7Wannabe5 wrote: ↑Tue Sep 14, 2021 5:47 pm
Might just be semantics, but I can’t see how savings and investments are not in the realm of Have.
I do think it is a case of semantics + a case of how investments are framed. The FIRE mechanism goes via the market but the point of the FIRE exercise is not to
have 10000 shares in XYZ. Nor is it to build a portfolio or a collection of securities that one may enjoy or proudly display or somehow seek to own. This is perhaps easier to accept when cast in the framework of annuities. Once the money is handed over, it is no longer yours---rather you now have the promise of a lifetime income that gives the you the time do, be, or see.
Compare that to having a granite counter top. One can
do cooking on any countertop, but some just like to have one made out of polished rock. Insofar one wants financial independence one has to have a cashflow ... but the point is not to have a specific set of gold-plated stock certificates...
Not much different than one has to have some clothes to put on in order to travel and
see the world. This does not mean that traveling is about having just because one has to be dressed and
have some clothes. Similarly jumping out of airplanes is not about
having a parachute. FI is the same---it's not about the portfolio even though the graphs in the journals can often make it look like that. I don't see this as a strawman argument.
I guess the point is
which one is the main why? Is having the primary motivation (goal) or just a necessary subgoal?
For example, FIRE "fails" when people have been pursuing FI as simply something they have like a "millionaire-status" or "FI-status" achievement award... these guys keep working to get richer and richer. They want to have money because they like money but do not desire to use it for "doing", "seeing", or "being".