries or bail out a
| bank.
|
| Now, why does the government get to decide when I retire
| with my own money?
| jcranmer wrote:
| If you don't like it, join the Amish and file a Form
| 4029.
| foxyv wrote:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ergo_decedo
| drivebyhooting wrote:
| Except for the part where citizens get low returns and are
| forced to work their whole lives accruing minimal benefit.
|
| How is being a serf win win?
| butterbomb wrote:
| People don't believe me when I tell them that there's a
| large portion of even the American population that will
| happily accept the simplicity and safety of serfdom.
| 3rodents wrote:
| I can't speak for Singaporeans and every government has
| their detractors but the Singaporeans I've known loved
| their system and hated the western systems they were
| exposed to. They would laugh if you tried to describe their
| life as serfdom when compared to a life in the U.S. or
| Europe.
| InkCanon wrote:
| I'll be blunt and say most Singaporeans have a very poor
| idea of how these policies work. Another major one -
| virtually all Singaporeans believe they own their houses,
| and it is a point of pride and financial security. Most
| houses are on 99 year leases, but the idea that is deeply
| lodged is that this is longer than you can live so this
| is inconsequential. While this is true if they only cared
| about living in it, houses have huge financial/investment
| value to Singaporeans. Despite the iron mathematical law
| that these houses must depreciate their lease value, most
| Singaporeans believe house prices will continue to rise
| based on historical trends. The math just doesn't work
| out.
| delta_p_delta_x wrote:
| I think Singaporeans have a decent idea, and given their
| quality of lives, they have no problems with the trade-
| offs. If they do, they leave. And many go back, because
| the trade-offs in the West are even worse.
|
| > Despite the iron mathematical law that these houses
| must depreciate their lease value
|
| SERS means that houses slated to be torn down are resold
| back to the government at near-market rates excluding the
| effect of the 99-year leasehold.
|
| In Singapore, the government owns _everything_ , even
| ostensibly 'freehold' land. If they want to run an MRT
| line under your house, and they need to tear your house
| down to get to it, they will force you to sell your house
| and your land to them. Has happened before, will
| absolutely happen again. It's an island city-state
| smaller than London. There is literally no space anywhere
| else.
| zozbot234 wrote:
| > If they want to run an MRT line under your house, and
| they need to tear your house down to get to it, they will
| force you to sell your house and your land to them.
|
| Eminent domain exists in the U.S. and other developed
| countries too. The point of it is largely to prevent any
| single owner from "holding up" a non-trivial project like
| an MRT line.
| InkCanon wrote:
| I think whether houses should be sold on a 99 year lease
| vs property is a large and separate question. The vast
| misunderstanding of it still remains - the idea that a
| house is owned, not rented. Selective properties might be
| bought back. But the fundamental invariant of this whole
| situation is that all 99 year leases will worth 0
| eventually. Any rise in prices now only increases the
| eventual depreciation. And add on that massive loans are
| taken out on depreciating assets, so it's not an
| investment, it's a liability. And the significant
| majority of Singaporeans bears this liability on their
| books.
| delta_p_delta_x wrote:
| > 99 year leases will worth 0 eventually.
|
| That's not how it works. The flats aren't valued for
| their space in the sky; they are valued for the land they
| are attached to, and their proximity and connections to
| other communities and infrastructure. I've already said
| that flats slated for SERS are _bought back_ by the
| government at market rates well in advance of their
| leases expiring.
|
| > The vast misunderstanding of it still remains - the
| idea that a house is owned, not rented.
|
| What _you_ seem to greatly misunderstand is that land in
| Singapore is at an extreme premium, the likes of which is
| hitherto unseen anywhere else. With this context in hand,
| the idea of traditional 'home ownership' is
| fundamentally flawed in the first place, because unlike
| much larger countries, there isn't a large suburban or
| rural zone in which a new city can just be sprouted up.
| 750 square kilometres is all you have, and if you have to
| recycle existing land to maximise its use, so be it, and
| if it means 99-year leases, then that is the cost.
|
| Given average human lifespans, the Western concept of a
| 'freehold' doesn't really make that much sense anyway,
| unless you want monarchies, oligarchies, or corporate
| dynasties monopolising prime land and settling into an
| even more predatory outright rental economy, which is
| already seen in most large cities elsewhere.
| zozbot234 wrote:
| 99 year leases make complete sense. Much of the value of
| a 'house' in an urban area like Singapore is actually in
| the land, and the value is being created by the community
| on a day-to-day basis. It makes no sense for that value
| to be captured for all future time by a single owner,
| that just encourages pointless speculation and makes it
| harder to allocate real estate towards its highest and
| most valuable use.
| gruez wrote:
| > It makes no sense for that value to be captured for all
| future time by a single owner, that just encourages
| pointless speculation and makes it harder to allocate
| real estate towards its highest and most valuable use.
|
| How do 99 year leases fix the problem? Do people actually
| get kicked out at 99 years, or does the government renew
| it for a nominal fee?
| zozbot234 wrote:
| If the lease gets renewed at market value then there's no
| point in speculating about what that land might be worth
| in the farther future. It's a key difference from a
| system where all of the future value must be captured at
| once by a single owner.
| gruez wrote:
| Doesn't that just turn into a property tax of 1% per
| year, without a massive tax bill every 99 years? 99 years
| is long enough that there's going to be at least 2
| owners, which means all sorts of strategizing required on
| how to plan for the renewal of the lease.
| delta_p_delta_x wrote:
| The overwhelming majority of homes in Singapore are HDB
| flats built by the government. These are torn down and
| new, taller buildings fitting more people built in their
| place. It's called the Selective En-Block Redevelopment
| Scheme, or SERS[1]. People sell their flats to the
| government and are given new flats in other
| neighbourhoods, while their old homes are torn down and
| new ones rebuilt. So, yes, in some way, they are 'kicked
| out'.
|
| [1]: https://www.hdb.gov.sg/residential/living-in-an-hdb-
| flat/ser...
| autoexec wrote:
| > virtually all Singaporeans believe they own their
| houses, and it is a point of pride and financial
| security. Most houses are on 99 year leases
|
| It's not as if the US fairs any better. Here you never
| own your home, you have to pay property taxes your whole
| life (basically rent) or it will be taken from you.
| Eminent domain means that they can take your property
| from you at any time even if you've kept paying them.
|
| Singapore has a home ownership rate of ~90% vs 65% in the
| US and prices are so unaffordable that on average people
| buying their first starter homes in the US are in their
| 40s! Most Americans, if they're lucky will get maybe get
| 30 years of their life in a home they own while they are
| still young and healthy enough to enjoy it.
|
| Last I heard Singapore only had about 1,000 homeless.
| Whatever they're doing with housing could probably be
| improved on, but they seem to be doing a lot better than
| we are.
| nosianu wrote:
| Unless we scale back our lives significantly, and are fine
| with a lot less stuff and vacations and devices and
| modernized living (houses and transit today are vastly more
| complex systems than a few decades ago), there simply is no
| way to let a large number of people live like rich people.
|
| I grew up in East Germany, and while it was a total
| failure, they got at least one idea correct in the workers
| paradise: We need to _work_. _(Never mind the
| implementation, I already said it was a total failure,
| okay? It 's about problem recognition, not about the
| quality of the solution.)_
|
| And you know what? I'm actually like my grandfather, who
| without any need whatsoever continued to work well past
| retirement, privately, painting a house here, doing some
| paint shop there, designing and installing a sun dial
| somewhere. He only got off the scaffolding on a house's
| paint job a week before he died.
|
| I too would hate to just laze around. I LOVE doing useful
| stuff. I worked and made money many times as a child
| already, and it was always fun!
|
| What stopped the fun was the coming of The West (which I
| too went to the streets for and wanted, still, _" side
| effects may apply"_). While I studied CS I took a job in a
| chocolate factory, not because I needed the money, but
| because that's what I always did and was used to. Being in
| the production of stuff is actually FUN! Except then came
| some western management idiot to make it clear fun is over.
| I had just setup a machine to work as efficiently and as
| well as possible (because that's fun!), so now I had to
| wait a few minutes for it to finish. Just a few minutes, no
| time to start something else. So I briefly sat next to it
| and waited for it to finish. In comes the management idiot,
| immediately jumping on me, why am I lazing around??? That's
| not what they pay me for!
|
| Just an anecdote, and of course it is much better in
| knowledge jobs, but that, and the fact that the money
| accumulates towards the top is what I think is a HUGE
| problem in today's capitalism. No wonder they have to make
| live as miserable as possible for the working majority,
| because there is no fun. The managers and owners think we
| don't want to work, and treat us accordingly. But it is
| THEM who are responsible for much of that.
| temp8830 wrote:
| You get lots of vacations? And fancy transit systems?
| Where do you live and work?
| drivebyhooting wrote:
| Working as a painter for lack of imagination of what else
| to do is not fun. It reminds me of being
| "institutionalized" from Shawshank's redemption.
| bubblewand wrote:
| Adult coloring books are a thing. I could definitely see
| a person enjoying a version of that, that also had a
| purpose beyond killing time.
| spyckie2 wrote:
| You mean the US, right? Especially with the part 2?
|
| I know this may sound like a shock because you are
| privileged but 7% yoy return on capital is NOT the norm for
| the rest of the world. Just look at any other index not
| called the S&P or the Dow. Look up US exceptionalism.
|
| The US policy for retirement savings shackles the younger
| generation with a ticking time bomb. Forcing your own
| citizens to save money for themselves is a lot better than
| forcing your own citizens to pay for others. Which one is
| more morally cruel?
|
| HK has a similar forced savings, but that ROI is like 1 or
| 2% and the options to invest are paltry.
|
| Some perspective is necessary. Yes it's not great but
| compared to the rest of the world it's stellar.
| drivebyhooting wrote:
| If ROI is lower than inflation then what's the point of
| saving? So you can have an even worse standard of living
| after you retire?
|
| Forced investment in low ROI vehicles is just a tax by
| another name.
| spyckie2 wrote:
| Well, would you have a better standard of living with $0
| or $1000 when you retire?
|
| Even if that $1000 used to be worth $10000, that $0 is
| still worth $0.
| delta_p_delta_x wrote:
| Singapore is one of the last countries one will be a 'serf'
| in.
|
| The parent contributor has conveniently left out the fact
| that the 37% of CPF contributions is split 20-17 in terms
| of employee-employer contributions[1], and has a ceiling of
| S$8000[2], so if one earns more than that, every additional
| dollar goes entirely to them, which is also taxed at
| globally low income tax rates[3]. One can put all one's
| post-tax money into any stocks/bonds/funds, and there is
| also no capital gains tax[4].
|
| [1]: https://www.cpf.gov.sg/employer/employer-
| obligations/how-muc...
|
| [2]: https://www.cpf.gov.sg/employer/infohub/news/cpf-
| related-ann...
|
| [3]: https://www.iras.gov.sg/taxes/individual-income-
| tax/basics-o...
|
| [4]: https://www.iras.gov.sg/taxes/individual-income-
| tax/basics-o...
| dmoy wrote:
| $8000 is considerably above median income, no?
| InkCanon wrote:
| Yes. Bluntly put, the government maximizes residence of
| high net worth individuals, and a 37% forced purchase of
| low interest bonds would be outrageous to them.
| gruez wrote:
| >The parent contributor has conveniently left out the
| fact that the 37% of CPF contributions is split 20-17 in
| terms of employee-employer contributions[1]
|
| This point is a shell game, because the employer's share
| is still effectively being taken from the employee. It's
| equivalent of "tariffs are paid by foreigners!" that's
| trotted out for supporting tariffs.
| kaashif wrote:
| I almost feel like the employee/employer distinction is
| actually worse than tariff fakery because at least
| tariffs are somewhat confusing to the average person, so
| you almost see why they get fooled.
|
| But I feel like no-one would be fooled if you changed an
| e to an r on payslips (employee contribution to employer)
| - it's just obviously the same.
| ww520 wrote:
| It's not a win win policy. The citizens lose massive amount
| of their money to government on the bond yield delta. It
| preys on people not knowing the effect of long term compound
| interest.
|
| Edit: in fact interest delta is how banks make their huge
| profits except the government here does it by force.
| cm2012 wrote:
| The average person does not make meaningful interest or
| investment income, its not practical to on individual small
| salaries.
| Aurornis wrote:
| In this case the citizens are forced to save, but the
| interest they're given is less than what they would have
| earned by saving the same amount on their own.
|
| Also, the average person in the United States does have
| meaningful investments toward retirement age.
| Aurornis wrote:
| > instead of just throwing it into a tax. It makes the
| government money
|
| It is a tax, but with extra steps.
|
| The reason it makes the government money is because they're
| collecting the extra interest that citizens would have earned
| if they were free to invest it on their own.
| everforward wrote:
| To me it sounds like a tax structured in a strange way so it
| doesn't obviously read as a tax.
|
| It's essentially a forced loan to the government at subpar
| rates. The "tax" is the delta between what the government
| pays out for the bonds vs what a bond of equivalent risk in
| the free market would have paid.
|
| The magnitude of the investment also probably makes it
| impractical for anyone but the very wealthy to retire before
| that starts paying out. Most other countries have lower rates
| on their retirement schemes, which makes it feasible for more
| people to live on their savings for a few years before the
| government retirement scheme kicks in. E.g. in the US it's
| pretty feasible for the upper middle/lower upper classes to
| retire a few years before Social Security kicks in,
| especially if they're willing to live frugally.
| gruez wrote:
| >It's essentially a forced loan to the government at subpar
| rates. The "tax" is the delta between what the government
| pays out for the bonds vs what a bond of equivalent risk in
| the free market would have paid.
|
| Yeah there's even a term for it:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Financial_repression
| raw_anon_1111 wrote:
| It's almost impossible for an upper middle class couple to
| retire in the US before their 65 unless they have some type
| of government provided or private company provided health
| insurance like teachers, police officers, military etc.
|
| It's about $25K a year for a decent plan which is doable.
| But you have to hope that Republicans - and yes this is a
| political issue - don't successfully kill the ACA and make
| it impossible to get insurance at any cost if you have a
| pre-existing condition. If you are old - you will develop a
| pre-existing condition.
|
| My parents are 83 and 81 and retired at 57/55. But my mom
| was a teacher who still gets benefits through the
| government and my dad gets benefits from the one factory
| that didn't shut down in our hometown.
|
| I'm 51 and even if I could retire early financially, I
| wouldn't do it _and_ stay in the US. Play the smallest
| fiddle for us. I "retired my wife" at 44 in 2020 8 years
| into our marriage when I did a slight transition to an
| industry where remote work with travel is the norm (cloud
| consulting + app dev) and we have traveled a lot including
| doing stints as "digital nomads".
|
| We are staying in one of the countries that we might retire
| to as a Plan B for six weeks starting next week.
|
| Even now that we moved to state tax free Florida and my
| wife hasn't had to work in six years, she keeps a current
| CDL because she can get a job as a school bus driver easily
| for the benefits and _someone_ will pay me for independent
| consulting if I lose my job.
| throwway120385 wrote:
| The other way to avoid a pre-existing condition is to
| just avoid medical care entirely.
| atomicnumber3 wrote:
| Ah yes, the 4chan retirement plan. Die of a preventable
| cause at age 42 while waiting for your captcha.
| paulddraper wrote:
| If you accept that cancer is a death sentence, it's not
| absurd to "self fund" your insurance with a nest egg.
|
| You can shop around quite a bit for non urgent care, and
| get good cash discount.
| raw_anon_1111 wrote:
| How much of a nest egg do you think would let you afford
| a major operation like heart surgery or cancer care?
| watwut wrote:
| Even a minor one.
| paulddraper wrote:
| Read the qualifier.
|
| And heart surgery is ~$60k. [1]
|
| That's <36 months of insurance premiums according to the
| earlier poster.
|
| [1] https://cost.sidecarhealth.com/ts/heart-bypass-
| surgery-cost-...
| mothballed wrote:
| It cost $30k for a loved one just to go to the hospital
| when their heart "felt weird" but absolutely nothing
| turned out to be wrong and all they did was run a couple
| quick scans and tests. I do agree with the overall idea
| of what you're saying that usually the premiums are way
| more than what you could get care for if you just saved
| the money, but the numbers on the website seem very
| wrong. I realize it's a total anecdote but from loved
| one's bills it is $20-30k just to get in the door and
| that is if _actually nothing is wrong and there is no
| heart attack_ yet they 're quoting $30k for an actual
| heart attack care.
| scottyah wrote:
| That's the pricing when you have insurance. It is cheaper
| if you don't.
| raw_anon_1111 wrote:
| I have never in my 30 year career paid more than $10K a
| year for health care across 10 jobs and that's including
| working at Amazon with their shitty benefit package
| greedo wrote:
| If you accept cancer as a death sentence, you're an
| idiot. I had cancer at age 41. If I left it untreated,
| sure I'd be dead, probably by age 43. But I'm not an
| idiot, I had good health insurance, I was treated, and
| now that health event is over twenty years in the past.
|
| Had I self-funded with a (non-existent) nest egg, I would
| still be in debt over $600k. Instead, my insurance had to
| deal with that...
| mothballed wrote:
| 600k once in 40 years is cheap compared to the total cost
| of insurance, especially when you consider the compound
| interest you could have made on premiums not paid, plus
| with the freedom to get cancer care cheaper someplace
| privately outside the US.
|
| Your insurance company got the last laugh by a long shot.
| A typical family on insurance would pay $600,000 (between
| their take-home and the reduced wages paid by employers
| to cover insurance) in just 25 years, and that's before
| considering the opportunity cost of lost
| investments/yield.
| raw_anon_1111 wrote:
| Are you really suggesting that a family should not have
| insurance at all and save the money?
|
| I have been working for 30 years and have never once paid
| more than $10K a year for insurance across 10 jobs 15 of
| those years were a family plan.
|
| Hell one of those jobs was with Amazon - the company with
| the shittiest benefit package in all of BigTech and even
| then I only $12K with a family plan. Right now we pay
| around $10K - my wife myself and my adult but under 26
| (step)son
| greedo wrote:
| My annual premium for insurance was roughly $2400/year.
| Since then, it's gone to about $6k per annum. Even
| compounded at whatever the S&P500 returns for a 40 year
| interval, I'm pretty sure I'm ahead of the game. If you
| think I've lost $600K by having work provided insurance,
| we're not dealing with the same level of reality.
| paulddraper wrote:
| While I won't argue insurance wasn't overall beneficial
| in your case...
|
| There is no way that $600,000 is the _cash price_ for
| cancer treatment (especially 20 years ago, but also
| today).
|
| The average cost of cancer treatment is $150k [1], and
| lower with cash price + shopping.
|
| [1] https://treatcancer.com/blog/cost-of-cancer/
| greedo wrote:
| I stopped cataloging the invoices after it hit $1.6M.
| Granted that's what the providers would bill my
| insurance, and we all know those are funny numbers, and
| while I'm sure that a concentrated effort to negotiate
| cheaper cash prices might have been productive, there's
| still the fact that I would have had to have $600k or so
| readily available. HYSA yields were pretty low for most
| of this time period, and if I had kept that kind of money
| in a stock portfolio, taxes would have killed me.
|
| And it's beside the point. 99% of Americans can't afford
| to build a $600k nest egg just to cover medical expenses.
| THAT'S WHAT INSURANCE IS FOR!
| greedo wrote:
| Also, I wonder if this is skewed by more affordable
| treatments for things like basal cell carcinoma or
| prostate cancer that doesn't require surgical
| intervention. In my case, I had full on chemo, rad
| treatment, surgery, and more chemo. Wouldn't wish it on
| my worst enemy, but I'm sure as hell glad I had good
| insurance. Dealing with the medical side was traumatic
| enough, I don't think I or anyone in my family had the
| bandwidth to deal with negotiating cash deals with
| multiple providers.
| glimshe wrote:
| The FIRE community and my own personal situation prove
| you very, very wrong. It's absolutely possible for a
| upper middle class family to retire in their 50s, even in
| their 40s, if they live frugally.
| aprdm wrote:
| "Live frugally" , "FIRE" , "work in tech"
|
| All incompatible with 99% of the upper class, neither do
| they want to eat ramen to retire early.
|
| You're also one medical disaster away from being "very
| very wrong"
| mech998877 wrote:
| 90%+ chance the person you are replying to has health
| insurance that will cover them in case of medical
| disaster.
| glimshe wrote:
| I absolutely have health insurance, the most expensive
| available on my state. That doesn't protect me 100%, but
| what health insurance (including the ones available at
| most companies) does?
|
| People who have poor money management skills believe that
| FIRE=Ramen and no health insurance... In fact, it's about
| getting a 30K car (the one I bought new 3 years ago)
| instead a 70K car despite having the money.
| mattmanser wrote:
| 99% of people have poor money management skills? It's
| statements like this that makes FIRE a fringe scene.
| scottyah wrote:
| you're saying 99% of people think FIRE = ramen? I doubt
| that many even have heard of it
| raw_anon_1111 wrote:
| And what happens when the Republican Party gut the ACA
| and you have a pre-existing condition. Do you know what
| life was like trying to get insurance with a pre-existing
| condition before 2012?
| scottyah wrote:
| Then they can just skip insurance. Most people don't need
| it, especially if they already have a lot of money (which
| is what FIRE means)
| raw_anon_1111 wrote:
| Obviously said by someone who is young and never had or
| knew anyone that had an expensive medical procedure like
| a friend who is 45 who I have known since 2003 and is a
| cancer survivor and now has to have open heart surgery
| scottyah wrote:
| I don't believe your friend is most people. I have quite
| a few who haven't been to a doctor in decades.
| raw_anon_1111 wrote:
| But do you want to take the chance that you will never
| have major medical expenses between the time you retire
| early and you are _65_ and eligible for Medicare? How
| many of your friends are over 50?
| supertrope wrote:
| That plan works until it suddenly doesn't. When it
| doesn't it's catastrophic for your finances and your
| health.
|
| If you have an extra couple million dollars above and
| beyond your regular retirement fund you could self-insure
| your medical costs. But then you could just buy the
| health insurance.
| scottyah wrote:
| Medical expenses are less expensive when you don't have
| insurance. Insurance is just for catastrophic events, if
| you do some regular risk analysis you can come to a
| balance that works for you. If you know a major medical
| expense is imminent then get the insurance. Most
| procedures don't happen immediately anyway.
| snake42 wrote:
| FIRE doesn't depend on having a tech job. Its all about
| income to expense ratio. Planning for medical events is
| something that gets talked to death in these communities.
| raw_anon_1111 wrote:
| How do you plan for a potential quarter million dollar
| medical bills over a couple of years?
| snake42 wrote:
| The same way that an employed person would plan for this.
| Catastrophic insurance plans put a cap on how much your
| medical bills can be.
| raw_anon_1111 wrote:
| An employed person since the ACA hasn't had to worry
| about lifetime caps...
|
| Oh and catastrophic insurance plans only have to cover
| pre-existing conditions since the ACA - which one party
| is actively trying to kill.
| Retric wrote:
| Good insurance is one aspect including long term
| disability coverage if you haven't retired.
|
| That's the thing medical expenses when young are unlikely
| enough insurance is a viable strategy. Long term it's
| worthwhile to move to a country with a less expensive
| medical system. You can move basically anywhere in
| retirement and be better off.
| raw_anon_1111 wrote:
| Again like I have been saying, good insurance is
| predicated on the open market and ACA being around and
| not being killed by Republicans. Even if they don't
| outright kill it, they are trying to put in a "death
| spiral" where only sick people use it and insurance
| companies don't want to participate.
|
| LTC not discriminating against pre-existing conditions is
| also post ACA.
| Retric wrote:
| In a hypothetical universe with different laws people
| would make different decisions, like abandoning the US.
| But you're asking about medical conditions which rarely
| apply and laws that don't exist. That's not a failing of
| FIRE for the vast majority of people.
|
| Further FIRE doesn't mean crap if you get something
| serious and die at 23, that's just the reality of human
| existence.
| raw_anon_1111 wrote:
| People didn't abandoned the US before the ACA was the law
| in 2011-2012. And if there were an influx of US citizens
| to foreign countries, I can guarantee you other countries
| wouldn't be as welcoming.
|
| There are plenty of conditions where the difference
| between life and death is being able to get health care
| Retric wrote:
| Some did. The US expat community has been quite large for
| decades.
|
| Most people didn't do FIRE style early retirement while
| dealing with pre existing medical conditions. There
| however was plenty of expats pre ACA who very much left
| the country for early retirement.
|
| US healthcare is ruinously expensive but on average it's
| not particularly good if you're in the income bracket
| where 1/4 million over a few years is a serious issue.
| raw_anon_1111 wrote:
| There is absolutely no significant number of Americans
| who left without ties to other countries. I find it rich
| that Americans who leave the US call themselves "ex-pats"
| instead of "immigrants"
| jandrewrogers wrote:
| I know several people with normie jobs (not tech related
| or government) and normie lifestyles that saved up enough
| money to never need to work again by 50 while still
| maintaining their lifestyle. Most still work because they
| have no idea what to do with their time even though they
| don't need to work anymore.
|
| You can easily derive that this is possible from the
| median household finance statistics published by BLS,
| never mind the upper class. It isn't that hard if you
| care to do it.
| raw_anon_1111 wrote:
| No one is doubting that it is possible to save enough to
| retire by the time you're 50 - as long as the ACA and the
| open market is viable.
| raw_anon_1111 wrote:
| And health insurance as soon as the ACA is gutted and you
| have a pre existing condition? Sure I could retire to
| Costa Rica or Panama. One of those are a plan B and we
| will be in CR for six weeks and we are both learning
| Spanish - I am. _decent_ at it.
|
| I bet you also your idea of upper middle class is not
| statistically valid.
|
| https://dqydj.com/household-income-percentile-calculator/
| glimshe wrote:
| I didn't get where I am by taking random bets, but I'll
| say you'd lose your money here.
| raw_anon_1111 wrote:
| Were you around and trying to get health insurance before
| 2012? I was. The startup I worked for shut down and while
| I had a well paying contract lined up literally the next
| week, I couldn't get health insurance at any price
| because of a pre-existing condition even though at the
| time, I was a part time fitness instructor and I had just
| gotten through running my first (and last) two half
| marathons.
|
| If you are betting on the stability of the US health care
| system outside of employer funded health care, that is a
| monumentally stupid bet with one party actively trying to
| kill the ACA.
| Jach wrote:
| So what did you do? Clearly you didn't die. Did you just
| have no insurance for the week before the new job
| started, or what?
|
| This also happened to you while you were working and
| slightly between jobs. So it's not really a FIRE concern
| if the concern is the US messing up the health care
| system even more in that it would effect everyone whether
| working or not. Generally speaking, an answer to
| mitigating a lot of types of risk with a FIRE model is:
| you just go back to work for a while. This is easier the
| younger you are.
|
| Edit: Also I thought COBRA would have been a more recent
| thing but it was Regan era. So did you not have employer-
| sponsored coverage with the startup?
| raw_anon_1111 wrote:
| No, my then fiance/now wife and I canceled our wedding we
| had planned, and went to the courthouse and got married
| six months earlier so I could get on her insurance.
|
| Also, just so happen I did end up in the hospital three
| weeks later because _something_ happened that affected my
| breathing for an entire year.
|
| And how do you "go back to work" if the entire reason you
| need to go back to work is that you have a health
| condition?
|
| If you haven't checked, jobs aren't that easy to come by
| quickly in 2026 in tech like they use to be. Sure I could
| find someone to give me a contract if not hire me full
| time - but we are still back to not having insurance .
|
| The US messing up insurance on the _open market_ is the
| concern and it being back like it was pre ACA. That only
| affects the unemployed under 65.
|
| As far as being between jobs - usually you can get COBRA
| for a limited amount of time - not an option for FIRE.
|
| Oh yeah, that brings up another point, I did pay for
| COBRA for two months back then. The contract I had paid
| more than enough to afford it. Then the acquiring company
| shut down their insurance plan and COBRA wasn't even an
| option
| scottyah wrote:
| You do know you can have a wedding even if you're already
| on-paper married? The ceremony really has nothing to do
| with the legal act.
| raw_anon_1111 wrote:
| So wouldn't it go against everything that FIRE stood for
| to spend money on a wedding after you lost your job?
| scottyah wrote:
| Nope, it's just mindful capital allocation. There are
| plenty of ways to spend money wisely on a wedding. It's
| just a big party, and maybe a traditional ceremony. It's
| whatever you want it to be.
| chasd00 wrote:
| Costa Rica is on my retirement shortlist. I really like
| it there and have taken the family for vacation a couple
| times. I've driven the whole country pretty much North to
| South. Puerto Jimenez is one of my favorite places but
| it's very rural. There's some nice areas an hour or two
| North of San Jose as well. I've met a handful of US
| families that, when the pandemic hit, just sold
| everything they owned and moved to Costa Rica. As far as
| central america goes Costa Rica is a bright spot of
| stability and like a functioning government. I live in
| Dallas so pretty much have to know a little Spanish but
| there isn't much of a language barrier at all. You could
| do a lot worse than Costa Rica.
| carlosjobim wrote:
| Thanks for living frugally. Since you now have some spare
| money, I decided it's time for a rent increase. And a tax
| increase.
| bjourne wrote:
| Statistics! Can a person below the median income afford
| to retire early? The answer is a resounding no. Can a
| person the top 10th percentile (upper middle class)
| afford to retire early? Yes.
| raw_anon_1111 wrote:
| https://dqydj.com/household-income-percentile-calculator/
|
| So the top 10% is a household income of $250K and most of
| those couples didn't reach that until their 40s. They
| aren't making $225K as an L5 at 25 years old like a
| former intern/new grad I mentored when I was at BigTech
|
| Most software developers won't even see above $160K
| inflation adjusted during their career. Most work in
| second tier cities in the "enterprise"z.
| apercu wrote:
| So Texas also doesn't have income tax but my siblings
| house (assessed at a lower value than mine) is assessed
| property tax almost triple wha mine is, dwarfing my state
| income tax plus property tax. Not sure about Florida -
| YMMV.
| raw_anon_1111 wrote:
| My property taxes are $3000 a year. They were around $7K
| a year before we moved. We also downsized to a two
| bedroom condo -1200 square feet - from a 3500 square foot
| house in the most expensive county in GA (Forsyth) after
| my step son graduated in 2020 and after Covid. We sold
| our house for twice what we had it built for 8 years
| earlier and bought our condo for the same price as we
| paid for our house in 2016.
|
| Florida - especially when you live in the same county as
| DisneyWorld - is heavily subsidized by tourism
| kelvinjps10 wrote:
| https://mrmoneymustache.com/blog/ Read this story and
| more in the fire community, it's not impossible
| raw_anon_1111 wrote:
| Does that answer the question about what happens when the
| ACA is gutted and you can't get insurance at any price
| with a pre-existing condition?
|
| That happened to me right before the ACA went into
| affect. I was engaged to my now wife and we moved our
| marriage up early so I could get on her insurance.
| kelvinjps10 wrote:
| https://mrmoneymustache.com/2020/11/09/direct-primary-
| care/
|
| https://mrmoneymustache.com/2017/11/05/when-your-shitty-
| heal... Regarding ACA >My family's monthly health
| insurance premium, which had already more than doubled in
| the last few years to $674 per month, was going up a
| further 44% for the coming year. For no good reason,
| other than perhaps the the current government's attempts
| to kill off the Affordable Care Act. (By cutting various
| parts of the structure, the insurance market becomes less
| stable and predictable, and thus more expensive).
|
| Also besides that there is also the solution of barista
| fire that's working part time just to get insurance.
| https://www.reddit.com/r/baristafire/
| kelvinjps10 wrote:
| With health marketplace you can get insurance, or you can
| get a PPA service, or save money into a HSA, like there
| is multiple ways to do it.
| raw_anon_1111 wrote:
| Until the Republican Party finally succeeds at gutting
| the ACA or make it so bad that insurers wing cover it.
|
| Let's say you maxed out your HSA for 20 years and have
| $200K - that can be wiped out with one uncovered major
| medical incident the HSA max is relatively low.
| everforward wrote:
| Without digging into this too far, I do think it's
| possible but it does require starting early and sticking
| to the plan. I'm not one of those people, but I know
| people who are.
|
| The mean household income for the 4th quintile is 115k a
| year. The mean of the middle quintile is 70k. There's a
| theoretical 45k a year spread if you earn like the 4th
| quintile and spend like the 3rd (evidently possible since
| a lot of people live in the 3rd quintile).
|
| Even ignoring compound interest, if you can hit that 4th
| quintile at 30 and you lose half the spread to taxes, by
| 55 you have 25 years of saving 22.5k/year for 562.5k in
| savings.
|
| It's probably not the most fun thing, but I do think it's
| doable.
| raw_anon_1111 wrote:
| Here are the numbers for context:
|
| https://dqydj.com/household-income-percentiles/
|
| The median household income doesn't earn the median wage
| every year from when they started working. That's just a
| snapshot and it's highly correlated with age. I'm 51, I
| damn sure couldn't afford to max out my 401K. That means
| I was 25 in 1999. I definitely could afford to max out my
| 401K - which was then $10K a year - when I was making
| $35K a year.
|
| Especially when new grads are coming out now with student
| loan debt.
| telotortium wrote:
| For curiosity's sake, what exactly do you think
| Republicans will do to "kill the ACA"? I doubt they're
| going to introduce a bill that revokes the ACA in its
| entirety. They killed the mandate almost a decade ago and
| the marketplace healthcare plans have continued to limp
| along, depending on the state. What's next?
| alistairSH wrote:
| That's not all that different than US Social Security. SS
| has a much lower required contribution/tax rate, but the
| overall scheme seems similar (lower than market returns,
| etc) and naming (despite SS actually being called a tax,
| many residents think of it as a required personal
| retirement savings account).
| everforward wrote:
| SS is different mostly in that you're not really loaning
| money to the government. The money coming in today mostly
| goes right back out as payments.
|
| There's also an upper limit on SS taxable income. I
| forget what it is, but basically the entirety of the top
| quintile isn't paying SS on their entire income. I want
| to say it's like 90k, but it's been a while since I
| looked.
| raw_anon_1111 wrote:
| The top social security taxable income hasn't been as low
| as $90K since around 2005. It's currently $184500. 93% of
| income earners earn less than that
|
| https://dqydj.com/income-percentile-calculator/
| alistairSH wrote:
| SS is forced to invest unspent funds in T-bonds... That's
| sort of a loan to Uncle Sam.
|
| And yeah, income over $185k isn't taxed by SS (silly law
| - fixing that would mostly fix the fund depletion that's
| likely to happen right about the time I retire).
| danans wrote:
| > The "tax" is the delta between what the government pays
| out for the bonds vs what a bond of equivalent risk in the
| free market would have paid.
|
| It also robs the individual's freedom to gamble with their
| retirement funds while expecting/demanding a bailout when
| shit hits the fan.
|
| In the USA we have thoughtful policies that allow people
| over a certain amount of wealth invested in key industries
| to do that.
| skrtskrt wrote:
| > The magnitude of the investment also probably makes it
| impractical for anyone but the very wealthy to retire
| before that starts paying out...
|
| But they can pull out for housing right? That's an enormous
| portion of most people's expenses. If I didn't have to
| worry about housing, I could be living large on less than
| half of my salary, I would certainly semi-retire at least.
| everforward wrote:
| Sort of. So far as I can tell, you can withdraw to buy
| housing but I don't think you can pay rent out of it.
|
| The loans are also 75% max loan-to-value so I think until
| you can get 25% of the purchase price in your account you
| have to pay CPF and rent (or live with family).
|
| Also, not an economist, but I suspect the forced savings
| has a wildly inflationary effect on housing prices. You
| can't do much else with the money until you retire, so I
| would guess the price of housing rises up to match the
| forced savings rate.
| zozbot234 wrote:
| > It covers a major individual cost and need (retirement,
| medical, housing) instead of just throwing it into a tax.
|
| Forced saving makes it a tax. It's essentially no different
| than payroll taxes in the U.S. that fund Social Security.
| Buying government bonds is still marginally better accounting
| than a complete Ponzi scam like Social Security in the U.S.,
| but even that ultimately amounts to the same thing - the
| government is paying itself, so it's a wash.
| philwelch wrote:
| The social security trust fund does buy government bonds.
| f33d5173 wrote:
| Social security is not a savings account and is currently
| underfunded.
| paulddraper wrote:
| It's analogous to the US, where you put money into social
| security and then withdraw later.
|
| The only question is whether the fund is running at a surplus
| or not.
|
| The US has raided its fund to finance other government
| programs, and then will have to pay it back via tax revenues.
| DaedalusII wrote:
| > It is structured as a massive forced bond purchase scheme by
| citizens
|
| the UK effectively does the same thing with DB schemes forced
| to buy Gilts
| philwelch wrote:
| > The primary purpose of CPF is not a pension scheme. It is
| structured as a massive forced bond purchase scheme by
| citizens. Financially what happens is the 37% of citizen income
| buys a long term bond (till retirement age, on average decades)
| at rock bottom interest rates (it's pegged to the overnight
| rate or a minimum of 2.6%).
|
| Social Security is effectively the same thing. Payroll taxes
| are collected and placed in the social security trust fund,
| which invests them in federal bonds.
| zozbot234 wrote:
| Payroll taxes actually pay for current Social Security
| benefits, the trust fund was tacked on with separate
| government funding in order to make it a bit less of a
| complete Ponzi scheme.
| drdec wrote:
| The trust fund is funded by the overage of collected Social
| Security taxes compared to Social Security payouts. It is
| not "tacked on" and does not use "separate government
| funding".
|
| Currently there are more payouts than taxes so the trust
| fund is being used to make up the difference.
|
| When the trust fund is depleted (barring any changes, this
| happens at some point in the next decade if I'm not
| mistaken) then there will be a reckoning. If no action is
| taken by Congress the result is that payouts will be cut by
| the necessary percentage to match the taxes.
| zozbot234 wrote:
| > does not use "separate government funding".
|
| Yes, it does. The Obama administration explicitly
| appropriated general government funds to try and make up
| a developing shortfall in the 'fund'. There is no money
| being accumulated because there _are_ more payouts than
| taxes - but even if that wasn 't the case, these are not
| actual "bonds" that have been bought on any market,
| they're just non-market government obligations.
| InkCanon wrote:
| The main difference is SS bonds are bought at market rates.
| CPF bonds are not.
| Terr_ wrote:
| > Singapore's economic policies are complicated and often
| misdirecting. [...] it's sovereign wealth
|
| Tangentially, I've had a similar gripe around how some US folks
| discuss Singapore's similar old-rival Hong Kong. They'll
| advocate "Hong Kong shows policy X works, we should do X here
| too", while ignoring the _other half_ of the system required to
| make it work, policies the same advocates would never want to
| adopt.
|
| In particular, celebrating HK's "tax freedom" while glossing
| over how the government _does_ fund expenditures. It 's the
| ultimate landlord, deliberately constraining supply (with high
| subsidies to the poor to prevent revolt), and draws from its
| huge [0] sovereign-wealth fund.
|
| [0] Huge by any US standards, even if far smaller than
| Singapore or Norway. To put the _per-capita_ amounts in
| context, if the US is 1x, then HK=80x, Singapore=356x,
| Norway=379x.
| ggm wrote:
| Like Dubai, many of the migrant workers are ineligible for post
| retirement life in Singapore and so despite any mandatory
| savings of any kind will not represent any kind of burden on
| the state.
|
| So they are functionally productive and net positive to any
| scheme about post work funding for the community.
| mark_l_watson wrote:
| I had the privilege of getting a working gig in Singapore for a
| small AI startup: such a well run country! There is a sense of
| community for helping by employing people who need jobs, the
| police were friendly and I felt very safe there (I like to take
| long walks either early in the morning or late at night and I
| felt very secure.)
|
| Amazing what the people and government have achieved since the
| end of WW2. 100% respect for them.
|
| A side comment: I enjoy listening to English language news from
| many countries around the world to get different viewpoints. News
| media from Singapore is very interesting, indeed!
| malshe wrote:
| I spent years in Singapore and loved it there. Never had to
| face road rage (which so many of us experience daily several
| times driving in Texas! NextDoor is full of these stories) or
| aggressive behavior by anyone in authority including police and
| immigration officers. I know many people find Singapore boring
| after a while but it didn't bother me much. On the flip side,
| the cost of living is high as a foreigner and traveling to the
| US is very tiring due to the long distance.
| SV_BubbleTime wrote:
| I worked with a guy from sg. He gave me tips for when I went to
| visit. He hooked me up with a family member that showed me the
| backend a bit.
|
| The country effectively runs on a slave class. You must drive a
| new vehicle under 5 years old, and the license just to buy a
| car was $90,000 or so. This means an entire class of people
| that will be taking the bus to do your laundry and clean your
| house for the rest of their lives and likely their kids lives.
|
| The guy took me around to construction sites. The Indonesian
| and Malaysian workers were some of the most brave or stupid
| workers I've ever seen. I saw a guy install a window in a three
| story building by effectively free climbing from the outside
| half a flight up starting on the third floor, from the outside
| of the building. No harness, no ropes, just him out there
| hanging and pushing against a nook with his work boots. The SG
| contractor had helmet, hi-vis, steel toed, carhart, radio,
| clipboards etc.
|
| Singapore is an amazing place. It's like, a dog whistle kind
| of. Like everyone sees something different there.
|
| I noticed things that trip. However... I was able to enjoy the
| botanical gardens and Marina Bay Sands rooftop like the other
| tourists... fond memories, but they have a backdrop that
| reality is only thinly hidden there.
| supertrope wrote:
| With the MRT not having a car is not bad. Paying $100K USD
| for a Certificate of Entitlement (10 year car registration)
| is definitely a rich person move. Good point on the
| underclass and labor conditions.
| FredFS456 wrote:
| I agree with you that the migrant workers are effectively a
| serf class. However, I think it's fine that the SG government
| severely discourages owning a car. It's a small island with
| lots of people, there would be gridlock if everyone wanted
| their own car. The public transportation system is amazing
| and works well.
| bluGill wrote:
| You know who they didn't interview: those who regret saving so
| much. Many of those people are dead and so the regret is
| something we can only apply on assumption that they would. I've
| known a few people who unexpectedly died before they hit
| retirement age. I've know a few people who retired and died
| suddenly. The vast majority of people in a "first world" country
| have an expected lifespan of about 80 - but there is a
| statistical curve and people start dieing in significant numbers
| at 65, while you are not an outlier until you make it to near 100
| (though some exist).
|
| You need to have some emergency savings. You should save for
| retirement somehow. If you can structure the above as insurance -
| and you can trust the insurance - (I know a few cases where the
| insurance type system went bankrupt and those with a "policy got
| nothing") that is best.
|
| Once the above is taken care of though, you can't take it with
| you (at least in most religions) so spend it. Save enough, but
| not too much.
| 3rodents wrote:
| People who save a lot are typically people comforted by sitting
| on a big nest egg. Saving a lot for retirement and then dying
| the day before retirement isn't necessarily going to be a
| source of regret, because they had 30 years of warm fuzzy
| feelings about eventually hatching their nest egg. They could
| have spent it all instead, and had a life full of anxiety.
|
| You're looking for people who didn't want to save but
| begrudgingly saved at the expense of their pre-retirement life
| and then died before they could enjoy retirement. That's a much
| smaller group.
| bluGill wrote:
| I'm not sure. There is a warm fuzzy from knowing you are okay
| if things go bad of course, but how many of those who saved
| for the feeling would have saved less - they still would want
| a good amount saved for things going wrong of course but not
| that much.
| bombcar wrote:
| This is more fleshed out in the book "Die with Zero" which may
| be a bit too extreme.
|
| But in general you have three things to spend in your life:
| time, money, and effort.
|
| You don't want to spend all your time saving money because
| you'll run out of time eventually, but you also don't want to
| spend all your money saving time because you'll run out of
| money.
|
| It's all about balance and thoughtfully understanding what you
| actually want and how to get it.
| philwelch wrote:
| Money can be passed down to your children and grandchildren
| though.
| bubblewand wrote:
| If you follow the fairly common path of "various expensive,
| intermittent medical problems for a couple decades, a
| handful of years of very-bad medical problems, nursing
| home, then hospice care" in the US, and you don't have _a
| shitload of money_ , you don't really have a savings of
| your own, you're just temporarily taking care of the
| medical and end-of-life-care industries' money. There's not
| going to be much to pass down.
|
| This becomes more true by the year, as those costs keep
| rising faster than broader inflation.
| carlosjobim wrote:
| You can do it before you die if you want to do that.
| They're not much helped by you sitting on it until you die.
| bombcar wrote:
| That's one of the biggest takeaways - if you're an
| average American with average retirement, you will die in
| your 70s and 80s and your children will inherit ... just
| before their retirement, likely.
|
| So instead of waiting to die, give it earlier when it
| helps more; or give to grandchildren.
| philwelch wrote:
| Of course, but it's best to do both if possible.
| robocat wrote:
| You won't be able to in the future unless you are very
| wealthy.
|
| Countries cannot afford the benefits and healthcare
| promised to retirees. So governments are getting more
| grabby. That pattern seems to be occurring in many
| countries.
|
| New Zealand example: when you are in nursing or elderly
| care you must spend all your savings and sell your home.
| The retirement age also needs to increase - one fund
| suggested to 70+
| https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/business/586737/retirement-age-
| wi...
|
| Netherlands example: new capital tax 36% rate. A capital
| growth tax (vermogensaanwasbelasting) applies to stocks,
| bonds, savings, and cryptocurrencies. A separate capital
| gains tax applies to real estate and startup shares, taxing
| only upon sale.
|
| US: see medical debts.
|
| Articles usually talk about savings as though you can bank
| some funds while working, earn interest, and withdraw the
| savings later.
|
| Don't deceive yourself thinking like that.
|
| "Savings" cannot work in the future due to demographic
| issues (especially due to people living longer) even if you
| saw it work in the past.
|
| Look at how many workers support one retiree. In New
| Zealand it used to be 7 workers to one retiree, and in the
| future it looks like 2 workers to 1 retiree.
|
| This is a core issue for anyone below retirement age. Not
| only do we deceive ourselves about solutions, we are
| deceived by articles and history.
| philwelch wrote:
| I have no intention of spending my childrens' inheritance
| selfishly extending my own life, and I'm grateful to live
| somewhere I still have that choice. The people of New
| Zealand and the Netherlands have my sympathy and I hope
| they one day have the same freedom of choice.
| throw-the-towel wrote:
| As someone who used to save too much, I agree.
| yoyohello13 wrote:
| > Once the above is taken care of though, you can't take it
| with you (at least in most religions) so spend it. Save enough,
| but not too much.
|
| I get it to a certain extent, don't live in poverty if you
| don't have too, but I am a major saver. I rarely buy new things
| if an old thing is working fine. If I die early at least my
| family will will be set.
|
| Really the social safety nets in the US are basically non-
| existent so having a big savings buffer makes me feel a bit
| safer. Honestly dying early doesn't worry me too much, I'll be
| dead so doesn't bother me. What does worry me is the economy
| tanks and all my saving become worthless. Then I would have
| some regrets...
| sigbottle wrote:
| I save out of a combination of buying into minimalism as a
| kid (though obviously it's nuanced) but also out of laziness,
| lol.
| ericmcer wrote:
| You just get taken in by life though, it isn't even about
| saving for some idealized retirement to me. As you age and your
| parents get old and you have kids and a spouse you just live
| less and less for yourself. You have to adopt a mental state
| where you feel gratification in sacrificing for others, if you
| constantly regret the things you can't do because people depend
| on you, you will drive yourself nuts. That sort of "I am a
| reliable provider and helper" mentality lends itself to
| obsessively building up a "safety net" because you can feel
| good about how stable and safe you make your loved ones.
| dsign wrote:
| Indeed. In fact, I would go further and say than, more than
| saving money, one should make preparations for a dignified
| passing should one's time come early. Living happy, dying
| before a gruesome disease completely erases that treasure. And,
| if destiny has it that one gets old enough, and one does so
| with little more than a camping tent, leaving this world
| because the night was too cold and one succumbed to hypothermia
| beats what most people get at the end.
| lelanthran wrote:
| > you can't take it with you (at least in most religions) so
| spend it.
|
| I don't understand this PoV at all.
|
| I can't take it with me, sure, but I'm happy anyway if I leave
| it behind to my kids.
|
| This PoV that you _need_ to spend, spend, spend to get the most
| value for your money is very primitive - my kids will do better
| if I die before touching my nest egg, and if I don 't at least
| I'll have a longer runway to live without working.
|
| There is no downside here, other than the artificial one that
| dictates you spend it all and leave nothing behind.
| bluGill wrote:
| Why are you working to earn that money - take unpaid time off
| to spend with the kids.
|
| i get what you are saying, but leaving money to the kids
| isn't the answer. (Other than collage money)
| readthenotes1 wrote:
| "In Singapore, people who report never putting off difficult
| things are more likely to express saving regret than those who
| sometimes do."
|
| That seems like what they should have been looking at re
| procrastination--conscientiousness.
|
| I am not at all surprised that people who Take Care of Business
| lament not doing a better job (saving) and people who YOLO don't
| as much.
| Noumenon72 wrote:
| "Saving regret" ought to also refer to when you have saved too
| much. The shocks in that case would be things like "inflation ate
| away all my savings before I got to use them" or "the government
| confiscated my savings via wealth taxes" or just generally "the
| government made me spend 37% of my income on saving when I wanted
| to use it to raise kids."
| kdheiwns wrote:
| Raising kids in a society where people hate their community and
| don't want to contribute through things like taxes generally
| isn't a society that is good for kids and their development.
| kaibee wrote:
| > "the government made me spend 37% of my income on saving when
| I wanted to use it to raise kids."
|
| This is a particularly funny one tbh. A nation's kids _are_ the
| retirement plan. It doesn't matter how many numbers you put in
| spreadsheets dated for 20-40 years into the future, if in said
| future, there isn't actually anyone to accept those numbers in
| exchange for labor.
| nancyminusone wrote:
| That seems like it causes a different category of problems than
| "I wish I had saved more but I didn't and now I have nothing"
| Sytten wrote:
| Forced savings like done in Quebec, Canada is likely the best
| model for most people even though I dont like it as an individual
| that knows how to manage its portfolio. It also has the benefit
| of creating a sovereign wealth fund that can invest locally and
| be an economic driver but independent from the government.
| nick__m wrote:
| I actually like the forced saving of Quebec. I also have a
| defined benefit pension plan, a TFSA and RRSP but I am happy to
| be forced to contribute the RRQ for the general welfare of the
| province even though I know how manage my portfolio.
|
| Considering that they also have to consider economic
| development in their investment decisions, the RRQ funds are
| well managed by the CDPQ.
| janalsncm wrote:
| Numeracy questions are on page 20 here
| https://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/working_papers/WR...
|
| People who score well on probability numeracy are likely better
| educated and better paid and have more in automatic savings
| plans. So if someone is maxing out their 401k they don't feel
| they need to save more.
|
| The article shows that in the US there is a 25 point gap between
| high and low income on savings regret, and a 14 point gap between
| high and low numeracy scores.
|
| In Singapore where savings are more automatic numeracy is a more
| powerful predictor.
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