Retirement?

The other thing is that out of hundreds of people, someone is likely to be doing something interesting at a given moment. She also has a best friend from college who travels quite a bit - often for work - and posts about it non-stop. She even shares the years old photos that pop up again.

 

Yes. You see it all the time where I live, which is a hotbed of conspicuous consumption. People with above-average (but by no means lavish) incomes see how the wealthy live and aren't happy unless they have a new Mercedes/BMW/Lexus/Infiniti/Jaguar and a boat, not to mention expensive vacations, Botox injections and plastic surgery. And most, if not all, is bought on credit.

It's the reason many residents of this area who outearn me by a considerable margin will be working into their 70s.

 

We've got my grad school debt, which is about to get cleared in the next month!
Which is awesome.

 

A few months ago one of my Facebook friends posted about how his car's transmission went out and he "has to get a new car."

I said, "just get the transmission replaced. I got mine replaced last year." He asked what it cost. I told him.

Two days later he posts photo on Facebook . . . of his new car.

 

You always have one. It's your thumb.

 

I doubt you're doing anything wrong. You just don't know the full (or even close to the full) story of those other people. Switching to regular milk and fruits and vegetables ain't buying a new car or a trip to Europe. But scrounging up a mommy or daddy who'll fork over $20K or $30K a year will.

My best friend's a financial advisor/stock broker (he's the real deal with the series this and series that). I'm sure he makes a pretty good living. But he spots his kids A TON of money every year. None of his three kids (two are grown, and one of those is married with a child) has ever paid for car insurance. None has ever paid for cell phone service. The oldest, a teacher married to another teacher, is constantly hitting him up for this or that fairly major expense (Tires! Exterminator!). If their friends, who are living within their means, are comparison shopping, they're asking, "What are we doing wrong? How can they afford that?" But the reason they can afford such is because old FriendOfQuant is back in Arlington keeping the whole show afloat.

 

Mrs. Whitman speculates the same. I guess that does go on. It's another universe to me. My mom spoils our kids a little too much, but this year I think I got a $150 gift card to Dick's from her for Christmas, and she shouldn't have.

 

When my dad died, I think my brother and I each received $10,000 from his life insurance policy. We had to talk through whether we were comfortable accepting it.

 

Considering I don't think I've ever discussed free trade agreements, retirement funding or regulation at any length here and that my thoughts on all of those topics is fairly nuanced, I find that interesting.

 

Why?

 

Whew! At least you don't find it lacking in thoughtfulness!

 

Because we thought maybe our mom could use it.

And I guess it just felt weird, something good coming out of something bad.