I find it kind of fascinating how into the idea of early retirement many people on this site are. I mean, there’s nothing wrong with it as such, but… I don’t really get it. I don’t think I actually know anyone who has early-retired. What would you do with yourself? Is it not better to work for a longer time at a job you like than a shorter time at a higher paying one that you dislike?

Travel, surf, garden, build and fly drones, make music, enjoy time at the beach, sculpt metal, write interesting programs that occur to me, write a novel, play poker... I could go on. You'd rather be working? You only have 40 or 50 years left on the planet and then that's...it.

I think the critique is that you should be perfectly able to do all those thing and more, while working, if you have a job that properly respects work/life balance. On the other hand, if you spend a decade or two constantly grinding on work at the expense of all else, so that when you’re 40 you can do those things, you might find that your body isn’t up for the task.

No, you cannot do all those things and more while working. You can't even get a taste, it's more akin to looking through a store window.

It's not possible to fully experience a foreign country/culture in a 1 week vacation.

No idea about surfing, but it's not possible to even get a sense of what skiing has to offer in a couple of weekends a year.

Maybe, for a few people, it's possible to find the motivation and energy to fully immerse yourself in working on your own software after already having put in a full day of work, but they are in a tiny minority.

I’ve known too many folks dead by 30 to take advice from someone advocating for “boring_twenties”.

This is the only life we’ve got. Don’t spend it bored.

It sounds like parody of roaring twenties. It’s probably a pun on the decade.

You're responding to my username, instead of my comment?

Perhaps, but it's about tradeoffs. If you retire in your late 50s or 60s, your body is into decline at that point, however fit your lifestyle has been. The goal of early retirement is about being free of the need to put in time for somebody else's business while you're still in a condition to lead an active lifestyle doing things that you enjoy doing.

I have friends who retired at age 25. Retiring early should be the number one focus you have in your life. Everything else is bullshit, noise and propoganda.

Then what? Three options: never work; work for yourself; work for someone else. Each has its costs and benefits. To assume that one path is the ideal state for absolutely everyone is naïveté beyond belief.

Sure. But then you are making a decision based truely on what you want to do with your life. Not the same as people working for a company because they have to and that's their only way to survive.

This is how I see it. It could also be more towards "financial freedom" instead of "early retirement". Financial freedom in a sense that you don't have to work for money anymore and can live on your investment/saving with some fix withdrawal every year. That also means that you can choose to work at the places of your interest but don't pay much and you will still be okay!

I left FB a handful of years ago and the RSUs left me in this position (low 7-figs in investments/savings). I still work full time, but I only work on things I care about, which mostly involves non-profits and social work. I like getting a paycheck and knowing that I'm still growing my nest egg, but I care very little about getting promotions and raises since they're a borderline rounding error compared to what I've saved. If the salary can cover my monthly expenses and I like the mission, I'm happy to take the job. That's what I've found financial independence to bring.

I'm looking to do something similar, leave behind the high stress and find something more meaningful to work on that covers the bills while my nest egg matures. I admittedly have not looked into what's next as much as I should have, but do you have any tips on how to make such a transition?

Moving out of the bay made a big difference for me. I'm now somewhere in the middle of the country. I have twice the house to live in and 200x more land to roam for about half the price. With the extra land, I can also grow a lot of my own food.

The openness to remote work has been huge. I have colleagues in the bay and NYC. We get paid the same but my money goes twice as far.

At the same time, I've always been a frugal person. When at FB, I budgeted like I was making about 1/5 of my actual income since I always saw it as a transitory windfall.

I don't think I've done anything outside the standard box of lowering my expenses and investing anything I've saved.

I had a similar attitude when I was younger - I thought I would work for ever since I enjoyed programming so much. I had a fairly successful career both financially and in terms of technical achievements but by the time I reached my mid 50s, I was feeling completely burnt out with software development. Thankfully by that time I was financially secure so I was able to retire (I don't know if you would call 50s early though). I am thoroughly enjoying retirement - I still spend my time studying a lot of math a physics and working on hobbies.

It's definitely early in general.

Most millennials or younger won't be retiring until they're 70+ if ever on average the way the world is going. I certainly hope I'm as lucky as you and glad to hear you're enjoying it and keeping your mind engaged.

'early retirement' doesn't mean sit down and do nothing.

for me personally it mean getting the opportunity to not be shackled by money.

you can spend the rest of your life working on whatever project/idea you want without it ever needing to be perverted by money in order to sustain yourself.

a lot of problems/services solved by many business would be more effective for both sides if the business didn't have as a goal first generating profit and then solve stated problem second (or further down the list of priorities)

This is exactly what I have been doing after I retired early. I spend a a lot of time studying math and physics and working on hobbies. There is simply so much to explore - I _never_ feel bored.

That's a good perspective, I'm fortunate enough at where I am that I have considerable say in determining what and how I am going to work. I still look forward to weekends but don't find this work as something I want to get away from.

Able to work from home might have significantly sweetened the deal.

What would I do with myself? Anything but sit in another pointless meeting or pretend to care about the latest corporate policy. The focus should absolutely be getting out of the 9-5 as soon as possible.

And I've found it gets worse once you realize you are financial independent or within spitting distance of the early-retirement. It magnifies the BS and makes it easier to mouth off. It also magnifies the concerns around inflation and stock market returns that could chain you to the 9-5 longer than planned.

volunteer, travel, hang out with friends, get in shape for a day that likely won't arrive

I want to continue being a homeowner in a walkable neighborhood of a major city, without necessarily always making the astronomical wages that calls for.

I won’t stop working, but I might work the kind of jobs that would otherwise require sharing a rental or living in sprawl.

In 3-4 more years at big corporates I think I could get my 1BR condo paid off with some passive income to offset property taxes. The HOA fee is basically a “normal” rent and I could pay that out of any job. I’m not sure what’ll happen if I ever need a 2BR though.

i personally feel that there's a good chance that the choices for people with 30+ years until retirement age are either retiring early, or not retiring at all. i want to have retirement money, but also keep working. i want to be in a position where i would be able to retire if i was no longer able to continue working. if im not in that position, i might lose my current income trajectory, and never recover it, and then im stuck working for the rest of my life

It's less about actually retiring and more about not working for "the man". I know of a couple of folks who have retired in their 30s to open up coffee shops or make games.

Work purely on something I'm passionate about.

If you like what you do for a living, retirement is less of a factor. And "30% less" is still a truckload of money. I've never worked for a FAANG and I don't live in a particularly cheap area, nor am I particularly budget-conscious, but a comfortable retirement isn't even close to being a problem at an early age.

Retirement at early age doesn't mean you stop doing things - it means you get to do things without having to regard financial consideration.

Yes. So does a career where you make stupid money almost no matter what you do. I've made less money than most of my contemporaries. I've also taken much more time off to do other things and had much more fun along the way.

Sustainability is a real thing. You don't have to wait until "FIRE status" or whatever the cool kids want to sell you podcasts about in order to have a life.

On the other hand, one could easily work at Facebook for 10 years and have enough saved up to retire immediately depending on what their living expenses look like. So taking a 30% paycut to work on something that you find more interesting is less about being able to retire and more about working on something interesting until you decide that you'd rather retire.

The kicker for me is based on my age, savings rates, and planned spending, a 30% drop from FB level comp could put retirement nearly twice as many years in the future.

I’d have to really hate my job to give that up, especially since he noted it’s easy to rest and vest with a few hours of work per day.

"twice" is not that much when you are already close to retire (like 2 years).

9 years at facebook, maxing out 401k and Roth Megabackdoor ~= $450k in tax-sheltered retirement accounts. That is a hell of a good start for retirement.

EDIT: forgot the employer match. More like $600k.

Matching is great, but the total limit on 401(k) contributions for the year ($61–67k) is the same whether it’s withheld from your wages or matched by your employer.

(This is not financial or tax advice; listen to me and I will definitely lose all your money and send you to club fed.)

You can save in ordinary taxable accounts, too. The sky is the limit.

That won't carry you very far if you live in a major city.

As I said, a hell of a good start.

It's entirely circumstantial and boils down to, "Is it worth sacrificing my [mental health/happiness/whatever] just to retire a couple of years sooner"?

He was at Facebook since 2012... has got to be rich. I gotta wonder why not just retire completely at that point, or at least start your own company?

For those of us not in that situation it's a lot harder, especially if you want to work now so you don't have to work later and can retire asap.

Starting a company is not fun for most engineers. Way more fun to get paid (a smaller amount, but way above "average") to hack at a company that has already found product-market fit. Replit doesn't have a Facebook-size audience, but it's still millions of people who you can reach with your work.

I work at a place with a defined benefit pension that is sweet.

But, I’ve watched colleagues who get and stay miserable because they just need another 15/10/5/3 years. Misery is tough and I’ve seen people really destroy themselves chasing the end goal.

Point is, find your happiness first.

Do note that bonus and promotion are tied to performance, which is huge at senior level. So if you're not motivated to perform, you may actually be better off taking a pay cut to follow your passions, both emotionally and financially.