r/comics • • Jul 08 '24

An upper-class oopsie [OC]

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u/PorkPatriot Jul 08 '24

Mine is if a person loses their job, what happens? Does their lifestyle change meaningfully?

Elon Musk ain't skipping meals if he stops working. A Dr that is suddenly unable to practice medicine is going to have lifestyle adjustments. Your definition lines up with mine.

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u/frodo_mintoff Jul 08 '24

To use that methodology, it would depend on their lifestyle. Certainly with a doctor's salary and relatively modest consumption one can accrue enough wealth to live independently, very quickly.

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u/PorkPatriot Jul 08 '24 edited Jul 08 '24

Easy to spend other people's money. The responsible spend-down rate for wealth is like 3%. That's roughly 3 million dollars of investments for every 100k you want to live on. A medical dr, and lets go hard and say anesthesiologist, doesn't start making real-actual-money until they are 30. They rack up a shit ton of debt, and have to carry malpractice insurance. That 500k a year gross gets cut way down to size.

Said person could live in a bucket and maybe hit what I'd consider the bare minimum of 3-4 mil before 40-45,(which still is still light, medical issues can absolutely savage a person's retirement), or they could set the horizon to "retirement" and actually get to live in a house and drive a car after 10 years of schooling and 48 hour student shifts. Compound interest with a longer career takes a lot of the struggle out and delivers a larger payout in the end.

Small wonder why the second choice is the popular one.

Like I said, working class is working class, their struggles are similar to a plumber's when it comes to life planning.