HN user
Oh, and if anyone would like a version of the formulas that work when you already have an amount invested, I'll put them here too:
C = Your current amount of savings invested or available to invest
X = (T - C * (1 + R)^N) * R / ((1 + R)^N - 1)
N = log(base 1 + R) ((T * R + X) / (C * R + X)) = ln((T * R + X) / (C * R + X)) / ln(1 + R)
The others have given you some good advice on techniques (Live Cheaply + Earn Well + Boring Stock Index Investments) but I'll throw some maths at you that you might find helpful.
There's a handy little formula that you can play around with in order to work out a suitable target and savings timeline. Although it ignores the stochastic nature of stock markets by assuming a constant return, it's a good ballpark figure, especially if you use conservative estimates for things.
X = The amount you will need to save and invest each year until retirement
T = Your target amount (Between 25 to 30 times your desired living expenses in retirement - See the Trinity Study and the 4% rule)
R = The expected rate of return after inflation
N = Number of years until you want to retire
X = T * R / ((1 + R)^N - 1)
Assuming a relatively conservative rate of return like 0.04, and a modest but liveable target of $500,000 in 10 years:
X = 500,000 * 0.04 / (1.04^10 - 1)) = $41,645
If you can keep your living expenses low, that could potentially be done on an $80,000 or $90,000 salary. Notice that your current age does not factor in this formula, only the number of years until you'd like to retire. Now obviously, if you'd started at say 28, you could retire at your current age with the same savings amount, or take the full 20 years but only have to save $16,791 each year, but overall, you'll be fine getting started right now.
You can also flip the formula around to work out how long it would take on a particular savings target:
N = log(base 1 + R) ((T * R) / X + 1)
Your calculator might only have ln, so you can just divide by ln(1 + R) in order to get the same thing:
N = ln((T * R) / X + 1) / ln(1 + R)
Like before:
N = ln((500,000 * 0.04) / 41,645 + 1) / ln(1.04) = 10 years
Play around with those numbers and you should be able to find a plan that feels attainable, even on a relatively modest income compared to some thrown around here. In all likelihood, you'll end up exceeding your savings target as you pick up a few salary increases along the way. And if you can save especially hard in the first couple of years, those early investments will put you ahead of schedule which gives you flexibility later on.
One more thing... On decade or shorter timescales, the rate of return doesn't really matter that much. That said, you'll need to invest your savings by the time you retire, so may as well get comfortable with it now - just keep it nice and boring.
Fingers crossed I've written those formulas correctly and that they are clear enough. Hope that it all helps!
Just wanted to say a huge thanks to everyone for sharing their thoughts and stories here. Definitely a lot of food-for-thought in regards to how one can find a better balance in regards to their technology usage.
If I were to summarise, I'd say that the overarching theme (and there may be some selection bias here) is that while it is impossible to disconnect completely and indefinitely, there is clear value is doing it from time-to-time in order to step back and recontextualize one's relationship with technology - whether that is through travel, religious practice, external circumstances or a purposeful choice to limit tech usage.
Will definitely be trying a few of the suggested strategies in the short-term to cut back on distractions, but I'm keen to see if I can "engineer" a more long-term break from my phone and computer in the near future.
Thanks for the discussion HN!
Some good practical tips here, thank you for your response. I've been reading through James Clear's Atomic Habits recently and one of his core ideas is that one should try to make good habits easy to do and bad habits hard to do. Convenience of technology has definitely become a double-edged sword in a lot of ways.
For me personally, HN is definitely a focus-stealer (I think I have at least 100 HN tabs open currently, that I really should just go and close). It's a tricky one, because I get a lot of value from it, but I guess that value is diminishing if I'm checking up on things every hour or so. I imagine those who've gone full cold-turkey on HN aren't here to comment, but I'll assume they've found benefit from that. Might have to start DNS blocking this one for a while and see what happens.
I did the friend unfollow trick on Facebook a few years back now, and definitely noticed the happiness benefits straight away, but still often catch myself clicking through random profiles when I do have to travel there.
To your point on convenience, I'm often frustrated by how easy it is to type 'yc' or 'fa' into the search bar in a moment of weakness, and then go down the rabbit-hole of distraction for hours. Obviously, a responsive search bar is an immensely useful feature for a web browser to have but this convenience does often make it easier to do something that is not in one's overall interest.
Yeah the 80s are definitely outside of my frame of reference, growing up in the 90s alongside the growth of household computers and the internet, living with technology has been the baseline for me. It's interesting to hear the experience of those who grew up on the other side of that divide and have an insight into both of those worlds.
It feels to me that the screen almost becomes perception after heavy usage. Like navigating a device and the apps within it becomes just another part of the world that we can interact with. And when we use a device we can go almost instantly from a thought to executing that thought by opening an app, making a google search etc. So it's almost as if the fact that things "lag" in the physical world, that it requires us to move and force things and use energy to action things is a positive. That friction between thought and outcome maybe is something that we need.
Yeah it seems like backpacking is a great opportunity to do a bit of reset in terms of technology, limiting it to those essential logistical tasks, but allowing one to get the majority of their social and experiential needs fulfilled in the physical world.
Do you think if you were to do the same trip today (let's assume no covid nonsense) you would use the same balance of technology, or do you think that things have become much more integrated over the last decade?
Thank you for sharing this one, I agree with you that we should be able to discuss ideas on their own merits. I'm only vaguely familiar with Kaczynski's philosophy and his actions, but I look forward to giving this a read over the next 24 hours.
Just looking over the introduction, certainly some strong beliefs there, but it does resonate to some degree. It does feel like this rejection of all-encompassing technological progress in favour of simpler human living is present in a number of modern movements. Things like minimalism, mindfulness and paleo diets spring to mind. But then again, maybe these are all manufactured and part of that same technological/industrial/consumerist wave.
It often feels like I switch on my phone or computer and they are instantly steering my attention towards things which I did not intend and which my simple human mind is too weak to fight against. In an ideal world there'd perhaps exist an OS or browser which has been designed with human weaknesses in mind, something to help one direct their attention to what they initially wanted, and to put walls up where one's attention is likely to spill out into mindless consumption. But it does seem like the world is currently structured in a way that technology is incentivized to give us an overwhelming kind of freedom, both in the sense that one is free to easily give in to personal weaknesses, and also in the sense that corporations are free to prey on these weaknesses.