Why does everyone want to retire so early?

[landonew]

But you are planning to help your parents retire early (http://www.early-retirement.org/forums/f30/helping-parents-retire-41851.html)....

At your age your job can fill lots of needs--financial, social, professional. It is great that you are excited about it (and you have an unbelievable starting salary per the above thread). As you progress in your career you hopefully will find that those needs have been fulfilled but sadly may lose your enthusiasm for doing the same thing day after day, year after year.

But good luck in your career--let us know how the bar exam goes.

I wouldn't consider them to be retiring "early". My main concern is for them to retire "comforatably" at a reasonable age.

Yea, the starting salary is not bad. I worked extremelly hard in school and the job path that I have chosen has relatively high barriers to entry and requires and diversified skill set. I am extremelly lucky to have had parents that gave me guidance and provided me with an opportunity to pursue the path that I have.

I will let yall know how the bar goes..I will be crossing my fingers.

 

[harley]

It wasn't hard work, and I liked getting paid for 77 hours of "work" in one week, but even that would get old after a while.

Man, where did you find a sysadm job where you got paid overtime? I worked untold 60+ hour weeks with ne'er an extra penny. If I got paid for all that I might have stuck with Megacorp for a while longer. I realized a decade or so ago that I was making about 25% less per hour than my salary indicated due to the overtime. I gave myself an instant raise by cutting back wherever I could.

 

[ziggy29]

Man, where did you find a sysadm job where you got paid overtime? I worked untold 60+ hour weeks with ne'er an extra penny. If I got paid for all that I might have stuck with Megacorp for a while longer. I realized a decade or so ago that I was making about 25% less per hour than my salary indicated due to the overtime. I gave myself an instant raise by cutting back wherever I could.

It was an unusual circumstance. We didn't normally get paid overtime.

This gig was with a defense contractor who also did work for NASA, and this was in the "peace dividend" era (mid-1990s) when they thought it would be critical for their survival to get into the commercial space business (because, of course, with the fall of the Soviet Union, defense was a "dead" industry). They spared no expense, and that meant granting an exception for us to be paid overtime in order to hit their deadlines. They brought in catered dinners for several weeks for people who would work well into the night.

One thing I remember was being called into the office of the program manager, and he asked me to compile a list of what I thought we'd need in terms of hardware for the next year or two. Playing the game, I figured if I needed X, I'd ask for 1.5X because they'd probably not give me everything I asked for. A week later I told him what I thought we'd need, and without flinching he said, "We'll double it to be safe." Making money was secondary on this project; proving we could deliver on commercial projects was the emphasis.

So in this case, they just wanted me there in case a workstation crashed, or a developer need a file restored from backup, and stuff like that. But they didn't want me working on the network -- that would eat CPU cycles the engineers needed! As I said, basically like a fireman hanging around at the station waiting for a call that rarely came. Managers saw me goofing off and didn't care -- they just liked having me there just in case something hit the fan.

In the end, we hit our deadline, and at about 11 PM on that deadline date, we began the secured uploading of the deliverable to the customer, and we began what was (to this day) the only time we've ever been encouraged to drink on company property as the program manager brought in 5 cases of champagne for us.

The ultimate irony is that when this project for a civilian customer was completed, it turned out that the first customer for this civilian service was.... the U.S. Army. So much for getting out of the defense business.

 

[crispus]

I am in printing sales and believe you me as soon as I have enough to retire I'm out. With my sales down 7% year to year, management push for weekly 3 hour sales training classes, end of expense reimbursement due to recession, new bi weekly 2 hour sales discussions, and one on one sales reviews. Not to mention the various networking events, do my own estimating, delivery of small to medium jobs, and two weeks a year of vacation(one of those mandatory between Christmas and New Years).

I just love my work

 

[Rich_by_the_Bay]

I do love my work. But as I have aged and my circumstances have changed, I no longer wish to do it so much. A 20-hour work week would be nice.

See, Landonew, 35 or more years of the same job or profession teaches you that balance is important. Work is fine (for some) but life has other priorities, too. Maybe it's family and grandchildren, maybe it's a poetic or artistic passion, maybe it's just unstructured time. There comes a moment where you realize it's now or never. Financial independence allows you to make those choices based solely on your personal situation.

 

[NW-Bound]

I think the main reason is that this is an early retirement forum. If we weren't interested in ER, why would we be here?

When you draw from the whole English speaking world, you can form a group dedicated to most anything.

Ha

Does anyone know of a forum for people who want to work till they are dragged out, feet first, from their workplace? I would like to visit to sample some of their posts.

 

[REWahoo]

Does anyone know of a forum for people who want to work till they are dragged out, feet first, from their workplace? I would like to visit to sample some of their posts.

Gigolo.com

 

[NW-Bound]

NO WAY! What ya think? That these guys die with a smile on their face? NO WAY!

It's w**k!

 

[Nords]

NO WAY! What ya think? That these guys die with a smile on their face? NO WAY!
It's w**k!

Well, in this situation I think it'd be appropriate to describe it as "f$%#in' work"... *

* Hey, isn't the software supposed to automatically to sanitize that four-letter word? No, not that one, I'm talking about the word "work"...

 

[DAYDREAMER]

I went to college 25 years ago to become an engineer, naively believing I would be developing innovative new things. Well, some of that has come true, buuuuuut, it involved working with alot of people I would prefer not to deal with in my personal life. You can't choose who you work with in corporate life. I also found working to unrealistic schedules drains the creative juices right out of you. After working on many successful projects (at multiple companies), you realize one thing---they just want more and faster. Got fed up and took one summer off 4 years ago. DW did the same and we had the best summer of our life. Didn't do anything earth shattering, but did what we wanted. We had been saving pretty good to that point, but, when we went back to work after our "get a life" sabbatical, we were alot more diligent to become FI. I became a contract Engineer, and both of us absorb as much OT to be able to get the heck out of the rat race ASAP. I don't have a career ambition anymore, at least in engineering. Now my ambition and #1 goal is to be FI.

Future employment----------Snowplow Driver Money won't be an issue by this point.

 

[Khan]

I went to college 25 years ago to become an engineer, naively believing I would be developing innovative new things. Well, some of that has come true, buuuuuut, it involved working with alot of people I would prefer not to deal with in my personal life. You can't choose who you work with in corporate life. I also found working to unrealistic schedules drains the creative juices right out of you. After working on many successful projects (at multiple companies), you realize one thing---they just want more and faster. Got fed up and took one summer off 4 years ago. DW did the same and we had the best summer of our life. Didn't do anything earth shattering, but did what we wanted. We had been saving pretty good to that point, but, when we went back to work after our "get a life" sabbatical, we were alot more diligent to become FI. I became a contract Engineer, and both of us absorb as much OT to be able to get the heck out of the rat race ASAP. I don't have a career ambition anymore, at least in engineering. Now my ambition and #1 goal is to be FI.

Future employment----------Snowplow Driver Money won't be an issue by this point.

Snowplow driver is cool. Weird hours but decent pay; and folks are glad to see you.

 

[growing_older]

I've worked many projects with crazy hours. Yes, I did over 100 hours in a week. It's not a sustainable pace and it's also a lot harder than it sounds. You have to do it to appreciate it. On some projects we were so gung ho excited we did the 60-70 hour weeks and felt good about it. I don't think it's possible to work over 90 hours and feel anything but tired. And non-stop back to back overtime (for which I have NEVER recevied any overtime pay - even in cases where the client was paying for it) is a real killer for work-life balance.

If it were my own shop or my own idea, maybe I would think differently. But my experience in all the companies I've worked for is that asking for excessive effort is common, employees are expected to do it or get demoted/fired, and managers running these projects often make very bad decisions, which makes work worse. Even when I've been in the rare wonderful work environment, it usually deteriorates due to management or external factors in a year or two.

Some years ago I was idealistic and believed that doing a good (great!) job was likely to be rewarded, or that taking a chance on the stock option fueled overtime lifestyle was a reasonable choice. I have learned that it wasn't for me. One incident that confirmed this was a week when I had over 50 hours logged by early Wednesday AM (this is physically possible but barely - not being paid overtime for any of it) after a month of working every weekend. I asked my boss if I could take the weekend off, since I was already over 40 hours and the week was still young. My request was declined and I got a formal reprimand for not being a team player - my request showed I counted work hours and that was against the then prevailing unlimited overtime policy. (That was also during an economic downturn and the company believed we had virtually no alternatives as the job market was horrible).

I actually like the work I do at some level. I'd have to if I was willing to do that much of it. But I'd rather be FI and be able to do what I want - even if it's more of this kind of work - but be doing so because I want to. Some employers, we've said I cannot believe they pay me to do this. But those have never lasted long for me before the company undergoes some Dilbert style transformation. If I'm FI, I don't have to put up with that, because I am not in financial distress if I'm forced to leave a job.

As for the desire to RE, I have so many other things I'd like to do. I do as many of them in my non-working free time, but I will have no problem being overbusy with just these ideas, even when I'm no longer working. The sooner I can devote myself to doing whatever I really want to, the happier I will be.

 

[BunsGettingFirm]

It was an unusual circumstance. We didn't normally get paid overtime.

This gig was with a defense contractor who also did work for NASA, and this was in the "peace dividend" era (mid-1990s) when they thought it would be critical for their survival to get into the commercial space business (because, of course, with the fall of the Soviet Union, defense was a "dead" industry). They spared no expense, and that meant granting an exception for us to be paid overtime in order to hit their deadlines. They brought in catered dinners for several weeks for people who would work well into the night.

Ah, the peace dividend. That must have been before the discovery of the Indian and Chinese menial labor dividend. I long for those days when I could watch some OJ trials and some Monica affairs and just sit back and watch my portfolio rise by 30% a year. Too bad a) my portfolio was tiny then, b) my pay was tiny but I just didn't know it, and c) I thought free dinners were fair compensation for 60 hour weeks for a couple of years at a time. What a dumb ass. I should have jumped ship more often and collected stock options along the way.

Some years ago I was idealistic and believed that doing a good (great!) job was likely to be rewarded, or that taking a chance on the stock option fueled overtime lifestyle was a reasonable choice. I have learned that it wasn't for me. One incident that confirmed this was a week when I had over 50 hours logged by early Wednesday AM (this is physically possible but barely - not being paid overtime for any of it) after a month of working every weekend. I asked my boss if I could take the weekend off, since I was already over 40 hours and the week was still young. My request was declined and I got a formal reprimand for not being a team player - my request showed I counted work hours and that was against the then prevailing unlimited overtime policy. (That was also during an economic downturn and the company believed we had virtually no alternatives as the job market was horrible).

Hey, what do you know? This stuff is pretty common. In my last job, I was going nuts for about 8-9 months at a stretch and still took the GMAT and went to grad school at the same time. I finally burned out at the 1-year mark and decided to take it easy by working only 40 hours a week for a month. The manager, who worked about 2.5 days a week, decided to write that I'm lazy on my review. It burned me to no end because by the time Wednesday noon rolled around, I was usually 24 hours into a work week while he's just starting to log his first 5. For him to be able to write with a clear conscience that I'm lazy is just beyond my comprehension. Well, two can tango. I kept my leaving plan hush hush and just left in the middle of the project. Good luck finding that mythical harder working person.

 

[BunsGettingFirm]

Gigolo.com

Nay, I think that your career would hit a plateau at about 40 no matter how well you maintained yourself.

 

[Coach]

landonew, thanks for the post -- you set off a good conversation!

Remember that we're a self-selected group. There are lots of people who want to keep working as long as they possibly can. They're perfectly honorable people and if you should end up in that group you'll be in good company. And we like them, we appreciate them funding Social Security!

And as a number of people have pointed out, the real secret is FI, which puts you in control of your life, perhaps for the first time in your life.

Welcome to the forum!

Coach

 

[Meadbh]

Does anyone know of a forum for people who want to work till they are dragged out, feet first, from their workplace? I would like to visit to sample some of their posts.

They're too busy to be wasting time on forums.

 

[Rich_by_the_Bay]

Does anyone know of a forum for people who want to work till they are dragged out, feet first, from their workplace? I would like to visit to sample some of their posts.

PhysiciansWithoutaLife.net?

I assure you that as much flack as I get around here for not yet pulling the trigger all the way, I wouldn't dream of talking retirement to any of my colleagues for fear of being tagged as impaired. I'll beat most of them by about 12-15 years.

A few will FIRE just a little too late for their own good (and that of their patients).

 

[Meadbh]

PhysiciansWithoutaLife.net?

I assure you that as much flack as I get around here for not yet pulling the trigger all the way, I wouldn't dream of talking retirement to any of my colleagues for fear of being tagged as impaired. I'll beat most of them by about 12-15 years.

A few will FIRE just a little too late for their own good (and that of their patients).

What Rich said.

 

[landonew]

PhysiciansWithoutaLife.net?

I assure you that as much flack as I get around here for not yet pulling the trigger all the way, I wouldn't dream of talking retirement to any of my colleagues for fear of being tagged as impaired. I'll beat most of them by about 12-15 years.

A few will FIRE just a little too late for their own good (and that of their patients).

As a professional, did you find it difficult to make smart decisions when you were relatively young and had a substantial income? My friends from law school who graduated a year or two ahead of me seem to be spending $$$ like it is going out of style. The new fad for the single guys is to finance a BMW M3. I hope I am not tempted by these material things. Any tips?

 

[Meadbh]

As a professional, did you find it difficult to make smart decisions when you were relatively young and had a substantial income? My friends from law school who graduated a year or two ahead of me seem to be spending $$$ like it is going out of style. The new fad for the single guys is to finance a BMW M3. I hope I am not tempted by these material things. Any tips?

As an intern, I was working more than 50% of the hours in the day. I worked, I came home to Mom & Dad, I crashed, I slept, I didn't spend any money.....at the end of the year I bought a Ford. After that I only had to spend approximately 45% of my time at work.

I always thought young lawyers worked ungodly hours. Maybe your young friends are underemployed.

 

[mews]

Landonew, the LBYM attitude is more easily learned young, although it can be learned at any age.

Many otherwise quite smart people, when confronted with 'real money'* go WHEEEEE!, not 'Let me sock some of this away, and then go WHEEE!'

Budget, figure out what you need and want, and go a bit slow.

Go find a compound interest chart on the Internet. The curve really starts rising at 25 - 30 years out. The difference between a BMW right out of school, and a nice but not nutso car, and multiple decisions like that, can be the difference between FI and not.

ta,
mew


*your definition of 'real money' may vary

 

[Bimmerbill]

My motto is "Working is for suckers."
I'm still working tho.

 

[Rich_by_the_Bay]

As a professional, did you find it difficult to make smart decisions when you were relatively young and had a substantial income? My friends from law school who graduated a year or two ahead of me seem to be spending $$$ like it is going out of style. The new fad for the single guys is to finance a BMW M3. I hope I am not tempted by these material things. Any tips?

I don't advise you to do what I did: borrowed so much for my training that I was over 40 by the time I had any real money to invest. By then, I was starting to get it.

But yes, it must be hard - pent up youthful demands for the toys, the too-nice-a-house, whatever. But really, you don't have to sacrifice that much if you stay just a little beneath your means. Most step out way ahead of their means while in those first few years. And split any financial good fortune such as bonuses and raises with yourself: stash half for retirement, and use the rest for fun.

 

[FIREd]

As a professional, did you find it difficult to make smart decisions when you were relatively young and had a substantial income? My friends from law school who graduated a year or two ahead of me seem to be spending $$$ like it is going out of style. The new fad for the single guys is to finance a BMW M3. I hope I am not tempted by these material things. Any tips?

My wife and I started making $100K+ (combined) right out of graduate school. It's very tempting to go crazy when you make that kind of money so young (especially after years of living on a shoestring). But we kept each other in check and started investing our money right away. A lot of young single guys who graduated with us, however, were feverishly spending their money on cars, TVs, video games, and parties. Of course we had a house (and a mortgage to pay), and they were still crashing on a friend's sofa, so they had more disposable income. I think if you are tempted by material things now, it will be hard to resist. If you are not, then making lots of money won't make much of a difference.

 

[landonew]

As an intern, I was working more than 50% of the hours in the day. I worked, I came home to Mom & Dad, I crashed, I slept, I didn't spend any money.....at the end of the year I bought a Ford. After that I only had to spend approximately 45% of my time at work.

I always thought young lawyers worked ungodly hours. Maybe your young friends are underemployed.

They work long hours, but they have short periods (at least from my perspective) of conspicuous consumption. I know how bad that is, but it looks like a lot of fun.

I think there needs to be a balance. Maybe I will set up a reward system. Once I pay off my loans, I will consider partitioning a portion of my monthly income for a toy with the intention of paying in cash. Perhaps, after seeing how long it took to save $30-40 grand for a nice used luxury car I will decide that It isn't worth it, and spend that $$$ wisely.

Am really glad I found this site. I first started thinking about investing about 1 year ago (After seeing my parents’ situation) and my plans have cycled from mutual funds, to index funds, to real-estate investments to DRIPs.

The stock market crash has absolutely scared the crap out of me. Until recently, I had thought purchasing a 1-2 DRIPs (w/ dollar cost averaging) in each sector would provide adequate diversification. After seeing a 20% reduction in the DOW, I have determined that having a portfolio consisting of diversified equities is not really a diversified portfolio. I read the thread on lattered CDs and I know think that may be the way to go.

I have a lot to learn from you guys. For now I will aggressively pay off my $150,000 worth of student loans, while at the same time maxing out my IRA/401k. After that, I will re-evaluate my situation.