Retirement Ponderings

Ireland (me) and Scotland (wife) both currently offer free undergraduate and subsidized postgraduate tuition to residents. TBC how long that lasts of course. Downside is the kid would need to work there first for three years before qualifying despite holding the passports. Which is probably a good thing really. I didn’t know what the hell I wanted to study age 17.

In no universe will I be able to fund US college for him as he’s in an independent school now and I’d like to be able to retire before I’m 70.
 
Disco P said:
They need to teach this stuff (properly) in schools.
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I taught H.S. Financial Lit and Econ for many years. At least in our schools all of our business and financial lit teachers put a lot into teaching things properly and it doesn't make a lick of difference. Most of the kids just don't care because they have no stake at this age. Some do because they are interested in business or finance in the future (mostly because they watched The Wolf of Wall Street) and some at least try to listen. But it's the old you can lead a horse to water issue.
stoutsandstouts said:
I didn't learn a fucking thing about this stuff in high school or college (mid-90s to early-00s).
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I don't know if it was an elective or requirement but I definitely took an Econ class as a Senior in H.S. (96-97) and it was one of the few classes I actually like. We traded stocks "virtually" when "virtually" meant looking at stock quotes in the NYT and filling out a slip to get approved by our teacher. (I'm thankfully the Marketwatch site makes it much easier now). I don't know if Econ classes are required in college now but I had to take them as part of my Social Studies teaching requirements. But honestly, I don't know what I learned from these classes versus what I learned through my own life experiences, and what I learned by preparing myself to teach these classes. I sure as shit didn't learn it from my parents.
 
Surprisingly, my 4th grader is doing a year long class activity where they have groups of four students and had to research stocks to invest in, have a platform to make investments, and are given time each week to check on their investments and make adjustments or transactions. They have to have group consensus on positions or transactions. I'll be interested to see which groups performed the best.

I'm big time index fund guy and was annoyed they had to pick individual stocks, lol.
 
boogercrack said:
I am hoping for some level of higher education reform by then though. But planning against it. The rise in cost is entirely unsustainable and predatory to the students.
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I think the bubble is starting to burst. I still have way too many students that want to go to college but have no business going to college. But there are significantly more that are exploring alternatives than there were 10 years ago. More kids in our district are opting to go the county tech school and that was unthinkable 10 years ago. And the rise of Dual Enrollment classes (which are complete BS but that's a different discussion) are at least cutting back on the amount of money kids have to throw at colleges.

But until the business world stops with the BS that you need a college degree for some entry level job, and until the public education system stop pushing the idea that every kid should be going to college, there will be too much demand for colleges and that will drive prices up.
 
boogercrack said:
I'm big time index fund guy and was annoyed they had to pick individual stocks, lol.
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I was getting annoyed reading your post. Tracking individual stocks over a short timeframe is possibly the worst introduction to investing you could give to young people.

We ran this exercise in HS Econ in the 90s. I picked Walmart by some random chance and thought picking individual stocks would be easy for the next decade.

Either that or they watch a stock lose 10% in a matter of days or weeks and decide it's too much of a gamble.
 
TerrorBerk said:
I think the bubble is starting to burst. I still have way too many students that want to go to college but have no business going to college. But there are significantly more that are exploring alternatives than there were 10 years ago. More kids in our district are opting to go the county tech school and that was unthinkable 10 years ago. And the rise of Dual Enrollment classes (which are complete BS but that's a different discussion) are at least cutting back on the amount of money kids have to throw at colleges.

But until the business world stops with the BS that you need a college degree for some entry level job, and until the public education system stop pushing the idea that every kid should be going to college, there will be too much demand for colleges and that will drive prices up.
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What are "dual enrollment" classes?

And I wish I was in as good a place as far as college money goes. I think we'll manage to support them through some of it but I can't imagine how much school will be in 6 years.
 
shadowane said:
What are "dual enrollment" classes?
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Basically it’s AP Lite. High Schools coordinate with local colleges to approve a curriculum that is supposed to meet college standards. Students pay a fee (which goes to the college) to take the course and if they pass, get college credits. So it’s a way for students to graduate high school with college credit paying less than they would taking those classes in college. In NJ, those credits will be accepted by any state school or community college. In some places kids are graduating HS with enough credits for an associates degree.

The problem is that they really aren’t a replacement for college level classes. I know some teachers that do hold kids to high standards but for many it’s just an elective and not taken seriously. (One guy who taught DE legal studies leaned very heavily on Law & Order and The people vs OJ Simpson). Once the curriculum is approved there’s no oversight from the college and unlike AP there’s no exam to prove mastery. If you get a C you get credit. And if you go to a private or out of state school there is no guarantee they will accept the credits.

I don’t know if this is strictly an NJ thing.
 
shadowane said:
What are "dual enrollment" classes?

And I wish I was in as good a place as far as college money goes. I think we'll manage to support them through some of it but I can't imagine how much school will be in 6 years.
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Dual enrollment for my kid works like this. Instead of taking high school English he can take the class at Long Beach City College. Free tuition for high schoolers and it counts both as college credit and high school. A friend that is a vice principal at one of the high schools told me the smartest thing you can do is have your kid take as many dual enrollment classes as possible. Max out on college credits while they are free. Easy way to avoid tough AP classes, plus they don't have to take the test and the college generally accepts the credit.

Has worked out really well for my older son. My younger son got burned with a tough physics class, but otherwise alright.
 
preluderl said:
A friend of mine's son graduated high school with honors and went straight into an electricians apprenticeship. He had all kinds of people at his high school telling him he's crazy and that he needed to reconsider and go to college, etc.
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A growing thing in the UK is smart kids going straight into technical apprenticeships with companies who then sponsor them through engineering degrees in their early 20’s.

On the accounting/audit side the Big 4 are doing it a lot in their local firms there. Turns out Jamal who’s worked hard to get into the profession and has a couple of years of real client experience under his belt is a better bet than Piers who’s dad went to school with one of the senior partners.
 
TerrorBerk said:
Basically it’s AP Lite. High Schools coordinate with local colleges to approve a curriculum that is supposed to meet college standards. Students pay a fee (which goes to the college) to take the course and if they pass, get college credits. So it’s a way for students to graduate high school with college credit paying less than they would taking those classes in college. In NJ, those credits will be accepted by any state school or community college. In some places kids are graduating HS with enough credits for an associates degree.

The problem is that they really aren’t a replacement for college level classes. I know some teachers that do hold kids to high standards but for many it’s just an elective and not taken seriously. (One guy who taught DE legal studies leaned very heavily on Law & Order and The people vs OJ Simpson). Once the curriculum is approved there’s no oversight from the college and unlike AP there’s no exam to prove mastery. If you get a C you get credit. And if you go to a private or out of state school there is no guarantee they will accept the credits.

I don’t know if this is strictly an NJ thing.
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BigFrank said:
Dual enrollment for my kid works like this. Instead of taking high school English he can take the class at Long Beach City College. Free tuition for high schoolers and it counts both as college credit and high school. A friend that is a vice principal at one of the high schools told me the smartest thing you can do is have your kid take as many dual enrollment classes as possible. Max out on college credits while they are free. Easy way to avoid tough AP classes, plus they don't have to take the test and the college generally accepts the credit.

Has worked out really well for my older son. My younger son got burned with a tough physics class, but otherwise alright.
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Okay that's actually what I thought they were. The high school my kids will go to offers this with a local community college too. I'm not sure if there's a cost since it's a few years from now. It can definitely be a trap to get all these college credits in high school classes, go to college at a higher level, and just be completely out of your depth as a result. Would save a lot of money though.
 
For the love of god, when you retire and move, do your kids a favor and purge stuff you aren’t using. Give them the stuff you want to give them.

Clearing out my dad’s place. I think he accumulated ten stools in the last five years. Threw out two kitchen trash bags full of Penzey’s spices. This after clearing out what I thought was all their spices a couple years ago. Easily over $600 in spice mixes today.

Anyone want some almonds?
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BigFrank said:
For the love of god, when you retire and move, do your kids a favor and purge stuff you aren’t using. Give them the stuff you want to give them.

Clearing out my dad’s place. I think he accumulated ten stools in the last five years. Threw out two kitchen trash bags full of Penzey’s spices. This after clearing out what I thought was all their spices a couple years ago. Easily over $600 in spice mixes today.

Anyone want some almonds?
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I may have a job for you in about 8 years.
 
I’ve said on here before that US social security benefits are ridiculously generous versus other first world nations. A think tank came out this week and suggested annual payments should be limited to $100k for couples and $50k for singles at maximum retirement age. Makes sense imo.

They will of course also want to scale down the maximum benefits at minimum and full retirement age. That’s going to be a much harder sell.

 
Disco P said:
I’ve said on here before that US social security benefits are ridiculously generous versus other first world nations. A think tank came out this week and suggested annual payments should be limited to $100k for couples and $50k for singles at maximum retirement age. Makes sense imo.

They will of course also want to scale down the maximum benefits at minimum and full retirement age. That’s going to be a much harder sell.

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50K for an individual is too low even in a low cost of living area. Most people have little to no savings and no IRA. Other than government employees, pensions are nonexistent anymore. Social Security is the only income a lot of people will have in retirement (which wasn’t the way the system was designed) so a cap would to provide adequate benefits for people with no other source of income or accumulated wealth.

It’s not a bad thought to cap benefits but I think it would need to be based on better methodology.
 
Some sort of means testing would probably be necessary on top of the cap but that would be a nightmare to administer. As I also keep saying this claiming benefit at 62 thing has got to go. It's totally unsustainable. It needs to become 66/67 like everywhere else. Obviously, that caused a bunch of riots in France and they are only going from 62->64.

Reality is that it's impossible to live off state pension checks in most countries. It's just there to stop the elderly from starving. We were the generation that got fucked over in the move from defined benefits to defined contributions. Most countries have now realized they need to enforce auto-enrolment and have gotten better at explaining why it's important to start saving something early on to benefit from compounding. Assuming a paid off home (yeah, I know) $50k a year does go a long way towards hitting medium household income in a lot of states. But yeah, it's only one leg of the stool.

Meanwhile the only thing Congress has actually done lately is increase unfunded spending by getting rid of the Windfall Elimination Provision (as it happens I benefit from this). They also want to increase spending (proposed Social Security Expansion Act) without any real clear plans to pay for it. They are also trying to rename Full Retirement Age to Standard Benefit Age in a bid to nudge the population to work longer (proposed Claiming Age Clarity Act).

These people are so unserious.
 
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