I knew a guy about 10 years ago — roommate of a friend in Manhattan. He’d apply to these executive level jobs online even though he was 25 years old... he looked much older... he'd tailor his resume exactly to the job description, and totally fabricate his experience in the interview. The man was a master bullshit artist. Truly elite. Never seen anything like it since. Last I remember, he landed a Senior Strategist gig at a consulting firm pulling in over $300K. Kept a low profile. Probably intentional. Each new role gave him the experience he had just finished faking. Just looked him up on LinkedIn. He's now the CEO of some company I’ve never heard of. Absolutely unreal.

I have a friend who has “jiggled” through his white collar middle management career for 8 years now. Base salary has gone up every year... now $200K plus incentives/bonus. 100% remote now post-COVID. He continuously upgrades with the latest “jiggle” tools to evade detection. Works maybe 6 hours a week tops… just hangs with family, works out, does personal stuff all day. Travels abroad all the time but pretends he’s at home if he gets an email or call. He thinks he can do this for the next 20 years and keep collecting higher pay. Says if he gets fired, doesn’t matter he’ll just find another mindless fully remote middle management job somewhere within a month and rinse and repeat. To make it more painful, he makes fun of SMB folks and friends with long hours… says they’re “low-IQ” for working so much in modern times when you can just fake work and get paid hundreds of thousands per year with no effort.

I feel like $5mil is still “the number” for anyone. If you think it’s higher, I’m sorry for you. Put $100K in a checking account. Put $900K in a money market account or a 4-5% bond ETF. Put $2mil in the S&P500 Equal Weight ETF. Buy a nice piece of property for $1mil and then spend the remaining $1mil to build a custom home. GC the project yourself, get it appraised for $2.5mil then mortgage the entire property for $2mil leaving $500K in equity. Put that unlocked $2mil in the S&P500 or maybe QQQ ETF. You have the dream property. You have cash in the bank. You have an average expected $300-400K passive income year one after paying the mortgage. You can mess around with business ideas, have hobbies, enjoy family, travel, and delete your LinkedIn.

I have a friend who’s been “jiggling” his $300K job for almost 9 years now. While most of us are grinding at work trying to build a business or career, he’s been coasting through his middle-management career for nearly a decade. His setup has gotten so insane, I had to share it again. He’s in “client success” (sounds fake) at a fully remote job, banking $300K+ a year for what he claims is 5-10 hours a week max. Hasn’t been in an office in 6 years. He uses these “jiggle” tools to fake being active online, while he’s really at the gym, chilling with his family, or traveling abroad—acting like he’s home if anyone emails or calls. He just got back from a FULL month in the Caribbean with his family. He jokes how he ironically used a tropical background on every Zoom call pretending to be in the cold rainy CT suburbs! It gets crazier. He and his wife are part of a real estate MLM (we joke it’s a pyramid scheme). It pulls in $10-15K a month, and they barely do anything for it. No one understands how it works. He’s convinced he can keep this up for 20 more years, getting raises and promotions every few years, then retire. If he gets fired? No big deal— he’ll just land another remote middle-management gig and repeat the jiggle. Claims large corps are a complete joke and are so far behind in tech they can be milked forever. Thinks trying hard and building a “reputation” is being “blue-pilled” and extremely low-IQ. I and all his other friends make fun of him… but as time goes on… I’m starting to think the joke’s on us…

Anyone else’s wife like this? My wife doesn’t know how much money we have, what we’re invested in, etc. No idea. Doesn’t care. All she cares about is 1) that there’s enough cash in our checking account to pay for things and 2) that we’re not spending more than we earn.

Let me explain something to the 99% of people commenting on these types of posts lamenting how low the pay and high the tax is in Europe. Amsterdam is one of the most expensive cities in all of Europe, for example, yet the average 4-bedroom apartment rents for about €3700/month. I assume this would be $15,000/month in Manhattan or San Francisco. Health insurance for a family of 4 costs €350/month and there is effectively no deductible or out of pocket expenses. And healthcare is high quality. When I was in the US, I was paying $2,500/month all-in. Don’t need a car at all. Cars are unnecessary luxuries. When I need one, I grab an €80 zipcar around the block for the entire day. Schools that cost $20-50K per in the US cost $0 here. In the US, I was paying $35K/year. University tuition is absurdly low. Might as well be free. I went to Penn State 15 years ago and it was like $30K/year. The list goes on. Especially for a family of young kids, living in Europe requires just 20-30% of the annual spending you’re used to in HCOL US areas. Don’t need that much after-tax income.

My friend's brother "works" full-time making around $120K/year... but he's never once gone to an office and just travels the world with his laptop. I don't even know what he does.. software testing or something. No kids. Early-30s. Doesn't own or even rent a place. He's been doing this since his mid-20s and has a ton of savings invested in the QQQ and VTI index funds... so his financial cushion just keeps getting bigger which further emboldens him to keep doing what he's doing. His parents are furious and want him to "get a life". He stays in hostels in random cities in places like Germany or Spain... or goes on road trips around the US and uses his cell hotspot if he needs to log on to answer an email. He'll literally stay at places like KOA campgrounds off highways and sleep in his truck which has a min-bed/mattress that folds out. When he's "home" in the US he'll just crash with cousins or family members. He doesn't understand why people waste money on mortgages or rent or stuff... when it's "just so easy" to get a random remote job paying 6-figures while you travel the world. He claims there are tons of people doing this everywhere and it's the new way of life for "smart people". Wild

Update on my friend who's “jiggled” through his white collar middle management career for almost a decade. Gets a raise every year despite fake working... now $200K+ plus incentives/bonus. Rarely went to an office even before COVID, now formally 100% remote. Sent me a pic of his latest USB “jiggler” and says he'll never get caught. Apparently he works even less now... like 30-60 minutes a day tops. He just hangs with his kids, works out, does personal stuff, and works on side hustles with his wife like real estate and organizing neighborhood kids activities. Travels all the time and pretends he’s at home if he gets an email or call. He thinks he can do this for the next 20 years and keep collecting higher comp then downsize and retire once the kids go to college. Basically he doesn't see himself actually ever working again. For Christmas they're spending an entire month in the Caribbean... he won't tell anyone where he is and will pre-write and schedule emails to people to make it seem like he's busy working. Says he doesn't care if he gets fired because "it's just so easy" to find another mindless remote job somewhere within a month and rinse and repeat. He makes fun of me as a self-employed consultant... says I'm “low-IQ” for not just getting some pointless W2 corporate job, faking the work, and getting paid hundreds of thousands a year with minimal effort.

Most people between 25-45 who are very smart, well-liked, “elite” in various ways, highly-paid and educated… have never experienced being laid off and then struggle to quickly bounce back to a role they want or makes sense for them. But it is going to happen to them soon. It’s going to be brutal on their egos and identities. The psychological torment coming to otherwise extremely confident and competent young people at the tops of their fields will be something quite destabilizing for society.

Between ages 22-25, I was stuck on a brokered CD trading desk in the NJ suburbs. The closest I got to actual Wall Street was the annual Christmas parties at South Street Seaport. On nights and weekends, I worked as an EMT at MetLife Stadium during Giants and Jets games. Saturday mornings, I worked construction with my family’s business—just trying to pay off student debt faster. I was living with my parents. My girlfriend (now wife) was in Manhattan. I wanted out. I wanted equities. I wanted NYC. My father had built a house for a well-known analyst you see often on CNBC. I reached out for advice. He told me breaking into Wall Street from my position would be tough. Instead, I should go into industry or consulting, then break in laterally—find a team where that industry experience would be valuable. Blast a hole and crawl through. So I did. At 25, I took a job in market research (CPG-focused). From there, I engineered a transfer to the team that worked with investment banks. Eventually, one of those banks poached me. By 27, I was on a top-ranked equity research team. By 34, I left to build my own consulting, M&A advisory, and venture business. The lesson? If the front door is locked, find a side entrance. If there’s no door, blast a hole. Just get through. It can be done.

So he’s actually been fired 2x so far over those 8 years Just gets the same job at a competitor and keeps the train rolling He makes up a reason why he “left” and ends up negotiating a pay increase Dude is laughing at us all

Met a $7M/year M&A lawyer. Partner. Early 50s. Prestigious firm most will know. We joked about “escaping the matrix.” He understood the concept. Said he’s fulfilled and extremely fortunate, but definitely "trapped". Spends nearly everything on houses, cars, kids schools, status markers like country club, etc. Can’t control his time at all. Can’t unplug because he has to check what the underlings are doing all the time.. meet clients.. show up to events. Has to keep up the performance at all times. He’s rich... but not free in any sense whatsoever. Will be this way for him another 10-15 years.

this is my favorite comment

Americans work so unbelievably hard to get rich so that someday they can do the things Europeans do on an average day.

I know so many people in their 30s and 40s who work corporate or Wall Street jobs and their financial situation looks roughly like this... $250K+ in cash accounts $500K+ in home equity $500K-1MM in retirement accounts $250K+ in equities That's $1mil to $2mil in potential liquidity, depending on whether they want to pay the tax/penalty on early withdrawal. That's $40-100K potential income from interest/dividends/returns + supplemental income from consulting or a part-time email/WiFi job that would allow them to work 90% less often and enjoy their day-to-day life 10x more. But instead, they follow traditional "norms" and stay in their suburban neighborhoods for 40 years, live near their parents, work their W2 job and hope for their next raise, put their kids in private school, take 1 or 2 vacations a year, etc. Why?

Was talking to my friend today about his father. He’s mid-70s and retired ~3 years ago with about $4 million saved and invested. He also owned a couple small 2-family rentals in New Jersey. This is a guy who spent his whole career in the trades. Owned a construction business for many years, but was an electrician by trade. He later went to work for a large electrical contractor in his early 50s because it was simpler and he just loved working independently on jobs. Did the right thing and was always investing and looking at real estate opportunities throughout his 40s-60s. What happened was… a couple years into retiring he started getting bored and restless. Close with his kids/grandkids but they have busy lives themselves so it’s not like he was seeing them every day. He’d go to South America, Europe for weeks at a time and was really enjoying it. Until it got old for him. He’s healthy but physically slower and can’t really do electrical work anymore. And he decided the rental properties were too much stress and annoyance to deal with at his age — so he sold them recently. He wants to “unretire” because he’s losing his mind — calling around to buddies who are still in business asking if there’s anything he can help with. Turns out last week he took a job at his local Lowe’s… because he just wants to interact with people and help them with projects. He needs to be “out there” staying busy and active. This is such a prime example of how… “retirement” is kind of a joke. Tough situation.

yes

I know so many bankers and lawyers in their late 30s/early 40s making $800K–$1.5M a year. Yet they have to schlep into a Manhattan office 4 days a week because their boss says so—or else. Or else what? Aren’t you great at your job? Aren’t you important to your firm? No group clings harder to the illusion of power while being treated like well-paid servants.

I have a buddy who makes $650K/year but doesn't really do any work. Lives out in Eastern PA near the NJ border on a 5 acre piece of cheap land and he's been building an epic estate with a pool, guest wings, giant garage, etc for the last 4 years now. Always adding additions and doing new landscaping projects. For example, he recently hired a landscape design-builder to install a fruit orchard adjacent his pool and gazebo area. He and his wife got involved in what I can only describe as a multi-level marketing real estate agency. They started as agents and then began recruiting others to work under them. 6-7 years later all they do is clip coupons. Saw his bank statement recently and it's all big deposits. $12K here. $57K there. $23K here. Just goes on and on. They get paid a % of whatever the agents that work under them close. Has 4 kids. Brings in au pairs from Europe on the cheap. Works out all day, buys nice cars, over-the-top unnecessary consumerism like the latest OLED flat screen or premium meat delivery subscription or whatever. Literally drops over $1000 every Costco trip, which is like a bi-weekly event. On top of all this, he has a "regular" job in the insurance industry as an account manager making over $200K/year. He keeps the job because it's fully remote and he works 5 hours a week. Clients like him so his employer will never fire him. Just collects another coupon and has good health insurance for his family.

Imagine being under 40 years old, witnessing the pure concentrated unadulterated power of the US stock market, and deciding that real estate was the better long-term investment vehicle.

I know a guy who’s worth at least $50 million having sold his agency and now dabbles in private equity, but is divorced and has to battle over when he will see his kids. I know another guy who’s worked the same job for 25 years at a large corporate consulting firm and my guess he’s worth maybe $5 million but a lot of that is illiquid. He has a great relationship with his wife and kids and seems generally happy most of the time. You would be surprised how many people would rather be the first guy and how many people would rather be the second guy.

The male urge to make $5 million, get his kids to college, retire to the western Irish countryside not too far from the beach, build a little cabin with a wood burning stove and large central kitchen, and just read and write all day.

I think the best living situation possible is living in an apartment in the middle of a great city, and then owning a country/mountain/beach house 100 miles away to escape to on a moment’s notice aka you don’t rent it out. Agree? Who has this already?

With $2,000,000 you’re absolutely “set for life.” You can easily invest it 100% passively into a blend of balanced dividend/growth stocks and treasuries/corps to generate a $50-100K “salary” with plenty of principle and long-term capital gains to dig into if and when you want. With your day to day core life costs entirely covered — you can literally do whatever you want forever, practically anywhere in the world.

The ambitious, childless, physically fit 40 year old is almost impossible to compete with in business.

Agree.. although he’s on the more extreme end. Still.. I am surprised how surprising this is to all these commenters.

I tell him this all the time He retorts with “life is meant to be lived and enjoyed.. working is a Protestant scam engineered by the elite.. do whatever you have to do to beat the system”

As an American who moved here.. I can tell you that it’s because a relatively safe and healthy middle class life costs far, far less.

If I stayed on Wall Street, I’d probably be making $500K+ by now—just assuming modest 10% comp growth from 2019 when I was at $300K. Instead, I earn a fraction of that. Because I completely upended my definition of self-worth and success. In my late 20s, I had grand visions of being “the guy” in NYC—climbing the ladder, going on CNBC, making millions, rubbing elbows with the industry elite, sitting on boards. I told myself it was about “making my family proud” and “leaving a legacy.” But I had it all wrong. That “pride” and “legacy” was misdirected. A bigger paycheck wasn’t making me any happier. Money doesn’t lower your risk of illness. It doesn’t shield you from random tragedy. It doesn’t shape your core memories or how your kids remember you. I loved the work I was doing. But the setup made less and less sense. The hours were brutal. Seniority just meant trading grunt work for relentless client dinners, marketing, events, and travel. What—so we’d have a nanny or an au pair spending more time with our kids than my wife and I together? Now, I work on my own time, on projects I care about. I say no constantly. Some years, I might make a lot. Other years, less. Doesn’t really matter. I see my wife and kids every day. My desk is covered in Legos and crayon drawings. If I told my 28-year-old self what I’m doing now, he’d be horrified. But that’s because he hadn’t figured out what real legacy meant yet.

Probably tied with health insurance as the worst industry in America is the mortgage business. You have $1,000,000 in the bank and have earned $500,000/year for a decade. You start your own business and then suddenly can’t get a $500,000 mortgage. Meanwhile, you get a job last month with a $200,000 salary and $100,000 in the bank. You only have 2 years of work experience. Effectively no questions asked you’re getting that $500,000 mortgage. Makes zero sense. The actuaries and statistics nerds will try to explain with their mental gymnastics, but they’re wrong.

My son spent 48 hours in the NICU in New Jersey. There were some concerns, but nothing life-threatening. The bill? $150,000. No surgery. No major complications. Just two days in the US healthcare system. In most of the developed world, this would have been free or the cost of a nice dinner. But sure, tell me more about how “we can’t afford” universal healthcare.

You’re 30 or 40 something. Maybe married, maybe some kids. You’re well-to-do… maybe you’re a consultant or a lawyer or work on Wall Street. Maybe you’re an up-and-coming executive or sales leader. From the outside, it looks like you’re on top of the world. Your parents are proud of you. Your family loves you. Your bosses have “big plans” for you. And your friends are in similar boats. Everything is great. Net worth goes up and to the right every year, and even more so lately. But something isn’t right. You can’t put your finger on it exactly. Isn’t this what you’re supposed to be doing? Aren’t you finally successful? Soon enough you’ll be partner, MD, CFO, CEO, big swingin. You start thinking, maybe too much. You’re distracted now. You’re having some kind of existential crisis. What is the point of all this? You think you want to get involved in the “real world.” You’re growing jaded. You want out of the hand-wavy professional world of “performative” corporate work. Off the treadmill. Cast yourself out of the upper caste of the highly-paid 7-7 “elite.” You see some folks jumping into SMB. Buying a business in a small town. You see some “going solo” and building their own things. You see some doing “micro-retirements” maybe even abroad and somehow doing just fine, if not better, despite the usual warning signs. You want in. You never want to wake up in the morning and have to check in with a boss again. Nor do you want to corral a bunch of corporate team members for whom you’re responsible. You never want someone else to make your schedule for you. You don’t want a “work family.” You want to be able to shut it all down for a week or three to travel somewhere with your family. And tell nobody. You want to build a little portfolio of SMB or startup investments. You want to trade your stock portfolio without worrying about compliance approvals. You want to write and share your thoughts without HR “checking in”. You don’t want deferred comp. RSUs. Promises and more promises. You want your cash, now. You want your own clients, your own book that you own, in a business that you own too. You want to wake up on a nice sunny Tuesday morning, and then putz around alone or with your partner or with your kids for hours… slow drink your coffee… make a nice breakfast, listen to the birds singing, feel the dew under your feat as you walk across the grass to grab your newspaper, watch what the talking heads are saying about the markets today. Slowly think about what you’ll do later that morning or afternoon. You don’t want to rush to a train, ferry, or subway ever again. And also… no more ties and suits. Drop them at your local Goodwill. Maybe you’ll go for a run or a bike ride from 10-12 then find a nice quiet lunch spot where you can “monitor the situation” while reading the latest issue of Monocle or Economist. Hey that little Greek island looks spectacular. Maybe you’ll book a trip there in a few months with the family. You are in complete and total control. Few years in, maybe you’re earning more than you ever have and maybe working half the time. The only reason you still keep a LinkedIn profile is so prospective clients can see you’re a “real person.” You can’t watch The Matrix anymore without thinking it’s an allegory for your life… you’re living in Zion — messy, dirty, yet free — while everyone else seems stuck in a concrete corporate jungle of the mind they claim, inexplicably, to tolerate or, worse, love. Part of you wants to show them, free them. Part of you wants to get offline, disappear, and compete your transformation. You “got out” and you’re happier now. But you’re a good person. You like helping other people. You’re a people person. What obligation do you have? Are you Neo?

We call him a thief too when we argue about work/life balance... He fires back claiming that corporations and greedy SMB owners are the real "thieves"... stealing valuable family and personal time from people just to further "degrade society" by selling the latest gizmo, hooking kids on sugar, or hurting the environment. Really tough to fight him on this...

Spoke with a fellow millennial (mid-30s working dad) who has a $2 million net worth. Half is liquid (cash/stock). The rest is split between his house and his 401K. High-income (over $300K) but high-COL area. He's depressed because he thinks he should have closer to $5 million by 40 to ever really "live a good life" more or less stress free.

Some weeks he works 10, admittedly. Nice glasses.

good take

In my ongoing informal surveys of how much money people are earning… it seems crossing from the $200K/year zone to over $300K is where your life does a total 180. This is where lifestyle seems to entirely change and requires immense sacrifice, like health, family, stress, personal time, etc. I know plenty of W2 corporate and middle or back office finance people in their 30-40s with wonderful seemingly stress-free lives earning $200K or 250K. They log off at 5p or whatever… don’t ever even talk about their jobs socially. Great family and social lives. Yet all the people who’ve punched above $300K in their 30-40s.. let alone higher-achievers earning $400K, $500K+… have been entirely consumed by their jobs (or even their solo businesses) to the point where they’re “always on,” rarely seeing their families, and find it difficult to talk about anything but their work or companies.

It’s that time again… let’s compare what $300K pay in the US actually gets you versus €200K in Europe.. say The Netherlands. You’re self-employed, family of four living comfortably but not extravagantly. Start with Europe.. You earn €200K. The first €77K is taxed at 37% and everything above that at about 50%.. but these rates include national insurance and social security. Assume only modest self-employment deductions and your total tax bill lands around €90K, leaving roughly €110K before health insurance. Coverage for the whole family costs about €3,600 a year because kids are free until 18 and there are practically no deductible (minuscule.. like a few hundred bucks) or out of pocket costs. Then add childcare allowances and deductions which range from €3-10K depending on situation. So let’s go with €115K true take-home. If you own a home, property taxes are rounding errors.. maybe €600–2,000 a year. Then there’s education… Article 23 of the Dutch Constitution enshrines schooling as a guaranteed right, with the government funding both public and “special” private schools.. meaning options like Montessori, Dalton, Waldorf, or religious schools are tuition-free (beyond tiny voluntary fees). Now let’s go to the US, say NYC metro suburbs… You make $300K. After the standard deduction, your taxable income is about $270K. Your federal income tax is an effective rate of ~16%. Add ~5% state income tax and ~$26K net self-employment tax (after the 50% deduction), and $25K in property tax on your house… and your total tax load is about $115K… or a ~38% effective rate. That leaves you with about $185K. Much higher than Europe, right? But now subtract $35K for private family health insurance (premiums plus OOP) and your take-home is now $150K. Maybe there’s a couple K of child credits so $152K. OK now what about baseline incremental lifestyle costs in the US vs EU? The average US household owns 2 cars and spends $10-20K a year on ownership, insurance, gas, and maintenance which is unavoidable in US suburban and even sometimes urban life. A Dutch family might manage with one small car plus bikes and trains for €2-5K. Scale the. compounds the lifestyle delta. The typical American home is almost 2,500sf which is almost 2x the Dutch average of ~1,250.. that’s more square and cubic footage to heat, cool, insure, repair, and fill with stuff. So call it another $5–10K in utilities, furnishings, and upkeep that most European families avoid via cultural differences that value compact intimacy and efficiency vs individualistic spatial grandeur. Then the education gap widens it yet again. In the NYC area and most top cities, those same options that are free in the NL will be private and cost $20–50K per kid, every single year. Even if you stay in public school, property taxes effectively act as tuition. So even with a ~50% higher gross in the US and much lower headline tax rates… the real disposable advantage shrinks to roughly 20–25%… and actually disappears entirely once healthcare, property taxes, car dependency, and the overhead of sprawling spaces are factored in. Depending on your situation, your take-home pay could actually be lower than the equivalent in Europe even with a much higher income. I talk about this stuff not as some kind of champion of Europe but as a deeply patriotic American who wants to spread this knowledge so that we can do much better at home.

Something folks often don’t understand about working for a large corporation or bank, or frankly any business… It doesn’t matter how many vacation days you “have left” or whether you are “allowed” to work from home. If you’re great at your job and add value to the company, then you can do whatever you want so long as that value sustains. Employers will look away from your non-compliance unless/until your non-compliance causes envious low-value colleagues to complain and create disruption that more than offsets your high-value. So, don’t be obvious about your “rule” breaking. Follow me if you like raw and powerful career advice.

I have a friend who's far more "successful" than almost every high-income PE/banking/finance person I know at the same age (37). He started working for a little-known biotech company right out of college 15+ years ago. Has never switched jobs. Doesn't own a business. Doesn't give life or business advice online. Doesn't share fancy vacation photos on social media. His secret? He's been collecting RSUs his entire career and the stock is up 10,000%. Uses some proceeds to diversify into real estate, crypto, index funds, etc. Spends his evenings/weekends hanging with his wife and kids, loves yard work and home maintenance, reads, goes to the local beach, etc. Millionaire next door energy. You don't need to own your own business to become wealthy... you can own a piece of someone else's business even while you work there.

I am once again asking why any investment banker, lawyer, or consultant working a W-2 over the age of 30… Doesn’t just start their own firm today? Both right and wrong answers accepted.

Thinking about it more, it could be HIS company

So, I'm 37 years old. I left a lot of money on the table leaving Wall Street when I was 33. I have to imagine most mid/late-30 somethings still working big finance jobs in Manhattan are worth at least $3, $4, maybe $5 million+ even assuming they don't have family money. Is this way off base? If it's about right, how do these folks continue to "take orders" from their bosses or tolerate client demands when they're sitting on that kind of net worth? Huge mystery to me as I get older.

Benz presents here a long thought exercise regarding the national interest rationale of our overt+covert ops throughout the world -- like funding social engineering activities like "funding trans dance festivals" in countries economically or geopolitically important to us -- but the world is a mess. What are the outcomes historically? The spending makes sense and the rationale is solid, sure. But what has been the ROI? The example of toppling some hypothetical dictator... what does the list of successful outcomes look like to-date? And then after that toppling, how did things go for us either commercially or politically? Honest inquiry... super curious.

I was covering the CPG and restaurant sectors on Wall Street from my mid-20s to 33. I was paid hundreds of thousands a year. If I had kept going, I’d probably be at $500-750K/year today living somewhere like Chatham or Princeton, NJ. But I wasn’t free. I was tied to a bank, FINRA compliance, earnings calendars, travel. Totally defeated the purpose of making money. Didn’t see my kids in the morning, didn’t see them in the evening. I wanted to be free. This is all I care about for myself and my family. Freedom and independence. I never wanted to be in a position where I’d wake up and have to be at a certain place at a certain time… or ever have to respond to an email within a certain time frame. Just ridiculous. So I quit with nothing lined up, plus my wife wasn’t working, plus she was pregnant with #2. My position was that I will burn all of my liquid net worth on this adventure if needed. My wife had slightly higher anxieties about this though, to be fair. Very few people would ever do what I did. In fact, I find me one because I’d love to meet them. That said, I’d like to think I’d do it again.. but the timing was so ripe during COVID that it’s hard to say really. I didn’t have a fixed plan. I was just confident that I could make it work. What kind of person gets paid the kind of money I was earning, with confidence and a big Wall Street ego, but then can’t make money on their own without the protective embrace of a large bank or firm? So I quickly parlayed my decade of experience into various small consulting projects. Within two years, I ended up selling nine SMBs as a business broker/M&A advisor ranging from no-revenue asset sales to $30mm revenue companies. I had exactly zero M&A or transaction experience whatsoever going into this. You don’t need any experience — just go create the experience. Then I launched a micro VC/PE business that’s just me writing tiny checks — and now I’m on 15 cap tables. Then I wrapped all those consulting gigs into a branded consulting business which lives on today and is growing. Then I peaced out to Europe with my wife and two kids. My wife doesn’t have a job that’s secretly funding our lives in the background. Life is good.. but it’s always a struggle. Running a business is freeing. But being free is hard. Not everyone can do it. When I say “free” I don’t just mean doing what you want where you want… I also mean free from your own past conceptions of what “success” means.

My friend and his wife make $650K in the NJ suburbs. Their life looks amazing—huge house, pool, multiple cars, big overseas vacations. But behind the scenes, they stress about layoffs. Their spending is astronomical, and their income just about covers it. Meanwhile, another friend in Amsterdam earns $100K. His family lives in a small but nice apartment, takes cool vacations around Europe and the Canaries, and enjoys life—for a fraction of the cost and with none of the job stress. My first friend says, “I’ll get another job.” But what kind of life is that? He doesn’t own a business. No matter how good he is, he’s at the mercy of HR, managers, and corporate restructurings. The takeaway? Sure, different places, different systems. But does anyone really need to live in a way that keeps a constant layer of stress hovering over them? I think the best approach is to try both lives—spend 5-10 years in each—and take mental notes on where you want to land in your 40s or 50s.

"Are you crazy? I can't just quit my job for a few years and live off savings/consult" "My wife wants to remodel the kitchen" "We need to be near the grandparents" "I might get a promotion next year" "My friends and family will think I'm unhinged" "Nobody will hire me afterwards" These are all solvable personal problems.

You’re a top undergrad and get a great dare I say elite job at 21. You have $0 to your name. You live modestly with a couple roommates until 26 and save $25K/year into a brokerage account. Now you’ve got about $150K. You level up in your late 20s and average 4 years of $100K annual post-tax bonuses and toss those into the brokerage account. Now you have about $700K liquid. 3-4 more years of working hard and simply investing in an index and you’ve got $1,000,000 to $1,500,000 in liquidity before age 35. Now you can go one of two directions. Succumb to lifestyle creep and put the golden handcuffs on yourself for your eternity Or Literally do whatever you want This could be 9/10 high-earners on Wall Street, in Big Law, or Big Consulting… but instead it’s only 1/10. Why is that?

The French are often offended if you ask if they speak English because they either don't or don't want to. The Dutch are offended if you ask if they speak English because they obviously do and why would you think they don't or won't? The Dutch are the most reasonable, normal, and practical people on the globe.

I have a friend who's far more "successful" than almost every high-income PE/banking/finance person I know at the same age (35). He started working for a little-known (still) biotech company right out of college 15 years ago. Has never switched jobs. Doesn't own a business. Doesn't give life or business advice online. Doesn't share fancy vacation photos on social media. His secret? He's been collecting RSUs his entire career and the stock is up 10,000%. Uses some proceeds to diversify into real estate, crypto, index funds, etc. Spends his evenings/weekends hanging with his wife and kids, loves yard work and home maintenance, reads, goes to the local beach, etc. Millionaire next door energy. You don't need to own your own business to become wealthy... you can own a piece of someone else's business even while you work there.

There is a time early in the life of an aspiring future Wall Street millionaire when the below “made MD” and “making $1MM+/year” outcomes are considered desirable and understandable. They are desirable less because of the material benefits themselves and more due to the abstract signaling and ego boost they provide the aspirant, whom may come from very little and therefore feels the need for validation OR may come from privilege and needs to uphold expectations and reinforce existing status. The desire does not discriminate on motivation. The first leg of this journey — typically in your 20s and early 30s — takes place in the shadow of a great hill. As you climb the hill, you assume greatness lies beyond its crest, that once you reach it you will see the sun, you will have “made it” and you can finally begin your real life — i.e. focus on your family, hours get easier, income increases, you start investing outside of your core competencies to diversify your net worth, maybe you can “retire” at 45, etc. But rarely is this the case. And by this waypoint, money begins to matter far less and time surges in importance. Most are too stubborn to accept this due to rationalizing of sunk costs and social expectations. But for those with high degrees of agency — those smart enough to realize this “new” reality — what lies ahead is actually a long plateau with some ambiguous shadowy features in the uncertain distance. And below is a great hill that would be exhilarating to descend — precisely a result of your long arduous ascent. There are also other great hills out yonder that you didn’t know existed, some even taller than the one you are on.. if you’re courageous enough to look. So you have two choices. Convince yourself that the great sacrifice of your 20s-30s was some seed investment required for this luxurious and lucrative future that may or may not await you. Or That these years were simply the requisite climb over the wall to see a much greater truth — a much-needed slapping out of an indoctrination suffered — and avoid an almost certain continued suffering to the great benefit of others and not yourself.

That's how I thought of him too

If you’re good at your job, you’ll never be fired unless you do something egregious. As I progressed in my career in my late 20s and early 30s, then especially after I quit my job in 2021 to build my own business, one of the biggest things that strained my relationship with friends was when I’d be in their neighborhood or near their office and ask them to grab a drink or coffee or lunch or leave early… they’d say some version of “I’m not allowed to leave.” Like they’re in some kind of prison. It’s a prison of mentality. What are they going to do? Fire you? On Wall Street… yes the job was hard and the hours were long… but I eventually got to the point where I would “disappear” whenever I wanted to during the day. I wasn’t going to be fired or even reprimanded because I was very good at my job. It’s hard for me to respect when someone can’t step out of work for a few hours at a moments notice in the context of white collar “knowledge work” which is mostly just performative.

With each passing year, I find myself increasingly alienated from the ideas and aspirations that largely defined my late 20s to early 30s middle- to high-income life in the NYC-Philly suburban corridor. Once my wife and I began having kids, my entire orientation inverted from serving a fixed career ambition to serving my kids and my legacy (i.e. memories of me). Perhaps it's just a phase since my kids are still very young. I don't know, honestly. I acknowledge that the desire to solve problems and to meet and work with teams of smart people are powerful draws that could someday regain a pedestal within my schema once my kids grow older. But at least for the time being, I will remain bewildered by those similar to me demographically, pursuing traditional corporate careers they don't love despite having enough in the bank and retirement accounts to break free from the traditional concepts of "careers" and "wealth" with which they've been indoctrinated and instead pursue meaningful experiences including -- and as a result of -- operationalizing their own income streams in combination with smaller-footprint living and finding deep meaning in places outside the reach of quantitative and thus superficial markers of success. I just simply cannot imagine being a father and a husband -- head of my house -- yet have my day, week, or year constrained or influenced by people not in said house. This mental, emotional -- and practical -- friction was what led to my course correction. Also, saving for retirement is a scam.

And you’re telling me that it’s rare to make €500,000 a year working in finance in Paris vs NYC? Is that a joke? This place looks like the pinnacle of wealth in every direction. I spent the day walking around and all I see everywhere are beautifully dressed and good looking people, including what looks to be endless finance bros wearing impeccable suits, speaking very quickly and confidently and walking fast as if heading to some meeting (which struck me as pretty unEuropean to be honest). They seem pretty rich to me.

Is this a normal/average HH net worth and salary situation for a 39 year old in Brooklyn? Seems crazy low. Where’s all their money?

Use the brand value he has to get a front office job at a far lower-ranked firm.

The Real Framework of a Life Well Lived 1- Death is always near You can die today. So can anyone you love. Live like you know that. 2- You are replaceable The world won’t stop when you’re gone. So stop living like your job or status defines you. 3- Presence is the only real currency Not money. Not accolades. But being here with your kids, your partner, your friends, yourself. Wabi-Sabi. Cherish imperfection and impermanence. 4- Yes, everyone else is wrong. The “system” will hand you a rulebook. Burn it, then write your own. What matters is what feels true, not what looks good from the outside. 5- You probably can’t “have both” If you optimize for wealth and success, be honest that you’re not optimizing for time, day-to-day freedom and self-care, or inner peace. Trade-offs are real. Don’t hide from them. Avoid the obligatory cope of “you can have both” — top 1% financial wealth and material success paired with deep everlasting personal relationships and superior mental, physical, and emotional health. 6- Moments are worth more than milestones No one cries over missed promotions on their deathbed. They cry over missed dinners, missed hugs, missed sunsets. 7- Joy compounds too Just like interest, so does happiness. Laugh often. Play often. Make memories early and keep making them. Write as many life chapters as you can… with many twists and turns.

The lucid dream of the aspiring SMB/HoldCo entrepreneur… Work an elite corporate/finance job for 5–10 years Decide to blow it up and buy a business Deploy life savings and sign a PG to buy a mid-scale machine shop with steady F500 customers Lose your long-time GM in the first 6 months, fire two employees caught stealing parts, lose a client worth 12% of revenue. You brute-force biz dev to 50% growth by year 2, hire a younger, motivated GM, and by year 3 you’ve implemented HR/ERP/training systems. Hit stride. Systems are humming, the team is firing on all cylinders. Hours drop from 50–60/week to 30–40, then to 20–30. Decide to pursue a bolt-on acquisition of a supplier that also does custom on-site servicing. Suddenly you’re on more radars (good and bad). You lose key employees amid the uncertainty. You promote a young manager to cover both businesses, trying to mentor and create career paths for hungry hustlers — but you overestimate his ability and motivation. He burns out and quits. The “synergies” turn out to be dissynergies. Six months later you realize you bit off more than you can chew. Your hours spike to 60–70/week. Every day there’s a fire. You need a clone just to function. Your wife and family — once elated at your success — now wonder why you’re doing this. You’re 40. Two years felt like ten. But you’ve become sharper, tougher. You rally your support systems, professional and personal, and go back to basics. You realize the fancy optimization frameworks from B-school are largely useless in the wild west of SMBs. You don’t abandon them, but you shelve them. You start thinking like a human again. You slow down. You’ve matured. The chaos subsides. Seven years later, you’ve built a true machine. Looking back, you wonder how much pain was caused by your own deliberate changes — but it doesn’t matter. You’re hardened. You’ve earned respect. You’re inspiring to peers, friends, family. Now you’re mid-40s. Your kids are teenagers, you’re spending real time with them. Your wife never cared about EBITDA or ops, but she always cared about what it did to you both. Slowly, you close the gap that had grown in your marriage. Romance rekindles. Vacations feel different. You still can’t fully shut off, but you trust your team. Systems are running. You can actually enjoy yourself. You bought the beach house. The mountain getaway. 3 jet skis. 4 snowmobiles. Your wife has what she wants. You drive a custom F-350 Raptor. The family Yukon is fully loaded. You haven’t thought much about it, but your net worth is now $12.5M. You grew the business 5x, and the market’s up 300% since you bought that “little” machine shop 10 years ago. Life is good. Around the campfire with your buddies, trading war stories over beers, you realize you may have “made it.” Then, you wake up. You realize it was just a lucid dream. You scramble for a pen, trying to write it down before it fades. Your toddlers are screaming. Your wife is already up making them breakfast. You’re just another dad with a Teams call in 90 minutes. At least it’s WFH Friday.

Look… he’s right. Here’s what to do today, not tomorrow, not after your next bonus, not after your next promotion — If you’re working a white collar knowledge W2 job… then you have to reorient your life and entire career ASAP. Make a list of every specific skill you use at your job e.g. writing emails or copy, analyzing data, idea generation, forecasting, negotiating with people, etc. Then create a brand name, buy a domain, create an email, form a legal entity, and buy professional liability insurance. Start imagining how you can deploy those skills to other companies on a part-time, project, or advisory basis. Kick off some bizdev — it is no different than searching and interviewing for new jobs while working your current job.. except you can stack multiple clients to fortress your income versus relying on “only one client” which is your current employer. Make no mistake — working W2 knowledge employment today is a career death sentence, you just don’t know where you are in line. You can’t take that chance. If you want to remain in white collar land, then your need to own your own capital — you need to be deploying AI tools under your own banner flag… you need to become the capital allocator (including your own human and tech capital) because your labor is leaking value faster than you fully understand.

I quit my career when I was 32. Then at 35 I moved my family to Europe. I was working on Wall Street in NYC and living in NJ. There were no problems… income was high, career trajectory was up and to the right, I served on a non-profit board, just bought a great house in a great neighborhood, growing family, great friends and family nearby. To this day, 4 years later, a lot of people think I’m insane. Why walk away from a lucrative career just as it was getting started? Here are some motivations and questions my wife and I had been thinking about that led to the decision… 1) Does it make sense for our young family to barely see me during the week, a requirement to pursue any kind of intense high-paying career? 2) If I’m so great at my job and confident, then why am I working for someone else’s brand? Why not create my own brand or business from scratch? 3) Why are we working so hard to earn so much if it all gets spent anyway thanks to lifestyle creep? 4) We love our friends and family, but why are we living in the same places we grew up? We can live anywhere in the world… wouldn’t living abroad be a good experience for the family even if short-lived? I had no particular plan other than pure conviction that I’d drum up business myself by just asking and hustling. It all worked out and still is. Take it day by day. You might not get the next one.

Soooo many young people are chasing money and status so they can do all the cool shit they dream about -- traveling the world, going on adventures, looking and feeling good, building a family -- but who's gonna tell them by the time they're "ready" they'll be old and gray and nobody will be around to join them. Do it now. You don't need that much to get started.

think about all the outsourcing, IT, and consulting companies out there... it's truly staggering

IYKYK Never buy a home unless you know for absolute certain that you’ll never leave it. For example, buying a so-called “starter home” in your 20s is the worst financial decision you can make as it relates to shelter. Keep renting and keep most of your liquid capital in the S&P500 until you’ve found the forever place.

The audience for this:

You’d be amazed

I have so many friends who bought their first homes in the northern NJ / NYC suburbs in the 2016-2019 timeframe in the $400-700K zone... ...who have since made an average $500K in capital appreciation just 5-10 years later. I'm talking earning an the amount equal to the entire home's original value. That's $500K of completely tax free "income" if they sell and are married. That's the equivalent of almost 10 years in a $100K/year job. And then I have some friends who didn't do this. And the wealth gap is massive between the two groups. Same starting point for everyone. Is that fair?

What’s the new comp benchmark at 35?

For 10 years in corporate/Wall Street, I took notes in meetings. Never looked at them again. It was corporate cosplay—a meaningless ritual to signal engagement. If I had just sat there, made eye contact, and actually listened, it would’ve been more productive—but that would’ve been “weird” and made me look lazy. This is reason #487 why corporate life is a glorified kindergarten for adults.

Only one in ten Americans is self-employed. That means nine out of ten are plugged into what I call the neo-feudal system. Basically, it’s the going assumption in modern life that there will always be some job available for you to do… a role where you’ll be paid in some consistent, predictable way for your time and effort. This harkens back to actual feudalism, where you would convert your skillset as a farmer into consumable assets like food or grain… but only by using someone else’s capital, namely the land owned by the lord or the king. In return, you would retain a small share for yourself and your family while the rest flowed upward to sustain the hierarchy. So therefore, the vast majority of adults — even “professionals” — don’t really participate directly in capitalism. They participate in what I’d call laborism. They trade time and skill for wages within someone else’s system of capital. Their participation in capitalism is mostly indirect through brokerage accounts or retirement funds that make them part of the investor class on paper, but not in spirit or control. In Europe, however, I think it’s less about being socialist or capitalist, and more about being laborist versus capitalist. So the real dividing line isn’t between left and right, or socialism and capitalism. It’s between people whose economic lives are organized around labor, and those whose lives are organized around capital… meaning ownership, risk, and creative autonomy. Most people in the modern world live inside the former. They are the modern serfs paid regularly, protected nominally, but ultimately dependent on the structures built by the latter.

Wow almost identical to my attempts

I have two brothers. One of them has taken an extremely unconventional career path. He started working for the National Park Service out of college... literally spraying trees in Appalachia for invasive insects, then building trails in the southwestern desert, then fighting forest fires. Now he works in software, but being a wilderness type at heart, a theme we often talk about is how, in modern times, you can’t just go live off the land anywhere in the truest sense and disconnect from the modern system. There is no real “opt-out.” It’s mainly because of property taxes or reliance on public utility or commercial infrastructure... even if you’re out on the deepest frontier. You can’t disappear. You will always need to file taxes or pay somebody who isn’t your kin... a tax collector, an insurance guy, a state regulator, some municipal zoning person. And even food production, especially protein, your grazing or hunting grounds can only cover a limited area unless you're extremely wealthy. So everyone is stuck playing the game. You can stretch yourself to the furthest margins of the game board and maybe go unnoticed for a while… your turn can be skipped a few times… but you can never truly opt out of the game.

there we go... they don't want folks like me posting about them :)

Hard to tell if this is satire or not

I honestly believe this describes 50-75% of government payroll.. from federal to state to local.

above average height

I had a private dinner with an executive at one of the largest consulting and professional services firms in the world. He told me that their new AI capabilities entirely obviate roles for people roughly between the ages of 21 and 30. The historical path in consulting is for post-grads to come in and do things like 1) shadow and take notes during meetings, 2) put together slides, 3) read significant volumes of research while creating new research, and 4) manage schedules or run project staffing. Those who excel at those tasks over the course of 5-10 years get on the partner track -- and then their role becomes almost entirely business development and account management (i.e. schmoozing and boozing). AI kills this entire multi-year career progression. What consultancies globally are now struggling with is this... Do we margin up today by not hiring young staff anymore and replacing existing young people with ChatGPT and emerging agentic AI tools... and risk future partner-creation and leadership-replacement... or are we confident we'll just figure it out once we cross that bridge? Either way... in what universe would this not make you freak out and question your entire future if you're in the W2 consulting or "knowledge" business?

One of the extreme things I believe is that if you plan to never have/adopt kids, don’t have a job. Get a really nice durable rucksack and hitchhike around the world keeping an adventure journal. Literally walk up to a ship captain on some coastline and join the crew. Join the Peace Corps. Get your WEMT cert and become a ski patroller in Chile or Colorado. Do cool shit literally every single day until you die and try to stay healthy and fit as long as you can.

Folks saying the $7M lawyer story is fake. It’s very real. BigLaw partner. 5 kids. Elite NYC area suburb. Huge mansion + 2 vacation homes. It’s not about him not being successful. It’s about being functionally trapped by circumstances and momentum. – 50% all-in taxes = $3.5M – $1M+ housing – $275K private school – $250K travel – $750K deferred comp – Cars, clubs, staff, insurance = 💸 Just an observation… not really a judgement in this case. He’s rich, but not liquid. And not free.

You want to quit your job. Start your own thing. Win back your time. Your freedom. Spend more time with your kids. Say goodbye to the corporate BS. All you need is $250K. A year to figure it out. A little cushion. But your wife wants to redo the kitchen. And the bathrooms. So you put that $250K aside. Now you need $500K. Just to be safe. But now you’re only a year or two from MD or partner. If you stick it out, you’ll really have made it. Your parents will be proud. Old classmates — less smart, less driven — will see your update on LinkedIn. They’ll envy you. You were always the smart one. High IQ. Crushed tests. Made for this. It makes sense. Who are you kidding? You’re in the club. Why would you leave? Nobody would take you seriously. And you want to be taken seriously. You’re a serious person. You’re successful. You’re not going anywhere.

The older I get the less I understand this obsessive romanticism of extreme puritanical hustle.

He thinks he just “figures it out” and lives life on easy street. Crazy.

In my office, bored. My boss hasn’t given me any work to do yet. He sucks. Might quit.

He throws a great BBQ

Unless you are fully in the “health is wealth” philosophical camp and can psychologically and emotionally accept living in squalor with nothing so long as you have the “gift of life” it is imperative that you build your own business or income-generating vehicle in the next 3-5 years because 90% of what you do now will not necessarily disappear but there will no longer be a employer “middleman” between you and a client/end-user due to accelerating AI and the increasingly violent hunt for efficiency in whitecollardom. We’re “going direct.” If you’re relying on a company/employer to allocate your time and skillset to their clients — you’re toast soon if not already. Wake up!

How to escape the humiliation rituals of corporate life— Buy a domain for $12 Make a SquareSpace site for $144 Get email from Microsoft/GoDaddy (cheap) Create an LLC or structure ($1-2k) Get business insurance ($2-3k) Cold email and network for consulting projects similar to what you are already doing in corporate now Focus on a small handful of sectors of interest or expertise to build a brand and reputation around Do the work Experience the stress and anxiety Send invoices Cash checks Post irreverent takes on LinkedIn that make rat racers uncomfortable

Most Americans don’t realize how radically different European pension systems are versus US Social Security. In the US, you'll only receive Social Security if you earn 40 "credits" over your lifetime. You'll receive 1 credit for each $1,810 you earn in a year, and you can earn a max of 4 credits each year. So this means that most people only qualify after working 10 years. So, if you don't work, and work at least a decade, you'll never see a dime. No "safety net" for you. Now let's look at the Dutch pension system for example. In the Netherlands, the state pension (AOW) works the opposite way. You earn it simply by existing here. There is no work requirement at all. Full-time, part-time, struggling artist who never earned a single cent, stay-at-home mom or dad... doesn’t matter at all. Each year of Dutch residency automatically gives you 2% of the full Dutch pension, paid anywhere in the world later in your life. Your spouse earns it too, even if they never had a job there. So live in the NL for only 5 years, then move back to the US or elsewhere, and you'll start getting surprise checks amounting to 10% of the full Dutch social security-equivalent in your late 60s. Both US SS and Dutch AOW are types of “social safety nets"... but they're built on completely different philosophies... one is work-based and other other residency-based. In other words, one you have to "earn" and the other you simply "are given" regardless of what you do with your life. It’s just one of those subtle things you only learn when you live abroad as an expat... with feet in both systems... that totally reframes how you think about government, its role in society, and the concept of "a society" itself.

True

I know (hope) the post is satire, but here's what I've got to say on the matter. This is where my mother grew up with 6 siblings and 3 dogs. Irish Catholic family in the 1950s northern New Jersey suburbs. My grandfather was a Teamster who earned his “1 Million Miles” driven. My grandmother was a homemaker. Both served in WW2. He served in China driving hovercraft. She worked in a factory manufacturing bombs. You think they had it easy? You think this house is gross and that you deserve better? Why is that? You think you are entitled to a sprawling place like the ones on HGTV where you can entertain friends and have an open floor plan so you can sip your cocktail or latte with your laptop while you watch your kids play on a large flat safe surface in plain sight of you? This house and many around it are still there, structurally unchanged since the original construction. They are selling for $600-700K. Roughly $4,500/month all-in including property taxes. Many young people have moved there and are raising great families. You can walk to the school nearby. Fire department around the corner. Pizza shops, delis, even the train to NYC is a reasonable walk. Kids still ride bikes around the neighborhood just like I did 30 years ago visiting grandma and just like my mother did 60 years ago living there. Many in the younger generation are emotionally unfit for adulthood because they have not experienced any true hardship. They have never felt existential pressure. So they complain about relatively non-existent problems in their lives as victims of things "they" did to them. I think there are two things going on. One is the social engineering. I say that loosely because I am not a conspiracy theorist. Espousing conspiracy theories is a form of neo fascist populism aimed to strip individuals of personal agency and responsibility by blaming some mysterious "they" for their troubles and failures. But there really was an effort, even if well-intentioned, to demonize trades, self-employment, and working with your hands in favor of a knowledge professional class that would outsource all physical hardship and labor to other countries (or people from other countries). This produced a generation and a half that does not understand basic mechanics or the physical world or how to get by on their own. It also spawned this crazy belief that children should always be better off than their parents. Absolutely not. The word "should" is dangerous. Our children have better opportunities, but not guaranteed outcomes by default. Believing otherwise is directed society talk. It is extreme socialism dressed up as optimism. Life is about opportunity, not entitlement. And young people today have an order of magnitude more to be excited about and to do than even Gen X let alone the Boomers. If you cannot see that you might be a lost soul and there is little a stranger on the internet can type to change it. The second thing is the deinstitutionalization of sick and demented people in the US as a result of Reagan era policies. This was problematic in the 1980s and 1990s and 2000s when the millennial and early Gen Z generations came of age. It created a distinct lack of safety for the Gen X and boomer generation to let their kids go explore the world on their own. Both of these factors produced a fundamentally fearful generation of young people... which automatically translates to a desire to be near their "mommy and daddy". And in many ways, they look to the government or society to substitute as "mom and dad" because they can't fend for themselves. Remember my neu-feudalism post? Same idea. So the idea of moving far away from their both physical and emotional comfort zone is deeply uncomfortable, if not insane to many young "educated" people. This is why you see memes about Millennial/Gen Z couples calling their father or father in law over to rewire a light fixture or fix something in their house. Nobody knows anything. Nobody understands anything. So if you want to live near your parents in the same town where you grew up... you are already asking for a lot generationally speaking. There is nothing wrong with this house and neighborhood and $4,500/month with a $150,000 down payment is not a huge hurdle if you educate yourself and work hard for 5-10 years. You would have rather driven a semi a million miles after driving hovercraft in WW2? Well, you can actually do this right now. Go join the armed forces then come back 5 years later and drive a truck. It's an awesome career path. Can even get your MBA and help from the government. But if you simply despise the aesthetic or maybe want more for less, then you have to move to a less developed part of the US or the world and help that area develop and grow through your efforts and your new roots. That is the entire story of America. Are you an American? Go West, as they say, figurately and/or literally.

People DM me all the time asking how to “escape the matrix”—how much runway they need to quit their corporate or Wall Street job. Wrong question. The real question is: Do you actually want to escape? Would you downsize your house? Move your family somewhere cheaper? Sell your luxury car? Cut your lifestyle in half if that’s what it took? 9 out of 10 won’t. They’ll fantasize about starting a business, buying a business, or taking a multi-year sabbatical… but never do it. Because the truth is, they don’t hate the system. They just hate their place in it.

There are many young professional couples in their 30s-50s out there earning $500K+/year in major US metros yearning for financial and family freedom... ...yet live in a $1,000,000+ home. Step 1 is not to start a side hustle, saving more money, upskilling, or exploring SMB ownership... Step 1 is cashing out the home equity and investing it in passive equity/bond/money market vehicles... and downsizing to a $500K house or moving into a $2-3,000/month apartment. It's the large and costly home and property that keeps them in a state of financial and creative stasis that is easy to confuse for stability and comfort.

You’re allowed a few years being really into college football after graduating. But if you’re over 30 and look at college football as anything other than background entertainment, then you are not a serious person. And if your favorite team or alma mater loses a game and this affects you emotionally, then seek professional help.

It simply showcases how human minds and bodies can achieve anything through development. Doesn’t matter what the “thing” is — so long as it’s extraordinary.

Outsourcing, ironically

wish this was a lie

To the mid-career 30-40 something white collar coastal professionals reading this... Why are you working a job? The S&P500 is up 50% over the last 2 years, 100% over the last 5 years, and 200% over the last 10 years. "Work ethic is important" "I want to make a good example for my kids" "What will I do otherwise" "Yeah but I want even more money" "We live in a high COL area and can't leave" I get it, but at some point doesn't this reasoning become ridiculous? You don't get time back. Big world out there. You're already top 0.0001% of wealth in the world and in history. And you can't take your wealth with you to the grave. Sometimes I feel like the "mind virus" doesn't mean what most people think it does.

Anytime I see any accomplishment or flex whatsoever.

If you're serious about your business, never have an OOO reply.

I made $300K as a W2 six years ago.. Had a great lifestyle and liked the job but started building a family and suddenly the lifestyle sucked. My advice is to get the 60-100 hour work weeks out of the way as early in your career as possible.