Recent contractual turbulence at my 9-5 job has people nervous. Funding is uncertain. Job cuts are likely. Thanks to my expertise and training, I should be OK. But the situation reminds me that the pursuit of financial independence prepares us for corporate layoffs and recessions, even if we’re not 100% financially free yet. A potential […]
A few months before the summer of 1996, I committed to a lifeguarding job at a local pool. It was supposed to be my fifth consecutive summer as a guard. Lifeguarding was an easy and stable summer job in my youth, but it never paid well. This new gig was at a private club with […]
The financial firm UBS publishes a quarterly report called Investor Watch that analyzes investor behavior. One of these reports has remained on my mind since publication in 2015. The report is called When is enough… enough – Why the wealthy can’t get off the treadmill. The premise is that more than half (52%) of millionaires surveyed […]
This quote changed the way I think about my career. Soon after I read it, a coworker complained to me that his manager was dumping menial work on his underlings; to the point it appeared he was taking on very few tasks. Previously, I would have sided with my coworker thinking this manager was not […]
I ran into my former coworker, Bob, in the office lobby the other day. We started talking about retirement. He’s planning to fully retire later this year. He’ll be 62-years-old. The last time we spoke about retirement, his target age was 67. I congratulated him for being five years ahead of schedule. He’s one of […]
We sometimes see friends on Facebook asking about local daycare facilities or looking for a nanny to watch their kids while they work. It must be stressful to find high-quality affordable daycare. We’ve never had to deal with child care because we started thinking about how to live on one income before we were engaged, […]
As a kid, I always thought I’d start a side business someday. I wanted filthy wealth, a big fancy house, and to be the boss. Filthy wealth takes A LOT of work. I’m not that motivated. A big house isn’t practical. And I don’t want to be the boss of people. People are a pain […]
14 years with one company is a long time in today’s employment market. My tenure was never been about loyalty or career advancement, and it certainly didn’t earn me a gold watch. The company paid me a salary above the market rate for the job I did. That’s why I stayed. The benefits always lagged competitors. […]
I moved in with my parents when I was 27. The football wallpaper in my bedroom was gone and the bed was bigger. But it was still the room I slept in for the first 18 years of my life. While most of my friends were married and starting high-salary jobs after years of graduate […]
One striking revelation from the presidential election process this year was the sharp contrast between people who think the U.S. is in pretty good shape and those who feel the country never recovered from the last recession. Politics aside, the U.S. is in its 89th straight month of economic expansion. The longest post-World-War-II economic expansion […]
Have you ever declined a work opportunity because you didn’t want the hassle of learning something new? Maybe it was a chance to enhance your skills or get promoted, but it required leaving your cushy job. You declined because the job would have taken more effort and initiative on your part. Or it might have cut […]
My retirement goal is still 15 years away. That may seem like a long time if you’re young. But ask any parent of teenagers and they’ll tell you it goes by in a flash. Retirement is closing in on me. I think about it with urgency. I Wanna Tell You, Ooh-Oh-Oh! Many readers have asked me […]
Late last year, upper management at my client was feeling the heat. The boss’s boss’s boss needed to show the CIO that his division would not falter in a climate of adversity. To allay the perceived fears that the IT project would fail, the second highest executive on the totem pole made a decision. When that […]
College graduation season will be here in no time. Graduates and their families will celebrate at an uplifting commencement ceremony, complete with speeches by inspirational alumni, business leaders and political figures, followed by a triumphant dinner at Applebees. Business Insider and other Twitter feeds will surely remind us that Steve Jobs gave a cool commencement […]
