Happily Disengaged

Most major investment firms are predicting lower than average returns for the stock market in the next decade. Horrifying words like Lost Decade are being thrown around. Even the vaunted Vanguard stock outlook has market returns in the 5.5% to 7.5% nominal annualized range for the next 10 years. This Vanguard report was recently updated over the summer after an even worse December 2019 outlook of 4%-ish returns. International equity growth seems to fare better when modeled by all parties….

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Once a year we take a vacation abroad. In 2018, it was the tiny beach village of Chacala in Nayarit Mexico. 2019, we hit up South East Asia; Hong Kong, Vietnam, and Taiwan. This year we had a spectacular trip to Europe planned for March. Spain, Hungary, and the UK were on the itinerary. But then COVID happened, and like most everyone with 2020 travel plans, we had to cancel the trip. We never once thought we’d rent and RV…

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We are ardent Capitalists here at Happily Disengaged. But we are also ardently aware of the problems associated with consumer culture in our society. There’s a problem with consuming items in ever-increasing quantities. Suffering inevitably results from the constant pressure we feel from advertisements and the need to show others we’ve made it. When you make more you spend more. The Consumer Okay, so the quotes are just a paraphrase of a mentality that us consumers have. There’s a bunch…

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When we moved into our house in 2015, we knew that the air conditioning didn’t work. The region of the Bay Area where we live has clockwork wind in the summer. This wind is usually enough to mitigate the need for paying thousands to fix the AC and then pay mightily to run it. Between the hours of three and five in the afternoon, on cue, a breeze picks up and continues on throughout the night. When my alarm goes…

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For the 4th of July weekend, we usually go camping. It’s a time of taking an extra day off work, to turn a three day weekend into a four day weekend, and driving out into one of the national forests we love to visit with friends and family. We swim. Drink. Cook delicious food. And enjoy being outdoors. For the last few years, we’ve been driving up into either the verdant forests of the north or the banks of the…

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