In memory of my Dad, I am republishing this post from 2021. I expect the blog will be quiet for a few weeks.
I see surgeons working because they can’t afford to retire. Don’t be like them.
My Dad made saving for retirement a priority; he did not want to be one of those surgeons, scrubbing in at a time when they would rather be done with work.
We lived well, but he did not spend like some of his colleagues.
We went to good schools, and had nice holidays, but there were no family trips abroad. My parents did travel without us, but most of their exotic trips came after his retirement, when all of their children were out of college.
My Dad liked cars, and he bought them new, but they usually lasted 5-8 years. No getting a new car every 2 to 3 years like some at the hospital.
We had one house, it was nice, but not in the fanciest part of town; my parents live there still (no buying a fancier home).
He made it a priority to save for his retirement, usually 25% of his income. He has been enjoying that money for over 20 years, and these days his fun spending is mostly curtailed by the pandemic, rather than because he is running low on funds.
You have to invest, otherwise inflation will eat it up.
He told me this in the days when you could easily get 5% in interest on your savings account.
In his 40s, a mortgages rates were 11-13%, and so was inflation.
I remember him saying that his Dad (my grandfather) had told him when they were in practice together in the ’70s that if he could just have $200 a week to retire on, he’d be good. It was pretty clear in the early ’80s that such a sum would no longer suffice .
It was easy to see that stuffing your money in a savings account wasn’t going to do you much good in 10 to 20 years; in fact, you’d be able to buy less with it then than you could now.
People coming out of training (or school) today have not had to deal with inflation as much. It is not clear if they are about to get a sharp lesson in the ways that the buying power of their money can be insidiously eroded.
It is still true, though, that over the long run you have to invest your money if you want to live the good life after years of saving.
Always read the small print.
This works out well in all sorts of situations: finding out about introductory fees that shoot up after 6 months on your credit card, prepayment fees on your mortgage, the non-compete clause in your contract, etc. The corollary:
Never sign a blank check.
Do I really need to explain this one?
Pigs get slaughtered.
This typically refers to the stock market, where people who are trying to make a lot of money very quickly often end up losing it instead.
The current example might be those people piling on the meme stocks after the huge run up, who found that instead of doubling or tripling their money, they were instead left with huge losses.
My Dad also used this phrase to simply denounce greed in general.
He also taught the inverse lesson:
Be Generous
To be honest, my Dad did not always give with a totally open heart. I remember some complaints about being asked to give more than he felt like giving.
However, if children learn by seeing what their parents do, rather than what they say, both my parents modeled the importance of giving.
They gave (and still give) to charity: to their local religious organizations, to the arts, to schools. If someone passes away, the second thing my Mom checks (after the funeral date and arrangements) is where to send a donation.
In a somewhat related vein, they have also taught us to:
Celebrate happy events
It is not true that, as a family, we have parties all the time.
However, big occasions get noticed: birthdays, weddings, graduations. Not just in our family, but for friends as well.
I spent plenty of time in my childhood attending funerals; I think in the span 3 years, most of a generation of my dad’s family passed.
After that, my parents listened to the advice of his best friend to celebrate the good things. I think it is some of the best advice they listened to. (Of course, I think the best advice that friend gave was for my Dad to ask my Mom out on a date, but that’s a different story).
It’s a beautiful day, go outside!
I can’t tell you how many times I heard this from my Dad as I was growing up. I was perfectly happy to stay inside reading a book, only to be booted out of the house to get some fresh air.
My Dad often took a half-day during the week to play golf, which was the subject of much “discussion” between him and my mom. He says that if he hadn’t gotten that time outside (and away from work) he probably would have burned out years before he retired.
I see my youngest nephew–his grandson–with a similar drive to get outside. Even before he could talk, he would bring shoes over to his parents as a signal for them to take him out for a walk.
I have written before, multiple times, about how a walk makes me feel better. I suspect it would make most people feel better.
Now that I am an adult, I periodically have to tell myself the same message on a beautiful sunny day: go outside! I am always happy when I do.
What advice did you get from your parents that you still follow today?