How to retire early, even with 2 kids! Blah blah blah...

[lludwig]

Overall I agree with the message though critical of one part.

You mention about survivor bias of 401(k)/slow lane retirees, which I agree. It's horrible.

Though you can say the same about small biz owners making a decent income, or like me who sold their business in 10 years.

Most don't.

Yes it's true you have more control when of owning your own business and can control your destiny. Though many individuals fail at business ownership and have a worse success rate than say putting money in their 401(k).

When I first started in business I thought anyone can and should start a business. Over the years I've come to realize it definitely takes a certain about of "chutzpah" to start and more importantly skills which many lack. I'm not suggesting people shouldn't start a business but to "go big or go home". Just some aren't cut out for it and may never be.

I guess what I'm saying some shouldn't even try to go the Fast Lane and accept mediocrity, because they just can't do it. It's not their lot/purpose in life. No different than me trying to become a professional ballplayer.

It just ain't happening.

 

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[The Abundant Man]

I guess what I'm saying some shouldn't even try to go the Fast Lane and accept mediocrity, because they just can't do it. It's not their lot/purpose in life. No different than me trying to become a professional ballplayer.

It just ain't happening.

How do you know it's not for you if you don't try at first?

 

[lludwig]

How do you know it's not for you if you don't try at first?

Yea I agree there's no way to really know. Unfortunately, there's no "if you do this as a career this is your best outcome" crystal ball.

 

[The Abundant Man]

View attachment 21032



I can't remember, I think 170,000 words. TMF was 120,000.

 

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[MJ DeMarco]

there is only so much you can trim from the bottom line before you have to think about increasing the top line too (which you should be thinking about anyway).

Yup, the game is WON on offense, maintained and preserved by defense.

You mention about survivor bias of 401(k)/slow lane retirees, which I agree. It's horrible.

Though you can say the same about small biz owners making a decent income, or like me who sold their business in 10 years.

Most don't.

Absolutely. Which is why I wrote 2 books about increasing your probabilities for making it happen, and going beyond the old "90% of all new businesses fail."

If you steer people into the right opportunities (ones that have CENTS components) odds go up.

If the failure rate for both options was 70% (slowlane v fastlane), which is the better route to take? One pays millions in old age, the other pays millions and freedom in youth.

 

[MAB1138]

One of my personal favorites was David Bach's The Automatic Millionaire. He relied heavily on "the latte factor" saying that you should take the money you spend on frivolous things like a daily latte and invest it in your 401k. In 20-30 years you'd be a millionaire!

He called it the magic of compounding interest. It smelled a lot like just keeping up with inflation to me.

A million dollars in your 401k 20 years from now will be the equivalent of a middle class income. Nothing wrong with that, but certainly not what people picture when they hear "millionaire."

Sent from my VS995 using Tapatalk

 

[lludwig]

If you steer people into the right opportunities (ones that have CENTS components) odds go up.

Yes I agree. It's opportunities, it is skills, with a dash of luck added in. I guess what I'm saying is skills (the execution) is where most fail. I don't expect your books to answer that specifically, but it's a real problem.

If the failure rate for both options was 70% (slowlane v fastlane), which is the better route to take? One pays millions in old age, the other pays millions and freedom in youth.

Well in my case you know the obvious answer ;-)

 

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[lludwig]

I originally had much more content on Investor Junkie to talk about business ownership.

I consider investing to be much more holistic and should include business ownership. Unfortunately, most of the readers I had didn't think that way.

The problem was my audience wanted more slowlane topics, so I removed most discussion of it on the website. They had no interest in owning a business.

They were looking for what they considered the "fastlane" to success. Optimization of what they currently were doing and knew.

The fact remains while entrepreneurs are glorified in the media (ie Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg, etc..), the stats show otherwise. I don't know if this stat still holds true today from 2014, but at the time less new businesses were being created than the amount being shut down. The trend overall is bleak. :-(

Where are all the startups? U.S. entrepreneurship near 40-year low

On a whole Millenials don't want to take the risk of business ownership. Could it be because of political reasons (ie more socialistic and capitalism is a dirty word), amount of debt, or just the red-tape of regulations? Who knows but I'm very saddened by this trend.

I do think sites like this should be used and small business owners. Go out and get all the help you need, as they are becoming a rare breed. Their success rate should be increased as much as possible.

Perhaps my next business venture will go off into this area exclusively to help other fellow small business owners.

 

[garyfritz]

Mind you he lives in Colorado. He isn't biking in the winter!

Don't be too sure! I live in Colorado, and I know guys who ride year-round. Back when I worked for Hewlett-Packard I knew one guy who rode his bike to work, 5 days/week all year long -- and he lived 15 miles from work.

When I first started in business I thought anyone can and should start a business. Over the years I've come to realize it definitely takes a certain about of "chutzpah" to start and more importantly skills which many lack. I'm not suggesting people shouldn't start a business but to "go big or go home". Just some aren't cut out for it and may never be.

Sadly, I agree 100%. I totally agree about the survivorship bias in entrepreneurship -- not everybody is going to succeed like MJ, or even at all. A lot of people will throw a lot of time effort money at it, and go nowhere.

And some aren't cut out for it. I suspect I fall into that camp. My mild ADD tendencies make it very challenging for me to be productive on the simple contract work I do, let alone trying to stay hyper-productive and laser-focused on birthing a business.

Especially now that I'm in my 60's with less fire & sass than I had decades ago, I don't have the limitless energy a true entrepreneur needs to draw on sometimes. Given my challenges, I really don't think trying to start a business is a good risk for me.

 

[The Abundant Man]

This reminds me of the Austin Powers movies.

In the first movie they unfreeze Dr. Evil. He tells the world council that he wants $1 million or he'll blow up the world. They all start laughing at him. #2 tells him that a million dollars means nothing in the present day.

Same things happens in the second and third movies. Though when he finally says that he wants a kazillion dollars they oblige by his demands.

 

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