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Old 05-20-2022, 02:40 PM
 
4,886 posts, read 2,990,111 times
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[quote=ddeemo;63469809]
The biggest threats are those looking to expand their territory - Russia and China mainly./quote]


Yet, these threats are not towards the U.S.; but we pay for them anyways to keep foreign investment in the greenback high.
A game we learned from the British.
The greatest threats are not from abroad, but rather domestic government incompetence.
Many of us, on this very site a year ago; saw exactly where we would be at today.
Yet our government still insists on giving money away overseas, to prop up the worthless fiat currency; and create the illusion of world stability.
63% of Americans are now living paycheck to paycheck, after 5-7 trillion of American wealth has been lost this year alone.
6 months ago I predicted $10 gas by Labor Day, and hope I'm wrong; as then almost nobody will be able to save for a home.
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Old 05-22-2022, 06:12 AM
 
11,156 posts, read 15,946,998 times
Reputation: 29827
Quote:
Originally Posted by Take a History Class View Post
Retirement, in the way it's portrayed by the media (golfing all day, traveling the world etc) is not actually the norm, now or historically. Most people, even those with good jobs, work until the are physically unable to sustain it. If you're very lucky, and have planned well, you can hang it up when medicare kicks in at 65.
I guess that depends on when one starts planning. If you plan well beginning when you're in you're in your 20s, you should be able to retire much earlier than that. My wife and I got married while we were still in college in 1978 and started planning for retirement with our very first jobs once we graduated. Because of that, she was able to retire at 50, followed by me at 54. And there are others who retired much earlier than that. In fact, there is an entire forum dedicated to people who are looking to retire early. (The link to which I'm not allowed to post here.)


Quote:
Originally Posted by ChessieMom View Post
I don't know anyone retiring that early either. Most are going at 65 or at least waiting until FRA.
As Sand&Salt already noted, head over to the Retirement forum as there are quite a few of us posting over there. Or search out the early retirement forum I alluded to in my response above.


Quote:
Originally Posted by ninjamyst View Post
Crisis is starting now with high mortgage rates and low availability. What you speak of is the last few months. Zillow and redfin already forecasted low transactions in Q3 forward.
I have to chuckle when I hear people complain about "high mortgage rates" of 5%-6%. I think it took me about 20 years to experience rates this "high" lol. The mortgage rate on my first real estate purchase was 12% in the mid-80s and when we moved up from a townhouse to a single family house in 1989, I was pleased that the rates had dropped to single digits and I "only" had to pay 9.5%. I was subsequently able to refinance it down to 8%, and when we moved in 1998, I paid 7%. It wasn't until I refinanced that mortgage in about 2003 or so when I finally got into the 5's with a 5.25% mortgage. When I retired in 2010 and moved to Las Vegas I paid cash so I don't remember what rates were then, but when we purchased our house in Miami in 2016, rates had dropped into the low-to-mid 3s so I decided to get a mortgage again at that time and keep my money invested in the stock market, which worked out quite well when I sold some of it earlier this year to purchase a house in Savannah. Coincidentally, we're selling our house in Miami this weekend, so I'll have another boatload of cash to invest just after the market has retreated into bear territory. Timing is everything.
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Old 05-26-2022, 02:41 AM
 
Location: Spain
12,722 posts, read 7,515,956 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ChessieMom View Post
I don't know anyone retiring that early either. Most are going at 65 or at least waiting until FRA.
You're probably underestimating how many retire without having planned to do so, but the stats don't lie the average age of retirement is a lot lower than the traditional full retirement ages.
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Old 05-26-2022, 08:42 AM
 
3,202 posts, read 1,371,293 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ddeemo View Post
You seem to have a hard time keeping on topic - defense is a small but very important part of the budget and actually causes more increase in GDP than it costs so not a drag or a source of excess spending unlike such proposals as paying off college debt.
This is incorrect. Defense outlays in the US accounts for about HALF of all discretionary spending. It is the single biggest discretionary spending item by far.
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Old 05-26-2022, 12:34 PM
 
Location: Las Vegas & San Diego
6,913 posts, read 3,324,069 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by WVNomad View Post
This is incorrect. Defense outlays in the US accounts for about HALF of all discretionary spending. It is the single biggest discretionary spending item by far.
Who said anything about mandatory or discretionary budget but discretionary is really an artificial distinction. Defense accounts for about 10% of the budget - much less than many other programs - that is fact.

Calling it discretionary is to ignore that common defense is the only thing that the Constitution specifically calls out for federal funding. Descretionary only means it is authorized annually instead of specifically with a program. Many other programs spend far more and are only deemed "mandated" because programs set expenditure amounts as they are authorized. Things such as unemployment, welfare, SNAP and other assistance program payments and the like are really not mandated spending - they are really discretionary because they could be changed at any time by changing the authorization.

The COVID relief packages for example were almost 10x times the amount spent on defense yet is mandated because authorized separately. Most of the defense budget is actually mandated also since much is technically multiyear contracts and other prior authorized payments by congress - the descretionary part is just a fraction of the total.
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Old 05-27-2022, 08:08 AM
 
7,395 posts, read 3,592,038 times
Reputation: 14080
Quote:
Originally Posted by bluesclues5 View Post

The better indicator of whether housing is overpriced is income to housing price ratio.
Not really. For many, income is irrelevant to purchase price. The purchase is merely a simple asset class transfer.

Let's take this Park City neighborhood home, on the market for $6,993,370.

https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/3...89090042_zpid/

Park City is a service-job community; most people work in the hospitality industry, although there are also commercial airline pilots (Delta, Southwest).


OR, take this Las Vegas home, on the market for $6,150,000

https://www.zillow.com/homes/40-Soar...82385544_zpid/

Las Vegas is also a service-job community. About two-thirds of all people who get up and go to work each day wear a name tag that says, "My Name Is ..." The price of the above house is not influenced by wages; again, asset class exchange is how such a home is purchased.


The house above is priced irrelevant to income, as people don't buy it from income. (Zillow estimates a monthly payment would be about $33K). People buy it as an asset transfer without regard to income.
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Old 05-27-2022, 08:14 AM
 
19,569 posts, read 17,852,956 times
Reputation: 17100
Quote:
Originally Posted by WVNomad View Post
This is incorrect. Defense outlays in the US accounts for about HALF of all discretionary spending. It is the single biggest discretionary spending item by far.

But alas just over 16.2% of all federal spending.
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Old 05-27-2022, 08:21 AM
 
Location: By the sea, by the sea, by the beautiful sea
68,297 posts, read 54,140,357 times
Reputation: 40606
Quote:
Originally Posted by GoAmericaGo View Post
Inflation is making cash worthless.

The stock market doesn’t seem like a safe retreat anymore.

Cars are wildly expensive and almost hard to get.

Homes…if you haven’t already bought one that ship has sailed.

Food prices are up…along with everything else.

When I think back over my life, it seems like people of my generation have been brutally clobbered.

Coming out of high school 2004+ and onward there was a huge push for everyone to go to college. I had a lot of friends take on massive debt for their education. Then the meltdown in 2008/2009 happened and these same people with degrees couldn’t even find jobs paying much over minimum wage. Fast forward less than a decade and now we are in the environment we have now.

Seems like a lot of people under 45 might be working until death. Perhaps retirement will be reserved for the top 10%.



The one with very low unemployment, that one?

These cycles are nothing new, had I stayed I would have graduated engineering school in 1971, my HS guidance counselor said be an engineer, you'll write your own ticket. Well, I knew people with engineering degrees working as truck mechanics and in other trades as it was all they could find at the time.

There's an old French adage: “plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose “ which translates to 'The more things change, the more they remain the same.'
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Old 05-27-2022, 08:24 AM
 
7,395 posts, read 3,592,038 times
Reputation: 14080
Quote:
Originally Posted by WVNomad View Post
This is incorrect. Defense outlays in the US accounts for about HALF of all discretionary spending. It is the single biggest discretionary spending item by far.

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Old 05-27-2022, 01:48 PM
 
Location: Oregon, formerly Texas
10,022 posts, read 7,169,858 times
Reputation: 17121
Stupid covid. We really screwed things up.
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