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birb_cromble  1mo ago (text post)   1044 thread views

Weekly Finance Thread - 2026-06-13

A weekly thread to discuss financial matters - from personal all the way up to global.

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How do you balance FIRE with not wanting to be a miserable tightwad? Most specifically interested in if anyone has thoughts on that in context of marriage + children + income gap (let's say 4 me:1 her). A particular potential (pun intended) Mrs. Lagrangian likes travel and activities more than I do and I have trouble thinking about that, especially in context of the income asymmetry.

You are supposed to pick a standard of living and develop your long-term budget accordingly. The subreddit's standard terms are "leanFIRE" for being a "miserable tightwad" and "fatFIRE" or "chubbyFIRE" for living large.

chubbyFIRE then I suppose, maybe flirting with FAT. HCOL. I think 3M would maintain my current life, 5M with kids, 7M with kids + buffer to pay for a divorce.

This still doesn't answer how to navigate the "how chubby" question with a partner. It's not like we haven't talked about it, it's just hard to really get more than vibes, hypotheticals, rough spreadsheet budgets.

Don't just think, run the numbers. Trying to plan on vibes would make me itchy. Forecasting out your current budget and adding health insurance costs and your other known early retirement expenses would give you good numbers to work with. Talking about exactly how many years of work are needed to pay for exactly what kind of lifestyle is really helpful.

Your partner may agree that 10 more years of work to pay for a country club membership every year isn't a good trade off. You may agree that 5 more years of work for a yearly trip to do a walking tour in Ireland is a good trade off.

In the US, the Bureau of Labor Statistics conducts the Consumer Expenditure Survey, which can be used as the framework for a very detailed budget. For example, the table "Cross-tabulated—Size of consumer unit by income before taxes—Two people—2023–2024" provides the following numbers, broken down into dozens of categories and subcategories.

Annual income range (k$)Average annual income (k$)Average annual expenses (k$)
(−∞, ∞)10981
(−∞, 15)740
[15, 30)2342
[30, 40)3548
[40, 50)4552
[50, 70)6064
[70, 100)8473
[100, 150)12288
[150, ∞)267142

Additionally, the IRS and the DOJ collaborate on estimating the cost of housing and utilities across the country on a county-by-county basis.

Interesting, but not super useful for me specifically. HCOL + want excellent schools + FAANG puts me well outside those buckets.

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