Hacker News new | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submit login

> Is your 'live on the interest from half the earnings of 11 years as an engineer' going to cover $500k in 20 years time?

Most people won’t ever be able to do that, no matter how much they save of what they earn.

Also, cost of living is another huge factor here. Housing isn’t always as expensive as it is in the Bay Area, and some countries have good (even sometimes great) free education. Heck, in some, you are paid to attend the top schools.

FU money isn’t about being rich. It’s about being able to keep living the life you want even in the event you were to tell your boss or the world to fuck off.

So… in this… everyone’s goal would be different, and yours is not his?

If my kids wanted to go to a half-million dollars university, I’d just burst out laughing and ask them how they expect to pay for that. If they were to reply that they expected me to, I’d probably laugh them out of the room.




Well in that case you're saying FU to your children instead of the bank that's loaning them college money. If you had actual FU money you'd be able to pay...


FU money isn’t about being able to satisfy every whim and hold up to anyone else’s standard.

Almost nobody in the whole world can afford to send their children off to a $500k college.

Not even after saving up half of everything they’ve earned across their entire life. I don’t care much about holding myself up to such an unreasonable standard.

Noboxy in the world is entitled to expect anyone else to pony up such an amount of money for them either.

If I can

- put a roof over their head,

- clothes on their backs,

- feed them well every day,

- provide them a good health insurance,

- send them to school

- and afford one or two extra-curricular activities

- as well as one or two vacations, preferably abroad, a year,

I’ll have more and be able to provide them with more than most people ever had, have and expect to be able to in their entire lives.

If I can do so without ever needing to work again, it absolutely is enough for me to tell any employer to go find someone else to do the job and please don’t let the door hit them on their way out.

To me, anything more is an extra nice to have that I don’t owe to anybody.

You appear to have a different point of view. That’s fine. To hold yourself to a different standard. That’s okay too. It’s your life.

You also seem to have a hard time grasping that different people have different needs, and to consider that everybody else should abide by your standards.

This, well… is fine too, I guess.




Guidelines | FAQ | Lists | API | Security | Legal | Apply to YC | Contact

Search: