Age – Earlybirds Invest https://earlybirdsinvest.com Latest Crypto News Fri, 12 Sep 2025 17:19:46 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.9.7 https://i0.wp.com/earlybirdsinvest.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/cropped-New-Project-2024-12-17T235703.455.png?fit=32%2C32&ssl=1 Age – Earlybirds Invest https://earlybirdsinvest.com 32 32 240146708 Social Security retirement age: How to raise it without hurting poor people https://earlybirdsinvest.com/social-security-retirement-age-how-to-raise-it-without-hurting-poor-people/ https://earlybirdsinvest.com/social-security-retirement-age-how-to-raise-it-without-hurting-poor-people/#respond Fri, 12 Sep 2025 17:19:45 +0000 https://earlybirdsinvest.com/social-security-retirement-age-how-to-raise-it-without-hurting-poor-people/

The other day, economist Tyler Cowen made an offhand observation that took me aback a bit: that the French, today, enjoy “the longest financed retirements ever seen in the history of the world.”

Verifying the “history of the world” part is beyond my historical skill level. That said, the OECD’s Pensions at a Glance report from 2023 confirms that French retirees are enjoying a lot of years off the job.

French men, per the report, left the labor force at an average age of 60.7. At that point, they have a life expectancy of 84, meaning they can expect 23.3 years in retirement, longer than any of the other countries the OECD examined (mostly rich peer nations plus a few select others). French women can expect 26.1 years in retirement, which is beaten by Luxembourg, Spain, Slovenia, and the world leader, Saudi Arabia, but still very high. (The Saudi case is more about women working fewer and shorter stints than in more liberal polities, as opposed to retirement policy.)

French men and women alike can expect over five additional years in retirement compared to Americans.

Incidentally, the French government fell this week in part due to opposition parties demanding that the centrist coalition in power go back on its decision to raise the formal retirement age from 62 to 64. Funding 23 to 26 years of retirement per person is expensive, which is exactly why President Emmanuel Macron raised the age in the first place, but when the elderly voter bloc is only growing in size, failing to pay that money out can be politically suicidal.

Retirement, American-style

As a non-Frenchman, this fight inevitably makes me think about the coming retirement battle in the US. Our Social Security trust fund is due to be depleted in about eight years. Under current law, when that happens, retirees will see an across-the-board cut of about 23 percent in their benefit levels. Everything I know about how the US government works tells me it will not get to that point. The question, then, is what a deal to prevent those cuts would look like.

One obvious way to avoid the French predicament is to do what Macron did: raise the retirement age. There are two components to the aging problem hitting the US and other rich nations’ pension systems. One is that, because of the size of the baby boom population, more people are hitting retirement age than ever. The number of retired workers newly receiving Social Security hit 3.4 million in 2022, compared to under 2 million in 2000.

Raising the retirement age doesn’t solve this issue. But it does partially address the second issue, which is that the average time spent in retirement has risen as nutrition and medicine have improved. A man born in 1900 and turning 65 in 1965 could expect to live 12.9 more years. The Social Security Administration estimates that a man born in 1960 and turning 65 this year can expect 18.4 more years. Even accounting for the trend of people claiming Social Security later in life, that’s a good number of additional years that the program has to pay out per male retiree.

Between 2000 and 2022, the US gradually raised the retirement age for full Social Security benefits from 65 to 67. But most bipartisan proposals to reform Social Security (that is, proposals with any shot of passage) envision some kind of further age increase. Two years ago, Sens. Angus King (I-ME) and Bill Cassidy (R-LA) floated raising the normal retirement age to 70. The Bipartisan Policy Center brought together some ex-politicians and experts in both parties to put together a plan, which wound up advocating an age of 69.

One of the key political virtues of a retirement age increase is that it’s a benefit cut that doesn’t present itself quite as obviously as a benefit cut.

But it does amount to a cut, and potentially a large one. Right now, a 67-year-old woman can expect to live 18.5 more years. Suppose she has to wait until age 70 to claim the same amount of benefits she can now claim at 67. That eats up three of her 18.5 years of expected benefits, an over 16 percent cut. The cut for men, with our shorter lifespans, is even larger in percentage terms.

The most important question to ask about it, though, is whether it’s an across-the-board benefit cut, or in fact a regressive one. There are strong arguments that it is the latter.

Death inequality and Social Security

The eminent Social Security expert and economist Alice Munnell recently highlighted a chart from the program’s actuary’s office that underlined a pretty concerning gap and trend:

A chart showing life expectancy of men at age 62 by quintile of average indexed monthly earnings

Screenshot

If you don’t speak Social Security jargon, this can be a little hard to parse. Essentially, it’s comparing two groups: men born in 1930 considering retirement in 1992 and men born in 1960 considering retirement in 2022. In both groups there is a large gap in life expectancy between the people who earned the least in their careers and those who earned the most. In 1992, the highest-earning men could expect to live 8.4 years longer than the lowest-earning men. In 2022, they could expect 10.3 more years. (“Highest-earning” here means the highest-earning fifth, This is not exactly Elon Musk money: in 2020, being in the top quintile as a man meant an average monthly income of at least $6,391, or $76,692 annually.)

Put differently: not only is there a big life expectancy gap between rich and poor people, but also the gap seems to be growing.

This puts retirement age discussions in a different light. Suppose we’re considering raising not the normal retirement age (now 67) but the early age (now 62), at which point retirees can claim reduced benefits. If we raise the age by three years, then men in the highest income bracket get a cut of 3 divided by 25.6, or about 11 percent. Men in the lowest income bracket get a cut of 3 divided by 15.3, or almost 20 percent. The specific numbers are different if you’re considering raising the normal retirement age, or looking at female workers, but the overall takeaway is the same: raising the age of retirement amounts to a bigger cut for poorer workers.

Recently, economists Henry Aaron at Brookings and Mark Warshawsky got into a heated dispute about how to make sense of these numbers. Warshawsky argues against using life expectancy numbers like those above on the grounds that they inevitably require one to make projections (we don’t know, of course, how long people who retired in 2022 will in fact live, chiefly because most of them haven’t died yet), and for restricting analysis to men aged 65-69. Aaron argues that this is too restrictive (everyone, including insurers, relies heavily on life expectancy projections as well) and neglects that women, for instance, have seen lifespan inequality increase.

To my non-expert eye, Aaron has the better of this specific dispute. But it’s worth emphasizing that the lifespan gap between rich and poor need not be increasing in order for hiking the retirement age to be regressive on net. If, in 30 years, rich men are still living 10 more years in retirement than poor men, an increase in the retirement age will still hit poor men harder than rich men, even if the gap itself hasn’t grown.

The traditional Republican approach to Social Security has been to call for its shortfall to be closed entirely with benefit cuts; the traditional Democratic approach has been to rely entirely on tax hikes. Neither of these has any shot in hell of happening, especially if the Senate filibuster remains in place.

I highly doubt that there are 50 Republicans in the Senate now willing to vote for major benefit cuts, and there certainly aren’t the 60 that would actually be needed. Similarly, I put the odds of Democrats ever electing 60 senators willing to pass a huge payroll tax hike, even just on top earners, at near zero.

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If there’s going to be reform before the trust fund runs out in 2033, it’s going to have to be on a bipartisan basis and involve pretty huge concessions by each side. And I suspect some kind of a retirement age increase will be part of the deal.

If that happens, the best option out there is one that Wendell Primus, Tara Watson, and Jack Smalligan outline in their recent Brookings reform plan. They would raise the retirement age — but only for the top 40 percent of earners. Most retirees would not see the age rise at all, while the top fifth of earners would see it rise to 70. Those in the 60th to 80th percentiles would see smaller hikes. Along with other progressive benefit cuts and tax hikes, the plan would fix the program’s solvency issue.

This retirement age change would make the system somewhat more complicated, as people would have to look up what their specific retirement age is based on their income. But it’s the only plan I’ve seen that keeps the most popular kind of benefit cut from being painfully regressive.

]]> https://earlybirdsinvest.com/social-security-retirement-age-how-to-raise-it-without-hurting-poor-people/feed/ 0 58087 This Is the Average 401(k) Balance for Retirees Age 60 and Older https://earlybirdsinvest.com/this-is-the-average-401k-balance-for-retirees-age-60-and-older/ https://earlybirdsinvest.com/this-is-the-average-401k-balance-for-retirees-age-60-and-older/#respond Sat, 30 Aug 2025 20:58:05 +0000 https://earlybirdsinvest.com/this-is-the-average-401k-balance-for-retirees-age-60-and-older/ A 401(k) is a common type of retirement account that employers offer to their workforce.

The 401(k) account is one of the most common retirement savings accounts that employers offer their workers. Employees are able to contribute pre-tax dollars to these accounts and invest them tax-deferred. Only when withdrawals are made do the account holders pay taxes at their ordinary tax rate.

Employers have the option to offer some kind of matching contribution, usually up to a set percentage of each employee’s salary. Employer contributions are deductible up to a certain point.

With everyone making different salaries and employers having different policies for their 401(k) plans, it’s natural for workers to wonder how much they should save as they approach retirement. While there is no single right answer, available data can help you gauge where you stand.

Person looking at laptop and holding documents.

Image source: Getty Images.

The average 401(k) balance for retirees age 60 and older

While several companies provide data on the average 401(k) balance, I like to use Fidelity when I can, given the company’s size and reputation in the space.

At the end of 2024, Fidelity looked at 401(k) data from 26,700 corporate defined contribution plans that included 24.5 million participants. The company found that the average 401(k) balance was $246,500 for ages 60 to 64, $251,400 for ages 65 to 69, and $250,000 for ages 70 and over.

Fidelity actually recommends saving much more than this amount. In prior articles, the company has suggested having eight times your annual salary by age 60 and 10 times your annual salary by age 67. With median annual earnings for a full-time U.S. worker above $50,000, Fidelity’s recommendation is far higher than the approximately $250,000 average balance for its plan participants near retirement.

But again, there’s always a difference between advice and reality. Retirees should also understand that an average number among tens of millions of people captures so many different scenarios. Ultimately, retirees should think about the lifestyle they want in retirement and work with a financial advisor or on their own to determine how much they need to support that lifestyle.

]]> https://earlybirdsinvest.com/this-is-the-average-401k-balance-for-retirees-age-60-and-older/feed/ 0 55940 How Much Should Retirees Have Invested by Age 65? https://earlybirdsinvest.com/how-much-should-retirees-have-invested-by-age-65/ https://earlybirdsinvest.com/how-much-should-retirees-have-invested-by-age-65/#respond Wed, 04 Jun 2025 07:00:23 +0000 https://earlybirdsinvest.com/how-much-should-retirees-have-invested-by-age-65/ The financial challenge facing U.S. retirees is still preventable for much of today’s working generation.

Retirement is something you hear about often throughout your working life. It’s easy to push those retirement thoughts away during your younger years, but waiting too long to get serious about your financial future can have serious consequences.

The typical U.S. household has median retirement savings of just $200,000 at age 65.

In other words, someone using the popular 4% rule is trying to live off just $8,000 in their first year of retirement. Not many people can live off of that, so it’s safe to say there is a financial crisis among older Americans.

Just how much are people falling short of where they should be? There is no single number, but investment management company T. Rowe Price lays out some reasonable guidance to help gauge how much you should have invested throughout your working years.

Young person listening to a piggy bank.

Image source: Getty Images. 

You should try to have 7.5 to 13.5 times your salary invested by age 65

T. Rowe Price lays out milestones, depending on your age:

  • 1.5 to 2.5 times your salary at age 40
  • 3.5 to 5.5 times your salary at age 50
  • 6.0 to 11.0 times your salary at age 60
  • 7.5 to 13.5 times your salary at age 65

Given the median household income in the U.S. is approximately $80,000, a typical household retiring at 65 should have between $600,000 and $1.1 million invested, according to the above guidelines. That’s three to five times what a typical household actually retires on.

Why the wide range? Everyone’s situation is different. Your lifestyle, location, income, and personal finances can all directly impact how much you might need. These milestones also also based on the previously mentioned 4% rule and a 30-year retirement period.

Younger workers shouldn’t depend on Social Security

This challenge is going to evolve and impact younger generations differently. Social Security currently provides a safety blanket to retirees. The average monthly Social Security benefit is approximately $2,000, and millions of Americans depend on that money.

However, Social Security is on an unsustainable path. Due primarily to an aging population, the number of beneficiaries is growing faster than that of workers contributing via payroll taxes. The Social Security Board of Trustees estimates the program currently has less than a decade of solvency left at this pace.

It sounds bad, but don’t panic. It’s unlikely Social Security goes away entirely. If it does reach insolvency, benefits will decline to match incoming tax revenue.

Between now and then, the government must take action to extend Social Security’s solvency. It could:

The bottom line? It’s more important than ever to take your retirement into your own hands. Social Security will look different in 10, 20, or 30 years.

Two things you can do right now to start heading in the right direction

Even if you can’t build the retirement portfolio you hoped for, any progress is better than where you would be otherwise.

The two most important things within your control are how much you spend and how much you invest.

If you don’t currently budget your money, now is a good time to start. Track your expenses and see where you may be able to cut back if you need to free up some cash. It’s also a good idea to focus on paying off high-interest debt, such as credit cards.

Then, focus on your retirement portfolio. If you have a 401(k) plan, check with your employer to see whether it offers an employer match. There are other tools and options to save with, even if you don’t have access to a 401(k).

If you’re feeling a bit overwhelmed, that’s OK. Finances can be complicated, and nobody is born an expert. Consider consulting with a certified financial planner who can help you evaluate where you stand and build a plan suited to your specific needs.

Justin Pope has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool recommends T. Rowe Price Group. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.

]]> https://earlybirdsinvest.com/how-much-should-retirees-have-invested-by-age-65/feed/ 0 40037 3 Reasons I'll Be Taking Social Security Long Before Age 70 https://earlybirdsinvest.com/3-reasons-ill-be-taking-social-security-long-before-age-70/ https://earlybirdsinvest.com/3-reasons-ill-be-taking-social-security-long-before-age-70/#respond Sat, 24 May 2025 11:58:38 +0000 https://earlybirdsinvest.com/3-reasons-ill-be-taking-social-security-long-before-age-70/

Those who qualify for Social Security retirement benefits can choose to start collecting their monthly payments as early as age 62, as late as age 70, or at any point in between those two ages.

As you might imagine, 62 is a very popular age to start collecting Social Security, as many people choose to start getting income as soon as possible. 65 is another common age — while full retirement age for Social Security is between 66 and 67, depending on when you were born, 65 is the age of Medicare eligibility, and for this reason, is a rather popular age to leave the workforce.

Social Security card in stack of money.

Image source: Getty Images.

One age that is not particularly common to start Social Security is 70. At first, you might think that many people try to wait as long as possible. After all, if your full retirement age is 67 and you choose to wait until 70, your retirement benefit will be 24% higher. However, a very small percentage of Americans wait until 70, and although a higher inflation-protected income stream certainly sounds appealing, I don’t plan to join this particular club.

In a nutshell, my current plan is to claim Social Security at my full retirement age, which is 67 for everyone born in 1960 or later. Here are three key reasons why.

1. I want to enjoy my retirement while still (relatively) young

I’ve been maxing out my retirement accounts every year for more than a decade, and plan to continue doing so for as long as I’m working.

The reason I’m doing this is to be in a position to retire well before I reach age 70. And while I don’t necessarily plan to stop working entirely when I’m in my early 60s, I want the ability to do so if I want. My wife and I want to travel extensively, and we’d like to do it while we’re still relatively young.

2. I hope to not need the extra money from waiting until 70

Having a retirement benefit that is 24% higher than at my full retirement age would certainly be nice. After all, Social Security is likely to be the only inflation-protected source of retirement income I have. But as mentioned, I’m saving pretty aggressively for retirement and hope to not need the extra money that comes from waiting as long as possible.

To be sure, I want my full retirement benefit. I don’t anticipate needing the money before I reach full retirement age, so I don’t want to take an early retirement benefit reduction. If I end up leaving full-time work at age 65, for example, I can use my savings to bridge the gap between then and my full retirement age.

3. I’d like income for more years

Of course, none of us know how long we’re going to live. We can use our family history as a general guideline, but that’s not a bulletproof strategy. As a personal example, I have several relatives who lived well into their 90s, but also had a grandfather who didn’t live to see 60.

By definition (assuming that you live until at least 70), claiming Social Security at 62 will get you eight more years of income versus someone who waits until 70. If you live to 80, for example, someone who starts Social Security at 62 will have 18 years of monthly payments, compared with 10 years for someone who waits until 70. I feel that claiming at full retirement age is a solid compromise between maximizing my income and receiving checks for more years.

It’s subject to change

In full disclosure, I’m 42 years old right now. Under my current plan, I’m a quarter-century away from filing for my Social Security benefit, and there’s a lot that can change in 25 years. Maybe I’ll still love my job as much as I do now and will want to keep working full-time until I’m 70. Or maybe health or job-related reasons will prompt me to retire earlier than I plan to.

The point is, while it’s smart to have a plan, it’s also important to acknowledge that nobody can predict the future. There are perfectly valid reasons to start Social Security at age 62, at full retirement age, at age 70, and at any ages in between those. And there’s no way to know which of those reasons will apply to me in a couple of decades.

]]> https://earlybirdsinvest.com/3-reasons-ill-be-taking-social-security-long-before-age-70/feed/ 0 38039 Anna Kazlauskas: Data Ownership in the Age of AI https://earlybirdsinvest.com/anna-kazlauskas-data-ownership-in-the-age-of-ai/ https://earlybirdsinvest.com/anna-kazlauskas-data-ownership-in-the-age-of-ai/#respond Fri, 09 May 2025 00:55:48 +0000 https://earlybirdsinvest.com/anna-kazlauskas-data-ownership-in-the-age-of-ai/

You’re swimming in data. You’re creating new data every day. If your health app counts your steps? That’s new data. The Oura ring that’s tracking your bio-metrics? Valuable data. Your social media posts, even the stupid jokes that got zero likes? More data.

This is all data that AI companies would love to harvest. You can’t build good AI without good data, which is why many view data as the “new oil’ in the race for AI. The problem, though, is that while your data is valuable in theory, the reality is that it’s hard to monetize your own personal data, as you have no leverage as an individual. (Open AI isn’t knocking at your door to buy your old tweets.)

Enter Vana. “I think data is this fundamental resource powering the next generation of AI, and really the next generation of our digital economy,” says Anna Kazlauskas, co-founder of Vana and CEO of Open Data Labs. “A lot of people frankly just don’t realize that they actually own their data.”

But you do own your data. And it’s valuable… if you can somehow join forces with millions of others who also own their data. This would give you bargaining power. And that’s the mission of Vana: To create an ecosystem for user-owned data, which in turn fuels user-owned AI.

That ecosystem involves a mix of Data DAOs (a “labor union” for data), decentralized data marketplaces, the recently launched VRC-20 token, and a new collaboration with Flower Labs to build the world’s first user-owned foundational model. (Exhibit A that Decentralized AI is creeping into the mainstream: The Vana/Flower collaboration was covered by WIRED.)

Kazlauskas will give a keynote at the AI Summit at Consensus 2025 outlining this vision, and she gives a glimpse here. And she sees the momentum shifting. “We’re already starting to see this shift where more people realize that, ‘My data is really important to AI’ and ‘I’m actually the owner of that.’” She predicts that in a few years, over 100 million users will be onboard. In 10 years? “World population. Above 10 billion.”

Interview has been condensed and lightly edited for clarity.

Why is user-owned data so important to you?

Anna Kazlauskas: Most people assume data is owned by the platforms that it’s sitting on, but that’s not the case. In the same way that when you put your car in a parking lot, the parking lot doesn’t own your car. You can always take it back. You have full ownership over it.

And there’s a huge amount of money being made today, mostly by big tech companies, off of that data, but users are the legal owners. So I think it’s important that we restore that ownership, both from a user perspective and from a developer’s perspective.

Can you connect the dots of how this helps developers?

As a developer, especially in an AI world, having access to the right data is really important. And it’s super hard to do right now, because most of the data is locked up within the walled gardens of big tech. So many of my really smart friends who do stuff in AI go work at the big labs, because that’s where the data is and that’s where the compute is. But that doesn’t have to be the case.

How do Data DAOs fit into this vision exactly?

So a DataDAO is kind of like a labor union for data. Where basically you have a large group of people who pool their data together, and then can make collective decisions over what happens to that data.

The reason why that’s important is that your data, on its own, is not that useful, right? It’s much more useful when there’s a big pool of it. When there’s enough of it to train an AI model.

What are some of the Data DAOs you’re most excited by?

There are a few in the health space that are really interesting. There’s an early one that’s actually doing full exports of patient medical records, which I think can really help advance a lot of research in the space. There’s some related to biometrics, sleep, and health. There’s one with the DLP [Driver Loyalty Program] Labs; they’re building car data. And within their data-set, the Tesla data is really interesting because most people think about Tesla as valuable because they have a data lead, right? Actually, the users can get a lot of that data-set.

You’re pivoting from theory to practice with the new collaboration with Flower Labs to build COLLECTIVE-1. What’s the goal there?

COLLECTIVE-1 is the first user-owned foundation model. Usually when people think about a foundation model, they typically think of one company running a very large training job in a single data center, right? Like OpenAI. And the reason why it’s typically done in a centralized way is because it requires, one, a whole lot of compute power, and two, a whole lot of data.

Flower AI is kind of the leader in federated [decentralized] training. They’ve done a really great job of building these great open source libraries. They’ve come in from the training side and the algorithm side. And with Vana, we really focus on that data piece, right? So we basically have all this data that people can train on. Then you give users end-ownership of the model, and users can decide on what the model is allowed to do? So this is the first foundation model of its kind.

And the theory is that eventually, with better data, you can build AI that’s not just competitive with the central players but better, is that right? So it’s not just about ideology, but also performance.

Exactly, yeah that’s 100% right. From a decentralized context, I think often people agree in principle that, “Yes, we should have AI that’s owned by the people. We should have decentralized AI.” But what’s the thing that we can actually do better in a decentralized context? Data is the answer. For each company, they only have their single slice of a data-set. Apple’s got their data. Google’s got their data. But if you’re going through the user, you can cut across platforms and actually build better data-sets than any single company. Data is the secret sauce that makes it all work.

Love it. Thanks Anna, see you at the AI Summit in Toronto.

Jeff Wilser will host the AI Summit at Consensus 2025, and is host of The People’s AI: The Decentralized AI Podcast.

]]> https://earlybirdsinvest.com/anna-kazlauskas-data-ownership-in-the-age-of-ai/feed/ 0 35167 President Trump’s Crypto Head Bo Hines Says White House Ushering in ‘Golden Age for Digital Assets’ https://earlybirdsinvest.com/president-trumps-crypto-head-bo-hines-says-white-house-ushering-in-golden-age-for-digital-assets/ https://earlybirdsinvest.com/president-trumps-crypto-head-bo-hines-says-white-house-ushering-in-golden-age-for-digital-assets/#respond Wed, 09 Apr 2025 23:13:33 +0000 https://earlybirdsinvest.com/president-trumps-crypto-head-bo-hines-says-white-house-ushering-in-golden-age-for-digital-assets/

President Donald Trump’s new head of crypto reportedly says that we are entering into the “golden age” of digital assets now that the previous administration’s policies are being undone.

According to a new report by Fox, Bo Hines – executive director of the President’s Council of Advisors on Digital Assets – says that Biden’s policies drove much of the industry overseas while Trump is embracing the nascent sector and setting it up to thrive in the US.

Hines says that instead of helping the industry innovate, Biden used regulatory agencies under his control to go after crypto firms.

As stated by Hines, according to Fox,

“At the end of the day, the largest players to the smallest players want to be operating in the United States – they just need a clear set of rules to abide by to do so…

We’ve been in the demolition phase – removing a lot of those barriers that the Biden regime put up so that people can actually start building back here in the United States.

My main message to players in the crypto space has been – welcome home. We are going to create the most pro-crypto-friendly regulatory environment that anyone could possibly imagine because we understand how important the innovation is here in this space.”

According to Hines, the Stablecoin Transparency and Accountability for a Better Ledger Economy (STABLE) Act would establish clear regulatory guidelines for dollar-pegged crypto assets and could be the first “truly meaningful” piece of legislation signed by Trump during this second term.

“I think that Americans will see that once this [stablecoin] legislation is through – once this regulatory framework is established – the way in which they move their money will be changed forever. You will see that Americans will have better access to quicker payments and better access to transparency.”

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]]> https://earlybirdsinvest.com/president-trumps-crypto-head-bo-hines-says-white-house-ushering-in-golden-age-for-digital-assets/feed/ 0 29962 Not your key, not your content: Ownership in the digital age https://earlybirdsinvest.com/not-your-key-not-your-content-ownership-in-the-digital-age/ https://earlybirdsinvest.com/not-your-key-not-your-content-ownership-in-the-digital-age/#respond Sat, 08 Mar 2025 01:07:48 +0000 https://earlybirdsinvest.com/not-your-key-not-your-content-ownership-in-the-digital-age/

Amazon has updated its terms of purchase for its US Kindle e-books, making it clear that customers are licensed content rather than ownership. The new statement reads:By placing an order, you purchase a license for the content and agree to the terms and conditions of use of the Kindle Store.“This update is specific to US customers. International users continue to look at the previous language, but the message is the same. You don’t own it. We’re just letting you use it.

From February 26th, 2025, Amazon will be offering “Download and transfer via USBKindle device features. This means that users will no longer be able to download Kindle books directly to their computers, as access to purchased content is entirely dependent on Amazon’s cloud infrastructure. This change points to subtle truths about ownership and reinforces simple facts. If someone else can take it, it’s not yours.

This is not just an Amazon issue, it applies to all content and materials in the current digital age. Your favorite songs and albums on the streaming app are not accessible without an internet connection. Limit the number of devices you can listen to and insert ads unless you pay a monthly fee. The era of records, tapes, and CDs allowed you to listen freely to the freedom you wanted, resell, or give it to your friends.

What does it mean to own something? Ownership is usually understood as an act or state of ownership of something. In this case, we clearly own the content, but we can change it or change it at any time. It is not true ownership. Oxford states that ownership is defined as “an exclusive right to use, own and dispose of property.” Therefore, ownership requires exclusivity.

What about other intangible digital items, such as money or identity? Have names and handles on social media and emails. It’s you, it’s your online portrait, persona and content you created. You cannot have two people with the same name or handle. That exclusivity is enforced by the account’s password, but that account can be locked, banned or deleted at any time by Facebook or X’s decision. What about that money in your bank account? You own it and you have a legal right to it, but the banks freeze your accounts and the government always seizes the funds. It is not true ownership.

So I ask again: what does it mean to own something? It’s not enough to own it. It’s not enough to have exclusivity or even legal rights. To truly own something, you must be able to enforce its ownership and exclusivity. In the physical world, enforcement mainly comes down to the threat of coercion and violence or actual use. Evict notice from the Sheriff’s Office, armed guards in front of the safe, and redrawing of the postwar border. In the digital domain, encryption serves this purpose, while at the same time eliminating the need for violence by making power effective. It creates ownership that is not voided by violence. You cannot break strong encryption. The government can seize servers and businesses can shut down their accounts, but if the data is encrypted and the key is private, the information is inaccessible. The only way to access encrypted assets is by consent.

Encryption doesn’t just protect digital ownership. It changes the nature of power. It removes violence from the equation. So it’s very destructive.

Digital signatures on encrypted systems are a way of proof of ownership and control in the digital world. PGP allows you to sign messages and files, and prove that they come from you and have not been changed. Nostr, a decentralized social media protocol, works the same way. Your posts and identity are tied to your private key, not to a company that can ban you or delete you. Bitcoin illustrates this principle. Controlling your private keys only means you can access and manage your funds. Signing a Bitcoin transaction allows you to access and move your money. Banks cannot freeze it. The government can’t grab it without your key. True ownership is the power to enforce that ownership.

The bitcoin axiom comes to mind: “Not your key, not your coin.” “Not a key, not a coin” means that you do not own a Bitcoin private key unless you control it. When you keep Bitcoin in exchange, the exchange holds the key, not you. They can freeze your account, limit withdrawals, or even lose your funds. Securities and retirement accounts using Bitcoin ETFs can be frozen or seized just like bank accounts. True ownership means holding a key. Because you have complete control over your money, identity and property.

The transition from physical to digital has made it easier to access, but ownership is dark. Whether it’s a book, music, identity, or money, simply owning is an illusion of ownership. Companies can revoke access, governments can seize funds, platforms can erase their identity, but encryption changes it. Ownership is enforceable by mathematics, not by law, business, or institution. If you need true digital ownership, the rules are simple. Control the key or someone else is the true owner.

This is a guest post by Will Jager. The opinions expressed are entirely unique and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of BTC Inc or Bitcoin Magazine.

]]> https://earlybirdsinvest.com/not-your-key-not-your-content-ownership-in-the-digital-age/feed/ 0 23889 Here's How Much You Should Have Saved for Retirement by Age 60 https://earlybirdsinvest.com/heres-how-much-you-should-have-saved-for-retirement-by-age-60/ https://earlybirdsinvest.com/heres-how-much-you-should-have-saved-for-retirement-by-age-60/#respond Fri, 21 Feb 2025 22:18:29 +0000 https://earlybirdsinvest.com/heres-how-much-you-should-have-saved-for-retirement-by-age-60/

Most 60-year-olds are standing on the precipice of retirement. This is a happy thought for some who were able to save consistently throughout their careers. For others, it’s alarming as they try to figure out how they’ll get by on little more than their Social Security benefits.

The best way to ensure you can afford to retire comfortably is to save some of your income every month and check in with yourself regularly to see if you’re on track for your goals. While everyone’s savings target is different, here’s what conventional wisdom has to say about how much you should have saved by the time you’re 60.

Person holding documents and looking at laptop.

Image source: Getty Images.

You should be pretty close to your goal

One popular retirement rule of thumb says that you should have an amount equal to your average salary saved by the time you’re 30. This should grow to three times your average salary by 40, six times by 50, and eight times by 60. By the time you’re 67, you should have 10 times your average salary.

Using a rule of thumb like this can help you get in the ballpark of what you need for retirement. Average annual earnings as of the fourth quarter of 2024 were just under $62,000, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. If you hoped to have eight times that amount by the time you turned 60, you’d need $496,000.

However, this might be an underestimate for some. Another popular retirement savings rule — the 4% rule — says that you should save 25 times your estimated annual out-of-pocket retirement expenses in order to have enough to last you 30 years. If we follow this rule and assume that your estimated annual expenses in retirement will be about $60,000, you arrive at $1.5 million.

Your retirement savings target ultimately depends on your life expectancy and the type of lifestyle you hope to have. You can use the strategies listed above as a jumping-off point. But you may need to make some adjustments based on what you expect your retirement to look like. You could also try a retirement calculator to help you figure out how much you need to save.

Most 60-year-olds are coming up short

Going by our “eight times salary” rule, the average 60-year-old should have roughly $500,000 socked away for retirement. But that’s not the case for the majority of Americans. Those aged 55 to 64 have just $244,750 set aside on average. The median balance, which better reflects what an ordinary person in that age group has, is $87,571.

This puts many seniors in a tight spot. If they’re not able to save more for their future, they could struggle to afford their bills. Most will have some Social Security benefits to help them, and possibly a pension as well. But this still might not be enough to pay for all their expenses.

There isn’t an easy solution to this. Delaying retirement is worth considering if you’re able to continue working: It gives you more time to save and reduces the length and cost of your retirement. If that’s not possible, you may have to look into government benefits to see if these can help you cover your essential costs.

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