I get very angry reading posts from people who seemingly grew up with every advantage possible, talking about how easy it is to save money and retire wealthy.
Let me tell you, when you grow up poor, single parent, and have to work and borrow to survive like I have for most of my youth, and then carry the burdens of debts for decades and cannot effectively "invest" because you're still focused on repaying loans, it's not that simple.
At least three times in my life, I've had to liquidate all my substantial savings to survive a unexpected job loss, downturn in the markets, or other crummy situations. I've 3 times had to make radical changes and sell homes, once at break even after owning it for 8 years, to avoid foreclosures.
So, what I read here is a lot of people who totally lack perspective. It's a heck of a lot easier to "just save money" or "just invest money" when you have a LOT of luck, and start off way ahead with wealth and good parents.
I've done nearly everything "right." I've worked harder than probably most people I've met in my life. I never had a family vacation; correction. We had exactly 1 short road trip which was ended prematurely because our car broke down. I started work when I was 15 and have had a job every day since then. Every dime I earned went directly to survival until I was probably in my early 30s. Saving? Give me a break. When I've invested in the markets, the timing was almost always against me and I've managed to lose a lot of money. Because market manipulations. I've invested in housing and of the 3 houses, I did great (doubled my money) on one (8 years, great market), marginally beat inflation on another (6 years, minimal return), and lost a bundle on the 3rd after 8 years of ownership. Every government program is geared toward the classes of persons I am not so I have rarely gotten any handouts that everyone else seems to soak up.
You can work your *** off, but you cannot outwork horrible economics, soaring college costs, soaring inflation, government picking winners and losers (if you're a attractive woman, or certain minority or single mom the world is handed to you on a platter and everything is free, basically), horrible government leadership, and market manipulators, and bad life events, and starting way behind... no amount of 1% or 5% ROI is going to make up for the first 2+ decades, formative years of having almost nothing until you're in your late 20s.