Comments on: Are we qualitatively different?

By: Jacob

Jacob — Sat, 06 Sep 2008 00:37:15 +0000

@kd – This is actually highly useful. I try to compare myself with those who are the best in their field to give me an idea of what can be done and what is possible. I agree it is not very useful (to me) to compare myself to people that are doing slightly better or slightly worse than me. I can’t learn anything from that.

By: TightFistedMiser

TightFistedMiser — Fri, 05 Sep 2008 19:12:06 +0000

I just posted something along the same line before reading this. My idea was to compare how much people save for retirement by what percentage of their income above the federal poverty level they save. To me this seems to make a better comparison.

By: kd

kd — Fri, 05 Sep 2008 16:40:56 +0000

I don’t really see a need to compare people.

By: Debbie M

Debbie M — Fri, 05 Sep 2008 15:43:02 +0000

I think there are various overall ways to categorize people based on things like their incomes or costs of living. But I like to think that people don’t necessarily match up across-the-board in their spending styles.

For example, I spend less than average on housing, transportation, and clothing so that I can spend more than average on vacations and retirement savings. So I’d like to see differentiations within different spending categories. Like transportation could have levels like walking, buses/bikes/canoes, cheap car or car sharing, new car (or perhaps motor boat, for island dwellers), multiple cars, and jet/helicoptor. And each one of these can vary based on outside factors. For example, I claim to spend a below-average amount on transportation, but that’s only compared to other people near me where our public transportation is mediocre at best. Compared to the average person in New York City, who probably doesn’t have a car, I spend much more on transportation.

What the actual categories should be is another question. Housing, food/supplies, clothing/grooming, and transportation are probably the big ones. Insurance, savings, and hobbies (including vacations) are probably big for people who make enough money for these to be possibilities.

By: Canadian Dream

Canadian Dream — Fri, 05 Sep 2008 15:33:39 +0000

Excellent post!

It does make sense to look at the class of people involved and general lifestyle assumptions. I would say FT and myself are just your usual ER type class.

While yourself is XER class, so comparing the two doesn’t work. The baseline is completely different.

Thanks for the link,
Tim