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I kinda wonder if there’s a growing number of people who recognize this, hence the emergence of the FIRE (Financial Independence, Retire Early) movement. Anecdo

I kinda wonder if there’s a growing number of people who recognize this, hence the emergence of the FIRE (Financial Independence, Retire Early) movement. Anecdotally I’ve noticed more of my friends having this same mindset that you’re having whether they’re entrepreneurs or corporate employees. It seems like the system is rigged no matter which way you look at it. The only option really is to amass enough fuck you money.

unishark 5y ago
> It seems like the system is rigged no matter which way you look at it. The only option really is to amass enough fuck you money. It's not actually rigged though. People just sell themselves short due to information asymmetries and a just plain crappy business model (work for hire). Customers see it as a risk so are reluctant to pay much, but it's your skillset so from your perspective there's actually little risk. Better to license technology but maintain ownership so you can sell it again to others. And now that the risk is gone, the hotter the technology the more you can ask for working technology you can demonstrate. Of course this isn't possible in all technology niches but I'd say your goal when self-employed should be to maneuver into areas where it is possible. Business is a game of avoiding being the commodity that others profit from by building into wealth. Work for hire is a commodity.
- PragmaticPulp 5y ago
  > Better to license technology but maintain ownership so you can sell it again to others. And now that the risk is gone, the hotter the technology the more you can ask for working technology you can demonstrate. Of course this isn't possible in all technology niches This is great in theory, but in practice it’s rare to develop something that can be passively licensed off. Usually it becomes a business that requires constant attention as it scales. I know a few people who have developed apps that sold well initially and looked like easy money, only to be buried under a flood of copycat apps as soon as the market realized the opportunity was there. The best success in cutting the cord seems to be building a company which is then sold off, but that’s hardly an easy path. This feels a bit like the “passive income” pipe dream that is frequently touted in FIRE forums but rarely comes with practical, real-world examples.
  - acwan93 5y ago
    Before the app economy was a viable option it seemed like real estate or dividend investing was the way to go. But even then rental income isn’t as passive as people make it out to be.
  - unishark 5y ago
    > Usually it becomes a business that requires constant attention as it scales. You seem to be talking about the typical solo entrepreneur story where someone tries to guess at a consumer product, makes it on their own time, then tries to sell it? No, I was talking about contractors keeping ownership of the code, for example, that people are paying them to make under contract. Give them a license not full rights. Now you can sell it again. It still takes work to sell, and work to deliver on each sale. Just less than the first time. And you can ask more since you have a demo. To make early-retirement money it still takes being in the right place at the right time, recognizing that, and setting a high price you can get. The point is the system isn't rigged to the point where heads you lose and tails someone else wins. It's in your hands. I certainly wasn't thinking of apps either way. I am only familiar with b2b markets requiring specialized skills (where I'd think contracting is most lucrative anyway).
    - PragmaticPulp 5y ago
      > No, I was talking about contractors keeping ownership of the code, for example, that people are paying them to make under contract. Great in theory, rare in practice. Usually when someone reaches the point where the code they’re writing for a company is self-contained and re-usable by other companies, they’re building a product rather than writing code. Not strictly an app, but it’s still a product that must be maintained, supported, and sold. I’ve hired many contractors and contracting companies to build code, features, or even products over the years. I can’t imagine a scenario where I’d willingly give any of them a license to maintain ownership of what I’m paying them to write and, even worse, a license to resell it to companies that are likely to be my competitors.
      - unishark 5y ago
xwolfi 5y ago
But it's artificial to a point: how can everyone be financially independent and retire early yet provide no tradable work? Someone has to grow the soils, cook the pizza, maintain the electric grid, wipe the asses of the elders, etc. In a way, if more people manage to find ways to retire early and forever, others will find ways to stop this bliss and make them work for them, and it sounds fair no?
- cpursley 5y ago
  There's always going to be people who spend their entire paycheck and then some before it even hits their account.
- oreally 5y ago
  > others will find ways to stop this bliss and make them work for them, and it sounds fair no? This statement assumes humans love having control over others and keeping them in a system of pseudo-slavery. But if you look at it closely humans are the faulty, unreliable pieces and if you can get them out of your business's equation it's hugely beneficial. And don't forget automation which seems to be looming closer and closer as time goes on. Theoretically, this results in fewer jobs for the non FI-ed people to compete for. You need something to assure their future least they become restless on the streets and adding to social unrest (that preferably doesn't include some kind of bullshit job). Food, medicine and affordable housing for a long part of their lives within a few years of working and saving would be a good start. The UBI talk is something to take note of too.
  - donkeyd 5y ago
    > don't forget automation which seems to be looming closer and closer as time goes on. Theoretically, this results in fewer jobs for the non FI-ed people to compete for This has been the consensus since the assembly line was invented. Yet, there's new jobs popping up all the time that still require people to do them. People used to work in the fields, then they moved to the factories, now they're in services. I have no clue what's next, but I don't think it's nothing.
- ivanche 5y ago
donkeyd 5y ago
In my opinion, the emergence of FIRE mostly has to do with influencers selling the idea of FIRE on social media. These people show themselves chilling with a laptop on some Thai beach and tell you that you can do the same thing if you just buy their FIRE course. These people only became FI because they sell the idea of FIRE to people who hate their jobs and possibly their life in general. While FIRE is of course a possibility, it's a possibility for a very vocal minority. Survivorship bias is huge in the FIRE communities.
- PragmaticPulp 5y ago
  FIRE may have started out as a reasonable discussion about retirement planning and personal finance, but the current influencer-driven FIRE world has become a pipe dream about people fantasizing about escaping jobs they hate by being extra frugal and quitting as soon as they’ve saved barely enough to coast through the remainder of their lives on a shoestring budget. I get anxiety reading FIRE posts from people in their 30s who have saved $1 million or less and have concluded it’s sufficient to carry them for another 5-6 decades of life. The cFIREsim results might support that conclusion, but only if they assume their frugal expenses will never, ever change as they age
  - acwan93 5y ago
    That’s where I wonder about the FIRE calculations, cause it assumes the S&P 500 will return a 7-8% gain YOY which, while historically true, may not necessarily be the case moving forward. Going back on-topic, it still seems like the biggest way to build wealth is either 1) kick ass at your job as an employee, or 2) hustle when starting a new business. Entrepreneurship has been romanticized this last decade with hustle porn and Silicon Valley’s mentality, but there’s nothing wrong with being a corporate employee where they hopefully pay you perfectly well. Each have their advantages and disadvantages, and it really comes down to personal preference.
    - PragmaticPulp 5y ago
      The return calculations are a red herring for many younger FIRE people, IMO. I think the real issue is the assumption that their spending will never change. At the extreme young end of the FIRE discussions the people in their mid-30s have barely been independent adults for 15 years yet are setting fixed budgets for the next 50+ years of their life. Many of these budgets have obvious blind spots, like the people who paid off their cars before setting up their FIRE budgets, so they forget to include future costs of replacing that car some day. Likewise, many of the frugality stories come from people who were high spenders in the past but recently became frugal, which ignores the fact that much of their current lifestyle (furniture, clothing, electronics, tools and equipment) were funded by their pre-frugality spending and therefore not accounted for in their current budget. Things decay and must be replaced eventually.

unishark 5y ago

> It seems like the system is rigged no matter which way you look at it. The only option really is to amass enough fuck you money. It's not actually rigged though. People just sell themselves short due to information asymmetries and a just plain crappy business model (work for hire). Customers see it as a risk so are reluctant to pay much, but it's your skillset so from your perspective there's actually little risk. Better to license technology but maintain ownership so you can sell it again to others. And now that the risk is gone, the hotter the technology the more you can ask for working technology you can demonstrate. Of course this isn't possible in all technology niches but I'd say your goal when self-employed should be to maneuver into areas where it is possible. Business is a game of avoiding being the commodity that others profit from by building into wealth. Work for hire is a commodity.

PragmaticPulp 5y ago
> Better to license technology but maintain ownership so you can sell it again to others. And now that the risk is gone, the hotter the technology the more you can ask for working technology you can demonstrate. Of course this isn't possible in all technology niches This is great in theory, but in practice it’s rare to develop something that can be passively licensed off. Usually it becomes a business that requires constant attention as it scales. I know a few people who have developed apps that sold well initially and looked like easy money, only to be buried under a flood of copycat apps as soon as the market realized the opportunity was there. The best success in cutting the cord seems to be building a company which is then sold off, but that’s hardly an easy path. This feels a bit like the “passive income” pipe dream that is frequently touted in FIRE forums but rarely comes with practical, real-world examples.
- acwan93 5y ago
  Before the app economy was a viable option it seemed like real estate or dividend investing was the way to go. But even then rental income isn’t as passive as people make it out to be.
- unishark 5y ago
  > Usually it becomes a business that requires constant attention as it scales. You seem to be talking about the typical solo entrepreneur story where someone tries to guess at a consumer product, makes it on their own time, then tries to sell it? No, I was talking about contractors keeping ownership of the code, for example, that people are paying them to make under contract. Give them a license not full rights. Now you can sell it again. It still takes work to sell, and work to deliver on each sale. Just less than the first time. And you can ask more since you have a demo. To make early-retirement money it still takes being in the right place at the right time, recognizing that, and setting a high price you can get. The point is the system isn't rigged to the point where heads you lose and tails someone else wins. It's in your hands. I certainly wasn't thinking of apps either way. I am only familiar with b2b markets requiring specialized skills (where I'd think contracting is most lucrative anyway).
  - PragmaticPulp 5y ago
    > No, I was talking about contractors keeping ownership of the code, for example, that people are paying them to make under contract. Great in theory, rare in practice. Usually when someone reaches the point where the code they’re writing for a company is self-contained and re-usable by other companies, they’re building a product rather than writing code. Not strictly an app, but it’s still a product that must be maintained, supported, and sold. I’ve hired many contractors and contracting companies to build code, features, or even products over the years. I can’t imagine a scenario where I’d willingly give any of them a license to maintain ownership of what I’m paying them to write and, even worse, a license to resell it to companies that are likely to be my competitors.
    - unishark 5y ago

xwolfi 5y ago

But it's artificial to a point: how can everyone be financially independent and retire early yet provide no tradable work? Someone has to grow the soils, cook the pizza, maintain the electric grid, wipe the asses of the elders, etc. In a way, if more people manage to find ways to retire early and forever, others will find ways to stop this bliss and make them work for them, and it sounds fair no?

cpursley 5y ago
There's always going to be people who spend their entire paycheck and then some before it even hits their account.
oreally 5y ago
> others will find ways to stop this bliss and make them work for them, and it sounds fair no? This statement assumes humans love having control over others and keeping them in a system of pseudo-slavery. But if you look at it closely humans are the faulty, unreliable pieces and if you can get them out of your business's equation it's hugely beneficial. And don't forget automation which seems to be looming closer and closer as time goes on. Theoretically, this results in fewer jobs for the non FI-ed people to compete for. You need something to assure their future least they become restless on the streets and adding to social unrest (that preferably doesn't include some kind of bullshit job). Food, medicine and affordable housing for a long part of their lives within a few years of working and saving would be a good start. The UBI talk is something to take note of too.
- donkeyd 5y ago
  > don't forget automation which seems to be looming closer and closer as time goes on. Theoretically, this results in fewer jobs for the non FI-ed people to compete for This has been the consensus since the assembly line was invented. Yet, there's new jobs popping up all the time that still require people to do them. People used to work in the fields, then they moved to the factories, now they're in services. I have no clue what's next, but I don't think it's nothing.
ivanche 5y ago

donkeyd 5y ago

In my opinion, the emergence of FIRE mostly has to do with influencers selling the idea of FIRE on social media. These people show themselves chilling with a laptop on some Thai beach and tell you that you can do the same thing if you just buy their FIRE course. These people only became FI because they sell the idea of FIRE to people who hate their jobs and possibly their life in general. While FIRE is of course a possibility, it's a possibility for a very vocal minority. Survivorship bias is huge in the FIRE communities.

PragmaticPulp 5y ago
FIRE may have started out as a reasonable discussion about retirement planning and personal finance, but the current influencer-driven FIRE world has become a pipe dream about people fantasizing about escaping jobs they hate by being extra frugal and quitting as soon as they’ve saved barely enough to coast through the remainder of their lives on a shoestring budget. I get anxiety reading FIRE posts from people in their 30s who have saved $1 million or less and have concluded it’s sufficient to carry them for another 5-6 decades of life. The cFIREsim results might support that conclusion, but only if they assume their frugal expenses will never, ever change as they age
- acwan93 5y ago
  That’s where I wonder about the FIRE calculations, cause it assumes the S&P 500 will return a 7-8% gain YOY which, while historically true, may not necessarily be the case moving forward. Going back on-topic, it still seems like the biggest way to build wealth is either 1) kick ass at your job as an employee, or 2) hustle when starting a new business. Entrepreneurship has been romanticized this last decade with hustle porn and Silicon Valley’s mentality, but there’s nothing wrong with being a corporate employee where they hopefully pay you perfectly well. Each have their advantages and disadvantages, and it really comes down to personal preference.
  - PragmaticPulp 5y ago
    The return calculations are a red herring for many younger FIRE people, IMO. I think the real issue is the assumption that their spending will never change. At the extreme young end of the FIRE discussions the people in their mid-30s have barely been independent adults for 15 years yet are setting fixed budgets for the next 50+ years of their life. Many of these budgets have obvious blind spots, like the people who paid off their cars before setting up their FIRE budgets, so they forget to include future costs of replacing that car some day. Likewise, many of the frugality stories come from people who were high spenders in the past but recently became frugal, which ignores the fact that much of their current lifestyle (furniture, clothing, electronics, tools and equipment) were funded by their pre-frugality spending and therefore not accounted for in their current budget. Things decay and must be replaced eventually.