Early Retirement TOO Extreme? Jacob Fisker unRetires

[dixonge]

Just found this interesting:

So Long and Thanks for all the Fish

 

[REWahoo]

Gilda Radner said it best:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V3FnpaWQJ

 

[W2R]

What a surprise! I hope he finds his new job to be all that he hopes it will be.

 

[Ed_The_Gypsy]

Rambles a lot, doesn't he?

 

[lemming]

browsing through just a few of the blog entries and forum topics makes me glad I found this forum first.

 

[arebelspy]

Since he may read this...

Good luck Jacob. Thanks for your contributions to the ER community. Hope you stick around here besides ERE as well.

 

[plex]

Uh oh, hope he started working because he was tired of RE and didn't fall out of FI. Hard to tell from his post since it is convoluted. Either way, good luck Jacob.

 

[mh]

Uh oh, hope he started working because he was tired of RE and didn't fall out of FI. Hard to tell from his post since it is convoluted. Either way, good luck Jacob.

Either way, He was pretty gung-ho in how great the not working thing was as a concept to subscribe to. And then.. , as noted before, the big "never-mind".

That's all fine by me, but obviously he's had some thoughts from time to time of life other than ERE and "making one's own entertainment" and never really talked about them in the blog (that i can recall). Seems a little disingenuous.

Nevertheless, If you're reading jacob, hope the new job is fun and thanks for some interesting ERE posts.

 

[haha]

Either way, He was pretty gung-ho in how great the not working thing was as a concept to subscribe to. And then.. , as noted before, the big "never-mind".

That's all fine by me, but obviously he's had some thoughts from time to time of life other than ERE and "making one's own entertainment" and never really talked about them in the blog (that i can recall). Seems a little disingenuous.

Nevertheless, If you're reading jacob, hope the new job is fun and thanks for some interesting ERE posts.

Hey, when you are selling something, you have to stay on message. Anyone who takes any of these things at face value is not quite hitting on all cylindars.

One of the fundamentals of undertstanding modern life is that anyone who has anything to gain by misleading you, will.

Ha

 

[lhamo]

Wow -- talk about going over to the dark side, in more ways than one....

He can do whatever turns his crank, obviously, but I find the choice of this first post-ERE career a bit odd. Couldn't he have gone and crunched numbers at google or wikipedia or something?

 

[MichaelB]

Hey, when you are selling something, you have to stay on message. Anyone who takes any of these things at face value is not quite hitting on all cylindars.

One of the fundamentals of undertstanding modern life is that anyone who has anything to gain by misleading you, will.

Ha

Has life changed all that much over a century? Do we need to be more distrustful now than our grandparents? I'm doubtful. Not about now, but then.

 

[pimpmyretirement]

Jacob seems to me much more like a guy that puts his full drive and energy into something, then loses interest as the challenges subside. I don't think he was ever much of a salesman.

The guy did good work, much of it spot on. He wants to do something new. I think that's great. Certain pursuits require taking a job to gain access to the resources that make it the most fun. He has the courage to change his path so he can pursue the life he wants. That's awesome.

Best of luck Jacob.

 

[yakers]

I think there is a good message that its not about RE so much as FI:
"So let’s generalize this and say that retirement without doing what excites you is not a good retirement. "
Now I really liked work, and being FI the last few years made it even better but thought it was time to move on to retirement. And I like retirement even better. If you like your work, great. Wonder how many would work if they didn't have to. How many have exciting jobs?

 

[ziggy29]

This part sounds familiar:

So let’s generalize this and say that retirement without doing what excites you is not a good retirement. What we actually need to understand here is the different perceptions of retirement: To some retirement means sitting in Florida and staring at a wall, to others it’s hang gliding in Tahiti, and to some it simply means not having to work. I’ve discussed how different generations perceive the “retirement”-concept in my podcast interviews.

Hence, what the site is really about is not “retirement” but financial independence.

For me, I think it will be the latter: simply not having to deal with the corporate grind every day and keep selling my soul to an increasingly stressful, increasingly exploitative business world.

 

[Bestwifeever]

I too am suspicious of many blogs, especially those that have a book to sell too; they often justify their choices in interesting ways.

I do give this guy a lot of credit for his "never mind" instead of just disappearing and closing down the site. Of course, since he used his real name on the blog and his book, it would have been difficult for him to disappear in this age of google stalking.

His decision shows ERing is not always easy or the right thing to do for everyone--and maintaining a blog is a lot of work too.

ETA: --good luck to him! He's young and supersmart with a phD in physics--he might as well rake in a little cash while giving his brains a workout in a complex field ("quant trade/research").

 

[Midpack]

Jacob seems to me much more like a guy that puts his full drive and energy into something, then loses interest as the challenges subside. I don't think he was ever much of a salesman.

The guy did good work, much of it spot on. He wants to do something new. I think that's great. Certain pursuits require taking a job to gain access to the resources that make it the most fun. He has the courage to change his path so he can pursue the life he wants. That's awesome.

Best of luck Jacob.

+1.

After the initial [-]shock[/-] surprise - then reading his OP link, I can well understand. FI was always the goal for me, RE is just one of several options from there, there's no 'dark side' and I don't share the view that he misled anyone. Jacob has "solved" the FIRE problem to his own satisfaction, and shared how he did it with anyone interested (I bought and read his book - thanks). He wants a new challenge, something that makes perfect sense to me. I've been goal oriented all my life, always looking for the next goal (the journey is what life is about, not reaching the goal IMO), and probably always will be. I retired end of June and it's been great fun/reward so far, but I'll be surprised if a new challenge doesn't lure me back into the workforce.

Best of luck Jacob, I really enjoyed your site and the book, and now I have two new sites to explore.

 

[Lsbcal]

To summarize: 36 year old guy decides to become quant trader after a stint telling everyone how frugal and pure one can be in ER.

Nothing very new here. He just needs to have something mentallly challenging in his life. And why not get paid for it?

 

[Sarah in SC]

I think that Jacob is doing something that isn't all that surprising to me--becoming bored with retirement.

For those who consider early retirement to be 50-something or later, you'd be quitting after a pretty long spell at the old workplace. But for super early retirees, I think it is a different issue altogether.
Let's face it--people who are smart and motivated enough to manage to retire that early aren't going to just lose that motivation and drive when they retire. Sure, there are plenty of projects around the house, books to read, photos to organize, but at some point, the same people who are bright enough to want to get out of the rat race early are going to run out of things to do.

I think it is intellectually honest to call whatever they decide to do, for a paycheck or otherwise, "work", even if for some of our already retired folk around here, it is considered more to be a hobby.
As we've split hairs around here many times--are people who own rental property and keep it up really retired? How about those guys who spend 10 hour days renovating their homes (gee, Nords, I sure hope the painting ends soon! or doing something else that might be gainful, even if it isn't the single source of their income.

I hope to encourage my own DH when he quits this job to find something that he enjoys doing to pass the time. Even if it only a hobby!

And + 1 on Lsbcal

 

[haha]

Has life changed all that much over a century? Do we need to be more distrustful now than our grandparents? I'm doubtful. Not about now, but then.

I also classify our grandparents as living modern lives. And in any case, my intention was to put a limit around the word "life", such that I might know at least a little about what I am trying to describe, rather than to contrast today with all other historical times.

It does seem however that our current fascination with "private persons" who are in fact commercial media constructions (homemade or otherwise) has become more extreme than even 25 years ago.

I also believe that there is no special magic in retirement, and would caution any young person to take the cheerleading that he might find here or elsewhere with a grain of salt. "The attitude often follows the act", so you have no idea whether the raves you are reading represent deep and abiding happiness, or just the flavor of the day, or an attempt to convince oneself that things are not as boring as they may sometimes seem, they are just perfect.

Jacob's example may show only that living in poverty is not much fun, once the "can I do this?" aspect has been settled. He is young and educated, so he can reverse field. It was similar back in the 60s when plenty of Stanford, Cal Poly, etc grads became hippies. Everyone knew they could reverse fields and become doctors or lawyers or bond traders if they did not tarry too long in lala land. Not so true of the working class kids who also thought that "tune in, turn on, and drop out" was a good idea.

Ha

 

[ESRwannabe]

Best of luck in the future if you read this!

I do find it amusing that you are going to work at a hedge fund. The wealthy customers of a hedge fund are like the exact opposite of the ERE philosophy!

 

[Gotadimple]

He is in a unique position -- he achieved FI early and chose to walk away from a career that contained too many complexities to make it enjoyable. He chose to find work which provides intellectual stimulation, which is what was missing in his retired life.

One doesn't always have to earn a living to find that intellectual puzzle to solve. There are plenty of small non-profit organizations that desperately need brain power to solve their daily operational dilemmas. The trick is finding one where you fit.

-- Rita

 

[Bestwifeever]

I admit I read the ERE blog only a couple of times (including the "how I made my own rake" post), but I did have fun imagining his life in a kind of sit-com way (especially after reading what his spouse posted, when I imagined her begging for a restaurant dinner just this once, and please please let her enjoy a glass of wine once in while, and the 55 degree limit on the furnace thermostat). He could pitch this "supersmart guy drops out" based on his blog to Hollywood--it would make a great movie, seriously.

 

[Ed_The_Gypsy]

The truth is financial independence, not early retirement.

 

[REWahoo]

The truth is financial independence, not early retirement.

I think the truth varies based on the individual. No lie...

 

[eridanus]

I admit I read the ERE blog only a couple of times (including the "how I made my own rake" post), but I did have fun imagining his life in a kind of sit-com way (especially after reading what his spouse posted, when I imagined her begging for a restaurant dinner just this once, and please please let her enjoy a glass of wine once in while, and the 55 degree limit on the furnace thermostat). He could pitch this "supersmart guy drops out" based on his blog to Hollywood--it would make a great movie, seriously.

Yep. His character's zany adventures and crazy conversations as he tries to cut expenses would make great tv as well.

A quant's salary can make up for a lot of that..."deprivation." Even if he only saves 50%, he would significantly improve his savings.