Welcome to the YOLO Economy

[bjl584]

https://dnyuz.com/2021/04/21/welcome-to-the-yolo-economy/

Something strange is happening to the exhausted, type-A millennial workers of America. After a year spent hunched over their MacBooks, enduring back-to-back Zooms in between sourdough loaves and Peloton rides, they are flipping the carefully arranged chessboards of their lives and deciding to risk it all.

Some are abandoning cushy and stable jobs to start a new business, turn a side hustle into a full-time gig or finally work on that screenplay. Others are scoffing at their bosses’ return-to-office mandates and threatening to quit unless they’re allowed to work wherever and whenever they want.


They are emboldened by rising vaccination rates and a recovering job market. Their bank accounts, fattened by a year of stay-at-home savings and soaring asset prices, have increased their risk appetites. And while some of them are just changing jobs, others are stepping off the career treadmill altogether.

If this movement has a rallying cry, it’s “YOLO” — “you only live once,” an acronym popularized by the rapper Drake a decade ago and deployed by cheerful risk-takers ever since. The term is a meme among stock traders on Reddit, who use it when making irresponsible bets that sometimes pay off anyway. (This year’s GameStop trade was the archetypal YOLO.) More broadly, it has come to characterize the attitude that has captured a certain type of bored office worker in recent months.

To be clear: The pandemic is not over, and millions of Americans are still grieving the loss of jobs and loved ones. Not everyone can afford to throw caution to the wind. But for a growing number of people with financial cushions and in-demand skills, the dread and anxiety of the past year are giving way to a new kind of professional fearlessness.

I started hearing these stories this year when several acquaintances announced that they were quitting prestigious and high-paying jobs to pursue risky passion projects. Since then, a trickle of LinkedIn updates has turned into a torrent. I tweeted about it, and dozens of stories poured into my inboxes, all variations on the same basic theme: The pandemic changed my priorities, and I realized I didn’t have to live like this.

[disneysteve]

Great article.

I think the pandemic "broke" a lot of people. It caused an abrupt and radical change in people's lives. It forced them off the hamster wheel and made them really think about what mattered to them.

Although I'm not quitting my job to open a coffee shop or start a dog-walking business, I can totally relate to the sentiment. Pre-COVID we were spending $7,000/month. We are now spending about $5,000/month. And guess what? We are perfectly happy. Sure, there are some things we miss doing, but we don't miss them nearly as much as we thought we would.

You need 25 times expenses to retire. Lowering our spending about $24,000/year means I could retire with $600,000 less in savings. And what do you know? The number needed based on that lower spending is right about what we currently have saved. If we could maintain this level of spending, I could retire tomorrow. That was a very powerful realization for me, and it only happened because of COVID.

I'm not planning to retire tomorrow, but my plans have definitely changed. I used to think I'd work until 62. Then I started thinking I'd work full time until 60 and then maybe part time for a couple more years after that. Now I'm actually seriously planning to quit full time work at 58, and possibly stop working entirely. I don't think I'd be on that path now had the pandemic not radically changed everything.

[GoodLiving]

If we could lower our expenses to $40k a year (not unreasonable in fly over country), we have that much as our networth, but some of that is real estate. We're not taking into account health insurance so that feels a bit too risky to me. I have thought that I might be able to work until I'm 55 and then do a phased retirement, a possibility as part of my contract. I would love that... covid has certainly had us revisit our priorities. I'm risk adverse and don't know that I would want to jump and try some kind of side hustle full time. (

[LivingAlmostLarge]

We are in the YOLO. Decided if we're going to do it might as well do it now and give up salary to do a startup. But I guess we were like that 6 years ago when we quit and moved cross country and started new careers. We were YOLO then too. I think people who FI or realize they want a different life or can downsize do it. Is it really risk? Or is it that they realize that money = time/happiness. So you might as well buy yourself time or happiness. Will you have regrets? If so then change what is making you regret time or money and do something about it.

[ua_guy]

https://dnyuz.com/2021/04/21/welcome...-yolo-economy/
Some are abandoning cushy and stable jobs to start a new business, turn a side hustle into a full-time gig or finally work on that screenplay. Others are scoffing at their bosses’ return-to-office mandates and threatening to quit unless they’re allowed to work wherever and whenever they want.

Good. Let's call these people what they are. Workers in their prime who are fed up with the meritless rules of self-serving, autocratic employers asking for more than they're giving in return. Loyalty isn't given, it's paid for, just like the rules of supply and demand dictate. And if employers want to retain that, along with knowledge and skill, they'd better be prepared to negotiate terms, or find new talent.

[amarowsky]

speaks to me a bit...

I did resign from my corporate gig 1/24/2020. And been betting on myself ever since. I live near Detroit, so flyover state, and incredibly cheap (subjectively) to live here compared to other areas of the States. We've eliminated most of our expenses and are burning pretty clean these days, so I was able to take a risky full commission sales job + start a couple small projects (with potential to manifest into small companies). More specifically a manufacturing/fabricating project, a procurement project, expanding some of my gardening projects, and our real estate project.

They've been super satisfying projects! I do have too many going on for sure... But that was intentional. As I see which projects sink/swim naturally, I'll trim back the ones that are not as satisfying or at least add less/value for the amount of resources they take. Current target is to start trimming back these hobbies/projects, and focus on the other ones to manifest from hobbby/project --> growing venture ---> ideally, legit company.

It's been very satisfying! I would go back to a cubical if anything bad happened (basically, only thing that could devastate our lives enough to do that would be a random medical issue cost), but I will try to reserve that as a last resort.

[amarowsky]

We are in the YOLO. Decided if we're going to do it might as well do it now and give up salary to do a startup. But I guess we were like that 6 years ago when we quit and moved cross country and started new careers. We were YOLO then too. I think people who FI or realize they want a different life or can downsize do it. Is it really risk? Or is it that they realize that money = time/happiness. So you might as well buy yourself time or happiness. Will you have regrets? If so then change what is making you regret time or money and do something about it.

I always give people props for the bravery to quit (of course proper context is required for this statement to hold true).

Nothing better than working for someone else to pay the bills. While, on the side, you build you F.I. engine from the ground up, so later in life you hands aren't so greasy, and you realize the cost (to you) of complacency is higher than the risk of a different opportunity.

[LivingAlmostLarge]

Sometimes you are forced to be YOLO. Sometimes you jump. It all depends on your level for BS tolerance. Call it what it is. Sometimes you know you need a change and if you are the type of person to have planned for it or not. Some of the planning can simply be that you want to stop the BS and so you choose a simpler cheaper life to afford so you can always walk away. My DH tells people that your level of wanting to do well probably is proportional to how much BS you are willing to put up with. We've always been more willing to put up with BS as we were younger. Then as we aged and got more secure that level gets lower and lower.