kudokatz (u/kudokatz)

kudokatz commented on Create value for others and don’t worry about the returns geohot.github.io//blog/je... · Posted by u/ppew

avaer · 3 days ago

It's easy to create value for others and not worry about returns when you have enough money to not worry.

Unfortunately for most people, there's plenty of companies willing to take the returns and leave you paycheck to paycheck. That's literally what they are optimized to do.

I don't even disagree with the ideal, but I think a prerequisite step to this philosophy is UBI.

kudokatz · 3 days ago

> when you have enough money to not worry. Unfortunately for most people ... paycheck to paycheck

This is some truth to this argument, but the frequency with which it's brought out as an excuse to just dismiss any argument one doesn't like is too high in North America.

Simply bashing every argument with, "but some people are in a bad situation" doesn't really further discussion all that much.

kudokatz commented on India's top court angry after junior judge cites fake AI-generated orders bbc.com/news/articles/c17... · Posted by u/tchalla

blackoil · 11 days ago

> You can make humans more productive

If productivity is 10x unless work increases 10x jobs will be gone.

kudokatz · 11 days ago

In about 1930, Keynes wrote "Economic Possibilities for our Grandchildren" [1] wherein he wrote:

"I believe that this is a wildly mistaken interpretation of what is happening to us.

We are suffering, not from the rheumatics of old age, but from the growing-pains of over-rapid changes, from the painfulness of readjustment between one economic period and another. The increase of technical efficiency has been taking place faster than we can deal with the problem of labour absorption; the improvement in the standard of life has been a little too quick ...

We are being afflicted with a new disease of which some readers may not yet have heard the name, but of which they will hear a great deal in the years to come--namely, technological unemployment. This means unemployment due to our discovery of means of economising the use of labour outrunning the pace at which we can find new uses for labour."

While there's no guarantee that what Smith got wrong then is the same as now, it can be a reasonable outcome that "the jobs" won't just disappear.

----

Keynes also speculated on what to do with newfound time as a result of investment returns on the back of productivity [1]:

"Let us, for the sake of argument, suppose that a hundred years hence we are all of us, on the average, eight times better off in the economic sense than we are to-day. Assuredly there need be nothing here to surprise us ... Thus for the first time since his creation man will be faced with his real, his permanent problem-how to use his freedom from pressing economic cares, how to occupy the leisure, which science and compound interest will have won for him, to live wisely and agreeably and well."

The modern FIRE movement shows that living at a dated "standard of living" for 10-15 years can free one from work forever. Yet that's not what most people do today. I would suggest that there are deeper aspects of human drive, psychology, and varying concepts of "morality" that are actually bigger factors in what happens to "jobs".

[1] http://www.econ.yale.edu/smith/econ116a/keynes1.pdf

kudokatz commented on Apple Intelligence for iPhone, iPad, and Mac apple.com/newsroom/2024/0... · Posted by u/terramex

xethos · 2 years ago

People will scoff and say "Yeah, but all kinds of companies have internal firewalls, big deal". But no, these were literal walls that would appear over a weekend and suddenly part of the campus was off-limits to those not on the iPhone project.

kudokatz · 2 years ago

I heard they did this for the Amazon Fire Phone, too

kudokatz commented on You won't find a technical co-founder breakneck.dev/blog/no-tec... · Posted by u/vyrotek

iamcurious · 2 years ago

I really liked the list, probably cause my resume kinda fits and as a true generalist, my resume rarely fits anything.

It is true that working for free is bonkers. Priority number 1 is always rent, at minimum cover that so that business is priority 1.

kudokatz · 2 years ago

> It is true that working for free is bonkers. Priority number 1 is always rent, at minimum cover that so that business is priority 1.

You can work "for free" if investments cover all your basics ... so only bonkers under the assumption that you haven't taken care of your basics already.

kudokatz commented on How to Start Google paulgraham.com/google.htm... · Posted by u/harscoat

ojbyrne · 2 years ago

Actually I just looked at my last year at a FAANG in California. I earned about $370 K (including 401K match). $135 K went to taxes (Federal, Social Security, Medicare, State).

If I save absolutely everything left ($235 K) for 10 years that gets me to 2.35 million.

The parent post mentioned saving $2-5 million. To get to $ 2 M I have to live off $35 K a year (I realize I'm ignoring investment activities).

EDIT: additionally to minimize taxation you’re probably doing some of that savings in a 401k. Let’s say $25k * 10 year (I was). But that actually creates a deferred tax obligation. Let’s say the tax rate you pay that at is 20% (very optimistic but by the time you pay it you’ll likely be used to living below the poverty line). That takes you down to $30k a year. Actually even worse the employer match is taxable when you withdraw it, so another deferred tax obligation means that to get to $2M (accounting for future tax obligations) in 10 years you need to live on $25K a year.

That seems challenging in Northern California. Also why would I want to do that? - living at that spending level is likely to affect my long-term health and happiness, so the motivation is not clear to me.

kudokatz · 2 years ago

At $45,000/yr of expenses (do-able in SF), it'll take 7 years to have passive income from a stock+bond portfolio cover those expenses.

https://ibb.co/qyFz1C3

Of course, a bad market makes it longer, but the converse is also true: it's more likely a good market makes it shorter! (historically markets go up more than down, of course)

Add a spouse that also saves and invests, and you can have MORE than $45,000/yr of expenses covered within 7 years of earning at that rate. You can also back off to part time or have one spouse continue working after having kids, and all you need to do is cover SOME (not even all!) of your expenses.

> I want to do that? - living at that spending level is likely to affect my long-term health and happiness

The freedom of not dealing with "the cult of impact" [1] and other such silly things is amazing. Having a huge pile of money allows solid peace of mind in a way most people can't even conceive.

And finding out how much happiness you can get independently of spending money is truly eye-opening. Most people are too scared to even TRY finding fulfillment away from what society tells us is "fun".

[1] https://old.reddit.com/r/ExperiencedDevs/comments/1bh80wl/go...

kudokatz commented on How to Start Google paulgraham.com/google.htm... · Posted by u/harscoat

ojbyrne · 2 years ago

Actually I just looked at my last year at a FAANG in California. I earned about $370 K (including 401K match). $135 K went to taxes (Federal, Social Security, Medicare, State).

If I save absolutely everything left ($235 K) for 10 years that gets me to 2.35 million.

The parent post mentioned saving $2-5 million. To get to $ 2 M I have to live off $35 K a year (I realize I'm ignoring investment activities).

EDIT: additionally to minimize taxation you’re probably doing some of that savings in a 401k. Let’s say $25k * 10 year (I was). But that actually creates a deferred tax obligation. Let’s say the tax rate you pay that at is 20% (very optimistic but by the time you pay it you’ll likely be used to living below the poverty line). That takes you down to $30k a year. Actually even worse the employer match is taxable when you withdraw it, so another deferred tax obligation means that to get to $2M (accounting for future tax obligations) in 10 years you need to live on $25K a year.

That seems challenging in Northern California. Also why would I want to do that? - living at that spending level is likely to affect my long-term health and happiness, so the motivation is not clear to me.

kudokatz · 2 years ago

> But that actually creates a deferred tax obligation. Let’s say the tax rate you pay that at is 20% (very optimistic

There are also ways to get at this money with almost no taxes paid later IF you are not working--look for "Roth IRA conversion ladder".

Also look into "Mega Backdoor Roth" for more tax sheltering.

> That seems challenging in Northern California

You don't have to retire to California. Just pay minimal costs while you're there. Many places in US are beautiful, have great infrastructure and health care, and don't cost as much.

And investment growth is a LOT; don't ignore it. And after just a few years of not working, unless you have a bad start you can probably live off of much more than the initial safe withdrawal rate.

kudokatz commented on How to Start Google paulgraham.com/google.htm... · Posted by u/harscoat

ojbyrne · 2 years ago

According to levels.fyi, E5 at Google gets you $385k TC annually. If you save a third of that (which is not easy) for 10 years you get to approximately $1.3 million. Maybe your investments get you above $2 million, but it would really depend on what decade that was. If you had the Great Recession in the middle of that, not so great.

If you think it is easy to save more than a third of your income, remember you’ll have a federal marginal tax rate of 35% or higher, will probably have to work onsite in a HCOL state, and unless you’re lucky enough to live in WA, a high state income tax. Yes you can shield some of your income via 401ks and Roths, but for the former you’re going to get taxed on withdrawal, and for the latter you get penalized if you touch it before you’re 59.5.

Now if you’re dual cogs with no kids, maybe. If you do have kids, you’re not retiring until long after ten years.

kudokatz · 2 years ago

> If you save a third of that (which is not easy)

This is very easy, actually. You just happen to like fancy things and houses, probably.

> Now if you’re dual cogs with no kids, maybe. If you do have kids, you’re not retiring until long after ten years.

I find it depressing that so many people use kids as an excuse to avoid facing their own problems with money and spending. Look deeper and you can find happiness with a lot less.

kudokatz commented on How to Start Google paulgraham.com/google.htm... · Posted by u/harscoat

rgmerk · 2 years ago

Hmmm. I don't know exactly what your personal financial circumstances are...but from what I understand salaries and benefits to be at Google, you're getting paid plenty, and it should be possible to save at least some of that. Do it for ten years, put it in a nice boring low-cost index fund, and watch the investment returns roll in, and you're looking at a pretty big nest egg by normal people standards.

kudokatz · 2 years ago

expected time to retirement is MUCH, MUCH higher at FAANG if you can save 50%+ of take-home pay after taxes.

kudokatz commented on How to Start Google paulgraham.com/google.htm... · Posted by u/harscoat

vundercind · 2 years ago

> maybe you can just say if you've got enough to pull $100,000/year, you're good on healthcare too.

You’ll be exposed to tens of thousands in risk per year on top of (low) tens of thousands in premiums per year for a family Exchange plan. You’ll be burning nearly half of that (and spending all your free time trying to keep hospitals and insurers taking even more) if one of you gets cancer—or, if it’s you who gets cancer, you better hope someone else can handle that.

You also can’t withdraw at as high a “safe rate” as people planning for an ordinary retirement at ~65 do, because your fund needs to last a lot longer despite inflation and such. $2m isn’t “retire at 35” (… or 45) money. It might be “take a big gamble and maybe get lucky… for a while” money. Or semi-retire money.

[edit] at constant 2% inflation (ha!) you need a very safe source of consistent (not average!) 6% returns to retire with 80,000/yr income on $2m, without eating into principal. Anything goes wrong (“whoops, ‘safe’ wasn’t as safe as I thought!” or “whoops, we had a year of 7% inflation and my investments didn’t benefit from that!”) and you can find yourself burning principal while your account value is already down. It won’t take a lot of that before $80k is no longer your safe-withdrawal amount. A couple such years and you may be back to work. 30+ years is a long time…

[edit edit] also damn under $10k max out of pocket on a family plan at the bronze level for $17k? I gotta get out of my shithole state. That’s better than our Gold plans (also our plans tend not to cover like 2/3 of area providers, which may include 100% of area specialists for certain situations)

kudokatz · 2 years ago

> You also can’t withdraw at as high a “safe rate” as people planning for an ordinary retirement at ~65 do

Solvable, including consideration of valuations via CAPE PE 10. Based on past data, the safe withdrawal rate (SWR) happens to be around 3.25-3.5% of assets to extend to a 60-year time horizon [1]

> at constant 2% inflation (ha!) you need a very safe source of consistent (not average!) 6% returns to retire with 80,000/yr income on $2m, without eating into principal.

For most of this research, "failure" constitutes running out of money. Preserving the initial portfolio value in inflation-adjusted terms can also be solved for. It takes the SWR closer to 2.8-3% for 60-year horizon with high equity valuation corrections.

> You’ll be exposed to tens of thousands in risk per year on top of (low) tens of thousands in premiums per year for a family Exchange plan.

Better to cap expenses and be ready to pay for it than live in fear. Save, invest, and move on with life.

> $2m isn’t “retire at 35” (… or 45) money. It might be “take a big gamble and maybe get lucky… for a while” money. Or semi-retire money.

Depends on how much money you need to spend every year to be happy. Sounds like you need a lot of it. For many, $2m would be fine, even with a very long time horizon. And if any problems crop up, there would be a 15-20 year warning during which a small income boost could top things up.

----

Things don't always have to be so gloomy.

[1] https://earlyretirementnow.com/2017/09/13/the-ultimate-guide...

kudokatz commented on I worked in Amazon HR and was disgusted at what I was seeing with PIP plans businessinsider.com/amazo... · Posted by u/cebert

bellgrove · 2 years ago

I completely agree. Plus, part of Amazon's candidate evaluation is to consider whether they are (or clearly have potential to be) better than 50% of your peers, as part of the hiring bar. Between that and stack-ranking/forced-attrition, even previously high-performing employees can one day find themselves on the chopping block.

kudokatz · 2 years ago

tl;dr: "You can't raise the bar if you can't pick the bar raisers. "

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21729619#21732841