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Re:Can Money Set You Free? by kragen on Monday June 14, 2010 @02:36AM (#1429068)
I would agree with you if you were talking about coal miners or supermarket checkers, but the one guy was a dentist and the other guy was a banker. Even 80 years ago, dentists and bankers made more than three times as much money per year as regular people. If they couldn't retire after one-third the normal career length, maybe the fault was not in their stars, but in themselves: perhaps a failure of frugality?
Re:Can Money Set You Free? by Tichy on Monday June 14, 2010 @03:37AM (#1429123)
Or the people who make just one third are just even poorer. I have an income in the top 10% of my country, yet my feeling is it is only sufficient to scrape by in a moderately convenient way. Certainly not enough to retire early. Like to buy a house or apartment, I would probably still have to take a 30 year credit.
Re:Can Money Set You Free? by kragen on Monday June 14, 2010 @05:35PM (#1431078)
Pretty much everybody has the feeling that their income is "only sufficient to scrape by in a moderately convenient way". In the end, of course, they're all wrong: no income is enough to keep you alive. What good does homeownership do you once you're dead?

You're comment points out very effectively that this is an illusion. I'm sure you're aware that the other 90% of the people in your country are also at least scraping by, even though many of them have an income that is a fraction of yours. Do you suppose they spend all their time missing the conveniences you take for granted? Unless those conveniences are things like access to surgery and adequate food for their children (do you live in Zimbabwe?) probably not.

So consider whether the conveniences that account for the discrepancy between their scraping along and your scraping along are really worth the inconveniences required to buy them.

If you're like 90% of people, you never will consider this seriously — because if it wasn't crazy, everybody would be doing it, right? — until it's time for you to retire.