21. What I learned in Paris

I've just returned from a 2 week vacation in Tel Aviv and Paris. It made me aware of one crucial aspect of retirement planning that I hadn't mentioned yet. First, some pictures:

The food in Paris was, as expected, superb. But what you can't see in these pictures are the price tags. Like tomatoes at the fancy food shop Hediard for 50 Euro per kg ($34 a pound). Of course, these are exquisite tomatoes, watered exclusively with the tears of virgin nuns from Mont St Michel (or so I imagine), and you can find cheaper ones if you go to the market. But sometimes you have no alternative. Consider for instance a common appliance like Kitchen Aid mixer:

589.50 Euro is equivalent to $884. Compare that with Amazon's price of about $200, and you can see that this is no coincidence - life in France is indeed much more expensive than life in the US.

Which brings me to today's point: your retirement planning is highly dependent on where you want to be when you retire. The cost of living in a big metropolis like New York or Boston is much higher than in smaller, rural areas. France and Europe are much more expensive than, say, Costa Rica. And if you don't mind third world countries, you can follow on my sister's steps and retire to Goa in India and live quite comfortably for $500 a month. 

Putting it another way, if your dollars don't allow you to retire where you are now, perhaps you should consider other alternatives? Just make sure you don't go shopping at Hediard! Especially if you're Israeli (their Hummus is 48 Euros per kg).