Another month, another update. A few random comments.
Good Reads/Listens/Watches
- National Geographic put out a new Honnold/Caldwell bromance on their bike/climbing journey from Colorado to Alaska (DisneyPlus link).
- Relatedly, Honnold was on Rich Roll’s podcast and provides a bit more context on their adventure (link).
Life
- I discovered how to universally set all websites to “dark mode” in Chrome, which is particularly nice in the evening. To activate, go to chrome://flags/ and enable “Auto Dark Mode for Web Contents.” It works well for the most part, but some images look goofy. I’m a fan nonetheless. I’ve bookmarked it so I can easily toggle on/off. I use it most days.
- I played in a disc golf tournament — my first. It was a partners tournament. The first round was a “best shot” format, where we’d take the best of each shot and play from there. The second round was an alternating format. We ended up earning a $80 cash prize, which exceeded the $40 entry fee. I’m basically a professional disc golf player.
- Apple announced their new M4 Mac Mini, which ships next week for $500 with education discount or $580 at Costco without (edu link, Costco link).
- I think I’m taking the plunge on our fourth Mac Mini. It’s hard to overstate the value you get for $500.
- The baseline RAM is now 16gb and can support up to three displays (two 6k and one 5k).
- We own three of the prior version (the basic 8gb RAM M2 Mac Mini) and I cannot recommend the Mac Mini enough. It is my primary work-from-home computer, I use it to blog, I use it for Excel, it cruises through 4k youtube at 2x speed (even with other streams going on the same device), it is a great Plex server, and the kids play endless hours of Roblox on it (which it runs like a dream). The little data analysis I ran on it performed flawlessly (until I ran into memory constraints thanks to the 8gb limitation). It is silent.
- It took me about 2 (very infuriating) weeks to unlearn everything I knew about computers thanks to 30 years of Windows usage to learn macOS, but I can honestly say I’m never going back.
- Things I hate about Macs:
- Overpriced hardware upgrades (like the $200 upcharge to go from 256gb to 512gb configuration).
- Solution: stick with the base Apple configurations and buy a third-party SSD for pennies on the dollar.
- We use a T7 shield SSD. On sale, the 4TB costs $200 and the 2TB costs $100 (link).
- Overpriced Apple accessories.
- Solution: third party mouse, keyboard, monitors.
- We bought a $30 combo Logitech Bluetooth keyboard/mouse from Costco and it works flawlessly. You’ll need a wired mouse & keyboard for the initial MacOS setup so keep that in mind.
- My 12 year old monitors from grad school work flawlessly for the kids’ Mac Mini gaming rigs with a simple DVI=>USB-C adapter. I personally use a dual 4k monitor setup (one vertical one horizontal) from Dell, which you can get for ~$200 on sale from time to time when paired with Dell/Amex offers (link).
- Overpriced hardware upgrades (like the $200 upcharge to go from 256gb to 512gb configuration).
- The Apple ecosystem is a bit culty — but I don’t think I’m brainwashed. I still think the iPhone is terrible value relative to Pixels (or other androids). I also love our Apple TV and don’t see myself ever leaving it (we had Roku for years). I prefer iPads to android tablets…they just seem to last forever.
- I think I’m taking the plunge on our fourth Mac Mini. It’s hard to overstate the value you get for $500.
- My US Bank Altitude Reserve review has generated more blog traffic than I’ve seen in several years (probably since the refi bonanza of 2020). Last month’s USBAR post ranks among the highest Google Search results. I think the universe is telling me that what people want to see on this blog is useful information, not incoherent tax/investing/life ramblings of a grumpy old man. It’s been about 5 years since my last BoA post, so I will update it with a better one that is less poorly written. Sorry in advance to the loyal reader who is sick of seeing them.
- Reader Adrian changed my outlook on running entirely with their comments (here and here).
- I went down the rabbit hole and Adrian is right — the reason I loathed running my entire life is because I spent almost all of my running time in Zone 3 rather than enjoying life in Zone 2. This realization has changed my outlook on running entirely and no longer despise it with a fiery passion. I had previously thought that the point of exercise is to push myself as hard as I could for as long as I could, but apparently that’s not how it works with running. The research seems to conclude that spending most of your time in Zone 2 and supplementing with high intensity intervals is the way to go.
- Relatedly, I’m in the market for a Garmin watch. My research concludes that the best-value products are the Instinct 2, Forerunner 255, and Forerunner 265. I bought my son an Instinct 2 last month for $200 and it seems to be a hearty and highly functional watch.
- I went down the rabbit hole and Adrian is right — the reason I loathed running my entire life is because I spent almost all of my running time in Zone 3 rather than enjoying life in Zone 2. This realization has changed my outlook on running entirely and no longer despise it with a fiery passion. I had previously thought that the point of exercise is to push myself as hard as I could for as long as I could, but apparently that’s not how it works with running. The research seems to conclude that spending most of your time in Zone 2 and supplementing with high intensity intervals is the way to go.
- Relatedly, reader Mike suggested I check out Kboges on YouTube (here and here).
- I’ve been roughly maxing out at least one set of pushups and pullups daily for a month since the suggestion. It feels good. After 30 days, I’m not jacked like Kboges yet. Perhaps next month…
- I really liked Mike’s suggestion to incorporate the exercise into one’s daily ritual so it becomes as second-nature as brushing your teeth in the morning.
- Staying on the health theme, the green smoothie habit is going strong. First, Blendtec replaced a defective out-of-warranty 8-year-old blender jar for free. Woot. Second, the entire family of seven has hopped aboard the daily green smoothie train. The amount of mangoes/berries added to the smoothie is inversely proportional to the smoothie’s sadness. My kids enjoy un-sad smoothies. Our consumption of greens has increased by orders of magnitude relative to our pre-smoothie days.
- This YT video is what got me back on the green smoothie train (link).
- During grad school, our first exposure to green smoothies was from our good friends and next-door neighbors, the Beans. Her dad (founder of SmugMug) runs a very popular Vegan/Longevity YT channel here. I don’t know that I’ve met a more impressive group of individuals in my life.
We became a “big candy” house this year.
Gotta love the passive aggressive microwave signs at the office and the behavior that necessitates the signs. I have a personal microwave in my office to avoid the drama.
We went through a particularly dry spell in which it didn’t rain for about 6 weeks — the longest dry spell I’ve seen here. This year was the first time our house was overrun with tumbleweeds. There are several steps hidden in there somewhere.
As per tradition, I took our family photo on a tripod. FC3 is giving me a run for my money on height. He just turned 14 and is over 6’1″. My days are numbered…
Fun family walk in the woods.
Triumphant duo with a fat wad of $80 cash in our back pockets (collectively, not individually). That’s right, we won a butter platter trophy which I should surely throw away but inexplicably haven’t yet.
These were the teams we were paired with and beat during the second round. You can tell how serious they are by the number of discs in their bag — they weren’t messing around.
This was one of the tee shots. The correct play was a right-handed forehand over the creek to fade back into play after 300 ft or so.
FC5 invited a bunch of friends over to hang out. We went to the park for water rockets — a favorite activity of ours. They can fly up to ~300 ft and the kids love to try to catch it as it falls back to Earth (buy here and here).
Watch out TPG, I’m coming for you! TPG sold his blog for $20M to Bankrate in 2012. I’m still awaiting my >$20M offer for this money-losing operation!
This Month’s Finances
BoA has another one of those “extra 2% off days” coming on Nov 7. Kind of a nice day to perform transactions you were going to make (on a BoA card) around then anyway. You can use this as an opportunity to prepay future expenses (utilities, buy Walmart/Costco/Amazon gift cards, etc). If interest rates are 12%, then you could rationalize prepaying 2-months of expenses (2% / (12%/yr) = 2 months). If interest rates are 6%, then you could rationalize prepaying 4-months of expenses (2% / (6%/yr) = 4 months). The beauty of the 2% bonus is that the return is tax-free, so it makes the argument to prepay even more compelling.
Was anyone else affected by Fidelity’s “unavailable cash” shenanigans on deposits? I faced a hold of 3 weeks on a $500 deposit. I’ll try to “push” rather than “pull” to Fidelity in the future, but the hold certainly had me concerned given my tiny cash holdings. Going forward I’ll either have to: 1.) increase my cash holdings, 2.) leave Fidelity, or 3.) avoid whatever triggered the hold in the first place going forward (I still don’t know what caused it). Given how little cash we hold, I would not miss the forgone interest. What I’d probably miss most is getting access to my paycheck a day earlier. There is an entire Bogleheads thread on the topic here.
I learned on Bogleheads that the 2% Fidelity Visa, which I’ve had since 2005 (technically its predecessor), now offers a $100 Global Entry / TSA PreCheck credit every 4 years — pretty unique for a $0 annual fee card. This will be our third credit card offering this perk and I’ll happily gift Global Entry to my eldest daughter who is turning 18 in a matter of months.
My US Bank Altitude Reserve card offered me a 0% APR “extended pay” option where I pay a credit card balance over 24 months. I took them up on their offer, figuring it would be idiotic to turn down a 0%, 24-mo loan on a $8.7k balance. This is the first time in my life that I will not pay a credit card balance in full, but US Bank was slick in adjusting my autopay settings so I don’t have to think about it ever again. Suffice it to say, this will be the first and last time I use this feature since it won’t be free in the future. The economics of credit card shenanigans never cease to blow my mind. For every customer like me, there must be many more subsidizing my behavior. Good for me, bad for them — a bizarre equilibrium of regressive cross-subsidization. Speaking of the USBAR, the (unsubstantiated) rumor mill says it is will be shut down when the 4% card comes out. If true, then perhaps apply now if you’re interested. However, I think the upcoming 4% card is the better option if you have the assets to transfer to US Bank’s brokerage.
$362.03*24=$8,688.72, so I guess my 0% extended payment plan technically carries $0.66 (=$8,688.72 – $8,688.06) of interest over the two years.
- The good:
- Still employed.
- The bad/abnormal:
- Spent $6.4k on nonstop flights to Europe over the summer for the 7 of us (thanks Google Flights for helping to navigate the infinite permutations of airport/date combinations).
- We promised each kid a family trip their senior year to the place of their choosing anywhere in the world (within reason). FC1 chose Europe. None of us has ever been. We’ll visit the UK, the Netherlands(?), Germany (Mrs FP’s brother lives there), Austria, Switzerland, and France. I’m looking forward to hut-to-hut hiking in the Austrian Alps. If anyone has recommendations on family-friendly (and preferably cheap and nature-oriented) things to do in these countries, I’m all ears. Here’s the tentative clockwise loop starting in London, though we might have to cut out Amsterdam (link). ChatGPT has been helpful in drafting itineraries and activities so far.
- $762 to doctors for healthcare not covered by insurance. Bummer.
- Spent $6.4k on nonstop flights to Europe over the summer for the 7 of us (thanks Google Flights for helping to navigate the infinite permutations of airport/date combinations).
Footnotes:
- Fidelity unambiguously has the best HSA on the market. $0 admin fees + cheap investment options (e.g. FZROX, FZILX, FSKAX, etc).
- I lazily approximate home value as my historical purchase price.
- I have a 15Y mortgage which results in much larger principal payments than a 30Y mortgage. Since principal payments are simply transfers from one pocket (assets) to another (debt reduction), I treat such cash flows as savings.
- ~$0 cell phones described here.
- All expenditures at Costco & Walmart are classified as “Food at home” for simplicity (even if it’s laundry detergent, clothing, medicine, toys, etc).
- Nobody knows the perfect asset allocation. Just pick one and run with it. Use a target date retirement fund as a benchmark if you want some guidance (link). If you prefer to DIY (as I do), then a three-fund portfolio is great (link).
- My low portfolio expense ratio is the primary reason why I don’t hold target-date funds, which have expense ratios anywhere from 0.16% to 1%. I can achieve a much lower expense ratio on my own, and it’s trivially easy to manage. Further, a DIY portfolio allows one to tax-loss-harvest more easily. Lastly, a DIY portfolio can help avoid the dreaded cap gains distributions caused by a fund-of-funds (e.g. Vanguard Target funds in Dec 2021).
- ETFs are slightly more inconvenient to hold relative to index funds. With ETFs, you must deal with bid-ask spreads
as well as the inability to buy partial shares(Fidelity now offers fractional shares). With a simple index fund, you don’t have to deal with either of these issues. Bogleheads discussion here (link). - I hold VTSAX in my taxable brokerage account because its tax efficiency (no cap gains distributions thanks to its patented technique).
- CA’s 529 plan has the lowest expense ratio US equity index fund (link). I’d have 100% of our 529 money there if not for the state tax deduction we receive in our own state.
- My Collective Investment Trust (CIT) version of Vanguard’s Total Int’l Stock Index has a 0.059% expense ratio, yet produces ~0.11% of “tax alpha” due to reduced foreign tax withholdings. Vanguard implemented this change around 2019. Therefore, I report the effective expense ratio of negative 0.053% for this holding (=0.059%-0.11%). The “tax alpha” shows up in the performance differential in the fact sheets here (CIT vs MF) and is more thoroughly explained here. Unfortunately, this ~0.11% of “tax alpha” is not available in the mutual fund version.
Disclaimer: This site is for entertainment purposes only, as disclosed here: https://frugalprofessor.com/disclaimers/.
Oops, left this comment on last months’ post:
I’ve been following Kyle Boggeman’s methods for a few years now and love it. Personally, I like his Push/Pull/Legs split the best: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KtBqdS8__Hc
Right now my Pushing movement are deficit push-ups, pull-ups for Pulling, and a mix of high-rep Squats and dumbbell Romanian Deadlifts for Legs, but it varies if I’m traveling.
Re: green smoothies, when we’re in Mexico we get a green juice pretty much every day from one of a couple of spots. This video is pretty close to what we make when we’re at home: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UBf9dYodE5k
Thanks for the suggestion on the Push/Pull/Legs split. Looks like a really simple program.
We don’t put cactus in our smoothie; looks adventerous and healthy. Reminds me a bit of my years in Chile where we’d eat a fair amount of cactus fruit (we called it “tuna”). 99% seeds, it seemed.
“It took me about 2 (very infuriating) weeks to unlearn everything I knew about computers thanks to 30 years of Windows usage to learn macOS, but I can honestly say I’m never going back.”
As a fellow 30-year user of Windows, I am curious what made you switch after so many years. Will you write a review for us, i.e., Apple-haters?
Believe me, I hated (and still hate) a ton about Apple:
* Walled garden on iPhone; I guess that may have been alleviated. I had to jailbreak my hand-me-down iPhone 1 to gain the functionality I wanted.
* The pricing seemed absurd.
What made me an Apple believer:
* Apple TV blows away the competition for streaming device. It isn’t even close. Such a great user experience. Reasonably priced.
* Apple’s computer hardware is unreal. The M chip series blows away the PC competition. The Mac Mini is silent. Power consumption rounds to zero.
* The Mac Mini is an absurd value proposition. $500 (with edu discount) or $580 without gives you an incredible computer that will blow anything away in that price range (or double?) on the Windows side. As an aside, the form factor is pretty novel and functional. Easy to tuck behind a TV, behind a computer monitor, etc. A nice transition from bulky PCs (though I realize that mini PCs are growing in popularity too).
* After suffering through the growing pains of learning macOS, it’s actually pretty intuitive. Peripherals (printers, bluetooth, etc) work fine. No bloatware. No ads (Microsoft is pretty terrible/intrusive with this).
* Software compatibility is pretty impressive these days. Everything I need runs on both. Native software for video editing is good enough for me. The baseline Mac Mini M2 does a great job with video editing. I’m sure the M4 will be even better.
Today, most of us spend most of our time online through a web browser. In that sense, we use computers primarily like Chromebooks, so we should be pretty agnostic about operating system. However, when I need non-Chrome tasks, I’ve learned that macOS is plenty sufficient for my needs (and even preferred now that I know it). The little software I need for work (e.g. Stata for research or Zoom/Excel/PowerPoint for teaching) works fine.
In conclusion, the hardware is unreal and the OS is nice once you incur the cost of transitioning.
For $500/$580, I’d say give it a try. 14-day return policy through Apple.com or 90 days through Costco (without edu discount). If you hate it, you’re only out your time. If you love it, then you’ll have some incredible hardware to enjoy for many years to come. I would predict that the M4 mac mini would easily stay functional for a decade.
Apple hater here! So curious about what can be better than a Microsoft Surface and what you like the most about Mac! Thanks for your work, this is my favorite blog!
Tom, please see my reply to Mike above.
I’m a fellow hater. Turned Mac convert. I think it’s definitely worth a try. I cannot overstate how much value I see in the baseline M4 Mac Mini.
Big fan of the Garmin Forerunner 255. It only needs charging once every 10 and is a great sport watch for running, biking, and swimming. With young children around I prefer the button only setup on the 255 vs the 265 even though the 265 is damn pretty.
Thanks for the input! I was torn between the Instinct 2 and Forerunner 255 for myself, but leaning towards the 255.
I’m looking forward to the coaching functionality and health monitoring. It’s been a bit since I had a monitoring device (last was Fitbit Charge 4).
Any hints on getting started doing spreadsheets monthly the way you do? Is there a template excel sheet that you have? I’ve seen some templates on Bogleheads but nothing quite as succinct. I like the monthly decomp of income for example but have to think about how to make my spreadsheets show that. I’m wondering also about your workflow in creating them – I have everything go through Quicken for example but the reports can get a little confusing.
Here’s a post in which I shared my template & workflow: https://frugalprofessor.com/my-updated-net-worth-and-more-tracking-spreadsheet/
Workflow is Personal Capital => Import to Excel through a couple copy & pastes.
I love the report (particularly the richness of the growing historical data), but I’m biased. I got the idea during my MBA during a valuations class…why couldn’t these same statements/techniques be used at a personal level.
What other spreadsheets are you wanting to see that I used to post?
I’m an iPhone user after having been an Android user and I prefer Apple for the integration of all the systems. The phones are relatively affordable if you go the SE route. Look for the iPhone SE 4th gen to come out next year: https://www.macrumors.com/guide/iphone-se-4/
Thanks for the recommendation.
My oldest two daughters have iPhone SE (2nd gen, I think).
I’ll take another look at the iPhone. I know they have a cult following. So far, I just haven’t seen a compelling reason to leave Android.
I prefer upgrading phones when Xfinity mobile does those free-phone things. They were giving away Pixel 9s for free a few months back. I regret not jumping on the promotion at the time.
Multiple Apple products and big candy? You really have loosened the purse strings. Though, I guess you are a professional athlete.
I have a Macbook Pro laptop at work with an M2 pro processor. It really is a fantastic machine and I never worry about battery life. Being cheap, I have a refurbished windows laptop for my personal machine. The user experience is considerably worse. I will definitely take a look at the m4 mini.
Yes, my transition to professional athlete has facilitated our transition to big candy providers. We couldn’t have justified it prior to that salary bump.
In my defense of the 3 x M2 Mac Mini purchases, we got them during their back-to-school promotion for $100 off (thanks to gift card, which I used sequentially on each purchase). Even in my pre-professional athlete days, I could stomach the $400/machine investment. We couldn’t be happier with the transition to Mac, and I would imagine that the M4 mac mini would be an even better value proposition given the hardware upgrade.
Thanks for sharing the Chrome flags tip—it’s super helpful! I prefer avoiding new extensions that need permissions for all the sites I visit, so having an out-of-the-box solution is definitely more appealing.
Also, congrats on the traffic from your USBAR review post! I’ve been following your blog for a while and have actually adjusted my credit card setup to the BofA/ME strategy, it’s simple, straightforward, and offers the best cashback return! It would be a bit of a loss if your blog went fully monetized and started pushing credit cards like other sites do lol. Clearly that’s where the money is – TPG valuation, Intuit closing Mint for CreditKarma, all Youtubers pushing Chase/Amex when there are better cards out there.
Glad you found the Chrome flag helpful. It’s a great feature.
One of the benefits of approaching FI is that I can speak my mind and there are no consequences.
My updated BoA post is brutally honest — I don’t particularly care for BoA/Merrill, but keep them only because of the 5.25%. Suffice it to say I’m not holding my breath for a sponsorship opportunity with BoA.
I don’t see too many unbiased sources of info on the internet. Reddit is good. Bogleheads is better. DoctorOfCredit is fine. Hopefully my blog fits in there somewhere…
Thanks for sharing. Have you considered MacBook Air? Same chip, cost $200 more, but it comes with a screen, meaning that one can save a monitor and take it on the road. With its portability (being not attached to a big monitor), it can be moved from one room to another, so one can perhaps buy one fewer Mini. If a big monitor (or 2) is desirable, one only needs to add a docking station without sacrificing its portability.
The two M4 Macs that were announced last week were the Mac Mini & Macbook Pro. The Macbook Air should get a refresh in 2025. The big thing that happened last week was that the baseline RAM across all apple products (even older ones like the M2 and M3) was defaulted to 16gb rather than 8gb, a huge difference. On my 8gb Mac Mini M2, I frequently come close to maxing out the memory. When I exceed the limit, it has to memory swapping.
The cheapest MBA right now is the $900 M3 MBA right now: https://www.apple.com/us-edu/shop/buy-mac/macbook-air/13-inch-m2. The M3 is $1k.
So even with an inferior chip, the M3 MBA is 2x the price of the M4 Mac Mini.
The M4 Mac Mini is a stupidly good value proposition.
When I travel, I take my sad old Windows machine with a 30 minute battery that runs hotter than the surface of the sun. If I had infinite money, I’d upgrade that to a MBA, but I don’t travel enough to justify it. When my daughter goes to college next year, I will almost certainly buy her a MBA. Frankly, the M2 will almost surely suffice for her, but I’ll evaluate the pricing differential relative to the M4 at the time. The nice thing about buying apple products in the fall (8 months after the release cycle) is they offer a $100 gift card for purchasing macs. $100 off a $500 Mac Mini is a stupidly good deal, which is how we came to acquire 3 of them over a year ago for $400 each.
The coaching functionality is pretty useful if you have a race on the calendar. The health monitoring I thought was interesting at first but it does not have the accuracy to really do anything with. Better just to listen to your body then an external device.
Thanks for the feedback!
I’m super glad that you’re finding running more enjoyable! Be careful, you might find yourself doing ultras now that you don’t want to stop running… 😉
Let’s not get ahead of ourselves. Though addicting, I don’t often feel like pushing beyond 4 miles / 30 min. I certainly like the endorphins though…Zone 2 for life!
I certainly admire those with the ability to do ultras. That’s an entirely different level of crazy.
I’ve seen from the Alaska adventure post that you already know how to suffer, which is the core skill for ultras. 😄
Voluntary suffering is definitely up my alley.
Not sure it’s in the cards, but we’ll see…
I’m sure you have shared this info before but I will admit that I am not the best “Follower”.
Can you provide a couple good recommendations for alternatives to some of the “players” other then Schwab, Vanguard, or E-Trade?
I recall you don’t appreciate Robinhood so I am fine with that not being an option too.
Again, looking for someone other then those above.
Plan is to buy and hold as I am not a trader and don’t want to spend the time researching every tip someone might share with me.
What do you say buddy?
Uncle Russ!
For the buy-and-hold investor, your best bet will be: Fidelity, Vanguard, and Schwab.
They all have their own strengths and weaknesses, but I feel that Fidelity is the most complete broker as of today.
Irrelevant from this post but I remember you talking about the WellsFargo $2,500 bonus, did you end up doing it? If so, how was your experience? I just received the offer today and I am considering it.
Planning to move the amount from Fidelity to WellsFargo for the bonus, once that’s done move it to USBank for the 4% card.
I opened up the WF checking account many months ago but couldn’t get the asset transfer completed in time. I ran into a few issues.
I think I’m going to try it again soon. This time with Mrs FP, so we’d have 2x$2500 for transferring the $500k. Not bad.
Reviewers on Bogleheads say that the bonus comes reliably as promised. WF apparently is very good about honoring commitments these days after the big scandal.
Garmin Forerunner 255 is great. I’ve had mine almost 2 years, and I’m still getting 7-10 days of battery life (and this includes more intensive usage during multiple hour-long workouts per week). Sometimes I wish it had a touchscreen, but I suppose the advantage of not having one is that it’s less likely to respond by accident.
Off topic, I’ve been thinking about savings, job security in academia, the viability of universities, in preparation for possible massive economic upheaval in light of developments in AI, and I’m interested in your thoughts.
Reading about OpenAI’s o1 and its math and “reasoning” ability is quite frightening, and it seems possible that in the near future (months or years?), AI could replace professors both in terms of research and teaching. By then, it’s also possible that those research and teaching skills are also no longer in demand anyway and universities will be obsolete. I’ve heard various takes. On the skeptical side, people say “Oh, all AI can do is solve minor variants of problems with known solutions, and recombine existing text” and point to a hard ceiling due to running out of training data and data quality. But then others say “Every industry is in the crosshairs, and we need to implement UBI, but even that might not work out.”
Having invested a lot in an academic career and accumulated some decent savings, but still 5-10 years away from FIRE, I feel fortunate but don’t feel out of the woods yet. The default strategy would be to just stay the course, keep piling money into savings (US equity ETFs really), and if and when we have a SHTF moment, there will be massive deflation but the portfolio should deflate less as whatever firms lead in AI will accrue huge profits. A different strategy would be to make a serious effort at developing a secondary source of income, such as through a trade like electrician or a create a startup or something.
Thanks for the feedback on the Garmin!
As far as AI and academia goes, I have a few thoughts:
* I’m more optimistic then pessimistic about the power of AI to unlock human potential.
* That said, I fully acknowledge the career uncertainty for the next generation. Who knows what kinds of jobs will cease to exist for my kids’ generation, for example. Despite my general optimism about AI, I’m grateful to have graduated when I did and built up the financial reserves when we had the ability.
* Regarding universities specifically, my biggest job security is ironically the non-academic features of colleges: football, parties, and personal relationships. If not for these features of universities, I’d be a lot more worried about the future viability of higher ed.
I have no idea what the future holds, but I have the popcorn at the ready to see how this all unfolds. I’m particularly interested to see how my kids are affected and what they can do to minimize the damage. It seems that many white-collar careers are on the brink of extinction.
You inspired me to write a bit more! https://adrian.rollett.org/2024/12/on-enjoying-running/
Great article! Thanks for sharing!