LogFAQs > #930964913

LinkPizza posted...

Except without a high income, it justbsounds like a normal retirement like adjl said... You being able to reach it (and so soon) sounds like it is attributed to your high income. And many people (if in your situation instead of their own) could probably reach it much easier.

And most people try to minimize the role luck plays. But its not always up to them... Sometimes, thats what it comes down to. My best friend back home is a dental assistant. She went to get her hygienist license. To get the hygienist license is tough. Not because she doesnt know the stuff. But because you need patients. From what I heard, they use to supply the patients. Then something happened recently. And now they only have a few. If it were just getting anyone, that wouldnt be a problem. But they have to be certain types of people. People who are in certain age groups, people who have special needs, people with stage 3 Periodontitis (which some people dont know which stage they are at, if they even know they have it)... And multiply that by the amount of people in the class... The main reason people fail the class is because they dont have patients...

Not necessarily a normal retirement. Normal retirement is 60-65, even retiring at 50 is shaving 10-15 years off your working life. A normal income for a college graduate can retire mid-40's, shaving 20ish years off their career.

Yes, that is the process of becoming a hygienist. They have to supply their own patients for board. The ones I know had backup patients in case their main patient didn't show. If worst comes to worse and they prepared well and if a main and backup patient doesn't show...they can take the exams again next year. There's over a 90% passing rate for the exam. Pretending passing was completely random and you didn't pass two years in a row, you're in the bottom 1th percentile of luck. Third time, bottom 0.1th percentile of luck.

Jen0125 posted...

He's also acting like no one has student loans that take a huge chunk of their income.

If you dont have student loans, dont get high amounts of student loans. Going to a school you think is flashy isnt better than getting a car you think is flashy. Especially when you dont have a plan to pay for what youre buying. There are many schools with tuition 3k and under a semester in the midwestmove there for a year and become a resident. So many unclaimed scholarships exist simply because nobody applies to them, apply. Not everyone can, but anyone can. I could completely restart and go back to college, and I wouldnt graduate with much/any student debt because I spent time trying to understand how to do it cheaply.

If you already have student loans and didnt think about choosing a higher paying occupation while racking them up, it sucks that some schools are predatory and charge so much. But right out of college just continue living like you did in college, one or two roommates and not buying luxury purchases. Enjoy your life, just pay attention to what you consume (live like you did in college, get a roommate if needed) and it should be paid off in 2-3 years if you live frugally. Even when I made 50k for two years I invested 25k a year, enough to pay off 50k of student loans.

Though you should still consider investing even when you have student loans. What you make off your investments will likely be more than what you'd be paying extra on student loans.