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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Teachers benefit from starting their careers young compared to other professionals. When you start teaching at 23 or 24, you can make your retirement contributions because at that age you can live quite cheaply. And since teaching is not a profession that encourages an expensive lifestyle (in fact the hours and culture discourage things like going out a lot, being very showy with expensive clothes or other personal items, etc.), it's not that hard to tuck away a significant percent of your income.

Teaching is also a job that rewards seniority and has fairly straightforward stepped increases. Yes, we're talking about moving from 75k to 90k over the course of a decade, so not eye-popping amounts. But that's a meaningful increase that can happen simply by putting in the hours. Teachers who get advanced degrees often see substantial increases even over that -- I know teachers with masters degrees who were making 120k by 30. There's a ceiling on that and they aren't going to go much higher. But do the math here: say you start out at 70k at age 24, and then get an additional via a part-time and summer program that allows you to add the degree without losing any years of income. Say be 30 or 32 your are over 100k, and by 37 you hit your peak earning of 140k. If you work at that amount until age 54 (30 years), you can retire with a substantial pension plus additional retirement savings. Then you can do education consulting or tutoring for another 8 years while also collecting your pension, essentially keeping your income steady while working considerably less in a lower stress role.

By 62 you'll have your pension, considerable savings, likely a paid off home, plus you can now collect Social Security.

I know many two teacher families who are currently living really nice retirements with world travel, kitchen upgrades, plenty of money to spend on grandkids, and expensive hobbies. And they were semi-retired by 55 and fully retired by 65.

I also know a number of Big Law partners who have way more money but are still working stressful, long days into their 60s and feel that they will "never have enough."

The teachers were smarter, no question.[/quote]

+1. Slow and steady wins the race (usually).  Not a fable. [/quote]

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