Frugality’s not my strong suit. Revenue and business sense are stronger for me. Discipline to some degree. So when I read or hear about someone who’s really good at frugality, it’s interesting to me. There are lots of blogs that cover frugality better than I ever can and can offer more and better frugality tips. But I thought I might share news here and again on people whose frugality skills have really impressed me.
Money brings us the story of David Gross. The story was really a small part of an article on paying no taxes. Mr. Gross did something unusual. He turned his entire life upside down to take a stand on a position—his opposition to the war in Iraq. Deciding he did not want his tax dollars funding the war, he quit his $100,000-a-year job and launched a business from his apartment—with a specific goal of earning less and paying no federal taxes. He pulled it off. In 2007, his gross income was $29,000. With retirement-account contributions of $8,500 combined with other deductions, his adjusted gross income (AGI) was $14,600. Amazingly, Mr. Gross lives in San Francisco—one of the most expensive places to live certainly in the U.S. and to a lesser extent in the world. Consider that he nevertheless managed to tuck away nearly 30% of his gross income!
How’s he doing it? He’s apparently ditched his car and is walking everywhere, he’s cooking most of his meals at home, and his entertainment consists mostly of movies rented through Netflix. And that’s all the detail the article revealed.
How’s he doing it really? My take is that it’s his unique motivation. He’s got a cause bigger than himself driving him.
For the full article, see the April 2008 issue of Money. (At the time of this post, the title of the article, “How to Pay Zero Taxes,” was up but did not yet link out to the article.)
Wow, that's really impressive. We should all strive to put away at least 30% for retirement. If we did this, we'd all be retiring at early ages. Great find!
Eli,
Thanks for the comment! We're being diligent about saving for retirement -- but yeah, I'd be pretty excited to tuck away 30% in just a single year for starters!
I'm not sure what's so impressive.
I'm living in Portland on less than $11,000 Unadjusted Gross Income and I have student loan payments and substantial out-of-pocket medical expenses.
So who's the Frugality King now?
Minimum Wage,
I was impressed by this person -- but it sounds like I should be more impressed by you. Is doing what you're doing easy for you? Do you have any ways that you approach it or tips that would be helpful for others? Please feel free to share here or let me know if you'd consider having a "Frugality King" post about you...
:-)
My friend had a hard time saving any money in San Fransisco making $70,000 a year. This just shows it can be done.
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