Hacker News Reader

Comment by bdangubic | Hacker News Reader

> Does that amount qualify as "F YOU" money? I always thought it was if you have multiple years worth of savings.

F YOU money is so that if your boss/employer/... pisses you off you can tell him "F YOU" and pack your shit and leave without a single worry on your mind

> The amount is highly dependent on your situation and risk comfort level and can be argued back and forth

Absolutely not - it is a simple math. If I spend $10k per month, I need $60k or $120k saved to have a cushion of 6 months (or 12 months). there is no argument, I said F YOU and I am now without a care in the world and can take my time to figure out what I am going to do next without needing to stay somewhere that makes me miserable (or same if I get fired)

> Is there something I am missing?

"According to a YouGov survey from May 2023, only 18% of Americans have savings between $1,000 and $10,000"

Now of course probably 2% of them or less are here on HN...

View on HN

To me, F-YOU money means "enough to retire today." It means you can live your current lifestyle using just 3% of it per year, which is a pretty normal retirement draw-down rate. Anything less, and it's not really F-YOU money, it's "I can take a brief sabbatical at the cost of adding N more years of work before retirement" money.

Yeah, that's closer to my understanding as well. Not necessarily retirement but a few years of runway perhaps. The 6-12 months thing I've always seen being called an "emergency fund" which in turn is different to your savings which may not be liquid.

Yes, AND if you're using your emergency fund then you should be in an emergency mindset, not chilling out surfing in Bali.

Sure, I wouldn't advise taking any expensive vacations or anything of that nature. But what caught my attention were the terms "pants-on-fire emergency" and "I would be interviewing 24/7". I mean I get it would be a stressful situation and may cause anxiety or panic but having those strong emotions could also lead you to end up working in a bad workplace which would make your mental health even worse. I am not judging, but those words just left me wondering what am I missing. And this is speaking as someone with a family to support.

I agree with the zen masters description though. I wouldn't be so zen about it either.

There is a HUGE difference between emergency fund and FU$

If my lifestyle currently is:

- summer vacay in Bali

- two ski trips, one US, one in the Alps

- eating out once per week

- daily Starbucks

- …

FU$ means I continue doing EXACTLY this, for 6/12/18 months.

Emergency fund would be I cut down all my expenses to a bare minimum until I find new source of income. Can’t say FU if I can’t go to Bali (I love Bali :) )

Here's the YouGov survey if anyone is interested [1]. A lot of people do indeed not have a lot of savings:

> One in 10 consumers do not have any savings (12%) while a slightly higher percentage of consumers say they have less than $100 in their savings account (14%). A further 13% of Americans say they have between $1,000 and $4,999 in savings. Altogether, that means that half of all Americans have less than $5,000 to fall back on.

[1] https://business.yougov.com/content/46083-how-much-does-the-...

Savings and savings accounts are being conflated here.

One can have a small amount a savings account with plenty withdraw-able assets in Mutual Funds etc to fall back on

In this context, “savings” includes all liquid assets.

To be clear, I am agreeing with you.

Except that me saying the amount is dependent on your situation is leaving some margin for if your child is special needs or you're going through a divorce or taking care of elderly parents or things of that nature where you'd probably want to decrease your risks by increasing the 12 months to 18 months to account for more unknowns that wouldn't apply to other people, for example. I do not consider it to be simple math nor a matter of an absolute right/wrong stance.

I apologize for saying simple math in a kind of an “absolute” way but I meant it in a “math” sense that I know my expenses and as well how long of a “cushion” I need to feel like I can FU out of a bad situation (or if get into a bad situation beyond my control). I also know my known expenses are just that - known expenses but of course there is always the unknown. But I am guessing adults could ballpark a figure that will get them through X number of months

No problem. Now that you mention it, I find it incredible that many people I know wouldn't be able to tell how much they're spending on what. Not even ballpark it. This is the first thing to start with and is incredibly easy to do, if you choose to. Whether you call it FU money or emergency or something on the side or whatever, you at least need some numbers.

And we're not talking about wealthy people here but the ones who complain that there's nothing left when there's an interest rate increase. I don't know maybe it's the crowd I hang out with. Or maybe they are actually wealthy and just don't want to say it.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com