Yeah, it's reddit so I don't expect anything different. People live to read whatever they want into statements and then go off on that.

Sure, there is a middle ground.

I wrote what I did in response to someone who said it's pointless to save beyond savings goals unless you can't think of anything else to do with the money.

I would say that you should save excess money unless you can think of something worthwhile to do with the money rather than basically spending it on whatever you can think of at the end of the month to get rid of it, because you'll probably come up with something worthwhile at some point in the future and wish you had some extra money.

That doesn't mean you need to obsess over what you have, constantly worry whether it's enough when those concerns are not objectively valid, or not spend any money at all. Just don't spend money to spend it because someone told you saving beyond what you can think of right at the moment is "pointless".

Given the person I was responding to said that "any other savings goals" in his list can include saving in general for literally anything you haven't even thought of yet, I would say he actually agrees with me.

Edit: Sorry about your dad.

You can say clearly as much as you want, it doesn't make your opinion correct. It just makes you sound pretty annoying and ignorant of the post I replied to.

I wasn't aware I was talking to the sole arbiter of what someone meant by a statement, regardless of what the person making the statement actually said or meant.

You can continue this conversation with yourself as long as you like since you keep putting words in my mouth and completely ignoring what I (and the OP) actually said.

You keep saying I alluded to this or implied that.

Just read what I actually said, which you probably don't like to hear since it doesn't encourage frivolous spending.

I don't imply anything.

Additional savings never hurts, and it's always better to save than to spend frivolously. That's it.

No it's not, it's just making sure you're spending money for a reason instead of just spending everything that isn't associated with a specific saving goal you have today.

Because you might think of a specific purpose or have an unanticipated need later and you'll be glad you made saving a priority instead of a last resort.

I didn't say anything about hoarding.

Ok if literally any theoretical future spending goal is covered under that, how does the rest of your comment make any sense?

They might not be goals at the time, but having the money later gives you options that don't exist if you think the way you described.

This is terrible advice.

They're setting themselves up for an earlier retirement, bigger down payment for a house, larger inheritance for their kids, or many other things down the road rather than just burning through everything that isn't earmarked as savings.