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Old 08-10-2019, 08:29 AM   #21
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We made a conscious decision to be child free. Had nothing to do with ER, more about knowing parenting was not for us. I mean it's ok to crate train your dog, people get upset when you do it to children.
LOL Child Free Humour….
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Old 08-10-2019, 08:29 AM   #22
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Originally Posted by 24601NoMore View Post
Every time I see an article that claims you should estimate your retirement income needs based on your pre-retirement income, it makes me absolutely crazy.retirement.
I truly believe that this advise is due to the fact that vast majority (80%) of population can't save much AND don't know how much they spend. The income gauge is useful to those 80% because everyone knows their income. This advise also assumes that you will retire at FRA with just enough savings rate to cross the FRA line. The rest of 20% understand that expanses are key to the retirement and you don't need to preach to that crowd since they are already saving way more than the rest.
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Old 08-10-2019, 08:36 AM   #23
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We made a conscious decision to be child free. Had nothing to do with ER, more about knowing parenting was not for us. I mean it's ok to crate train your dog, people get upset when you do it to children.
Back in the day, there were more than a few times we would've liked to crate up our teenaged sons and then ship them out.
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Old 08-10-2019, 09:05 AM   #24
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Depends what one considers extreme. Having children is a life choice people make, nothing more. We chose not to, and do not regret it one iota, why is that sad, is it because you disagree with the decision, or?

Just because some disagree with, or do not like a life decision others choose to make does not make it sad, bad or otherwise.
We all make our own choices for our own reasons.

It's sad that more people would forgo children than pets.
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Old 08-10-2019, 09:09 AM   #25
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We made a conscious decision to be child free. Had nothing to do with ER, more about knowing parenting was not for us. I mean it's ok to crate train your dog, people get upset when you do it to children.
As soon as you put a top on the playpen Child Services wants to get involved.

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How exactly does a 40-ish couple with 2 children "forgo having kids"? Where exactly is the return policy?
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No return policy. You can sell them in the secondary market though.

I stopped reading MMM when he wrote about pets and dogs in particular being an un needed expense.
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Old 08-10-2019, 09:17 AM   #26
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My oldest son and his wife were just saying how glad they are that they decided not to have kids. While their friends have kid related bills and less freedom she is leaving for Poland for 2 weeks to visit her family and he is flying to Oregon to see a friend for 4 days. They are in their 40’s. When I was young Ann Landers asked her readers if they could start over would they have kids and 70% said no. It may be that the people that chose to write her were unhappy with their kids but I never forgot it.
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Old 08-10-2019, 11:04 AM   #27
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My oldest son and his wife were just saying how glad they are that they decided not to have kids. While their friends have kid related bills and less freedom she is leaving for Poland for 2 weeks to visit her family and he is flying to Oregon to see a friend for 4 days.
Fewer bills and the freedom to travel more often? Is that why they are glad they decided not to have kids?
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Old 08-10-2019, 11:15 AM   #28
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We all make our own choices for our own reasons.

It's sad that more people would forgo children than pets.
It's a one percent difference on a clickbait poll, hardly a scientific "more people" conclusion...

But many people have many reasons, and we're not going to go into them here. It's an entirely personal choice (sometimes a painful one) and likely almost never for simple pragmatic reasons like money, retirement, and freedom.
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Old 08-10-2019, 11:15 AM   #29
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They love not having extra responsibilities. After work they can do whatever they want. My sister never wanted kids and at 73 is not sorry. I don’t know what’s so hard to understand that not everyone wants children. What I find sad is grandparents raising their grandchildren because the parents are irresponsible. More people should put serious thought into what having children involves instead of kids being abused and neglected.
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Old 08-10-2019, 11:27 AM   #30
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We all make our own choices for our own reasons.

It's sad that more people would forgo children than pets.
You still haven't said why you think it is sad that people would forgo children, that is, assuming they haven't had any yet and choose to be childfree. I don't have any pets, either, due to my co-op's bylaws. But I would surely consider having a pet if I lived in a larger environment (i.e. a house), as that would not have any financial impact on my ability to remain retired.

I think it is terrific that people have chosen to buck society's "life script" and become childfree, instead of caving to those pressures and had kids they didn't really want. Why do you think people freely making their own life's choices is so sad?
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Old 08-10-2019, 11:34 AM   #31
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Old 08-10-2019, 11:48 AM   #32
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When we decided not to have kids we took flack from all angles, family was the worst, quite insensitive actually.

Our reasons were simple, not in order and not limited to:

1) I was traveling for a living, we had already moved 3 times and did not want to have to spend so much time moving around and not being able to spend time with a potential offspring. I did not stop traveling until we retired and would have missed most of it anyway.

2) We have experienced how some folks children regard and treated their parents, we did not like that. DW was not keen anyway. Probably what attracted us to each other as we knew what each other thought very early.

3) We did not like the direction the world was seemingly going, and with all the poverty and strife around, along with the amount of unwanted children about, we figure if we changed out minds we could always adopt.

4)To us having our own or bringing up another's is much of a muchness. We had no burning desire to have our own. We never did adopt either as we simply did not see any advantages.

There are so many reasons I cannot mention them all. We still are more than happy with our decision and never feel otherwise. In fact it is reinforced on a pretty much a daily basis, when we see others with their children giving them grief we look at each other and smile. (Not the folks we know, but those we stumble across in everyday life).

What we also notice is that we really do not have any long time friends that have children other than family. It is moot now as with most of the folks we meet, their kids have fled the coupe long ago.
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Old 08-10-2019, 11:49 AM   #33
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I truly believe that this advise is due to the fact that vast majority (80%) of population can't save much AND don't know how much they spend. The income gauge is useful to those 80% because everyone knows their income. This advise also assumes that you will retire at FRA with just enough savings rate to cross the FRA line. The rest of 20% understand that expanses are key to the retirement and you don't need to preach to that crowd since they are already saving way more than the rest.

Agreed. The 80% rule is way too simplistic and misleading and inappropriate for members of our group, but it serves as a "sound bite wakeup call" to hopefully get the attention of the masses. It''s reminding them that they need to save a lot of money if they want to have a comfortable retirement. The hope then is that a person who receives this wakeup call will want to learn more and dig deeper, rather than taking it as gospel and simply continuing to work until the 80% milestone is reached.
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Old 08-10-2019, 11:58 AM   #34
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Every time I see an article that claims you should estimate your retirement income needs based on your pre-retirement income, it makes me absolutely crazy.

"If you hope to enjoy a lifestyle similar to the one you currently have, experts at T. Rowe Price suggest this rule of thumb: In order to maintain their current lifestyle during retirement, people should strive for an income replacement rate of 75% of their gross pre-retirement income."

...

" Fidelity recommends saving 10X your income by age 67 and offers these guidelines to help you set savings milestones"

UGH! This is some of THE ABSOLUTE WORST "advice" people can be given. You need to save based on EXPENSES (which in some cases may even increase in retirement due to HC costs), not income (as most of us here already know).

No wonder people who do not follow sites like ours are so confused about retirement.
That's true. I've seen this point raised elsewhere as well. I guess they assume most people are basically living paycheck to paycheck. The calculation is worse when they are basing it on "gross" income since you're likely going to pay less taxes in retirement (like no payroll tax).

But I calculate my stash requirement based on my required living expenses PLUS my desired discretionary spending using a 3.4% WR, which means having a stash close to 30X total yearly spending until additional retirement income kicks in another decade out, when I can drop to a 2.1% WR to sustain the same standard of living (Medicare costs factored in as well).
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Old 08-10-2019, 12:02 PM   #35
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They love not having extra responsibilities. After work they can do whatever they want.
If that was their reasoning, then I applaud them. Not everyone is cut out to be a good parent. And there's nothing worse than a parent who would rather not be one.

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What I find sad is grandparents raising their grandchildren because the parents are irresponsible. More people should put serious thought into what having children involves instead of kids being abused and neglected.
Yup, that's sad too.
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Old 08-10-2019, 12:04 PM   #36
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I think it is terrific that people have chosen to buck society's "life script" and become childfree, instead of caving to those pressures and had kids they didn't really want.
I think it's terrific that people who don't really want kids choose not to be parents.

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Why do you think people freely making their own life's choices is so sad?
I think it's sad when I see evidence that children are valued less than pets. It tells me something about society that I'd rather not believe.
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Old 08-10-2019, 12:09 PM   #37
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To us having our own or bringing up another's is much of a muchness.
No idea what that means.

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We still are more than happy with our decision and never feel otherwise.
Terrific. Most people tend to be happy with their decisions, once they are made. That's true for most of life's decisions.

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What we also notice is that we really do not have any long time friends that have children other than family.
Children other than family
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Old 08-10-2019, 12:39 PM   #38
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I never bugged my kids about having children because it’s none of my business. Heck they don’t even want pets. It ended up being a good thing because 18 months ago she had a tennis ball size tumor removed from her brain stem and is still recovering. She can only work 3-4 days a week and is exhausted most of the time. I let my 3 kids know as teenagers that I wasn’t raising grandchildren so they had better be responsible. I always knew I wanted kids and my sister knew the opposite.
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Old 08-10-2019, 12:45 PM   #39
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I think it's terrific that people who don't really want kids choose not to be parents.


I think it's sad when I see evidence that children are valued less than pets. It tells me something about society that I'd rather not believe.
You are making a common mistake when it comes to describing childfree people. Many of us do value kids even though we don't want to have any of our own. Many of us (like me) do volunteer work with kids and are loving and generous aunts and uncles. Just because we would rather have pets than kids doesn't mean we value kids less than pets.
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Old 08-10-2019, 12:53 PM   #40
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18 months ago she had a tennis ball size tumor removed from her brain stem and is still recovering. She can only work 3-4 days a week and is exhausted most of the time.
Yikes, hope her recovery goes well.
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