Are you middle class?

06deacon said:

I’m guessing you’re not subject to the same independence rules as your audit colleagues across the hall. That’s some burdensome shit

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06deacon said:

I think this is fair. This order maximizes your guaranteed return for every dollar invested, not just potential market returns.

1. Gives you a guaranteed 100% return on your investment (free money) from where your employer matches you, and guaranteed preferential tax treatment down the line
2. Gives you a guaranteed return equal to your interest rate on that debt, so if you’re paying down credit card debt at 15% you just got a 15% return on that
3. Gives you guaranteed preferential tax treatment down the line.

After this then you have the tradeoff between things like paying off low interest debt like a 3.5% mortgage vs investing in #4 from that order and at that point it’s less of a black and white comparison since it’s comparing against hypothetical market returns. I’d figure a market investment will beat 3.5% over time so I’d do #4.

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tiltdeac said:

There are people on here would could give you way better advice than me, I think a basic order for where you should put extra cash would go something like:

1. Contribute to your work retirement plan (at least up to your employer match, if you get some sort of match, but maybe they give you comp time instead?)
2. Pay off any high interest rate debt you might have
3. Max out retirement accounts including beyond employer match
4. Put the rest in a taxable investment account (mostly or all stock market index funds since you are young, more bond funds as you get older and need less risk).

Paying off your mortgage early is fine, but that's super cheap money that would likely do better in an index fund, imo.

Finance bros can chime in a tell me why I'm dumb.

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