John D.

Comments:

• I live in the boonies (foothills of the Sierra) and the 90 foot cedars/pines/firs are wonderful to live amongst. However, my internet is 10Mbps (yes, you read that right...10Mbps) for which I pay $191.95/mth and that's after I paid a guy $100 to climb 60 feet up a tree to install a directional antenna. I'm considering Musk's system. Does anyone have any yeas/nays to say about Musk?

  Post: Favoring Fiber

  Link to comment from June 22, 2024

• California politics and taxes suck, but the weather and recreational opportunities are the best that we've found after 20 years of travel with the military. Born in the midwest (Missouri and Illinois), it wasn't hard to find better weather. Living in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada mountain range two hours from the ocean and an hour from snow skiing and Tahoe is our ideal. Jonathan is an excellent writer and nailed it with his Financial contentment paragraph. John Deam

  Post: Retire Is a Verb

  Link to comment from January 28, 2023

• I too, was a big saver - 401, 459, IRA, etc. So much so that I stupidly didn't factor in how all those paycheck deductions which lowered my "take home" pay would affect my retirement income. So I started SS at FRA. Wish I hadn't because my income w/o SS was more than adequate. What's not addressed in most comments is the future viability of the SS system. I strongly suspect that w/i 6-9 years, the pinheads under the capitol dome will formulate some kind of "means test" for collecting SS. Total individual assets will be looked at and those of us who have done without some things/vacations in order to save more will forfeit a portion of our SS in order for those with less foresight haven't saved. It's the socialistic solution to Aesop's Ant and Grasshopper fable. Therefore, I recommend to those about to retire: TAKE IT AT THE FIRST OPPORTUNITY.

  Post: Eyeing the Cake

  Link to comment from August 13, 2022

• VERY good writer; especially for an engineer. Every investor has made some mistakes. I'll always remember the tidbit about how to "make a small fortune in commodities futures": start with a large fortune. Palladium was good to me in the '80s when catalytic converters were new, but orange juice wiped out those gains. Although I never bit on ENRON, I did on GE when the CEO -Jeff Immelt- said unequivocally on the Cramer show that the 12.8% dividend was "secure". Five days later GE cut it to near zero. The upshot is that now I follow statistics and sleep better. Hulbert's analysis convinced me to go into index funds from November to May and to cash the other 6 months. It's worked out pretty well over the last 20+ years....although I've missed a few upsides, I've also missed the majority of downsides and sleep much more soundly.

  Post: Learning by Erring

  Link to comment from July 2, 2022

• After being drafted into our military (on my university graduation day), it didn't take many years before I realized what a great pension I'd have if I stayed 20 yrs. While it's not the life for everyone, the camaraderie in the military far outweighs anything I've experienced in subsequent employment. And behavioral economics should be a required course in all high schools. Nudge by Thaler and Sustein should be required readding.

  Post: Smooth Moves

  Link to comment from June 8, 2022