As I promised, going to do a news story, and free-write.
For the news story, there’s this.
Obviously, with my tenuous health, and the state of the economy, these sorts of things have been of great interest lately.
I’ve been dumping money into my 401(k). And what I wanted to write about just now I deleted, because I might not be allowed to disclose.
I will say that I’m not old enough to qualify for any of the “catch-up” provisions in tax law, so it’s kind of forcing me to do things on my own apart from the “normal” ways of doing things.
As if there’d be anything different in my life.
I have a chunk. I’m not sure how long I could ever hope to live on it. I think probably some sort of long-term disability is more likely, honestly. What I have now would be more than I was earning not terribly long ago.
Even before the MS diagnosis, I was probably only looking at a lifespan of 65 years. MS, when you take a look at the actuarial numbers, takes ten years off your life. So that puts me likely dying before I’m able to tap anything without significant penalties.
Oh well.
I did listen to something interesting a few weeks ago that really changed my way of thinking about “investments.” Putting money into stores of value is not trying to get growth; it’s just trying to keep the value from going away.
In other words, I’m not planning to get rich off Tesla stock. Maybe next week, that’ll have appreciated a lot more than an ounce of gold or silver; what will it be worth ten years from now?
The same can be said for other things like real estate. Even if a big crash happens, it’s not going to be worth zero.
I can’t say the same for the Flooz I bought in 1999.
I’m also interested in buying stock that’s not publicly-traded. If I put, say, $10K into an apartment management/ownership group, maybe it’s a smaller payout than it was when I bought it. Maybe not. Maybe the Federal Reserve will juice the currency so much that it’s worth a lot more.
Even if it goes bankrupt, I’d be an unsecured creditor, and would get something back during the liquidation.
This is rapidly turning into the free-write I promised.
But I’m going to stop, as the weather’s nasty, and I’m worried about the power going out.