Getting paid for doing nothing

[Hopeful]

Speaking of making money for doing nothing.... Today my stock account shows the added Apple shares for a 7:1 stock split. The price is still showing $645 until it opens Monday at it's adjusted price. My account value went up by a million dollars. To bad on Monday it will be all gone.

[marko]

Quote:

Originally Posted by NW-Bound Anyway, before I made the earlier post I made a sample price check. A round-trip coach seat to SYD was around $2K, a business seat was $8K, and a 1st class $21K on Qantas. Does anybody really pay for these 1st seats and not get it via upgrade? It's mind boggling how much money truly rich people have.

Back in the day, NorthWest called their 1st class seats "business" on long hauls. A lot of companies would pay for business, but not 1st. So you got a 1st class seat and would submit a business ticket to accounting.

As an aside, some NorthWest planes would have only 8 seats on their 747 upper deck to Japan. On one flight, I was the only person there....a cabin the size of a living room and an extra large bathroom from MSP to NRT! It was like my own private jet!

[John Galt III]

As a conservative investor and frugal person with low expenses, I just love getting $540 a month from my almost risk free stable value fund, all in a 401k and tax free.

When I get a "weirded out" is when I see so many middle aged people strolling around "dong nothing" during working hours (like me ). Walking their dogs in the neighborhood, sauntering casually through stores. Come on folks, get back to work to keep the GDP going !! We can't all retire early !

[Alan]

Quote:

Originally Posted by NW-Bound Anyway, before I made the earlier post I made a sample price check. A round-trip coach seat to SYD was around $2K, a business seat was $8K, and a 1st class $21K on Qantas. Does anybody really pay for these 1st seats and not get it via upgrade? It's mind boggling how much money truly rich people have. PS. By the way, on a long flight like that, a business seat allowed me to lean way back and go to sleep through most of the flight, waking up only for meals (3 of them!), and the flight felt so short. I have also flown business class to a Middle East country for work, and the experience was also positive. We have flown to Europe on business class, but as the flight leg was shorter the difference in comfort between coach and business was not as pronounced as the super long flights.

That does seem a crazy price for 1st class. We are flying Business to Sydney round trip in a few weeks from LA and the price is $5k including all fees. A milestone for us as we've never paid for a Business class ticket anywhere before, although have flown Business many times for work plus a few personal trips using FF miles.

We decided to fly Business to the UK last year but found that that a cruise over was much cheaper, and since we are retired we could take the 8 days "the crossing" takes.

[Mulligan]

Quote:

Originally Posted by NW-Bound I agree that it is highly seductive to allow myself be tortured, OK not tortured but greatly inconvenienced, to save $200/hr. But I would not imagine that the airline was paying me that money. Else, I should just imagine that I could just stay home and get the airline to pay me the cost of the whole ticket. Anyway, before I made the earlier post I made a sample price check. A round-trip coach seat to SYD was around $2K, a business seat was $8K, and a 1st class $21K on Qantas. Does anybody really pay for these 1st seats and not get it via upgrade? It's mind boggling how much money truly rich people have. PS. By the way, on a long flight like that, a business seat allowed me to lean way back and go to sleep through most of the flight, waking up only for meals (3 of them!), and the flight felt so short. I have also flown business class to a Middle East country for work, and the experience was also positive. We have flown to Europe on business class, but as the flight leg was shorter the difference in comfort between coach and business was not as pronounced as the super long flights.

I finally got my first taste of first class through an airline employee deal of rd trip for $200 this spring. It was cheaper than coach. Pretty nice setup in first class. Trouble was it was all on standby and we damn near didn't get out of Vegas to get home. Finally we found a path back to Midwest through Miami. Doubt if I ever do that again, but at least it was all in 1st class.


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[scrabbler1]

One of my Fidelity bond funds (the one I often refer to as the "big bond fund") just paid a cap gains distribution of $5,400 yesterday. Because it is all LTCG, I will pay no federal income tax on it, only state income tax (about $350). I also figured out that having reinvested this amount in more shares, it will pay me about $20 extra per month every month....forever!

Not bad for doing nuthin' LOL!

[TuborgP]

No guilt at all and we get two pensions and two SS checks and this time of year spend a lot of time on the beach. Had to have done a lot to reach this point. We realize we are blessed and had good fortune but it wasn't just that.

[FUEGO]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Alan We decided to fly Business to the UK last year but found that that a cruise over was much cheaper, and since we are retired we could take the 8 days "the crossing" takes.

I can't wait till DW and I can do the transatlantic cruises to/from Europe instead of flying. I wouldn't mind the eight to 14 day crossings at all!

[Chuckanut]

Years ago I worked for MegaCorp as my first job after college. A tycoon had bought one company and over a period of years merged it with two others to form MegaCorp. There were lots of older veterans of each organization who did not have much to do other than push a few papers for two to three hours a day while they sat it out waiting to hit retirement age. They were almost literally getting paid for doing nothing.

When the company started offering early retirement incentives, the Big Boss dictated that the people who chose to stay must now pull their weight. In a few months some very nice offices became meeting rooms. But, I don't blame them a bit for leaving. I would have myself if I had been in their situation instead of being a wet behind the ears, know nothing, 20-something.

[Alan]

Quote:

Originally Posted by FUEGO I can't wait till DW and I can do the transatlantic cruises to/from Europe instead of flying. I wouldn't mind the eight to 14 day crossings at all!

You are going to love it, very relaxing and no jet lag as the time change happens gradually over a number of days.

[NW-Bound]

Quote:

Originally Posted by daylatedollarshort Okay, I can relate. I have my little luxuries I enjoy, too, that other people here would not choose to spend money on. Have you looked in to the frequent flyer hacks for free air travel and upgrades? That is one of my next projects.

Now that both of us are no longer working, and then more of our travel is by RV, we do not fly much to get frequent miles. Are there some shortcuts or hacks? I have not looked into that.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mulligan I finally got my first taste of first class through an airline employee deal of rd trip for $200 this spring. It was cheaper than coach. Pretty nice setup in first class. Trouble was it was all on standby and we damn near didn't get out of Vegas to get home. Finally we found a path back to Midwest through Miami. Doubt if I ever do that again, but at least it was all in 1st class.

First class and business class in small planes such as the 737 is still nice, but nothing like the big long haulers like the 747 or 767, where the seats lean back to near flat. I slept very nicely on those, thank you.

Back on getting paid for nothin', last week I gained almost as much as what I have spent year to date. I have a feeling some of it will be taken back next week. Easy comes, easy goes.

[mpeirce]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mulligan I finally got my first taste of first class through an airline employee deal of rd trip for $200 this spring. It was cheaper than coach. Pretty nice setup in first class.

My one and only experience in 1st class was back in 1985. I was recently out of college and my now out of college friends decided to go on a ski week. Back then the dollar was strong against the lira and it turned out to cheaper to spend a week skiing in the Italian alps than in Colorado or Vermont.

There was also a sweet deal on Pan Am - buy a Polaroid camera and get a half off ticket on Pan Am. So I bought a ~$100 camera (earmarked as a christmas gift) and end up spending about $400 on the round trip tickets from San Francisco to Milano. These were coach tickets of course.

The college friends where scattered around a bit, so we all flew through New York to get to Milano. One friend was late getting in from Boston. The rest of us had checked in and had seats and were getting really worried about the guy.

Well, he finally showed up with maybe 15 minutes to spare before last call for boarding. BUT they had given his seat away to someone on standby.

One of our group was rather gifted in negotiating and went to speak to the Pan Am folks. He wandered back and announced that Pan Am had found a seat for our late friend. But he and one of us would have to change seats and sit away from the group. "Who wants to go with ___ (that friend)"?

I volunteered. Then the negotiating friend announced that the two folks "sitting apart" would actually be sitting in 1st class!

So I got to a 1st class seat from JFK to Milano. Excellent food. Plenty of room. Nice.

Not bad for $400 tickets. The whole trip was <$1000 for a week skiing in the alps. It was a great trip!

[daylatedollarshort]

Quote:

Originally Posted by NW-Bound Now that both of us are no longer working, and then more of our travel is by RV, we do not fly much to get frequent miles. Are there some shortcuts or hacks? I have not looked into that.

There are bloggers and forum members who travel all over the world for close to free using airline miles from credit card sign up bonuses and manufactured spending, like finding ways to buy and sell gift cards at cost but making the profit on the miles or cash back of the credit cards used to buy the gift cards.

I probably wouldn't do many of the more extreme hacks because I can make more money working part time, but there are some low hanging fruit ideas I have on my to do list.

[Onward]

Quote:

Originally Posted by brewer12345 After crawling over a mountain of broken glass while being sprayed with lemon juice by supersoaker-wielding members of management, its about ****ing time.

Well put!

[mickeyd]

I only count my investment gains when I take the money from the account and do something else with it. Paper gains are, well...only paper gains.

[IMD801]

I must admit I feel some guilt about my income and the opportunity to make a lot of money on investments.

Part of success is hard work and taking risks.

The other, arguably bigger part, is luck. Being born into a white American family that cares about your education and well being is an absolutely massive advantage.

[ziggy29]

To me this is the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow... sort of. You bust your butt for decades at w*rk and your BS bucket overflows, even when sometimes you really aren't yet able to quit. But when you are, sure, in some ways it feels like I'm profiting from corporate decisions to make w*rking an even worse deal than it was for me. But it's not like my staying out of the market would change anything. So I don't dwell on it; I'd sooner just invest well and assuage my guilt by using some of the gains to support causes I believe in.

[Sea Kayaker]

When I think about what I had to do for almost 25 years at my job in order to accumulate enough capital so that I can enjoy 4k in monthly dividends, and 5 figure stock price appreciation in a single day I feel no guilt whatsoever. None.

[check6]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mulligan I finally got my first taste of first class through an airline employee deal of rd trip for $200 this spring. It was cheaper than coach. Pretty nice setup in first class. Trouble was it was all on standby and we damn near didn't get out of Vegas to get home. Finally we found a path back to Midwest through Miami. Doubt if I ever do that again, but at least it was all in 1st class.

Friends don't let friends fly on Buddy Passes.

[Mulligan]

Quote:

Originally Posted by check6 Friends don't let friends fly on Buddy Passes.

Especially from certain cities like Vegas. Funny you say that as our original options evaporated at the airport, we asked the gate lady what she thought best option was as you run the risk of getting stranded at the next city. Her response was..."I would never fly on this guest pass".


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