Canadian Chat → How to blow your lottery winnings

You can still rent those girls for an hour without winning the lottery.

Studies have shown that money can only buy happiness up to about $70-$80k/year of income, and after that point there is no additional return of happiness despite an increase in money.

The better answer would be money can buy you happiness - up to a point. Beyond a certain point it can't.

That's simply not true. RRSPs offer two distinct tax benefits, regardless of your tax bracket before and after retirement.

1) The contribution amount in the year is deducted from taxable income.

2) Interest earned in the RRSP is tax deferred, therefore will grow far faster over time than say a regular investment account where gains are taxed every year.

In Canada too. They're called "moral persons." It's what allows a corporation to legally open bank accounts, borrow money, and pay taxes.Without that designation, only strict "biologicals" could do all that.

But unlike real people, moral persons aren't true citizens, and they don't have the right to vote (although they can still greatly influence elections).

Agreed RRSPs and TFSAs are amongst the best things you can do to save and make money.

To add to my previous comment; safe investments that usually produce consistent income (fixed income funds, bond funds, dividend funds) are also highly taxable, by putting these into tax sheltered plans you're effectively mitigating their greatest disadvantage which is that the revenue generated by these is 100% taxable at your marginal rate.

Beyond that it can buy you an island in The Bahamas

I think that's mostly true, though not sure about the appropriate income threshold. It's not so much that money buys happiness at any level, but at the most basic level it prevents the real misery of true poverty. At a second level, it provides you with common "wants" rather than just "needs" so you don't have the frustration of not having the same lifestyle as most people you know and come in contact with.

That last point is why countries with large income disparities have so much misery at the lower income levels even when basic needs are being met, and conversely, why people living in countries with less income disparity can be quite happy and content even though average income is a fraction of what it is here.

The idea that large sums of money by itself will make someone happy has to be one of the most pervasive, false, and downright evil myths of the modern world. It certainly opens up the potential to do so, but very few people are smart enough to exploit that potential. Those who are don't typically buy lottery tickets on any regular basis.

I believe the income figure they quoted is where one starts to get into the realm of being able to afford what they want, rather than what they merely need.

My wife and I have a household income just into the six figure range and are in the top fifth percentile (probably even lower, as they don't do any numbers beyond 5%) of income in the Town of Fort Erie. We live comfortably and are able to not only afford what we need but also a good chunk of what we want. If we were above 150k I can truly say we'd have everything we ever want and any income beyond that wouldn't do anything more for us than it would at that level. Knowing this, those numbers they quoted make a lot of sense. Of course, while we live great here in Fort Erie, at 100k we'd probably just be average in Toronto.

Depends what you want one of the best things about living downtown, is not needing a car, so take the car expense away, and on 100K you're still doing pretty good.

However if you live out in the suburbs, where you need the car and have to pay for Toronto housing, then you'd really feel the hit then.

We have a child who turns one on Wednesday and are planning for another. A condo in Downtown Toronto is just not something either of us could stomach.

It's been a year already!! Man time flies.

Tell me about it. Growing up you hear your parents talk about how fast children grow. I didn't truly understand what they meant until now.

I see it in my niece and nephews, the oldest hits high school this fall.

I was thinking a house in the Annex of Parkdale... but yeah, in my case having a two year old, and another one coming "any day now" I wouldn't want to raise 'em in a condo either.

how about this latest millionaire

Calgary's newest Lotto Max $30 million winner Darrell Szczerba wants his old job back

»www.calgarysun.com/2013/ ··· job-back

Guy seems pretty smart about it. Topping out his retirement fund, enjoyed his job and wants to go back to it.

Random note: Don't go to NYC and pay $350 for Kobe beef. Go to Kobe and have it there. It's amazing.

I've seen that option with some of my friends.

We all basically retired at the same time due to our company being bought. We all had large stock options and all made enough on the sale to never have to work again. I was 51 and after a couple years I worked a couple days a month at another railroad for 14 months to be able to start collecting full railroad retirement(like social security plus for railroaders) at age 60 instead of 66. But I had no real desire to go to work on a regular basis. I've been retired 13 years now and don't miss work at all after working 50-60 hr weeks and being on call 24 x 7 for 20 of my 30 yrs working.

Only 2 of us, out of 7, felt bored in retirement to go back to work. One worked part time in a retail store and the other worked for about 8 more years on a contract basis at various companies doing consulting work.

The rest of us found enough interesting things to do in retirement, that going back to work wasn't wanted. Travel, hobbies, families(grandkids), friends were fulfilling enough.

Some people just never developed enough interests outside of work to fill their day. Those of us who didn't go back to work felt in the wind for a few months adjusting, but quickly found the time filled with things we wanted and liked to do outside of work.

Maybe this lottery winner just needs to give himself some time and he will realize there are things he will want to do besides work.

Been there, done that, and I agree. A much better option if you have 30-mil.

Don't need $30 million to do it, the plane tickets from Montreal to Tokyo only cost us about a thousand bucks :P

Don't need to go anywhere, you can get it in Toronto -- at Pusateri's. I made a Kobe roast once, and it was quite the mouthwatering experience! The best part was that I got it for the price of prime rib. The butcher knew me as a regular and gave me a cut that was accidentally mangled by some incompetent assistant so it didn't have the perfect shape that a Kobe connoisseur would demand -- on the condition that next time I tell him what I thought of it. Man, that stuff was fantastic!

P.S.- in case anyone accosts me in future discussions, no, I don't each much beef any more, but I'm not a confirmed vegetarian, either. I just have beef very rarely. Chicken and fish much more often.

I'm a meatitarian.

I question if you can get a real Kobe beef experience in Toronto or NYC, so far from the source...

I'm no expert, but Kobe beef is basically just a piece of meat, much the same after being flown over from Japan. Pusateri's has white and black truffles in season, too. Much the same here as they are at Fauchon.

No doubt the Japanese would be able to prepare it much better than I did, but we still appreciated its intrinsic qualities. There were no left-overs!

The preparation is part of it, but I was thinking more in terms of freshness. By the time it would make it here, it's not as fresh.

A bigger problem is likely that there's a good chance that the Kobe beef you bought was fake, because it's been illegal to import it for a few years now. Everything sold as "Kobe Beef" in Canada is currently fake, to the best of my knowledge. Even before the ban, there was a good chance that it was fake because stuff like "Kobe Classic Beef" that is commonly sold is fake.

The USDA lifted the import ban on Kobe Beef not long ago, but this does not affect Canada, where it is still illegal.

"Fake" isn't the right term since what they are actually selling currently is described as "Wagyu" beef. This happened a long time ago but I'm not sure if they were even then describing it as "Kobe". I tend to use the terms interchangeably.

In any case, the stuff is intensely marbled and looks and tastes like no other beef. I'll have to check next time I'm there and see if it actually comes from Japan. But it's not like I actually buy the stuff. I'll probably pick up a couple of chicken kebobs that definitely didn't fly over from Japan!

I'm not saying it's not really good and tasty :P

Just noticed this today -- Dionne Warwick is down to her last $1000 in cash and declared bankruptcy, still owes $10 million in tax liabilities. Another example of how common this is. At least the lottery winner didn't end up in debt!
»www.cnn.com/2013/03/26/s ··· pt=hp_t5

Sure she did, she has a mortgage company on the house.

I don't think the parallels are as close. Warwick's debt is 20 years old and she did not remit taxes over a period of time and received relatively small amounts and not a large windfall.

You'd think one of her former co-workers on the psychic friends network might have helped her out and seen that coming!