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The author makes two assumptions which are either wrong, or at least I don't think they apply to me. - "it would be quite unpleasant if I had to regress on my

The author makes two assumptions which are either wrong, or at least I don't think they apply to me. - "it would be quite unpleasant if I had to regress on my standard of living", this makes the assumption that how great your life is is dependent on how much money you spend. That assumption sounds obvious, and I made it for decades. I realize now it just isn't true. I can meet my friends somewhere cheaper and have just as much fun. I can cook at home and, although it's more effort, it can be just as good if not better than the takeouts I used to get every day. Making the effort to have relationships with people in the city I live in, as opposed to finding people on the internet on the other side of the planet. At least for me, I was able to cut down on my expenditure significantly without cutting down on the pleasure I had in life. - "Work gives me satisfaction, and I intend to continue working for as long as I’m able to.". When I was in my 20s, my girlfriend's father was near retirement, also a software developer, and he seemed to try and do as little work as possible. I didn't understand, I was building great stuff (my first job was at a social network in Europe, with 6m users and about 50 servers), I loved it. I assumed I'd always want to work and would never be like him. Now I'm in my 40s, that social network has long been taken offline, most of the work I've done for startups is no longer online, my one stint at a large company involved politics making me write worse code (e.g. 1y with a team of 15 developing basically a static website, we wrote our own CMS because it meant the company could bill its customer more hours). What I mean is, just because you are enjoying work now, doesn't mean you'll enjoy work forever. The author builds their argument on these two assumptions, which (at least for me, but I'd say for everyone) aren't valid.

DVassallo 8y ago
Author here. I addressed those 2 points in another blog post: https://danielvassallo.com/only-intrinsic-motivation-lasts/ https://danielvassallo.com/only-intrinsic-motivation-lasts/ In short, no I'm fully cognizant that satisfaction is not dependent on how much I spend or earn. And I did my best to keep my standard of living abundantly within my means, even when my income grew 10X over the last 9 years. However, when you have other people living with you, it's not as simple to disrupt their life by moving somewhere else, or making drastic changes. We never eat out, we don't go on expensive vacations, kids will go to public school (in preshool now), and we have no extravagant hobbies. Nevertheless, just our housing and insurance costs are $84K/year in Seattle. That's before food, utilities, etc.
ellisv 8y ago
The author is inflexible in his conviction that he has no intention of retiring. (and never will!) In 10, 20, or 30 years he may change his mind, what then? He points out that he's willing to make the trade off of working in exchange for money (even if he doesn't need it) -- but what about working for other reasons? Taking a job at a non-profit that can't possibly pay what you're "worth".
- DVassallo 8y ago
  I know dozens of people that are able to retire, but don't. Or they chose to retire, but then very quickly started doing some other work that gave them satisfaction. I just don't believe in the myth that if you retire early you're going to spend the rest of your life sipping pina coladas on the beach. My argument is that if I can be doing the work that I would be doing if I "retired", and it paid me enough money to make ends meet, then I won't need to retire. Sure, if the work you want to do can never pay you enough to live off it, then you have to find another income stream; maybe passive income. But it's not the only option if what you seek is satisfaction.

DVassallo 8y ago

Author here. I addressed those 2 points in another blog post: https://danielvassallo.com/only-intrinsic-motivation-lasts/ https://danielvassallo.com/only-intrinsic-motivation-lasts/ In short, no I'm fully cognizant that satisfaction is not dependent on how much I spend or earn. And I did my best to keep my standard of living abundantly within my means, even when my income grew 10X over the last 9 years. However, when you have other people living with you, it's not as simple to disrupt their life by moving somewhere else, or making drastic changes. We never eat out, we don't go on expensive vacations, kids will go to public school (in preshool now), and we have no extravagant hobbies. Nevertheless, just our housing and insurance costs are $84K/year in Seattle. That's before food, utilities, etc.

ellisv 8y ago

The author is inflexible in his conviction that he has no intention of retiring. (and never will!) In 10, 20, or 30 years he may change his mind, what then? He points out that he's willing to make the trade off of working in exchange for money (even if he doesn't need it) -- but what about working for other reasons? Taking a job at a non-profit that can't possibly pay what you're "worth".

DVassallo 8y ago
I know dozens of people that are able to retire, but don't. Or they chose to retire, but then very quickly started doing some other work that gave them satisfaction. I just don't believe in the myth that if you retire early you're going to spend the rest of your life sipping pina coladas on the beach. My argument is that if I can be doing the work that I would be doing if I "retired", and it paid me enough money to make ends meet, then I won't need to retire. Sure, if the work you want to do can never pay you enough to live off it, then you have to find another income stream; maybe passive income. But it's not the only option if what you seek is satisfaction.