If you're new here, this blog will give you the tools to become financially independent in 5 years on a median salary. The wiki page gives a good summary of the principles of the strategy. The key to success is to run your personal finances much like a business, thinking about assets and inventory and focusing on efficiency and value for money. Not just any business but a business that's flexible, agile, and adaptable. Conversely most consumers run their personal finances like an inflexible money-losing anti-business always in danger of losing their jobs.
Here's almost a thousand online journals from people, who are following the ERE strategy tailored to their particular situation (age, children, location, education, goals, ...). Increasing their savings from the usual 5-15% of their income to tens of thousands of dollars each year or typically 40-80% of their income, many accumulate six-figure net-worths within a few years.
Since everybody's situation is different (age, education, location, children, goals, ...) I suggest only spending a brief moment on this blog, which can be thought of as my personal journal, before looking for the crowd's wisdom for your particular situation in the forum journals.
If you enjoy the blog, also consider the book which is much better organized and more complete. You can read the first chapter for free, listen to the preamble, or see the reviews (1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9, A,B,C,D,E,F,G,H,I,J,K,L,M,N,O,P,Q,R,S,T,U,V,W,Z). Subscribe to the blog via email or RSS. Get updates on the facebook page, join the forums, and look for tactics on the ERE wiki. Here's a list of all the ERE blog posts.
Today’s episode of The Survival Podcast discusses consumerism and how companies are intentionally designing products to be faddish and break down in order to maximize profit. He also mentions the ERE book in the beginning.
For those who are coming over from from the podcast, let me say that the kind of everyday-survivalism Jack talks about and ERE has a lot in common. If you have a wide array of self-reliant skills and have chosen to live debt-free (no bills, no car payments, no mortgage or rent <15% of your income) you could be in a position of saving a lot of your income. If you ignore the standard advice to save 10-15% of your income in your 401k (this figure is based on people working until they're 65 and rather optimistic stock market returns which I don't think we can count on for the next 10-20 years), and instead save 50% of your income by relying more on yourself than walmart for your needs, you could retire at 40-50 years old---presuming you're 25 and start with nothing. If you save 75% you could retire, that is, have the option to no longer work for a living, within a decade.
See more in the menu bar above: About ERE, Frequently Asked Questions, etc.
