Category: Financial Independence

I can’t believe how many years it’s been since I was first introduced to the FIRE movement. After reaching a 50% savings rate, I pretty much tapped out trying to increase this number further – and I think that was good for me – but now that I’m 2+ years into unemployment, I’ve realized something […]

This will probably be one of my more boring posts, but I find myself sometimes fascinated with the philosophy of owning things and the usage of money. In general, I’ve long believed that the more you use something, the better, at least when it’s something that can be “used” (which is to distinguish it from, […]

I’ve been watching a channel on YouTube that talks a lot about socialism, and although I don’t think anyone will ever convince me that socialism is a good thing, the guy who runs the channel has some pretty fascinating criticisms of ‘capitalism’, or at least, how this appears to function today. Several of his points […]

It frustrates me when people choose not to invest in themselves. It doesn’t frustrate me from a moral perspective, as if productivity or achievement was some weird moral obligation, but from the perspective of hoping people can realize more of their own potential. I gave up on cyber security years ago because I was afraid […]

It’s often said that competition is good for consumers, as businesses will compete based on price, quality, or both, which leads to better goods or better prices for society. Efficiency is seen as being good for economic progress, too, and increases in technology are said to make things cheaper for individuals over time. But I’m […]

One of the arguments against the FIRE community and seemingly radical savings is that if everyone stopped spending money, the economy would collapse. It’s an interesting argument, but it’s not showing the whole picture, and while it’s not wrong for this reason alone, it’s an argument often presented by people who are terrible with money […]

Before the S&P 500 reached its all-time high back in January, I reached a milestone where my investments were technically paying my rent. I didn’t want to make too big a deal of this, as I knew that markets inevitably experience downturns, and it was also true that my rent was abnormally low, so it […]

With the recent downturn in various financial markets, another cliche suggestion has turned up, namely that you should buy these investments because they are “on sale”. There is a certain logic to this: if an investment is a good investment, it’s generally better to buy it at $30 than at $60, since this gives it […]

This is something I’ve been meaning to write about for a long time, but it’s kind of a sensitive topic. Back in high school health class, I remember hearing about an early version of a vaccine for HPV. Not much was really said about it, and it wasn’t until I was well out of high […]