Dec 18, 2018:

Feb 15, 2019:

I'd now like to add another 5% to that assessment.

When we were young nihilist ****heads my friend used to sing:



I'll put myself in timeout now.

Funny thing is that Yoko made that same sound two more times during the song. However, her mic was cut after the first time she did it so nobody heard her.

Speaking of blues

I'm more of a jazz guy, but I think there were no better Bluesmen than Howlin

I don't really feel like doing actual work today so let's post some more. I'm going to have to make a decision in a few months about pension vs. 401k. Once I decide there's no going back.

I'm 50. I could probably retire in 5 years if I want to as my post-retirement plans are very cheap.

In both scenarios I contribute about 7% of my salary and the university contributes about 8%.

If I leave before 5 years with the pension I get my 7% back but forfeit the 8%. 401k obviously I get to keep.

After 5 years, if I start withdrawing the pension immediately it's about $600/month. If I wait until I'm 65 to start collecting it's like 3x that.

If I stick around 10 years (which is hard to imagine) and start collecting immediately it's like $1800/month.

Both of those are at current rates not accounting for inflation - which is pegged to the average of the cost-of-living in SF and LA. Woot - that's a good peg. So assuming they'd be a chunk higher when I get to that point.

I currently weigh about 265 lbs and while I don't plan to be this fat forever, the reality I will probably not be one of those wiry still spry 90 year-olds. I'm built like a smallish offensive lineman from the 40s or something. I don't think my life expectancy is that long is what I'm trying to say.

So I'm going to assume that taking the pension payout as soon as possible is probably the best deal overall for me since I'm likely on the short side of the actuarial tables.

I currently have a decent chunk in a 401k, some more in home equity. So the idea of some guaranteed money over SS vs. more money that could be wiped out in a stock market/housing crash - appeals to me.

However I feel like there's a 50/50 shot I make it to 5 years. I think it's either 2 years or 5 years. Obviously I'm not likely to quit at 4 years in and one year until payday. So I'd be throwing away about $20k and change from their contribution if I left at 2 years.

Let's say I retire at 55. The breakeven for 5 years of 8% going into my 401k vs. pension at $600/month starting at 55 gonna be about 8-10 years. Assuming my 401k isn't wiped out.

I think 401k has to be the no-brainer here given my uncertainty. Really want that sweet sweet pension though.

The thing is that nobody particularly wanted it. It's miles from anywhere and had no obvious resources to exploit. The natives had nothing to trade. A colony would just be a burden for the colonizing power to support. It was only after the British decided they needed lebensraum for their criminals that Australia looked useful.

Haven't seen it. Burke and Wills were these yahoos who didn't have a lot of idea what they were doing, they were like those clueless people who go to Alaska with romantic ideas of living off the land. You can still go see the Dig Tree, if you're keen to drive hundreds of miles into the middle of nowhere to see a tree.

Claiming that about the late 90s seems odd. I'll ask my parents about it. The concept of being a citizen of Australia only became a thing in 1948 - prior to that people were just citizens of the British Empire - so I can imagine that attitudes were different in the 60s. I personally have a patrilineal ancestor sent here for murder and have never felt ashamed of it. Bryson isn't Australian and might have misinterpreted things; I'd expect the reaction to asking a room full of Australians about convict ancestry to generally be silence simply because most people have no idea if they have any or not.

I'd be interested if it is true because it's a bit contradictory; Australia was a frontier country and as such has a lot of founding myths which are similar to the Wild West, with a tendency to glorify outlaws. Ned Kelly is almost certainly the most widely-known historical story in Australia and he's generally seen as a folk hero/antihero.

Sounds interminable to me, but there are even some Australians who like doing that, so it's personal preference. I've never been on the Indian Pacific. I got the Ghan to Alice Springs once (it runs across the country north-south, from Adelaide to Darwin).

I would always lean pension because it eliminates the biggest risk with retirement, not knowing when you’ll die. Of course you can always buy an annuity but they tend to be terrible deals at current interest rates.

That's some **** I don't wanna think about yet.

I'm too young to think about dying.

Cool - I crave more crazy Aussie history stories. Ned Kelly has the OG hipster beard.

Breaker Morant and the Man From Snowy River were two of my favorite movies as a kid.

So it's a 50% shot at $20,000 vs a 50% shot at a $600 a month pension. So how much more is the 5 year pension worth over 5 years of 401k contributions? If it's 8% and 7% contribution, and 8% is 10k/year, you're looking at about 19k in contributions per year. At 6% real return, you're looking at that being worth 107k after 5 years. That's $357 dollars a month at a safe withdrawal rate of 4%.

OK. So the pension gets you an extra $243 a month after five years. The 20k you'd be risking would be 24k growing at 6% for three years, and that 24k would provide $75 a month of income at a safe withdrawal rate of 4%.

So given equal chances of making it five years or quitting after two, the pension is clearly better.

edit: ehhhhhh should probably add 30k of contributions to the 20k you'd be risking, as if you quit you'll probably be working somewhere else, and contributing to another 401k which would also have an employer match.

So you'd have 56k after five years which translates to an income of $185 a month. So the pension is still better but not as much.

Yeah but in one case I get the safe withdrawal and the principal. And in the other I just get the guaranteed payment.

How does it change the math if I expect to start drawing down the principal at some point? I'm not trying to go to my grave with $600k in the bank or whatever. Worst case scenario I drain it all down and live in Honduras on my SS. At that age (80+) I probably won't need to travel much anymore so I can live pretty cheap.

For reference I think I can live on $2500 a month in retirement. And some of that will eventually be covered by SS.

Although at 55 I will definitely still want to travel a lot, which gets expensive. But mostly I will go somewhere, buy a van and live in it - which is cheaper. It's flying back to the US to see friends and family that will get expensive.

If you value money say twice as much if you spend it at age 60 vs age 75 then the 401k becomes the clear winner.

Yeah I definitely feel like I can still enjoy a lot more things at 60.

Which is 10 ****ing years away.

Turning 50 suuuuuuucccks.

Ned Kelly is a great story. I skimmed the Wiki page and there's stuff that isn't even in there. For example, this detail is well known:

Unmentioned in the Wiki is that Barry died suddenly only 12 days later.

He's a good looking dude from that Wiki too. There should definitely be a movie.

Lol Johnny Football got kicked out of the CFL right while the world discovered his wife was one of the two fastest runners in the world.

https://deadspin.com/either-johnny-m...-re-1832967146

I don’t understand why you bother going to the finish line if you are going to do whatever they did.

To be fair it does sound like a cluster of a race.

NOT GUILTY!

If you read the rest of that Deadspin article you will find it to be FAKE NEWS

I highly recommend Bill Bryson's One Summer: America, 1927. Dude just has a knack for finding wild historical factoids.

Yeah I love him. I even really loved At Home which is basically just his oral history of domestic life in the age of the great manors in England and how all the stuff in our houses came to be.

My hope is to turn my travels into something like a Bryson-esque memoir. With pictures.

The Lost Continent: Travels in Small Town America is my favorite Bryson book.

The first feature-length narrative film in the world was a Ned Kelly movie. There have been a bunch of others. No good ones to my knowledge, though. There was one from 1970 where Ned Kelly was played by Mick Jagger (!!). Also one in 2003 starring Heath Ledger.