Comment by 3rodents
6 days ago
People who save a lot are typically people comforted by sitting on a big nest egg. Saving a lot for retirement and then dying the day before retirement isn’t necessarily going to be a source of regret, because they had 30 years of warm fuzzy feelings about eventually hatching their nest egg. They could have spent it all instead, and had a life full of anxiety.
You’re looking for people who didn’t want to save but begrudgingly saved at the expense of their pre-retirement life and then died before they could enjoy retirement. That’s a much smaller group.
That’s what I was thinking. I’m a simple man, and a part of me just enjoys seeing the line go up. Be it because stock prices go up or because I have simply put a bit more cash into a savings account, I simply like the feeling of “I have more money now”.
Now, I realize that this is a privileged position. I have a yuppie software job that pays well, and as such I can afford to have savings and still afford to do fun things. I don’t go on luxury cruises or super fancy restaurants, but I do try and travel fairly often with my wife, and as long as we’re a little frugal about it we can go on a “big trip” once or twice a year without it being something that hurts us much financially.
I'm not sure. There is a warm fuzzy from knowing you are okay if things go bad of course, but how many of those who saved for the feeling would have saved less - they still would want a good amount saved for things going wrong of course but not that much.
I’m a saver. I’ve had coworkers tell me I “live like a poor person.” I disagree, but can see how it might look that way sometimes.
The thing is, I have everything I want. On serval occasions I’ve gotten a bonus or something and decided I should recklessly spend a certain percentage of it. It’s hard, because there is nothing I want. I spend months trying to come up with ideas and buy some stuff, but rarely all of it. This last year, I just stayed at a really expensive hotel to finish out the reckless spending budget… and think I would have been happier at a less nice place. I own my home, my car is paid off, I go on a nice trip or two each year. I’m not sure what else I’d want.
I like the idea that I could buy something more than the reality of having it. In many cases, I find the idea of having more things stressful. Having multiple homes or cars just sounds like work. A boat sounds like a nightmare; the best boat is a friend’s boat.
If I won the lottery, my big splurge would probably be selling my house and going back to renting. I liked not having to care about anything as a renter.
My grandma lived to 104, and had she lived another couple months, there would have been a lot of uncomfortable talks about where the money would come from to keep supporting her. She died with about $1k left to her name. You could say she did it perfectly, but this caused a lot of stress for the people taking care of her. She also got lucky with various benefits, which a lot of work went into getting. She lived a very frugal life, so this was not overspending on her part… she just lived a long time. I don’t want anyone who might be taking care of me to need to worry like that, and I don’t want to need to worry either. I don’t know how much I’ll need, but would rather have it and not need it, than need it and not have it… and I don’t feel like I’m making any sacrifices for that. What would make me miserable is having to go back to work in my 70s, because I spent too much money on nonsense I didn’t even want when I was younger due to social pressure.
There is a lot of freedom is not being saddled with payments or expensive stuff. If I lost my job, I could probably make ends meet working just about anywhere. This gives me so peace of mind, and if I didn’t want to work for a few years, I could do that too.
I do like to buy nice stuff when I do buy things. I often wish I didn’t. I feel like there is also freedom is not having a bunch of nice stuff. When it’s too nice, the stuff ends up feeling like it needs to be treated with kid gloves and protected. I’d like to feel less attached to some of my things.
In college there were 2 kids who shared a dorm room and they had basically nothing. They never locked their door, because there was nothing to take. Move in/out probably took 10 minutes. I kind of envied the amount of freedom that gave them. I think about it often, even decades later. I knew other people who were robbed and they were always stressed out.
If people have ideas of things to spend money on to “save less”, I’m all ears. I have been out of ideas for years.