other interesting numbers for eremites?

[loutfard]

What other financial numbers than savings rate might be somewhat interesting for an eremite?

- lifetime labour earnings? Example. My good friend is in his late fourties. He has only ever earned about 80k€ in his life.
- lifetime labour versus financial capital earnings rate. Example. The same friend has had about 10k€ in a low yield emergency savings account for years. His lifetime nominal labour to financial capital earnings rate is about 800.
- lifetime labour income/months. He's thriving with only ~133€/month (80k€/600 months) in labour earnings since birth.
- others?

[Quadalupe]

Income Robustness score, see viewtopic.php?t=11914

[Chris]

Net Worth / Life Months Remaining

I find this can be motivating than just tracking monthly NW, since the declining denominator (life months) adds some sense of urgency.

[biaggio]

The usual numbers:
- Years (months) of annual (monthly) basic living expenses saved
- Share of basic living expenses covered by passive income (such as interests and dividends)
- Cost of working (if in employment): commute + clothes + stuff you wouldn't otherwise pay
- Fair market value of major stuff items (bikes, skis, car, book collection)
- Breakdown of expenses into basic (food, clothes, gas, ...), fixed (health insurance, rent, ...), extraordinary (flight tickets, travel, ...)
- Share of (annual) expenses that went into marketable stuff (for that year)

[jacob]

Spending/adult in the household reveals a lot about how far along someone has gotten on their ERE journey. Since situations may vary individually, it's more useful to compare spending over time. For example, eremites going from spending $60k/year to spending $10k/year as they progress up the WLs.

In that regard, a more fuzzy/guesstimated number would be:
"How much do my neighbors think I spend" divided by "How much do I actually spend"

This would be related to "skills of living", also see viewtopic.php?p=99322#p99322

[IlliniDave]

I don't know that this would have widespread benefit, but I always found it good to know how little I could live on and not feel that the availability of money was not a burdensome constraint, and also how much I thought I would like to have available to spend on an ongoing basis, and lastly to track what I was spending to see how it compared to those other numbers. I did a lot of experiments to help me arrive at those numbers and learned things like, yeah, I can spend this little for a year but imagining doing the same for 20 years or more is not appealing. And conversely, spending a large amount of money for a month or two is fun, but after a while it starts to feel a little gross (i.e., feels wasteful to my temperament). Then those numbers can be used to track progress in all the same ways it's done for a more notional future expense level, it's just some numbers with visceral connections rather than purely intellectual.

Another one I kept, and still keep though don't use, is what I call a cash out net worth. How much could I raise by selling everything at quick sale prices, paying all applicable taxes (significant for someone who has a lot in traditional IRAs and 401ks), and plop it in a deposit account (or hide under a mattress, or buy gold with, or whatever). I don't know how much good it did me other than keeping me from getting too enamored with the numbers resulting from a standard personal finance textbook net worth calculation.

[Laura Ingalls]

In that regard, a more fuzzy/guesstimated number would be:
"How much do my neighbors think I spend" divided by "How much do I actually spend.”

I think this number causes us relational problems sometimes. People say things like “I wish I could afford to do that.” when their current life costs many multiples of ours. And if they went to the places we do they would still spend several times what we do.

[Frita]

I think this number causes us relational problems sometimes. People say things like “I wish I could afford to do that.” when their current life costs many multiples of ours. And if they went to the places we do they would still spend several times what we do.

There’s the WL difference right there. People who are more black-and-white see difference as divisive rather than a prompt to consider learning something, so the relational friction results.

[Stasher]

This would be related to "skills of living", also see viewtopic.php?p=99322#p99322

Thank-you very much @jacob for always referencing other posts you have made in the past here on the forums, like this one here they always provide great ERE insight.

I think the key number to reflect on for me is how much longer we have left in a healthy state to enjoy our best years. Now this is more important on say the MMM forums where the "one more year syndrome" is a bigger concern, ERE types tend to already know that working more is just to feed excessive consumerism.

So with that I really appreciate this calculator > Rich, Broke or Dead?
https://engaging-data.com/will-money-last-retire-early/

Hopefully this is interesting data for EREmites. For example when plugging my age (just over 50) and my investments into that calculator, I have 25% chance of having 5x more money than when I started at age 70 but also have a 22% chance of being dead. Food for thought.

[biaggio]

Thank-you very much @jacob for always referencing other posts you have made in the past here on the forums, like this one here they always provide great ERE insight.

I think the key number to reflect on for me is how much longer we have left in a healthy state to enjoy our best years. Now this is more important on say the MMM forums where the "one more year syndrome" is a bigger concern, ERE types tend to already know that working more is just to feed excessive consumerism.

So with that I really appreciate this calculator > Rich, Broke or Dead?
https://engaging-data.com/will-money-last-retire-early/

Hopefully this is interesting data for EREmites. For example when plugging my age (just over 50) and my investments into that calculator, I have 25% chance of having 5x more money than when I started at age 70 but also have a 22% chance of being dead. Food for thought.

Yes this is a good one:
- Number of healthy years left (*)

(*) For me this is one of (vector) tagets in ERE that points in roughly similar direction as other targets. When added up these all move you in the desired general direction (they do not cancel each other out). Pursuing ERE (for me) enables lifestyle (more exercise, less stress, mental well being) that increases number of healthy years. This ties in to the web of goals idea.