I'll bet if I added up the wifes income and our dividends, it might be higher than 4%.
An income stream has a very profound effect on SWR, even if it doesnt show up for a while but you're pretty sure it will. Remembering my firecalc work on when to take social security, if I presume a $1200 a month benefit starting in 20 years, I can start taking an extra grand or more every year starting right now.
No cantaloupes required, although it appears I'm carrying mine in my shirt.
Unless we're old and feeble, I can always get a job or do some sort of work. Could be something like what I did before. Could be something different. Again, without that debt weight and with the ability to almost completely control my expenses month to month, it doesnt have to be a very spectacular job to get us by.
If the wife decided to quit tomorrow, i'd probably keep the same weightings, but shift out of target retirement and back into more high dividend payers, adjust our spending a little bit, and find a reasonable cost high deductible health plan to ride until nationalized or statewide health care is implemented. We'd make it. I'd work a little here and there if needed. Its really no big deal.
As far as rocks and markets...only two things would have creamed most of us. The Depression and Stagflation. We just saw a huge bull market and a big pullback bear. Are we really due for TWO once-in-a-lifetime major financial events within one lifetime, when there have only been three significant ones in over a hundred years?
Yep, we could have a dumper. That'd suck. But with a horizon of 20+ years and maybe 40-50 years of total retirement, I cant afford to sit scared in the corner and suck on my bonds and cd's. I know that strategy fails. I know the strategy i'm on will probably win. Hmmm...probably lose or probably win...tough choice!
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