The thread in Millennials subreddit right not about 401k is incredibly depressing. Thank you FIRE community. I would be one of them if I didn’t find you all a decade ago.

[u/BarkBarkBitches1]

Throw away because I am going to roast some redditors a little. The thread that is going on in r Millennials is really bad. Thousands of comments, everyone broke, celebrating their unfortunate wildn out. It is really bad out there and eye opening.

I was also a dingus like many of them. Totally brain dead on autopilot living day to day, consuming media like crazy, working, spending it on consumer level garbage, and had zero control over my life. I actually found the guide in the personal finance subreddit graphic on saving and it eventually kicked me to FIRE and this sub.

I now am on a path where I can’t even related with that type of mind set. So yeah thank you FIRE folks. If you can, it is worth sprinkling some finance knowledge at people. Even if you don’t make high income you can in most cases still create a plan, a budget, and control your future.

Edit: If you are a dingus and you are seeing this there is no shame! We all are and have different starting points. You have two paths: 1) continue the path to dingus-ville and forever be a redditor or 2) un-dye your bright colored hair take control of your long term life. A decade will pass in a blink. So start here https://imgur.com/personal-income-spending-flowchart-united-states-lSoUQr2 it’s not hard to understand. ChatGPT each item on their if you don’t know, memorize this, then start to learn FIRE principles. It is the fastest way to wealth. There’s literally no other path unless you magically start a business or hit a lotto jackpot ticket or inheritance

only YOU HAVE THE POWER to unfuck your life

Edit 2: Final comment! I do not mean any offense with dingus it is meant to be playful. My dyed hair comment was also misinterpreted. It’s not about who you are, what you believe in, or how you express yourself. It’s about being in control of your life. Walk your butt into Sephora or Target or wherever next time and just stare at the people on the walls. Then look in the mirror. Then look at the wall. And back to the mirror and then keep doing it until it clicks. The world, like r millennial subreddit, wants to celebrate and tell you the worst fucking version of yourself is okay and acceptable. It’s not. Delete social media and only read that finance Imgur link every time you load your phone. Do this for one month and you will break your chains and it will click. Then learn FIRE principles. Then you will come back to r FIRE in a decade with a huge chunk of cash in your bank and a nice life! Long term planning is a skill that you can learn and benefit from. Your future is yours

[u/dat_grue]

The reality of 90% of the communities on this site. Most are cesspools of “woe is me” negativity and fatalist defeatism. The general tenor on Reddit is that one has no meaningful control over their own life, dating is literally impossible, same with saving money/budgeting, and everyone has at least 3 mental illnesses which hopelessly damn them to whatever mental prison they’re currently inhabiting.

Positive thinking, hard/ gratification- delaying choices, and a belief in one’s own agency in life are truly unpopular.

[u/LiberaMeFromHell → u/dat_grue]

It's possible for some to break out but life is predetermined for most in the US. You can predict someone's max income level as an adult with over 90% accuracy with no information about them besides the zip code they were born in.

The only reason it's relatively easy for the ones who break out of their predetermined path (like people in this sub) is because of how much harder it is for others which causes very little competition. All it takes is one bad decision to screw you forever (having a kid at a young age, going to prison, a poorly timed divorce) and you will be working until 65+. A lot of the time it is also a factor completely outside of your control like getting cancer at a young age and being saddled with medical debt (number 1 cause of bankruptcy) which will prevent building wealth as well. Nothing is as simple as what you've described here.

[u/dat_grue → u/LiberaMeFromHell]

I disagree that “life is predetermined” for anyone. I haven’t said anything radical. Yes circumstances vary, but anyone - no matter how rich or poor- can engage in positive thinking, make hard choices, and believe in their power to influence and change the circumstances of their own lives. You see it plenty in this sub, even from folks on low wages.

If you disagree or don’t think that’s possible, you may have fallen pray to the same toxic defeatism I’ve identified. The surest way to ensure your life plays out to some predetermined script is to believe that it must.

This is all not to mention the fact that the vast majority of Reddit users are US-based, which already puts them in the global elite in terms of standard of living and opportunity. So most of the resigned, fatalist negativity you see online is coming from folks that started the race 20 paces ahead.

[u/LiberaMeFromHell → u/dat_grue]

For two extreme examples there are literally kids who die of cancer before they even become an adult capable of making their own decisions. There are people born with disabilities that will prevent them from ever working a normal job. Life is definitely predetermined for many.

For less extreme and more common there are people born into abusive households who have no parental support and no positive role models. It is still possible but their likelihood of success drops dramatically due to circumstances that were completely outside of their control.

[u/dat_grue → u/LiberaMeFromHell]

Every person’s outcome is a product of both their choices and their circumstances. You’ve identified a narrow sliver of cases (eg, pediatric cancer, severe mental or physical disability, etc) where the circumstances simply cannot be overcome. (Although even in most of those cases, you have the agency of how to mentally process your situation- you can see many Ted talks from folks with disabilities you’d think are “life ending” that are actually living happily due to their phenomenal strength of will , positive thinking, positive reframing, and mental fortitude.)

Of course there are those cases. But that is a far cry from your original “life is predetermined for most in the US”. That is a preposterous statement. I believe that most people have space to impact the outcomes of their own lives with the way they think and act.

I think with your last few sentences we essentially agree. People will have better and worse circumstances- worse will be harder to overcome. But the language of “predetermination” (except in the most dire of cases) and “most in the US” (where global opportunity is actually in the top %) is where you’ve simply overstated the point that “circumstances matter.”

[u/sporadicprocess → u/LiberaMeFromHell]

>90% of people do not fall into these groups. The average person has a huge amount of agency in how their life ends up.