Divorce is way more expensive than your savings. I went through this; you save $12-16k/yr for 10 years and if you invest the difference smartly, it's $300k.
Without a prenup, and most don't cover earnings during your marriage anyway (They're hard to keep updated yearly), you're giving away half in California, which can be over $1M if you're a diligent saver and investor. Then if your spouse is REALLY nasty, you'll owe her spousal support that can be thousands per month, depending on your income (and income POTENTIAL), for the rest of her life (after 10 years of marriage in CA).
Any cost savings are completely nullified by divorce if you're a high earner and almost never make sense. Don't get married for tax savings, marry for other reasons and have the most iron-clad prenup you can afford and get your partner to agree to. I promise you, your future self will thank you.
This might be a naive question but how does one determine what "best" is for multiple subjects?
Even in your example, physics and mathematics could be curated for "best" when dealing with equations and foundational knowledge that has been hardened over decades. For history, climate change of invasion of Ukraine, isn't that sensitive to bias, manipulation and interpretation? These are not exact sciences.
> Here I am, just fine, a self-made millionaire today.
That says everything about how you view the world. "self-made". Nothing about how your adoptive father contributed, your peers or the entire society you grew up in.
Something else I'd love to get away from is that having money != being a well adjusted individual.
I wonder if the records set now during the reduced traffic COVID era will be able to be beaten once regular (or accelerated traffic begins due to reduced public transit use) resumes.
If we defund the police completely then maybe new records will be set (I'm being facetious of course).
Alex Roy has a very interesting talk he gave at Google 12 years ago (Wow!) on the subject of Cannonball runs. I highly recommend it: https://youtu.be/IQpg0tvap4A
Without a prenup, and most don't cover earnings during your marriage anyway (They're hard to keep updated yearly), you're giving away half in California, which can be over $1M if you're a diligent saver and investor. Then if your spouse is REALLY nasty, you'll owe her spousal support that can be thousands per month, depending on your income (and income POTENTIAL), for the rest of her life (after 10 years of marriage in CA).
Any cost savings are completely nullified by divorce if you're a high earner and almost never make sense. Don't get married for tax savings, marry for other reasons and have the most iron-clad prenup you can afford and get your partner to agree to. I promise you, your future self will thank you.