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I went on a bachelor party one weekend and the 12 of us got to talking around a camp fire about the #MeToo movement. What I heard was interesting.

None of the men were willing to be alone with another woman, junior or senior, for business lunch, dinner, or drinks. They were too afraid of being accused of inappropriate behavior.

All the men were between 35-55 years old. They also all had roles ranging from mid-level management to CEO. The men were responsible for over 40,000 employees skewed by one founder and CEO.

As someone who hasn’t worked a corporate day job since 2012, I was a little out of sorts. I went out with female colleagues and clients 1X1 all the time and never worried about being accused of inappropriate behavior. We’d get lunch and go to happy hour all the time.

My direct boss for the last three years of my career was a female Managing Director and she was great. I hope she one day joins the C-suite.

We had sexual harassment and management training while I worked in finance for 13 years. But even on the rough and tumble trading floor, there was never a #MeToo incident in my office that I was aware of.

Nowadays, when you just work with your wife on your small online business (this site), things are pretty streamlined. I guess she could fire me if I pinched her butt, but then who would do all the writing?

Canada is a wonderful country. Their GDP per capita is a respectable $45,000. Few people go through medical bankruptcies because healthcare is heavily subsidized. Meanwhile, the average annual tuition for Canadian universities was only $6,571 for the 2018/2019 academic year.

In addition to recommending all Americans looking to retire early to immigrate to Canada to take advantage of subsidized healthcare and other government benefits, I also recommend American high schoolers apply to Canadian universities as well.

The top Canadian universities are all much easier to get into than the top American universities. As a high school tennis coach for three years, I personally witnessed the grind my students faced every day studying for AP exams, trying to get straight-As, and taking the 3-hour long SAT multiple times.

Despite all their studying, most didn’t get into a top 20 American university. If only they applied to the top Canadian universities instead.

Ever since achieving financial independence in 2012 – where my investment income covers my desired living expenses – I’ve run into the Internet Retirement Police at least once a month.

The Internet Retirement Police are those people online who have nothing better to do but to criticize your way of life after you achieve FIRE (Financial Independence Retire Early).

Despite having enough passive income to never have to work again, as soon as you do something other than sit at home and watch TV all day, the IRP will come after you with a vengeance.

From 2012 – 2017, the Internet Retirement Police (IRP) said I wasn’t retired because I spent time writing on Financial Samurai each week. I made a promise in 2009 when I started Financial Samurai to write regularly for 10 years. Writing is something I love to do.

Since this site has grown into one of the top personal finance sites today, my FIRE status is not real according to the IRP. But if Financial Samurai remained as a small unknown site, then for some reason, I could retain my FIRE status. What strange logic the IRP have.

Then in 2017, I decided to coach high school tennis for four months a year. The Internet Retirement Police lashed again and said that I wasn’t able to say I’m a tennis coach because I have a profitable website and worked in finance for 13 years. Absurd!

The modern day FIRE movement started in 2007 when Jacob from Early Retirement Extreme began blogging about living super frugally to retire early. Unfortunately, Jacob went back to work as a quant trader in 2010 and left his Lean FIRE lifestyle behind.

In 2009, Sam continued the movement by starting Financial Samurai with the motto: achieving financial freedom sooner, rather than later.

With now over 1.5 million organic pageviews a month, Financial Samurai is helping inspire people from all over the world strive for financial freedom at a younger age.

Let’s look into the fundamentals of FIRE. We’ll learn what is the FIRE movement, the definition of FIRE, who is FIRE for, criticisms of the FIRE movement, and the framework behind FIRE.

When I started writing about retiring early in 2009, I didn’t quite know what to expect. I was 31 years old at the time and looking to retire early from my investment banking job of 10 years. I longed to surf and be a papaya and mango tree farmer in Hawaii.

Since 2009, the FIRE movement, short for Financial Independence Retire Early, has really boomed. So many bloggers have picked up the baton to try and achieve financial independence sooner, rather than later as well.

The bottom and the start of a bull market in stocks and real estate surely helped as well. All of us who’ve been saving and investing regularly have seen our net worths skyrocket.

In 2012, I finally negotiated a severance to be from full-time work for good. But like everything in life, there are risks. Let me share the top risks for those who achieve FIRE and retire early.

Bernie Sanders, the Democratic Socialist senator from Vermont, is a multi-millionaire with a net worth of at least $2.5 million according to public records.

The reality is that his net worth is likely more than $5 million given public records don’t include his Thrift Savings Plan and the capitalized values of his pensions and book income streams.

As a fierce critic of the wealthiest people in America, Bernie Sanders’ net worth stands at odds with the very people he is trying to take down. But that’s politics in a nutshell. “Do what I say, not as I do.“

But as someone born in 1941, it should come as no surprise Bernie Sanders is a multi-millionaire because he’s had over 50 years after graduating from the University of Chicago to save and invest. We are all living in the greatest bull market in history.

By simply saving $6,000 a year for 50 years at a 7% compound annual growth rate, Sanders could have amassed $2,600,000. If Sanders saved $10,000 a year for 50 years at an 8% compound annual growth rate, he would currently have over $6,200,000. Therefore, it’s not far fetched to believe Senator Sanders is secretly worth over $5 million.

If I was a Democratic Socialist, I would practice an intense version of Stealth Wealth as well to keep the angry masses at bay. After all, it’s logical to protect your assets from the taxes you are proposing.

The 2020 Democratic Presidential Primaries is a crowded field with 23 confirmed candidates, on exploratory committee, and multiple “maybes.”

If there’s ever a demonstration of the Dunning-Krueger effect and how politicians are clueless egomaniacs just looking for fame and power, this is it! Someone needs to tell these candidates there can only be one winner.

All the candidates are pretty much running on the same platform: promoting universal healthcare, pushing for regulations to curb climate change, reducing inequality, and improving conditions for the American middle class.

In other words, the candidate who will win will be the one who will simply appeal to the most people who look and sound like the majority of Democratic voters in America.

Given the majority of Democratic voters in America are white, it is highly likely that Joe Biden, Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, or Beto O’Rourke will get the nomination according to odds makers.

There will inevitably be candidates dropping out of the race as time goes on. Further, you will absolutely see candidates join forces and join as Vice Presidential candidates.

In 2009, I helped ignite the FIRE movement when I started Financial Samurai. With a motto of “achieving financial freedom sooner, rather than later,” I’ve been helping encourage people everywhere to get their finances right so they can live their best lives.

Coincidentally, 2009 was also the bottom of the previous financial crisis. Since then, the stock market and real estate market have performed extremely well. In fact, I’ve personally shifted over $800,000 in assets into real estate crowdfunding from directly owning physical real estate because of my desire to earn income 100% passively.

As a result of the strength in the markets, more and more people have built great wealth and have found the courage to retire early as well.