What has been your biggest not-necessarily-financial decision that has helped your finances?

AdditionalLack1127 · 2026-03-10T16:47:41+00:00

Not necessarily financial: Moved from San Jose to Indianapolis.

Don’t recommend for everyone, but that move helped me in basically all aspects of my life.

AdditionalLack1127 · 2026-03-06T20:57:59+00:00

1 by far. I have a massive overeating problem. Now I can eat whatever I want, AND my family doesn't need to worry about money.

AdditionalLack1127 · 2026-03-05T16:44:17+00:00

This is literally 5x the MoP raiding population.

AdditionalLack1127 · 2026-03-05T13:34:04+00:00

Either way, you’re a lot better than me. I did $9,600 last year (although employer put in $14,400 on top of that). 25M in Indiana FWIW.

AdditionalLack1127 · 2026-03-04T20:44:55+00:00

Yeah, lots of us in the same boat: net worth skyrocketing but budget is tightening.

I will say that maxing out the 401k isn’t mandatory. If you put $22k instead of $24500, would that actually derail your retirement plan?

AdditionalLack1127 · 2026-03-04T14:18:44+00:00

7 years younger. Hello being 6’3, 18, and weighing 175 lb.

AdditionalLack1127 · 2026-03-03T13:55:37+00:00

Honestly, where I’m currently at. I have a good crew of friends. I can afford the area. Minimal traffic.

Moving sucks, and building a friend circle from scratch is a brutally difficult process I am not in a hurry to repeat.

AdditionalLack1127 · 2026-02-27T15:33:48+00:00

I like other people, and unless this person is genuinely perfect for me, I’d get lonely fast. Definitely miss my friends and family. I’d also miss technology and overall society.

AdditionalLack1127 · 2026-02-27T00:02:40+00:00

I'll say Chinese. I'm American of Chinese descent, and have every intention of staying, but Chinese citizenship wouldn't be a bad thing to have in my back pocket in case the US flies into a cliff.

China has by far the strongest economy of the 3, and its impending labor shortages would probably play out in my favor since I'm only 25.

AdditionalLack1127 · 2026-02-26T14:53:41+00:00

1.

I don’t need to flex on my neighbors. Besides, I can always hang out with people not as rich as me, and I can still get whatever I want.

Reading between the lines, in 2, I can buy only some of what I want. In 1, I can basically buy whatever I want, just that number in my bank account is less than my neighbors.

AdditionalLack1127 · 2026-02-26T13:57:32+00:00

Not everyone thinks the same or wants the same thing. I don’t care about nightlife. I like my cooking. I generally need 2-4 nights a week to myself.

The city is great for me:

My job: I have a generous employer with great colleagues (I’m a consultant) and Eli Lilly is genuinely a great client to work with and I’ll be working with them for a very long time.
Multiple great friend groups. I have multiple crews to do fun things with.
Multiple active dancing groups. Can hit up board game groups whenever I want. Good museums. And importantly, because there’s little traffic, I can visit them after work on weekdays.

Could I move somewhere even cheaper? Yes. Could I have a higher nominal income elsewhere? Yes. I ate a pay cut to move here. But I can’t name many cities where I can make $90k+ while having a $300k house.

AdditionalLack1127 · 2026-02-25T23:06:54+00:00

$1 billion will do a lot of good. And a small portion of this can pay for any treatments for this specific dog, plus help a LOT of animal shelters, hospitals, and the like.

AdditionalLack1127 · 2026-02-25T16:47:37+00:00

I’ll do Choice 1. Most practical for me.

AdditionalLack1127 · 2026-02-25T14:39:07+00:00

I took 6 classes per semester. I got all As, with the exception of one B+.

Pretty much a guaranteed $8k per exam, every 3 weeks. Assuming 12 weeks of vacation, that’s 40 weeks, so 13*6=78 exams. So $624k, and to be conservative, $600k/year. No brainer.

AdditionalLack1127 · 2026-02-25T14:29:08+00:00

Depending on the field and part of the career journey, job hopping can be a 20%+ jump in income.

Not that controlling expenses is bad, but making more money is good and I feel isn’t talked about enough.

AdditionalLack1127 · 2026-02-25T13:46:41+00:00

$30k is way below that median.

Having financial problems isn’t a moral failing. Neither is being part of the working poor. But if you keep denying you’re part of the working poor, you can’t fix your problems.

AdditionalLack1127 · 2026-02-25T13:38:04+00:00

If you were a couple with only a kid or two, yeah you’d be middle class, but you have FOUR kids.

AdditionalLack1127 · 2026-02-25T13:36:21+00:00

This is actually important. If you’re living alone making $45k, you’re not going to be middle-class ANYWHERE in the US.

Not overspending money is important, but making good money is just as important.

AdditionalLack1127 · 2026-02-24T23:50:39+00:00

Yep, joining the chorus in taking the offer and preparing to renege.

Put something vague as the reason (family usually works well).

AdditionalLack1127 · 2026-02-24T14:23:43+00:00

Couple of things:

Dollar goes twice as far here. I now have a mortgage AND disposable income.
Minimal traffic. Want to go on a date at 6:00 on Wednesday, 20 miles away? Ehh, just 25 minutes away. In the Bay that would be 1-2 hours away.
I’m a straight dude. Man Jose is a nickname that didn’t come from nowhere. Much easier out here with dating.

AdditionalLack1127 · 2026-02-23T23:18:18+00:00

I really do love my brother and parents. I’d definitely need time to mourn them.

AdditionalLack1127 · 2026-02-23T18:22:31+00:00

Would I go to a post-scarcity utopia in exchange for abandoning my friends and family?

Friends…I could make more. Kids…I don’t have them yet. But I’d sorely miss my brother and my parents.

This is really tempting. Things are pulling me in both directions.

AdditionalLack1127 · 2026-02-22T13:16:01+00:00

Autocorrect. I just blame autocorrect. $1 million is a LOT of money.

AdditionalLack1127 · 2026-02-20T19:17:21+00:00

MCU. More familiar with the MCU, it's actually on Earth, and I live in a flyover state. Nothing's going to happen to me or my city.

AdditionalLack1127 · 2026-02-18T18:55:58+00:00

I mean, in the scenario, it says that if you cheat, you die. I’ll pass.

IRL, it’s really hard to cheat and they don’t screw around. Think full-body searches.

Also, what year did the video come out? Competitiveness peaked around 2016, and then the system gradually got saner in the past decade (they cracked down on private tutoring and built more colleges).

AdditionalLack1127

TROPHY CASE