What are some poor pieces of advice for life?

I'd say about 20% of people I encounter, including people in my immediate family, still believe this.

My uncle believes this and has made life decisions based on it ... but has a financial advisor. So either that advisor sucks or he hasn't actually discussed finances with them.

For anyone here who doesn't understand why this is bad advice, it's because income tax increases only apply to income made above that threshold.

Let's do a simple example and pretend there's only 2 tax brackets. From 0-50k tax is 10% and over 50k it's 20%.

If you make exactly 50k your tax burden will be 5k and you'll take home 45k a year.

If you get a 1k raise, only the final thousand is taxed at the higher rate, so your tax burden will be 5200 (10% of the first 50k and 20% of the remainder), and you'll take home 45,800 a year.

So even though you change tax brackets, you still make more money.

The same people who think they pay federal tax dollars cause they never realize they get it all back and then some.

In the UK there is a point between 100 and 125k where the tax levels of being in that region make it more financially prudent to do pension salary sacrifice or a similar scheme. You should still take the pay rise obviously.

Edit: To illustrate it I think the marginal tax rate jumos to ~60% or something like that between 100-124k. but then moves back down to 47% after you earn over 125k for some reason.

Some people may be thinking of what’s called the “benefits cliff”. At certain points you lose the ability to take certain tax credits or deductions. Theoretically this could result in a higher net out of pocket for you, but in the grand scheme it’s really minor, so always take the raise.

All one liner advice is a shortening of a much more complex idea and people rarely pass along the complexity. I think you nailed the goal of the saying, that fitting in shouldn't require losing their individuality.

Sadly some people use the saying to justify being an asshole, because they don't understand that they can be a decent person and still be themselves.

I really like this answer! Absolutely gorgeous response. Confidence is massively important for being happy with oneself, and that starts by understanding you are a singular original human.

You still need to follow your society's expected behaviors. Like showering or wearing shoes in public venues.

A big problem is people not picking up certain queues and being ostracized then continuing to follow "be yourself." It's a downward spiral.

1. Learn to fit in
2. Learn when and where "rules" can be bent/broken
3. Then be yourself

The retort to that is, “be yourself, unless you’re and arsehole, then be someone else”

This also depends on the society you are living in. Good luck with "being yourself" in north korea, or even any east asian countries.

You know who take this advice too seriously? Assholes.

"Fitting in is one of the greatest barriers to belonging. Fitting in is about assessing a situation and becoming who you need to be in order to be accepted. Belonging, on the other hand, doesn’t require us to change who we are; it requires us to be who we are." -Brené Brown, The Gifts of Imperfection

"God will bring the right person into your life"

I know someone who believes this so strongly that they don't even really go out or date or anything. They legit believe that somehow their soulmate, chosen by God, will show up at their doorstep while they sit at home every night watching TV? I don't understand.

I guess maybe if it's the pizza delivery guy or something...

I can't imagine any relationship working without some degree of compromise. But as to the other part of your comment, I've found The One several times in my life. They were right at the time, there was a deep connection, and later, things changed. But it was real and I don't regret a minute of any of those times.

a good marriage drastically improves your life. a bad marriage will obliterate it.

Sorry for your luck.

That is not bad advice

You want to listen to your body because it tells you way more things than just feeling hungry. That is a gross simplification of that suggestion, almost assuming human bodies are machines.

Bad advice in this context is saying "you are gonna be happier if you lost weight" or "you are gonna look better if you lost weight". That is extremely personal and changes person to person, some might even feel worse.

Listening to a doctor's concerns is for everyone with no exclusions, but feeling good in oneself's body is another different topic that needs to be tackled appropriately.

Listening to your body is meant in the context of over-exercising though. It’s not a blanket get out of exercise card. That’s called “listening to your brain”.

Listening to the body is a rule of thumb. If you feel bad after eating/drinking something it's probably not good for you. If you cough from something in the air it's not healthy to inhale.

It's especially true in high octane workout culture like cross-fit, if it hurts then don't continue, this is how you end up with a herniated disc.

That being said, if you're on heroin you shouldn't listen to the body. Same with cigarettes, junk food, sugary drinks, candy etc. because the body is a dopamine removed.

Don't listen to food adverts. Broccoli doesn't have a marketing budget.

Listen to your body, assess how its feedback comports with your goals, then use your brain to decide what to do.

Listen to your body as in observe your body and how it responds to activity, certain foods, medications and environments. That's good advice. There are many bad doctors out there.

famines are increasingly likely.

Break up!

Grab a brush and put a little make up!

"Guys I just hooked up my new set of 5.1 speakers and I'm getting a little buzzing in the subwoofer I can't track down, what do I do?"

"You should break up, he's totally cheating on you."

creatural realism. thats why i love die hard, hero gets hurt a lot.

Why is this bad? If people said, "Follow your dreams and they'll always come true," I'd disagree with that. But it doesn't hurt to have goals and work towards them.

Being stuck because of worrying and overthinking is not a good place. Calls to action are the only way to improve the situation.

Some of them are good advise, but like any advise take it with a grain of salt and get to the core of the advise and that is what often goes missing.

Yolo is a good thing/example if we are talking about life experiences and just experiencing them. But that doesnt mean you should jump of a bridge without any safety cords or doing coke everything for the kicks haha.
It essientially means that if you can, do something new (safely) so you enjoy life instead of only living it.

Same holds for the other examples you gave.

Karma in the west is grossly misunderstood anyway. pisses me off

I mean it's always worked for me. Debt can be easily ignored in the United States, and I've gotten by just fine without ever opening a line of credit. I always pay cash for everything, including vehicles, and we used the girlfriend's credit to get a house so it's all turkey and gravy. Even then I could always just rent through private landlords like I always have.

With that age you experienced most of the stock explosions and multiple splits (e.g. Amazon, Apple, Broadcom, Nvidia etc.).
No way in hell I could live from my 10k of stocks on dividends and I am aggressively investing as I still am allowed to live at home (graciously btw) to build up some savings.

Not bad advice at all.

Why not? Having two paycheck going into one place seems like it would make things easier, since you’d only have to deal with one set of accounts. And if something happens to your SO, you already have access to the finances and don’t have to worry about getting access while dealing with whatever happened

You're with the wrong person then

Totally disagree, however it does depend on what stage of life you're on. Straight out of college, sure, married at 50, I would say "no".

I've been married almost 25 years and we've been sharing finances since before we were married, but we both started with nothing, and we both had college degrees and equal paying jobs out of college, so there was no real disparity of finances.