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Wealth is the only true path that gives you options. All other paths are dependent on income.
There really is no other exit plan except financial security. Every other plan is just putting you into the walls a new rat maze.
Aggressive FIRE makes a ton of sense for the few people that know early what they want out of life. If you want to spend your life surfing by all means, work the system to the hilt (leetcode, job hopping, etc.) and retire by 30.
But a lot of people that go down that road get to 30 and find that they have no clue what makes them happy to begin with. Fairy tales for upper middle class young adults notwithstanding, travel doesn’t magically impart this or any other wisdom either.
Non-financial goals are way way harder to achieve than FIRE: the biggest issue is selecting your non-financial goals. Money is a simple goal and it isn't impossible to achieve - then what?
Deciding that money should be your primary focus overoptimises for financial wealth against non-financial wealth.
For example, life satisfaction: do you know people doing jobs they love? People that would continue their calling even if it didn't pay them? Try to understand their wealth even if they don't have the financial freedom a successful business can give you. The main problem is most of those jobs are not in businesses and it is hard to understand things we haven't experienced. Jobs are a very poor example but you get the idea.
I've retired early: for me personally, financial wealth is not enough.
One limited resource that we are approximately all given the same amount of is time - you get fifty years between 20 and 70 to use the best you can. I think most people don't use their limited resource very well (even those that optimise their time well seem to use it poorly on bad meta-goals).
True, but I believe also its important to factor in that those in lower socioeconomic classes effectively have their time stolen from them in many ways.
ex: I don't enjoy fixing the vast majority of things I have to fix, (although there can be a sense of satisfaction in it sometimes), but I have to 1st learn to do so and then do it because I absolutely need it fixed, but don't have the funds to pay to have it done. To compound the loss of time, financially wealthy people can afford to buy new things, like automobiles, which dont break down or require nearly as much maintenance.
Many other things are also outsourced by people because their time is too valuable to do otherwise this outsourcing is just not an option for others.
Personally I find the words “stolen” and “theft” is usually just political signalling when applied to time. The metaphor has some sense, but so does pirating as theft of copyrighted movies…
One significant waste of our precious “resource” is often paid for in money regardless of our socioeconomic status - the 40 hours doing shit we wouldn’t do if we didn’t get paid for it - and then often using the money to win regretful prizes. Capitalism deeply sucks but it sucks less than some other things humans have tried.
a huge amount of wasted time in wealthy countries is under our control: the classic example of TV. Or working harder to buy a bigger house we don’t really need. My poorer friends choose to waste their time as much as my richer friends do.
