Riggo-toni

Not exactly humor, but since I am liable to get yelled at by mods if I put this in the RTT and it doesn't quite belong in the Pets thread, I am putting this here. ocelot scritches https://imgur.com/gallery/XBI6yVK

For @twa And for me...

Kind of pointless...By the time an Alabama man has hit 50, his sister would have already hit menopause anyway.

Given that the cost of education has been increasing at a much higher rate than inflation, I will concede this is likely true. I guess my point was that from us Gen-xers on down, there has been a continual trend of each successive generation winding up less well off than the preceding one. It's a sad contrast to the first 2 centuries of our country when it was assumed that one's children would be more successful/ have greater opportunities.

@Renegade7, it's not unique to your generation - it's been that way for all post-boomers. I finished grad school in 92 with over 30k in debt and after doing temp work for peanuts, had to settle for a desperation job at 19k/year. With inflation I would guess that's about the equivalent today of 50k debt on a 35k salary. After a BA in French and a Master's in International Business (I spoke 3 languages then, and could read in 5), I ended up getting training in programming in order to land a job with a living wage. I am now 56. I am putting nearly 20% of my income into 401k and a Roth IRA. I will likely cross the million dollar threshold sometime in the next ten years if the stock market continues to go up at least close to its current pace. But I am realizing that that's likely not going to last my entire life if I retire at 66. My father lived to be 93, and my mother is still alive at 88, so figuring on 25 years post-retirement combined with the loss of value in money due to inflation, and I realize I may be facing a shortfall near the end.

Please tell me they bring back that same hot babe.... please!!!!!

Don't feel bad, Mr Prager - on many messageboards we seafaring folk can't even discuss sal****er without being censored. On second thought, feel terrible, you worthless racist piece of ****.

I would do nothing.... actually I would do two women at a time first, and then I would do nothing.

That would mean 10% return. Stock market does better than that long term, but interest from bonds, CDs, etc. is currently less than half that. Also, remember that inflation will eat away at the value of annuities over time. When I finished grad school in the nineties, I was hoping for a job around 40-45k/yr. That was too optimistic. Nowadays people want a minimum wage of $15/hr for even unskilled labor. Even an 7.5% annuity (6k a month before tax) might seem enough to live on now, but 15 years from now will be insufficient if you haven't put back about 8k every year as a buffer against inflation.

This was the supposition in my question. Perhaps I should have offered more clarification. Let's just say total other net assets (i.e. home equity) < 250k. So, for example, you have $1,005,000 between your 401k and IRA, and you owe $150k on a house appraised at $375k. Technically, you are a millionaire. Are you genuinely rich?

With all the recent talk about wealth taxes and one percenters and such, does simply having a million dollars mean you are rich. I am not talking about having a million dollar salary, or multi-millions, but rather, just crossing over the million dollar threshold in your savings or 401k. To me, the answer is no, because I would define rich as having enough money so that you never have to work again. Unless you are a senior citizen, you can't live off the after-tax interest and pay for health insurance, a mortgage, and still put enough away to offset inflation. You can retire much sooner, for sure, but not tomorrow, or next year. You would have to keep working for another 5 to 10 years until the house is paid off and compound growth/interest has nearly doubled your savings.