Money #

Frugality is one half of the equation and it has a hard ceiling. You can only cut so much, and once your fixed costs are low there is nothing left to squeeze. This section is the other half: what to do with the money once you are not spending it, and how to have more of it coming in.

Everything here is arithmetic you can check rather than advice you have to trust. Where a number depends on an assumption, the assumption is stated. Where something is genuinely uncertain, including what tax rates will look like in thirty years, I say so rather than pretending a spreadsheet settled it.

Nothing on this page is financial advice, and I am not a financial advisor. It is the reasoning I use for my own money, written down.

The basics underneath everything #

• Where to Actually Keep Your Emergency Fund: checking accounts pay nothing, stocks can be down 30% the month you need it, and the gap is several hundred dollars a year.
• How Tax Brackets Actually Work: no, a raise cannot lower your take-home pay, and the marginal-versus-effective distinction explains most of the rest.

Credit cards #

Free money if you pay in full, and a 24% loan if you do not.

• Credit Card Rewards Without Getting Burned: the one rule, the myths that cost people money, and what actually drives a credit score.
• Picking the Right Credit Card for Each Spending Category: what a percentage point is really worth, and why merchant category codes decide your rewards.
• Is a Credit Card Annual Fee Worth It?: how to run the number, why premium card credits are worth less than their sticker value, and what to do the month before a fee renews.

Retirement #

The one place where starting early is worth more than being smart.

• Why Saving in Your Twenties Beats Saving Twice as Much in Your Thirties: the actual arithmetic, and the order to do things in.
• How Much Do You Actually Need to Retire?: the 4% rule explained honestly, including the three assumptions that break it.
• Roth vs Traditional: why they are mathematically identical in theory, and the four asymmetries that decide it in practice.
• The HSA Is the Best Retirement Account Almost Nobody Uses Properly: three tax advantages at once, the receipt strategy, and why California takes one of them back.

Careers, where the real leverage is #

Cutting expenses has a floor. Income does not.

• How to Become an Actuary: a path to $150,000 plus, with the exams paid for by your employer and no graduate degree.
• High-Paying Careers That Do Not Require Grad School: twelve of them, with honest downsides for each.

How this fits with the rest #

The spending side lives in Frugal SF, and the two are meant to be read together. A high income with high fixed costs is an ordinary financial life. A modest income with low fixed costs is also ordinary. The unusual outcomes come from doing both at once, which is the entire premise of rent control plus a real salary.