Yep - this is my take, financial independence gives you freedom.
It's not about hating your job (or even loving your job) - it's about buying your own independence. For those without family wealth it's building your own safety net and bringing money related anxiety to zero and making it easier for your children to take bigger risks too.
This lets you take more risk (like doing a startup) with the downside risk contained. There's a reason startups are more often started by people with family wealth, they're ultimately risking a lot less.
Americans work hard in part because there's more upside potential than in Europe, but there's also more downside risk. I think we could do more to protect the lower bound which would be good for entrepreneurship and society, but we shouldn't put restrictions on the upside (I'd argue restricting upside disincentives risk taking and wealth creation).
One of my main 'contrarian' opinions is that wealth inequality isn't actually a big deal, and as long as you protect the lower bound is desirable in a society. You also need to control how that wealth is leveraged into political power though (and that can be a problem).
It's not about hating your job (or even loving your job) - it's about buying your own independence. For those without family wealth it's building your own safety net and bringing money related anxiety to zero and making it easier for your children to take bigger risks too.
This lets you take more risk (like doing a startup) with the downside risk contained. There's a reason startups are more often started by people with family wealth, they're ultimately risking a lot less.
Americans work hard in part because there's more upside potential than in Europe, but there's also more downside risk. I think we could do more to protect the lower bound which would be good for entrepreneurship and society, but we shouldn't put restrictions on the upside (I'd argue restricting upside disincentives risk taking and wealth creation).
One of my main 'contrarian' opinions is that wealth inequality isn't actually a big deal, and as long as you protect the lower bound is desirable in a society. You also need to control how that wealth is leveraged into political power though (and that can be a problem).