> Basically plan for 4.5% ROI
Warren Buffet notes that a nation's ROI overall basically can't exceed its GDP growth for an extended period of time. So if your country has a 1% to 3% growth rate and you're investing in an unsophisticated way, then 4.5% might be optimistic.
(It's still a thoroughly good idea to do the rest of your comment. I'd save most of my income even if my ROI was -10%, because money is more useful in large quantities, especially when you break certain thresholds like "can take 2-3 years off work when it's a good time to do so" and "can mix cash and and labor when joining a company to get a big equity stake" and "can buy tools and gifts without even looking at the cost if there's a productivity benefit" - cash is more useful/leverageable in large numbers than small for most middle class-ish people.)
Is it in bonds? Several cities and states are looking at defaulting on those. Even if they're corporate bonds, you're right back to being tied into the stock market again.
Perhaps you have it all in CDs. Probably a 20 year Cd if you're getting 4.5%. Fifteen years from now, the bank elects a new president whose new investment strategy is Beanie Babies. There months later, the bank goes under and you're praying that the FDIC steps in to bail you out.
If you're getting any ROI, there's risk involved and you can get wiped out the same way that the boomers did.
You blame people who fail to control their unhealthy eating decisions; why don't you blame people who fail to control their unhealthy procreating decisions?
That's not what I said.
I do blame people who make unhealthy parenting choices, i.e., who have kids before they're financially capable of supporting kids. I take no issue with that argument.
Rather, I took issue with the language in your original post, which seemed to imply that having kids at all is considered a high-end luxury. IMO, something's seriously wrong with any society in which that's categorically true.
Having kids at all is not a basic human need on the level of food, water, and shelter. It is a biological urge, similar to the urge for french fries.
Now, I don't personally think that eating a reasonable serving of french fries while getting adequate exercise is blameworthy; nor do I think that buying a Lambourghini while earning $10M/year is blameworthy; nor do I think that having children you can afford and care for is blameworthy.
I do think that it's silly for popular culture to have sympathy and often admiration for unprepared parents, but scorn and derision for indebted luxury car owners.
FWIW, I am childless and drive a VW.
Effectively you are telling the majority of people on this planet they don't deserve the right to have children.
This kind of "I'm going to make babies and you can't stop me!" attitude is what created the Iron Law of Wages.
Looks like, even here, that's something you just can't say http://www.paulgraham.com/say.html
All of these things cost money, none of them are charitable, but it's somehow less ok to get in financial trouble over them, the further you move toward the end of that list. Why?
PS: An Indian friend of mine saved 20k over a year while making 42k and living in an expensive area. He had no car, never eatout, and had a lot of roommates, but he wanted to save up for his sisters dowery. You can still splurge a lot more than that and still build a nest egg quickly.