Quote:You are right. I couldn't do it. And neither could you or anybody else.
The $100 a month for 40 years is a Dave Ramsey fantasy that has been disproved.
In order to accomplish that, you would have to get a 12% return, which is completely unrealistic.
It'll take more than $100 a month. If a person invests $800 a month and earns 5% return, in 40 years they will have 1.2 million.
If they earn 6% return, they will have 1.5 million.
If they invest $500 a month and earn 7% return,, they will have 1.2 million.
From 1950 to 2009, the total
real return of the S&P 500 (adjusted for inflation) was 7%.
The median family income in the US in 2014 was $51,000. That means half the families in the country earn more than that. I believe those families could make do on a little less spending money, and manage to set aside $500 a month. So a million dollar retirement fund, adjusted for inflation, is attainable. Difficult for those at the bottom of the top half, which would be $51,000 a year income, but still, attainable. It would require some sacrifice and a lot of discipline, but when I say half the people in the country could get rich if they really really tried, keep in mind that $51,000 a year is the very bottom of the top half. Half the families in the US earn more than that. A family earning 60, 70, 80 thousand a year would have a much easier time of it.
Quote:It'll take more than $100 a month. If a person invests $800 a month and earns 5% return, in 40 years they will have 1.2 million.
If they earn 6% return, they will have 1.5 million.
If they invest $500 a month and earn 7% return,, they will have 1.2 million.
From 1950 to 2009, the total real return of the S&P 500 (adjusted for inflation) was 7%.
The median family income in the US in 2014 was $51,000. That means half the families in the country earn more than that. I believe those families could make do on a little less spending money, and manage to set aside $500 a month. So a million dollar retirement fund, adjusted for inflation, is attainable. Difficult for those at the bottom of the top half, which would be $51,000 a year income, but still, attainable. It would require some sacrifice and a lot of discipline, but when I say half the people in the country could get rich if they really really tried, keep in mind that $51,000 a year is the very bottom of the top half. Half the families in the US earn more than that. A family earning 60, 70, 80 thousand a year would have a much easier time of it.
A family making 51k a year is not going to be able to save $500 a month. And do not give me that it would require sacrifice or discipline. It would require a miracle.
And this is why we'll never have any success. The resistance to doing it is simply overwhelming.
Quote:It'll take more than $100 a month. If a person invests $800 a month and earns 5% return, in 40 years they will have 1.2 million.
If they earn 6% return, they will have 1.5 million.
If they invest $500 a month and earn 7% return,, they will have 1.2 million.
From 1950 to 2009, the total real return of the S&P 500 (adjusted for inflation) was 7%.
The median family income in the US in 2014 was $51,000. That means half the families in the country earn more than that. I believe those families could make do on a little less spending money, and manage to set aside $500 a month. So a million dollar retirement fund, adjusted for inflation, is attainable. Difficult for those at the bottom of the top half, which would be $51,000 a year income, but still, attainable. It would require some sacrifice and a lot of discipline, but when I say half the people in the country could get rich if they really really tried, keep in mind that $51,000 a year is the very bottom of the top half. Half the families in the US earn more than that. A family earning 60, 70, 80 thousand a year would have a much easier time of it.
Depends on if they have a mortgage, kids, etc... not to mention paying off college debt.
Quote:Depends on if they have a mortgage, kids, etc... not to mention paying off college debt.
Or a car or a health problem or a diet that includes more than ramen noodles, frozen Banquet dinners and canned vegetables.
Quote:And this is why we'll never have any success. The resistance to doing it is simply overwhelming.
Resistance to doing what?
Quote:Or a car or a health problem or a diet that includes more than ramen noodles, frozen Banquet dinners and canned vegetables.
Well you don't have to buy a new car. My wife and I have never spent more than $15k on a car.
Groceries... our family of 7 spends a little over $1000/month for groceries. Though that'll go up when our youngest two get older.
Not sure how mutual funds work exactly myself. I know savings accounts don't offer much interest. I don't think (Mutual Funds) are consistent though from what I've read. Not sure how risky they are either. A house payment though will really put a damper on saving.
Quote:Well you don't have to buy a new car. My wife and I have never spent more than $15k on a car.
Groceries... our family of 7 spends a little over $1000/month for groceries. Though that'll go up when our youngest two get older.
Not sure how mutual funds work exactly myself. I know savings accounts don't offer much interest. I don't think (Mutual Funds) are consistent though from what I've read. Not sure how risky they are either. A house payment though will really put a damper on saving.
It's not even about buying a new car and having a car payment. Just having a car carries costs. Routine maintenance, gas, insurance.
Quote:A family making 51k a year is not going to be able to save $500 a month. And do not give me that it would require sacrifice or discipline. It would require a miracle.
No it wouldn't. They'd just have to:
1. Live in a one-bedroom apartment in the worst part of town.
2. Not have a car--just ride a bike everywhere. No buses! Buses cost money!
3. No traveling or vacations. If your family wants to see you badly enough, they'll come to you.
4. A "night on the town" consists of hitting up the dollar menu at McDonald's, then going to the project two blocks away and watching the police action.
5. No kids.
6. No getting sick.
7. Ramen. Lots of ramen.
8. No buying new furniture. Just use what you can find on the curb.
9. Education? We don't need no education! We don't need no thought control!
10. A little bit of creativity on April 15th. I mean, your neighbor's got eight kids...surely she can share a few of them with you come tax season?
11. If you do happen across a used and abused laptop on Craigslist for $50 or so, be absolutely certain that one of your neighbors has an unprotected WiFi hotspot you can borrow from them.
12. If you absolutely
must have a TV, make sure it's running on OTA feed only. Cable, satellite and Netflix are for all the suckers who don't want to be millionares when they retire.
13. Rest assured that by the time you retire the sudden jump in minimum wage from $15/hr. to $40/hr. will make your million dollars worth about 75 cents in today's money.
That's if you start shoving money under your mattress early in your 20's, btw.
Quote:Resistance to doing what?
Reducing your luxurious lifestyle to one that you can actually afford without debt. That is what Americans cannot seem to accomplish. But we've built our entire economy on debt, so it's not really a surprise.
Quote:
12. If you absolutely must have a TV, make sure it's running on OTA feed only. Cable, satellite and Netflix are for all the suckers who don't want to be millionares when they retire.
And get one of those old tube TV's nobody wants anymore. You can get one for free and they are so heavy you are getting exercise in the process.
One thing that I learned, albeit at a later age is that if you put something, anything aside and don't touch it, it will grow. That could be $5 or $10 per week or whatever. I'm one of those people that will pick pennies or other change up off of the sidewalk and put them in my pocket. Change goes into a jar, and when the jar gets full it goes to the bank and gets deposited. I first started out with a simple savings account. When that account grew enough I invested in a couple of "short term" CD's (5 years). When the CD's matured, I had enough money to open up a Money Market account that earned a bit more interest than a simple checking account, and that's where those pennies and change still goes to this day.
I took a portion of my Money Market account and invested it (after consulting with a financial adviser) in the mid-to-late 90's. In the meantime I continued to save money in both a regular savings account as well as my Money Market account. At a certain point, my financial adviser convinced me to either "cash out" or get out of the stock market and look for a safer way to invest the money that I earned. I opted to "cash out" what I earned in the market, and after paying my taxes I put the money right back into my Money Market account (where it still sits today for the most part).
I did all of this as an enlisted man in The Navy and got out shortly after selling my stocks. I have since held a few different jobs working for companies that offered a 401k plan and even matched some of my contribution (as little as no match to as much as 4%). At each company I contributed a minimum of 6% of my income and now do 10% of my income (before taxes).
I now have a pretty good nest egg for my retirement which is approaching faster than I would really like. In the meantime, if something should happen catastrophic be it health issues, loss of job, etc. I have plenty of cash on hand to get me and my wife through it (our children are grown up and moved out of the house). We don't have to depend on IF social security is going to be there for us when we retire.
In the meantime, we started to get sucked into the "easy credit" trap. I remember my wife actually breaking down into tears when I cut up our JCPenny's, Sears, Chevron and other credit cards that we had acquired.
Now I'm not going to sit here and say that we are "wealthy" by any means financially. However, my wife and I made choices, disciplined ourselves and put ourselves in a position to be able to retire comfortably.
I started doing this when I was a young enlisted man in the military around 1994 or so. Look up what my income was back then.
Quote:One thing that I learned, albeit at a later age is that if you put something, anything aside and don't touch it, it will grow. That could be $5 or $10 per week or whatever. I'm one of those people that will pick pennies or other change up off of the sidewalk and put them in my pocket. Change goes into a jar, and when the jar gets full it goes to the bank and gets deposited. I first started out with a simple savings account. When that account grew enough I invested in a couple of "short term" CD's (5 years). When the CD's matured, I had enough money to open up a Money Market account that earned a bit more interest than a simple checking account, and that's where those pennies and change still goes to this day.
I took a portion of my Money Market account and invested it (after consulting with a financial adviser) in the mid-to-late 90's. In the meantime I continued to save money in both a regular savings account as well as my Money Market account. At a certain point, my financial adviser convinced me to either "cash out" or get out of the stock market and look for a safer way to invest the money that I earned. I opted to "cash out" what I earned in the market, and after paying my taxes I put the money right back into my Money Market account (where it still sits today for the most part).
I did all of this as an enlisted man in The Navy and got out shortly after selling my stocks. I have since held a few different jobs working for companies that offered a 401k plan and even matched some of my contribution (as little as no match to as much as 4%). At each company I contributed a minimum of 6% of my income and now do 10% of my income (before taxes).
I now have a pretty good nest egg for my retirement which is approaching faster than I would really like. In the meantime, if something should happen catastrophic be it health issues, loss of job, etc. I have plenty of cash on hand to get me and my wife through it (our children are grown up and moved out of the house). We don't have to depend on IF social security is going to be there for us when we retire.
In the meantime, we started to get sucked into the "easy credit" trap. I remember my wife actually breaking down into tears when I cut up our JCPenny's, Sears, Chevron and other credit cards that we had acquired.
Now I'm not going to sit here and say that we are "wealthy" by any means financially. However, my wife and I made choices, disciplined ourselves and put ourselves in a position to be able to retire comfortably.
I started doing this when I was a young enlisted man in the military around 1994 or so. Look up what my income was back then.
How dare you defy the Narrative!
Quote:How dare you defy the Narrative!
I defy the the narrative only because I'm speaking the truth as it relates to my life. Sure I make a considerable amount more now than I made when I was a young E-2 or E-3 in the military (actually I think I made E-4 by then, but it doesn't really matter). I worked my way up as did my wife.
My point is though, it is possible to raise one's self out of poverty and it is still possible to reach the "American Dream" for anyone. My wife and I, when we got married couldn't imagine ever buying or owning a house. We started out in a trailer (single wide not double wide) on the West Side of Jacksonville. Our "kitchen table" was a fold up card table. Our "end tables" in our living room were cardboard boxes covered by afghans that my wife made. We had one car that was pretty crappy (I remember spending a lot of time either under the hood or under the car fixing it). However, we made the best of what we had. We spent a lot of times going to flea markets and yard sales to acquire what we could back in those days.
We saved enough money and developed a good enough credit report to be able to qualify to buy a home. It wasn't a brand new home and it wasn't "grand" by any means, but it was something that we could call our own (even though the bank actually owned it).
My point is, if someone like me can take and survive that journey that my wife and I took, anyone else with a bit of discipline and courage can take the same path.
Wealth and/or achievement is not is not "distributed" it's earned.
Quote:I defy the the narrative only because I'm speaking the truth as it relates to my life. Sure I make a considerable amount more now than I made when I was a young E-2 or E-3 in the military (actually I think I made E-4 by then, but it doesn't really matter). I worked my way up as did my wife.
My point is though, it is possible to raise one's self out of poverty and it is still possible to reach the "American Dream" for anyone. My wife and I, when we got married couldn't imagine ever buying or owning a house. We started out in a trailer (single wide not double wide) on the West Side of Jacksonville. Our "kitchen table" was a fold up card table. Our "end tables" in our living room were cardboard boxes covered by afghans that my wife made. We had one car that was pretty crappy (I remember spending a lot of time either under the hood or under the car fixing it). However, we made the best of what we had. We spent a lot of times going to flea markets and yard sales to acquire what we could back in those days.
We saved enough money and developed a good enough credit report to be able to qualify to buy a home. It wasn't a brand new home and it wasn't "grand" by any means, but it was something that we could call our own (even though the bank actually owned it).
My point is, if someone like me can take and survive that journey that my wife and I took, anyone else with a bit of discipline and courage can take the same path.
Wealth and/or achievement is not is not "distributed" it's earned.
This is where the leftists start making fun of you and using terms like "bootstrappy" to describe how you've succeeded. I, too, followed a similar path though without the military. I got married, worked what jobs I could find, found a career, went to college and grad school and am now told that people can't do what I did and I should sacrifice my family's financial means on their behalf. I mean, living on a budget is somehow beneath all these people who think they shouldn't have to do what we did, that financial security is their right, even if that means other people have to subsidize it.
Quote:And you know that because ...?
Maybe you need to read something other than left wing talking points.
When you first visit the US and go slightly off the tourist track, the amount of poverty is actually shocking, I have never seen so many homeless people around.
On social mobility, just google some sources. I know it doesn't reflect the "American Dream'. In fact just look at the Jaguars, Tony Khan is the perfect example of how it pays to be born into money and connections. You think he's in any position like that otherwise at his age? Highly unlikely.
My household income is actually in the top 5% for Australia, but I don't see the need for the poor end of the spectrum to work for poverty wages just so I can keep a bit more of my money when buying goods and services. I was lucky to be born into a good situation, I wouldn't have a masters degree/ professional qualifications now if my early education had been neglected or lived in the chaos some kids grow up in.
Quote:This is where the leftists start making fun of you and using terms like "bootstrappy" to describe how you've succeeded. I, too, followed a similar path though without the military. I got married, worked what jobs I could find, found a career, went to college and grad school and am now told that people can't do what I did and I should sacrifice my family's financial means on their behalf. I mean, living on a budget is somehow beneath all these people who think they shouldn't have to do what we did, that financial security is their right, even if that means other people have to subsidize it.
Oh, I'm sure that the leftist attacks are going to come. I don't worry, but wonder how many on the left will take the time to research how little an enlisted man makes in the military. Justification for those types of people come in the form of "yes but you get "free" healthcare or "free dental". Their perception of "free" doesn't include being away from your family for several months at a time. It doesn't include working in a dangerous environment. People that want to bring that kind of thing up can just KMA as far as I'm concerned. At least it used to be when I served, if you can't/didn't "walk the walk" then you really shouldn't "talk the talk".
Quote:Oh, I'm sure that the leftist attacks are going to come. I don't worry, but wonder how many on the left will take the time to research how little an enlisted man makes in the military. Justification for those types of people come in the form of "yes but you get "free" healthcare or "free dental". Their perception of "free" doesn't include being away from your family for several months at a time. It doesn't include working in a dangerous environment. People that want to bring that kind of thing up can just KMA as far as I'm concerned. At least it used to be when I served, if you can't/didn't "walk the walk" then you really shouldn't "talk the talk".
Does this apply to those have never even sniffed being poor a day in their lives criticizing the poor and labeling them moochers or bums or losers?
That aside, this is why we need better and vastly more affordable access to education. The military is not for everyone and a good education is necessary to live the american dream.