9 ms·

It gets worse when you read financial "social media" people repeating BS like "high yield savings account" there is no such thing as long as I am alive, it is s

by ozim 14d ago

It gets worse when you read financial "social media" people repeating BS like "high yield savings account" there is no such thing as long as I am alive, it is something from maybe 80's or 90's or even earlier. My cousin had the idea of "just put some money in savings account each month and never check it" - that's exactly super outdated advice or a crooked one where someone doesn't know anything about ETFs and heard you put money each month in it and forget... There is whole LARP scene of FIRE and influential bloggers from that scene are the only ones that are making money. Nest egg I do believe had merit back when there actually were "high yield savings accounts" available. I basically see who is LARPing money management when I see they post about FIRE or HYSA, well "money market accounts" seem better and kind of like of HYSA, but the hell those are not really that easily available. Government bonds are also rather interesting for keeping as "nest egg", corporate bonds are useless. Article author seems to be from quite well off family lamenting he just didn't understood any of financial stuff and world moved on while he ate away whatever he had. Sad part is it can happen to any of us even if we are financially literate because market can be bad far longer than we can afford or like retirement, jobs all of this can shift while we are left with much less for day to day. Part that I don't understand is that, we should expect that outcome rather than be surprised by it. We should be surprised when all went well and there was no recession, layoffs during our lives.

cagey 14d ago
[Speaking as a US citizen] > ... BS like "high yield savings account" there is no such thing as long as I am alive ... HYSA are in 2026 readily available. > ... well "money market accounts" seem better and kind of like of HYSA, but the hell those are not really that easily available. Likewise readily available: open a free brokerage (or "cash management") account at Fidelity.com online (it is easy and acts similar to a bank account: your paycheck can be direct deposited there, it offers a billpay service, you can use it for electronic transfers, and outgoing wire transfers are free; no minimum balance and no monthly fees), cash by default goes into their SPAXX money market account (its 0.42% ER (Expense Ratio) is higher than some, but its 3.33% yield beats most savings/credit union savings rates; EX: Ally bank is yielding 3.00% these days). If you want more of the yield to go into your pocket you can buy (with no transaction fee) a ETF like Vanguard's VBIL which invests only in short duration US Treasury bills (now yielding 3.63% w/ER 0.06%). And if you're up for slightly higher effort, you can buy T-Bills directly at Fidelity with auto reinvestment, at no extra cost. The preceding (including HYSA) are all near-zero risk, and as a consequence, do NOT pay truly "high" yields (which I think was your real point), they just pay yields that are at the upper end of 'near-zero risk'. These are NOT where you invest for long-term gain/appreciation. For the latter, conventional wisdom says: invest in the stock market, where the risk is much higher, but the historical long-term return is too. ETF's make this easy and efficient. One candidate for "fire and forget": VTI, Vanguard's Total [US] Stock Market Index ETF (as before, with an easy to open account at Fidelity, you can trade these for almost no cost; Fidelity has many competitors, I am merely a happy customer of theirs).
- georgemcbay 14d ago
  > HYSA are in 2026 readily available. The designation of "HYSA" is itself kind of a semantic shrinkflationesque slight of hand. "HYSA"s in 2026 have similar and often worse rates than a standard savings account back in, say, most of the 1990s. But, sure, compared to the average modern standard savings account (with rates of effectively nothing and well below inflation) it is higher yield than that.
  - bilegeek 14d ago
    Generally the only account that keeps even with inflation is a CD, but of course that locks up your money for that duration, which would suck in an emergency.
- ozim 14d ago
  What are the rates of your HYSA? between 2.5% and 4% that's normal savings account rate and high yield is BS.
Danox 14d ago
That is why a personal finance class should be required before you graduate from high school. The treadmill starts at 18 unless you have a silver spoon.
JackMorgan 14d ago
I know folks who save and invest 20-80% of their income. They are not LARPing, and many of them have investments with growth exceeding their job income after 10 years of this kind of saving. It's hardly a LARP to save and invest. Maybe if you're investing in something actually worthless or a ponzi scheme, but last I checked land is still an investment vehicle and they aren't making more of it. One can put solar on it, or a business, or lease it out to someone else.

by ozim 14d ago

cagey 14d ago

[Speaking as a US citizen] > ... BS like "high yield savings account" there is no such thing as long as I am alive ... HYSA are in 2026 readily available. > ... well "money market accounts" seem better and kind of like of HYSA, but the hell those are not really that easily available. Likewise readily available: open a free brokerage (or "cash management") account at Fidelity.com online (it is easy and acts similar to a bank account: your paycheck can be direct deposited there, it offers a billpay service, you can use it for electronic transfers, and outgoing wire transfers are free; no minimum balance and no monthly fees), cash by default goes into their SPAXX money market account (its 0.42% ER (Expense Ratio) is higher than some, but its 3.33% yield beats most savings/credit union savings rates; EX: Ally bank is yielding 3.00% these days). If you want more of the yield to go into your pocket you can buy (with no transaction fee) a ETF like Vanguard's VBIL which invests only in short duration US Treasury bills (now yielding 3.63% w/ER 0.06%). And if you're up for slightly higher effort, you can buy T-Bills directly at Fidelity with auto reinvestment, at no extra cost. The preceding (including HYSA) are all near-zero risk, and as a consequence, do NOT pay truly "high" yields (which I think was your real point), they just pay yields that are at the upper end of 'near-zero risk'. These are NOT where you invest for long-term gain/appreciation. For the latter, conventional wisdom says: invest in the stock market, where the risk is much higher, but the historical long-term return is too. ETF's make this easy and efficient. One candidate for "fire and forget": VTI, Vanguard's Total [US] Stock Market Index ETF (as before, with an easy to open account at Fidelity, you can trade these for almost no cost; Fidelity has many competitors, I am merely a happy customer of theirs).

georgemcbay 14d ago
> HYSA are in 2026 readily available. The designation of "HYSA" is itself kind of a semantic shrinkflationesque slight of hand. "HYSA"s in 2026 have similar and often worse rates than a standard savings account back in, say, most of the 1990s. But, sure, compared to the average modern standard savings account (with rates of effectively nothing and well below inflation) it is higher yield than that.
- bilegeek 14d ago
  Generally the only account that keeps even with inflation is a CD, but of course that locks up your money for that duration, which would suck in an emergency.
ozim 14d ago
What are the rates of your HYSA? between 2.5% and 4% that's normal savings account rate and high yield is BS.

Danox 14d ago

That is why a personal finance class should be required before you graduate from high school. The treadmill starts at 18 unless you have a silver spoon.

JackMorgan 14d ago

I know folks who save and invest 20-80% of their income. They are not LARPing, and many of them have investments with growth exceeding their job income after 10 years of this kind of saving. It's hardly a LARP to save and invest. Maybe if you're investing in something actually worthless or a ponzi scheme, but last I checked land is still an investment vehicle and they aren't making more of it. One can put solar on it, or a business, or lease it out to someone else.