Under the Yoke

Where are you and where are you going?
Post Reply
User avatar
fiby41
Posts: 1611
Joined: Tue Jan 13, 2015 8:09 am
Location: India
Contact:

Those that first honestly acquire wealth in due time attain happiness both in this world and in that to come.

Post by fiby41 »

LiberateMind wrote:
Fri Apr 09, 2021 2:03 am
For what scenario do you have that level of expenses saved?
Scenario #1: Living with parents until I'm 32 or
Scenario #2: Joining temple which is 11 km away or
Scenario #3: Living in any 1 of 2 flats 174 km away or
Scenario #4: Living in an eco-village 135 km north.
LiberateMind wrote:
Fri Apr 09, 2021 2:03 am
Is it possible to maintain the same level of expenses when living alone?
Only when cost of food (known) is less than that of rent (unknown.)

User avatar
fiby41
Posts: 1611
Joined: Tue Jan 13, 2015 8:09 am
Location: India
Contact:

Your servant's servant's servant's servant's servant's servant's servant's servant's servant, make me, my dear Kṛṣṇa

Post by fiby41 »

There are 4000 engineering colleges in India pumping out a million plus engineers a year. The IT sector employs 4.36 million people in India which is even lower than 4.6 million in USA.

Applying to jobs is like a full time job when every job that is put out gets 150+ applications.
After applying to 72 jobs here, 5 jobs there and n jobs everywhere else..

Have a 3 year job offer in hand that'll earn me 7.5 years of outflow working on something I know currently somewhat about. Future prospects after the 3 years would be the large companies employing lakh plus employees that use the same technology but reviews say and the offer letter implies that serving a notice period even after the 3 years is just a suggestion to the company and they take originals of many of your documents too.

5 days from the last date I have to answer above offer, I may or may not get another offer where the inflow over 4 years would be 20.5 years of outflow. It'd be a continuation of what I've been learning over the past 11 months.

To a third company I gave a quote equal to 3 months of outflow per month, for talking in Russian work, and they called me for an 'interview' which I suspect was an attempt to bid lower on me after they asked me if the salary was negotiable and I said yes.

All this in a weeks time after 17 months from when I first and last worked.

LiberateMind
Posts: 197
Joined: Fri Oct 26, 2012 8:18 pm

Re: Under the Yoke

Post by LiberateMind »

I would be vary of accepting any job where they ask for the originals. Good companies don't ask for it, they need your skills not a chain to fix with them.

User avatar
fiby41
Posts: 1611
Joined: Tue Jan 13, 2015 8:09 am
Location: India
Contact:

Interesting, part 2

Post by fiby41 »

Under section 80TTA of the Income Tax Act, interest income of upto ₹10k is deductable under 'income from other sources.' This is counted for the year in which it was earned. Most of my deposits are set to 'cumulative' such that I can get compound interest, so I'm annualizing them below to think about it:

₹3,868.67 & ₹3,538 per year until 11th and 12th months of 2022 respectively.
₹10,141 and ₹844.61 yearly per year until 7th month of 2024.
₹5,870.35 annually until 6th month of 2024.
₹4,125/year until 3/2024.

₹28387.63 in all. I had arranged my saving with seasonal freelance interpretation income in mind. If it wasn't for the ₹50k standard deduction under the old tax regime, I would have to pay TDS (tax deducted at source) whenever interest was credited and thus be in a taxtual mess.

User avatar
fiby41
Posts: 1611
Joined: Tue Jan 13, 2015 8:09 am
Location: India
Contact:

August 2021

Post by fiby41 »

In another city.
Savings rate for the month of August 91.56%.
Top three expenses are transportation, food and maintenance of clothes.
Took second dose of the vaccine yesterday.

User avatar
fiby41
Posts: 1611
Joined: Tue Jan 13, 2015 8:09 am
Location: India
Contact:

Under the Yoke for September 2021

Post by fiby41 »

Received August's transport allowance bumping that month's saving rate to 94.27% of net salary.
Obtained work from home permission for the latter half of September making this month's savings rate 96.75%.

High savings rate can be mainly attributed to employer providing breakfast, lunch, evening snacks and dinner along with tea/coffee twice on workdays and making stay arrangements without cutting house rent allowance.

User avatar
fiby41
Posts: 1611
Joined: Tue Jan 13, 2015 8:09 am
Location: India
Contact:

Under the Yoke for October 2021

Post by fiby41 »

Visited extended family last month reducing that month's savings to 94.26%.
Salary in September was 1.64% less than that of August on account of halfing of transport allowance due to working from home for 15 days.

Spent 1.06% of September's salary on train pass for the month of October. Same amount as a percent of October's salary would be 1.01% bumping October's projected savings rate to 98.99%. Mainly thanks to living with parents.

Round trip time to workplace yesterday was 3 hours 24 minutes + 8 hours at the workplace.
In previous city round trip time was less than 45 minutes and time at workplace was between 8 to 9 hours mainly due to leaving for work early at 7 am and socializing with colleagues when leaving.

Sitting in train for so long made me wonder what would have happened if I had joined another company 40 days before this one.
The notice period for than company was one month.
I received the two offers exactly 15 days apart. I could have joined the previous one and given notice and would've been 1 month richer as the take home salary for both was the same but the joining dates were 43 days apart. However, the previous one was WFH for the most part but the provident fund in the second is higher (which I've yet to receive.) Now I have a longer notice period and transport allowance is withheld if working from home. October would be the first month in which I'll receive full salary that was promised as I won't be working from home. Previous city was pleasant whereas this one is sweaty.

User avatar
fiby41
Posts: 1611
Joined: Tue Jan 13, 2015 8:09 am
Location: India
Contact:

Re: Under the Yoke

Post by fiby41 »

Crossed 1 TB data up/downloaded through present carrier recently.

User avatar
fiby41
Posts: 1611
Joined: Tue Jan 13, 2015 8:09 am
Location: India
Contact:

Tick tock, tick tock... That's the sound of your life running out...!

Post by fiby41 »

I have 15 years of expenses yet to save for.
I have saved 1 year of expenses in the previous 2 months.
If I don't get a promotion ever, I could retire in 2.5 years.
If I get a promotion next year but not in the year after that, I could retire in 2 years 1 month and 15 days.
If I get a promotion every year, I could retire in 2 years 22 days 4 hours and 48 minutes.

Assumption: I live with my parents or in one of their apartments forever/or live in a temple and never marry/have any dependents.

User avatar
Mister Imperceptible
Posts: 1669
Joined: Fri Nov 10, 2017 4:18 pm

Re: Under the Yoke

Post by Mister Imperceptible »

Beware of overfitting the models.

User avatar
fiby41
Posts: 1611
Joined: Tue Jan 13, 2015 8:09 am
Location: India
Contact:

Re: Under the Yoke

Post by fiby41 »

@Mister Imperceptible : Thanks for the warning/shining the headlights.

User avatar
Mister Imperceptible
Posts: 1669
Joined: Fri Nov 10, 2017 4:18 pm

Re: Under the Yoke

Post by Mister Imperceptible »

Maybe instead of living in your parent’s house or a temple, you could sell your body to a Western woman.

The borders are open right now. Get online and seduce somebody.

Stahlmann
Posts: 1121
Joined: Fri Sep 02, 2016 6:05 pm

Re: Under the Yoke

Post by Stahlmann »

I don't like competition :lol:

User avatar
fiby41
Posts: 1611
Joined: Tue Jan 13, 2015 8:09 am
Location: India
Contact:

Long Live the Motherland

Post by fiby41 »

Mother India has started receiving 24% of my base salary (12% employer and my contribution each) for the previous months.
Dunno if I should include this when calculating saving rate (I haven't), as I will be able to withdraw the amount saved in this way and the interest earned on it, within 2 months after quiting active employment /retiring.
Interest rate is 8.5% which was taxfree until this year, but would be taxable (for me) after saving like this for 3 years 1 month.
In general, I receive every month as compensation 6x to 10x monthly expenses (if going for barebones FI).

User avatar
fiby41
Posts: 1611
Joined: Tue Jan 13, 2015 8:09 am
Location: India
Contact:

Long Live the Motherland pt2

Post by fiby41 »

Savings rate for October 2021 was 0.63% lower than the predicted 98.99%. Actual savings rate came out to be 98.36%.

Income in October was 4.93% more than September and 3.24% more than August.

Many life decisions could be influenced by Mother India if I go along:

I can quit working anytime and be able to withdraw 75% after 1st month and remaining after the 2nd month.
Withdraw 50% of my (employee) contribution + interest for marriage after 7 years.
Withdraw 90% after turning 54/1 year before traditional retirement.
Withdraw 24x monthly salary for purchasing house after 5 years.
Withdraw 36x monthly salary for constructing house after 5 years.
Withdraw 6x monthly salary or all of my (employee) contribution tomorrow for a medical exigency.
Withdraw 90% for repaying home loan after 3 years.
Withdraw 12x monthly salary for renovating aforementioned house 5 years after its purchase/construction.

I'll be taxed at 10% if I withdraw before 5 years, none otherwise.

Savings rate for November would be considerably lower due to festivals and earmarking 9.11% for annual data subscription which I am postponing so as not to get sucked back in after working hours. Main benefit of working from office apart from a 9.87% 'raise' would be the 'free' internet.

User avatar
fiby41
Posts: 1611
Joined: Tue Jan 13, 2015 8:09 am
Location: India
Contact:

Pulling Strings

Post by fiby41 »

Checking lines of credit to see how much I could borrow. I've never borrowed from an institution so my CIBIL (credit) score is non-existent (I checked.) Cancelled the debit card that came with the salary account which had 5x the annual maintainance charge (AMC) after the first year than the one I've had for 5 years.
Applied somewhere for a 'forever free' credit card but the algorithm declared me unworthy instantly. 'Eligible' (=don't require) for 5 credit cards elsewhere, 3 of which have an annual fee, 1 gives cashback on spending on fuel, so basically useless (I travel by train.)
However, I could borrow 3x monthly salary at 15% interest as overdraft or
I could borrow 6x monthly salary for a 2-wheeler loan at 17% interest or
a Personal loan at 10.25% interest or
a Home Loan at 6.7% interest or...

Income has plateaued and will remain constant for the next 9 months unless I hustle on the side.

All of my employer's revenue is generated from inside the country so I've a clear conscience from knowing that I am not taking away a job from someone else in another country.

Bought oranges yesterday at two rupees a pop. Before that, bought sandalwood incense sticks at 50 paise/stick. Paid same amount for both and both were from vendors who come in the train to sell their wares. For the latter, the vendor was saying ₹10 a packet with the number of incense sticks inside a packet unknown. I took a packet to examine it and gave him ₹20 and asked for two as I didn't have change, he mumbled '25' and then took my money and went away... after coming home, I read the 'Max. Retail Price' printed on the packet was ₹15. Most of the spending on food happens in the eateries around the workplace.

A gardener had two pots one of which was cracked. The broken pot leaked water on the gardener's way back from the well to the garden. The leaky pot felt bad until in due course of time it was brought to its notice that it was watering the flowers on the way by dripping.

Even after accounting for leeway, it doesn't seem I'll be able to reduce the savings rate below 95% or increase it above 98.86%, so if I stay on course and don't go astray, see you in Sept 2022 with 23.27% and 23.48% hike in gross and net income respectively and a 99.16% savings rate hopefully. Or in 2023 with a 31.21% increase YoY or in 2024 with a 40.07% raise from the year before...

Basically, the corp I work for is humane as it didn't ask me to sign a bond/service level agreement although I do have a really looong notice period. It has seen high attrition during the last couple of years so has published the salary structure for the next third of a dozen years.

Above figures exclusive of statutorily mandated gratuity which is 4.81% of base salary as it can only be claimed if I stay and continue with this org for 5+ years.

User avatar
fiby41
Posts: 1611
Joined: Tue Jan 13, 2015 8:09 am
Location: India
Contact:

Under the Yoke for November 2021

Post by fiby41 »

89.45% savings rate for November. Lowest month so far and hopefully for the forseable future.

It was good that I made the annual internet recharge as operators have started hiking tariffs and the one I have did so by 25%.

Temporarily blocked a debit card and if I am still charged an annual fee for it I'll permanently block it next year.

Removed myself from parents' medical insurance as work has now got me covered.

User avatar
fiby41
Posts: 1611
Joined: Tue Jan 13, 2015 8:09 am
Location: India
Contact:

Even God has a 75% savings rate as "he maintains all life with 1/4th of his potency" per Mahābhārata2.38.___

Post by fiby41 »

Missed out on purchasing the 3 month train pass as couldn't find the note (bill) kept in other part of the bag in time. Forfeited 7.2% discount by buying the pass for 1 month only.

Second largest expense was for gifting a book to a coworker.

Saved 97.76% of net salary in December with rolling average 94.28%.

No tax but saved 98.13% of gross salary for this month before provident fund deductions.

Spending the leaves available as they can't be carried over to the next year.

Spending the travel time reading when sitting and chanting when standing. Reading is putting strain on the neck so looking into sleeping or listening.

User avatar
fiby41
Posts: 1611
Joined: Tue Jan 13, 2015 8:09 am
Location: India
Contact:

On the morality of slacking off

Post by fiby41 »

The honeymoon period at work lasted about 3 months. In that time, it was difficult to get rid of the brisk walking habit although it made no difference rushing/hurrying when all I would do after getting home is get back to work. It would've been different if I had to cook for myself & wash clothes. I was doing more or less similar things before but now I am getting paid to do it. I've wondered how some of these things are done for years and now when I can not just see but actually do them myself it is hard to keep my hands off.

I can't see myself quitting ever. Here's why:
1. Ageism - It would be difficult to get back at same pay even after being able to explain why I quit without another job offer in hand
2. I can always go on an unpaid leave for a long vacation or to complete my education and then return.
3. It would be better to slack off instead... only if it wasn't so difficult to get over the immorality of it.

The second best thing I like to spend time doing is being a bard... there is little scope of me making any money with it ever, which I am totally fine with. So it is as if my 1st hobby generates resources which I can spend on maintaining my 2nd hobby.

Lifetime Earnings: It is a nice thought experiment to do. Let us assuming I'm going to serve for another 36 to 37 years until I am 60 and a 3% increase in income every year... I will have earned in my lifetime 10,685 months worth of APY (pension) payouts of the fixed payout plan I am subscribed to (I chose the highest payout plan.) That is 890 years! Anyways, I forgot where I was going with this.

Income, excluding arrears, for January, will be 7.72% less than the previous month on account of WFH and already savings are down to 89.33%.
Hourly rate, as calculated including commute time, has increased by about a third.

User avatar
fiby41
Posts: 1611
Joined: Tue Jan 13, 2015 8:09 am
Location: India
Contact:

Under the Yoke for January 2022

Post by fiby41 »

Received a component of pay that was pending for 5 months, combined amount of which would be 1/4th of this month's income and covering about twice than of this month's expenses making this month a wash. Salary for this month was 24.75% more than the salary in the previous year/month but this is due to a one-off event. In comparison, salary for February will fall to 78.32% of January's. Actually December's salary was 2.33% more than what February's will be.

A bank took 1% of my monthly salary as Annual Maintenance Charge for their debit card. Searched all over for that card to call the toll-free number printed on it for blocking/cancelling it. I haven't used this card in a year so have got absolutely no utility out of it, so much so that I don't even remember where I kept it. Likely lost/misplaced it. Anyway, I find the customer care number for the bank and when I call it my telecom operator plays a recorded message saying 'You haven't recharged in a year so your SIM has been disabled. Recharge before 11th Feb or else your number will be permanently deactivated.'

I recharged with the lowest talktime but no! They want a 'validity' recharge which confers neither talktime nor data just extends your SIM cards validity by N days! Fie on such rent seeking behaviour. Year ago, I'd recharged with what is now 2% of salary so I'd get 100% of talktime. Lower recharges gave only a percentage of the cost as talktime. Now about 3/4ths of this amount is unutilized and if I don't part with another 1% of monthly salary before 11th Feb, an amount equal to 1.5% of salary will be gone. Stuck between a rock and a hard place.

If switching jobs is the name of the game for increasing income then I'm already getting good practice. Every other month I'm being put on another project inside the company. I'm on my 3rd such project and once its ready by March-end I maybe put back on the previous project .

Got some work translating documents into Russian which was promptly revoked a day after as it was for use in Kyrgyzstan.

It will still take February's income to max out the PPF account for this Financial Year.

Savings rate would've been 84.99% if it wasn't for serendipity but now it is 88.9% of net or 90.37% of gross.

Top three expenses: Food, electricity and the bank tied on the 3rd spot with trains.

Static reserve index: I can live for 9 years and 3 months 6 days 10 hours 19 minutes and 12 seconds if I spend as much as the APY payouts I'll get after I'm 60.

Dynamic reserve index: Stash will last 13 years 24 days 21 hours 10 minutes and 10 seconds if I spend like I spent in January 2022.

Post Reply