Monday, November 26, 2018

40 Thousand to Freedom

There's a question that gets thrown around in the FIRE community: is achieving financial independence and early retirement possible for everyone? And I keep getting surprised that the correct answer is hardly ever uttered. I'm not sure I've heard it more than once. Which is crazy. It's such a softball question.

But no, achieving financial independence and enjoying an early retirement is clearly not possible for everyone.

Why is this even a question? Do people not understand what a lot of people make in the US?  Have they not read my excellent posts on the middle class and income quintiles? Do they feel appropriately guilty for not having read them?

I have a feeling things are really going to change for a lot of people in the FIRE community when they discover the interesting and diverse group of people sometimes described as "not us".

So let's take some time today to introduce some of these new and exciting people, using the wonder of publicly available income statistics.