

How To Retire At Age 27 - happyscrappy
http://thoughtbroadcast.com/2011/09/04/how-to-retire-at-age-27/

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zallarak
This title is a bit sensationalist, but the points this article makes are
valid. The mind is too complex to diagnose psychiatric illnesses with labels,
and if we associate rewards with having one of these labels, people will game
the system.

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jareds
As a blind person I have seen the disability system abused. Using Blindness as
an example I can understand someone who has recently gone blind using
Disability. It bothers me when I see people like me who were born blind and
are capable of holding a job chose to get Disability instead of working. I
don’t understand the logic of this since it looks like your benefits max out
at about $2600 a year but a lot of this depends on how much you worked in the
past. I’d like to know how much the person in this article gets a month. I
realize I’m lucky that I have a well-paying Software development job but I
would not want to live on SSDI income. First it would reduce my quality of
life while I could survive I wouldn’t be able to have the disposable income
for things such as vacations or new technology that I have now. Second having
a job makes me feel like I am a productive member of society. I am sure it is
different if you live in an area with chronic unemployment but I would feel
like my worth was lower than the average person if I made the choice to live
on disability when I was capable of working while all my friends were holding
down jobs.

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soneil
Putting a cash value on benefits is quite misleading. Once you factor housing
benefits, food stamps, etc - the total should be something you can live on. It
shouldn't be something you'd choose to live on, but it should be enough
(otherwise it's failing those who truly need it)

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jareds
True, I didn't take that into consideration. I used Social Security Disability
and Social Security Supplemental income to help pay for College but didn't get
any other bennefits since I lived on campus and was on my parents health
insurance.

