> To many people have a very very complex relationship with money. Too many use it as a "score" to reinforce their own self image.

This quote from the show Ozark really resonated with me:

"Money is not peace of mind. Money's not happiness. Money is, at its essence, the measure of a man's choices."

Money is not peace of mind, but lack of money--measured against real and perceived needs--is a great detriment to peace of mind.

I found the book "Scarcity: While having too little means so much" very informative in that regard. The fundamental principle is that when something is scarce, one doesn't always make rational choices. And while the conversation is generally around money, it applies equally to any finite resource. I found a lot of wisdom in that book when substituting "time" for "money." That is because running around with a scarcity mindset around time puts some of the exact same mechanisms into play.

Could you expand on this, Chuck? When time is scarce, we tend to make poorer choices in how we use our available time?

That is exactly correct. So a money example;

Winter's coming and you need a coat, you don't have much money and so you buy the cheap coat that costs $40 instead of the expensive coat that costs $60, 2/3rds through winter your coat fails and you buy another cheap coat for $40. You're out $80 for the winter vs being out $60.

A time example works similarly, when time is scarce you choose not to invest enough time into something (cleaning, fixing something, reading, whatever) and by making that choice, over a wider period you end up spending more time on this task because you're making up for not doing enough when you could have.

For me the trigger is anytime I think "I should do <x> but I don't have enough <y> to do it, correctly but I can get by using only a small amount of <y> if I do it this other way." That is a scarcity based decision not a reasoned one.

The deal for me is to look at the situation with a wider lens to see what the longer term resource requirement is and working from that. It does result in what can feel like a "riskier" choice, but when I track those choices I find making the non-scarcity driven decision is usually the better choice.

This advice will depend upon having a decent safety net, obviously.

So here is the thing, if you have a 'safety net' you really don't have 'scarcity'. These effects manifest in the presence of the stress that you can't "undo" or may not survive the decision you make. That is what pushes the decision down into the "fight or flight"/"survival" part of your brain which is very focused on surviving "right now".

The book's entire premise is that you can end up making decisions in that mode that end up having worse outcomes.

We joke about companies that make choices to survive to the next quarter that end up killing the company long term, but it is the organizational equivalent effect.

Using the winter coat example, make it winter, you're homeless, and you have exactly $60 on you and two coat choices. If you buy the $60 coat you have to figure out how to get more money to eat, which could not pan out and you could starve, if you buy the $40 coat you know you can eat at least for a little while before you have to get more money. So that choice is survival based. If you get the expensive coat, then the next thing you work on is replacing your money supply. It either works and you survive or fails and you starve.[1]

One of the interesting things about basic income programs is that it provides a safety net which allows people to make better choices because they are not in survival mode.

Another revelation for me was that I had not previously realized that while I accepted people making bad choices under the influence of drugs or alcohol, it had not occurred to me that survival stress could be just as debilitating!

"Why did this person do this thing? Oh, they were drunk." that was easy but "Why did this person make this clearly stupid choice? Oh, they afraid of dying." that wasn't at all understood by me early on.

[1] The reality will be somewhere in the middle but that is the nature of the human mind to see the worst outcomes as most probable.

> Winter's coming and you need a coat [..]

Which immediately brought to mind https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boots_theory

So many use it to criticize others.

Losing money or net worth as evidence of moral turpitude

> use it as a "score"

Sounds like achiever/explorer/killer/socializer?

My stepdad saved, as much as he could, so he and my mom could enjoy at the level or slightly less, retired 18 months ago and was proud. Retired at 71. Died this January past. Got less than 2 years.

Thanks Capitalism!

I'm sorry for your loss.

Thanks poor financial planning!

go fuck yourself.

Please don't respond to a bad comment by breaking the site guidelines yourself. That only makes things worse.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Edit: please see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40314726.

This crosses badly into personal attack and we ban accounts that do that, so please don't do it again.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Edit: please see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40314730.

flandish has been consistently attacking others and posting trollish comments.

Example:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40289592

> it only makes you seem like the simp for profit piece of trash you are.

Compared to above what you are pointing out here is mild.

Sure—not every comment that breaks the site guidelines is equally bad, although if you take the context into account the GP comment was pretty vicious.

As it happens, I banned both of those accounts elsewhere:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40314730

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40314726

If there's an assumption in your comment that moderation ought to be consistent, this is not possible because we can't moderate what we don't see, and we don't come close to seeing everything.

p.s. It looks like your account is still using HN primarily for political and ideological battle after we asked you to stop doing this: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39700299. We ban accounts that continue to do this, so it would be good if you'd stop. For explanations about the principle involved here see https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comme....

Thank you. I will tone it down.

At least your step dad reached 71.

My grandad died from stress and poor healthcare when he was 40, in a socialist country.

> The common thread is that just because you can buy something, or can qualify for a particular mortgage, doesn't mean you should if you're goal is to "retire" early. One of the engineers I worked at Sun with told me that once he had enough value in Sun stock he just decided it was enough. He never moved out of his "starter" house (small 3 bedroom) and always drove his budget/no-options economy car at least 100,000 miles. And his idea of a "great vacation" was camping in the Sierras. So it didn't take much for him to get there and in the middle of the dot com "boom" he sold all his stock, paid his taxes, paid off his house, and retired.

My problem with the FIRE and /r/of communities is that their loudest proponents shun anyone who _doesn't_ want to live like this.

Anyone who wants new cars, nice vacations (don't you dare mention flying business class!), and nice houses are anathema to these folks, even if you can clearly (a) afford it and (b) continue to save towards retirement, albeit less aggressively.

This is why I like the /r/fatFIRE community instead. They acknowledge that one can want to retire early (or just retire at a normal age, but with thick assets) and live a nice life while getting there IF you are willing/able to push for higher income jobs.

I mean, that's just called being rich, which is great work if you can get it, but kinda rude because not everyone can just pull themselves up by their bootstraps.

If we’re talking FIRE instead of FatFIRE, I think if you go the Mr Money Moustache or Millionaire Next Door route it’s much less about luck and more about financial discipline which as you’ve implied is very difficult. Many of its successful disciples only make 5 figures. They’re just retiring in their 40s and 50s and not in their 20s.