I have been following the "Financially Independent, Retire Early" (FIRE) philosophy for over a decade now.
The FIRE approach recommends reducing spending and saving up aggressively so that you can retire in your ~40s with the investment returns from the money you saved.
I fundamentally agree with the premise of getting out of the rat race and not sacrificing your precious life years on work that you don't enjoy, to earn money to spend on things you don’t need. Freedom to not have to work in a job you don't like or when you aren’t able is great.
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But I think the FIRE framing is problematic in a few ways:
The entire concept of retirement is defined around what not to do (work), rather than answering the more important question of what you'd rather do with your life. Most people don't have a good answer to "What would you do if you never have to work again?" or "What kind of job would you actually enjoy doing?" And the few who do only have a half-baked theoretical answer that is unlikely to be as satisfying as they imagine.
There are many satisfying jobs with good managers, income and balance. FIRE framing makes people hate on the concept of working, rather than actually exploring careers and jobs that they may like and defining what they'd rather do in life.
Saving 25X annual expenses is tough and typically achievable only after 20+ years of working. It's better than the regular 30-40, but not that much better.
You risk not experiencing many joys of life if you are saving aggressively. I have seen stories of FIRE people who moved to a remote area, never have a family, never dine outside, rarely travel etc. It seems like a pretty bland way to live to me.
FIRE doesn't leave you much optionality to accommodate life surprises (kids, medical issues etc.) or if you change your mind. It’s much harder to restart your career in your 40s.
To be clear, many of these issues are addressed when you read in detail about FIRE. But to anyone new or who reads just at a surface level, the FIRE framing is misleading.
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I propose an alternative framing: Lifestyle You Want Early or LYWE (pronounced Live)
LYWE has 3 main steps:
Define lifestyle and activities that will make you happy and fulfilled. What would you do if you didn't have to work? How will you spend your days and years? What kinds of work do you enjoy?
Chart and follow a path to slowly do more of the lifestyle and work. Eliminate money and time expenses on anything that isn't contributing toward that path.
Find a job that fits with this lifestyle. It only feels like work if it is something you don't want to do.
Let me illustrate this with an example. Let's say you want to spend your life with close family, in a cabin near nature, writing books and traveling occasionally.
In your 20-30s, spend 20% of your time (weekends and a couple of weekday evenings) doing some of this, while earning money from a regular job and cutting unnecessary expenses. For example, author Arundhati Roy, supported herself with screenwriting gigs and aerobic classes during the 4 years it took to write her literary debut, The God of Small Things.
In your 30s-40s, when you have saved enough, maybe switch to a journalism job or go part-time at your regular job so that you can expand to 40% of the lifestyle.
In your 50s-60s, switch jobs or start a small writing business and work remotely from a cabin.
In your 70s-90s, you can continue working on your journalism job or business - why stop and retire when it's the lifestyle want?!
LYWE framing fixes the FIRE issues:
It forces you think of what you want, rather than just about quitting working.
You get to start living the lifestyle you want immediately and all your life! You also start investing in your alternative career pathway and enjoy the benefits of compounding.
Trying out the lifestyle early gives you a taste of it and lets you course correct.
Go LYWE it up!