‘4,500 days to retirement’: young woman’s days till end of being ‘job slave’ calendar shows Chinese youths’ changing priorities
- A woman’s countdown calendar to her early retirement has inspired many people seeking a life change on mainland China’s social media
- The calendar has resonated with the emerging ‘fire’ and ‘lying flat’ movements among younger generations in China today
A 24-year-old Chinese woman’s retirement countdown calendar has highlighted the rising popularity of early retirement among youth in China.
The woman from central China’s Hunan province, surnamed Deng, made a DIY calendar that counts down the 4,500 days she has before the day of her planned early retirement.
On March 13, Deng posted photos of her tear-off-a-day calendar that showed the number of days “until freedom”, which looked far off judging by the thickness of the calendar pages remaining.
An advocate of the “fire” movement, which stands for “financial independence, retire early”, Deng said the calendar was for the day she had saved enough money to quit her job and become a freelancer. However, she did not specify her profession.
Intended as a documentation of her journey towards “a life with more choices”, Deng said that she also put encouraging messages on every 10th page in the calendar to celebrate her success in getting through another part of her life as a “job slave”.
Deng’s calendar has resonated with the emerging fire movement among younger generations in China today.
