Who made this?

I started my career in New Zealand, where I accidentally fell in with people who had a very suspicious lifestyle: they'd do contract work to pay the bills, then spend the rest of their time on social enterprises and impact missions—optimizing for meaning instead of LinkedIn titles.

That led me to found a social enterprise helping charities de-risk funding. It was deeply purposeful work. It was also financially... let's say non-robust.

Eventually, I realized something uncomfortable but important: caring about society doesn't mean you can ignore your own financial future.

These days, I work as a product manager and find a lot of purpose and joy designing and building digital experiences. But that early experience shaped how I think about the relationship between money, work, and meaning.

The recalibration

My husband and I moved to the US, and I've been working a great job solving real problems for real people. It's interesting, challenging, and I'm grateful for it. It just isn't the only thing I want my life optimized around.

After having a baby, I started thinking a lot about time, energy, family, and who I want to be around. I opened "just one" spreadsheet to figure out: when could we reduce income? When could we stop optimizing purely for comp? When could we take a year to travel Europe? When could we live overseas and spend more time with family and in nature?

That spreadsheet got wildly out of hand. And here we are.

The thing about happiness

I went down a rabbit hole reading about what actually makes people happy. Turns out, once your basic needs are covered, more money doesn't do much. What helps is strong social connections and a sense of purpose.

But you can't prioritize those things when you're stressed about survival. Money isn't the goal—but it does buy you options, time, and flexibility to invest in what matters.

So there's this sweet spot — enough financial security to stop optimizing and start living. This calculator helps you find that spot.

Why I built this

I built this for my own family planning, then figured others might find it useful too. I'm still employed (and grateful for my job). I'm just trying to make the math around not needing to a little more honest.

It's free, there are no ads, and I'm not selling your data. I'm just a person who wanted to answer a question.

If you want to connect or see what else I'm working on, find me on LinkedIn or check out ashlyn.app.