April's CR Diary

Yep, we geeks make things blow up! I love the vegetable and fruit platters you found. I wish we had those at work. And the book sounds interesting. My father did actuarial work, so I've heard a bit about this stuff. Maybe I'll try to find it at the library.
Emi

April,

Over the past 2 weeks, I have read your entire blog from start (AprilCR) to today. Wow! What a journey.

Without knowing it, I practice a moderate version of CR. It's been a pleasure to read an echo of some of the internal conversations I've had with myself on this blog.

The one nagging question that I haven't been able to find an answer to:
Cooking oil obviously oxidizes it and makes it lose taste, but what are the health issues with cooking in oil?

Thanks!

Hey! I'm a real, live actuary, and I even work in pensions. I have a feeling it's not as exciting as you think it is, but I will let you know the next time I'm in Philly.

I prefer chardonnay in the warm weather too :D

A follow-up to this, because it is obviously fascinating to me as well: The thing that really stunned me as I watched the process you describe, was how paltry the average defined benefit pension was even when it existed, and I am talking about collectively bargained plans.

The fact is, that any pension is a benefit tomorrow instead of a benefit today. If, as you say, someone doesn't have the give in their budget to take shorter hours to spend time with growing children, where is the give to save money for years when the children won't be around at all?

If the book did any justice to the "history of pensions", the first thing you learn is the "three-legged stool" analogy, which says that any post-retirement system relies on 3 sources of income: savings, retirement funds (government social security and employer pension), and family. The poorer the person, the more likely they are to rely on the extended family for support. Pensions is very much not a "one size fits all" plan.

Getting people educated about their pension seems remarkably difficult. I'm regularly stunned by the obviously intelligent people I know who don't even fund their IRA. Of course you can say "I'm going to live to 150 so I'll work until I'm 120", but even if you're right, there's no reason not to use the tax-savings that are available to you.

Oh yes, the geeks are all around, even if we're not all that obvious. I was reminded today of just how geeky I am, when I went to pick my son up from a birthday party and stayed to help another parent install some software on his new mac laptop that he'd brought over to the first parent!! Then we started talking tech toys and LAN's. I just couldn't help it..it was too much fun!!
Bring on the whites!

Cheers! Enjoy the beautiful weather!
;-D

Hi RG!

Wow, a real live actuary! Thanks for your comments.

It's so true that people don't pay nearly enough attention to their retirement. I meet a lot of people who don't contribute enough to their 401ks to get the matching funds their employer offers. Lots of people leaving money on the table out there.

I think it's hard because we're not really educated about these things, and as you say, there are needs that appear more pressing earlier in life. I definitely feel like however long I live, I want to do so in financial security. It will be great if I'm well enough to keep working, but it would also be great to be young in body and mind with a decent income to live on with the freedom to do paid work or to engage with the world in some fashion that doesn't bring a paycheck every two weeks.

Feel free to post tips on how we should all be saving... many of us, especially younger folks, don't know nearly as much as we should.

a

Hi April

As one petite lady to another, can you advise - how do you arrive at the right RDA of nutrients? All the figures I find seem to assume an average size person!

Linda

Hello April,

here another lady question: how do I tell my beloved CRON-o-Meter that I am a woman? I read in one of your entries that it is usually suggesting male nutrition targets.

Thanks and greetings, Marianne

Hmm, a set of comments about how to save is a tall order. Kind of like a set of comments on "how to eat properly". It's a question of goals, what you're willing to give up. Start with basics: don't buy things you can't afford, don't buy on debt (except potentially things like education and homes which will repay themselves), have an emergency fund (6-12 months' expenses).

Charles Schwab has a nice retirement planner on their website, indicating what you would want to save to be able to retire with the income you want.

Start early! Part of the philosophy of "live within your means" is for me that I try to think about my long-term expenses, not just this years'. For someone in their mid 30's, for example, it's not unreasonable to think that you might work 30 years and then be retired for 30 years. That is, each year's income has to pay not just for this year's expenses, but also a year of retirement expenses. If you invest $1 today, at 7% interest and no taxes, you'll have $7.67 30 years from now, so you don't have to cut your salary in half - but saving 12% of your pre-tax income (a 401K will be tax-deferred, for example) is a reasonable tactic. Subtract off what you think Social Security or your employer is putting in, if you know.

By the way - I thought it was interesting to look at how much my own company is paying annually to my pension, since I'm fortunate enough to have a fairly generous formula. For me, they are putting in about 2% of my salary, which means I still need to save 10% of it.

(This is not an entry. I'm just taking back my above question, as I found out that I already had found out myself, but forgot about it. Silly.)