I wasn't belittling you!!!! thats a LOT of money. what I meant was you are optimistic in thinking everything will hold together for six years!

I have some money saved up now, but not enough for solar panels yet. I am going to continue to plow as much as I can into savings... Its just that in 6 years massive more resources will be available.

If I come up with $15-18K before then and it looks like TSHTF soon I will go solar with whatever I can get with it.

Actually, under what conditions can you take out 401K money, or can you just take it out and simply just take a huge penalty (including taxes) on it?

I used some 401K money 2 years ago to help get a house (I took out what I would have lost due to stock market drop as downpayment + savings account---mine was already in moneymarket not stocks before the stocks crashed from 14K)

I'd have almost enough for solar panels NOW if I was able to take 401K money out (even with a penalty) I haven't researched THIS particular topic, only when I needed to get a house.

The reason I think it can hold out that long is that first I don't think we are quite ready to tip dramatically the right side of the slope downward and I think the US (and others) has a lot of "fat" that can be trimmed without everything going "Mad Max".

Try and imagine the country as a whole adopting a 40-hour work week based 4 10-hour days... right there you drop gasoline consumption used for work commutes by nearly 20%... This is without carpooling, etc.

I could go on, and on, but there is lots of fat that can be trimmed before we start cutting into the real "meat" of the economy, and by that time I should have solar panels etc.

Hmmm mary and I have a similar agreement but I am allowed $150 a week for eating on the road LOL The rest She gets!

For 5 years i "saved" 600$ a month, not in the bank but by making double payments on 20 acres..of farm land. Then I switched my $300 dollar rent payment for a $560 dollar house payment ( 33 payments to go)

Soon after beginning the house payments I started by "saving" money each month by investing them in used containers to bury in the yard, followed by above ground buildings for chickens etc. Oh I also had a 200 ft well put in and retired the water ram from the spring for now.
Mary and I added a 500 gallon propane tank and 'retired the wood cook stove for now also.

For a couple of years I added to my savings by investing $200 a month in trees and bushes, gardening supplies, animal feeding and watering supplies, also in horse drawn implements. This year I finally bought a 45 hp tractor. Ran out of planned investments years ago, so I stocked up on long term storage and tripled the gun safe also the black powder supplies etc.

This year I am beginning to double the groves and vineyards because in the last 5 years we have added several paid off double wide trailers for children to come home to, ( they are all already occupied LOL)

I guess spread sheet and the hope that things will not happen in some cliff event are better than throwing up hands and doing nothing, but in the last 2 years the price of many of the things I have invested in little by little have doubled.... really doubled... The difference in trees and vines and farm supplies in the hyears we have had them also has I see gone way way up.

Worth thinking about, cash in the bank will do little except hopefully grow more cash in the bank..IF things work out great.. if not.. well half an apple orchard is better than none..

I am glad Mary decided that believing what I did money in the bank meant little to us. I have no savings.. unless you count a few odd silver and 1/10th oz gold pieces I put back many years ago because of the TAX man. He may not accept chickens..LOL

rangerone said:
Actually, under what conditions can you take out 401K money, or can you just take it out and simply just take a huge penalty (including taxes) on it?


In the case of my 401k (which is pretty small anyway) you can't touch it unless you quit the company. Then if you cash out, the gubmint gets one third up front and you pay taxes on the remainder.

Probably the case with mine, I am only putting in 1% matched with 0.5% from company.

I DO have a Roth IRA though that I add post-taxed money to. I got more flexibility with that.

My husband gets to keep all the money he makes by himself (his SAG residuals) for his personal expenses and hobbies. I, on the other hand, have no independent income.

I just have to comment on some of Ludi's clearly uninformed posts.

While men occupy the highest wealth positions many of them are married and that wealth will pass to their wives.
It isn't who makes the money that is as important it is who spends it.
For every man at the top of society there is a man who is homeless or at the bottom and the bottom is mostly by men.
The wage myth has been disproven in numerous western countries and in early 2009 the BLS put out a study, for the second time, why it is not true.

There is extreme sexism in western society today.

Who gets most of the health care dollars and research money dedicated to them - women
Who gets most of the social safety nets - women
Who gets to be the beneficiary of reverse discrimination - women
Who gets less time for the same crime - women
Who gets the better end of a divorce, including favorable custody determination - women
Who gets the traditional benefits while not having to carry out their traditional role and responsibilities - women
Which gender can make claims of superiority, being oppressed, and get away with physical violence against the other frequently - women
Which gender is portrayed as angels while the other is seen as devils - women
Which gender commits more violence against children - women
Which gender kills more children (non-war) - women
Which gender has the entire educational system and financial aid slanted in its favor - women
The list is quite extensive so I will stop here.

The service jobs of today's society are largely toil and unnecessary to the survival of the society. The nastiest, dirtiest, and most dangerous jobs are almost totally done by men. Men suffer 93% of workplace fatalities. Male military personnel die or are killed 40 times as often in the current U.S. wars as women.

Women desire big government and the "nanny" state. This comes at the expense of the core producers, men. After the government gets too big it goes bankrupt as it completely destroys the incentive to produce.

Here is some further reading that shows history is against the current state of the western collective.
http://www.the-spearhead.com/2010/01/14/john-bagot-glubb/

This video shows just how "oppressed" women were:

http://www.youtube.com/user/TheHappyMisogynist#p/u/5/oMzcMATRGmE

There are many others by the author that show why feminism has been a destructive movement to society and that ultimately we all lose because of it.

Maybe they should stop volunteering for those jobs.

What is the definition of "feminism" to you?

How do we all lose because of it, in your opinion?

So are you saying women should not have the vote? Or what?

Maybe the "core producers" should stop working so hard. If they have lost the incentive to produce, maybe it's better they have stopped producing. This is what I suggest to men who feel oppressed by feminists. Stop working so hard to support them.

Defacto "feminism" is the movement to discriminate and even criminalize male activities with the ultimate goal of eliminating all important male roles from society. Further "feminism" seeks to place females in the higher paying and most prestigious positions on the economic and political ladder thus relegating men to economic, political, and legal second class citizens. Feminism is justified in the belief that females are superior to males.

We all lose because the nonsense that is feminism doesn't work for society as a whole. Feminism fails because it undermines the economic foundation being male labor and destroys families by waging war on husbands and father figures with Children being the ultimate losers.

This is the first year I made more than my old lady. I edged her out, my 81K to her 78K. Before that it was her 100-110K to my 15K. She retires this year, and any discretionary spending I used to do is done. We're taking a cumulative 90K pay cut with her retiring and me working full time and cranking out a Masters.

It's all good, though. I'm the only guy I know with a stay at home wife. Barefoot and pregnant.

We're not spending money on anything other than rent, vehicles, the upcoming baby, and retiring debt. Metric assloads of debt. With any luck we'll be out from under in 5 years, and that's only if the kid doesn't eat anything for the first five years.

Seriously, how many of you guys just turn over your paycheck? That's pretty fucked up. I wouldn't have done that to my wife, and she won't be doing that to me after we get a handle on stomping this debt down and getting some breathing room.

Boy, I'm impressed at how far that mutual trust got you!!!!

That's a pretty specific definition and probably doesn't reflect the majority of people who consider themselves "feminists."

Main Entry: fem·i·nism
Pronunciation: \ˈfe-mə-ˌni-zəm\
Function: noun
Date: 1895
1 : the theory of the political, economic, and social equality of the sexes
2 : organized activity on behalf of women's rights and interests
— fem·i·nist \-nist\ noun or adjective
— fem·i·nis·tic \ˌfe-mə-ˈnis-tik\ adjective


What are the "important male roles" in your opinion?

How does your wife feel about your attitudes toward women and feminists?

I think Novus and some others have been a/ screwed over by women; b/ watching too many of those 'happy misogynist' vids on youtube.

My mother gave me "The Female Eunuch" and "The Beauty Myth" in my teens, as part of what she considered a balanced education. As a result of reading these iconic feminist books (and understanding them) I have had much deeper and healthier relationships with women than most men.

I believe all well educated women are aware of the concepts delved into in these books. I believe they do not support man hating or denigration. If men choose to be ignorant of the intellectual development of feminism they are 'defacto' chauvinists; exactly the type of men who gave rise to the female angst which generated the feminist movement.

Men who want to regain a sense of equality they feel they have lost, I would advise to read and grasp the key concepts of feminist litterature as a starting point; thereby availing themselves a clear distinction between healthy feminism and mentally ill reactionary feminazism.

PS: 'Women Who Run With Wolves' is a modern feminist iconic litterature which I found profound in the extreme and very worthwhile reading for either gender.

I don't see how anyone would see benefit in hating or denigrating any gender. I've never understood it, personally. I was never oppressed by men and have always been treated in a way that seems to me equally by them even in a competitive male-dominated industry. I've never been in the "battle of the sexes."

There aren't many women here at po.com, so I feel I should pop into this thread from time to time to give my uninformed perspective.

I'm always impressed when I find someone of any race or gender that is really angling for equality as opposed to superiority.

Well, I want to stay a breadwinner myself. Never had much use for the stuff and
I sure as hell don't know how to put it on, but I guess if that's what it takes,
I'll go to Dollar General and get me a couple of tubes of the cheap stuff to
try it out. Hope a breadwinner can get by without the bright reds and purples
and what not, and to hell with that sparkly stuff I see on the kids.

If it works out, I will pooch my ruby nuggets out and put a big smooch mark on
a hundred dollar bill.

Wearing lipstick seems kinky, but I guess not so much as watching CSPAN
has been the last few years.

If Millionaires wear thong panties, well, I think I will settle for just being one of
of these here plain old breadwinners.