The personal finance wrecking ball no-one's talking about

Like money? Want to be future rich? You can't afford (ha!) to ignore this threat. It's already knockin' on the door and it'll barge its way in if you don't act swiftly.

Nov 27, 2025

No, the threat is not Miley Cyrus. I just wanted you to have a mental soundtrack for this read… ‘I came in like a wrecking baaaaaaallll’ You’re welcome ;)

Do you like money?

I do. I reckon money’s great!

It helps keep me fed, sheltered, clothed – bonus for y’all not having to watch me strut in my birthday suit. When those needs are met, it helps me choose how I spend my time.

Basically, money makes me feel time rich.

For that reason, I pay attention to my wealth. I save, invest, and make sure today and all my tomorrows are financially covered.

Maybe you do too? If so, I’m probably preaching the choir.

But it’s worth saying anyway:

Risk management is key.

It’s not what you know that’ll hurt you. It’s what you fail to prevent, or to mitigate when it arrives (in risk management parlance).

Being an engineer, I take a risk management view of my money.

Each year I check there’s nothing on the horizon threatening to derail my sense of feeling time rich.

(At least, not anything I can feasibly prevent or mitigate. There’s not much I can do about asteroids, for example.)

This year’s risk check floored me. It’s the first time I’ve clocked a credible, universal threat to everyone’s wealth simultaneously.

For some, I’m slow to the party and a little embarrassed as a result. Sorry about that.

…but it seems I’m well ahead of most financial professionals, educators and content creators. Not sure why, but maybe that engineering brain of mine has come in handy. I was nicknamed ‘The Winged Keel’ in my 20s, an invention known for being ahead of its time.

When you’re the only one talking about something, assuming you’re wrong is a good starting point. I’ve been trying to prove the risk I’d spotted was wrong for 12 months now. No joy.

So, it’s time to talk about it.

What threat am I talking about?

Climate change …wait, don’t leave!

Before you go all eye-roll-and-I’m-out on me:

Whether you believe in climate change or not, whether you think it’s inevitable or not, is irrelevant.

It’s coming to decimate your wealth.

Let’s illustrate using something I love. Pie:

Whatever size your wealth pie now, it’ll shrink - a lot - on three degrees of planetary warming

Now, I haven’t done proportional calculations of pie surface area based on modelling. How very un-engineer-y of me.

This is just a metaphor, OK?

I’m trying to show your wealth pie is going to shrink, possibly by quite a lot, as climate change worsens.

I don’t know about you, but I don’t like the idea of us squabbling over pieces of a smaller wealth pie. It’s not a recipe for happiness. A world where the wealth pie shrinks will not be fun for anyone, no matter how schmick your bunker is.

And sadly, nowhere is safe. Not property, not shares, not retirement funds, not gold, and not crypto.

If we carry on this way, we’ll all be future poor – as in the future will suck.

You want to be future rich, right?

I do. I want the wealth I’ve built to still mean something, and to have a future worth looking forward to. It’s future rich or bust as far as I’m concerned.

Change is happening to prevent pie shrinkage…

…but it’s too slow.

Governments and corporations have had a long time to sort this out. They have, to be blunt, been operating at a snail’s pace. Urgency is rising - how very human of us to leave it to the last minute - but it’s still not good enough.

Take Australia’s updated environmental laws, which passed today (27 Nov 2025). A win for deforestation, but still no climate and carbon considerations.

The powers that be are doing too little, too late.

Frankly, they need to pull their finger out. Otherwise we’re all going to end up a lot less happy with our smaller pie.

I reckon it’s time to give them a little extra motivation.

People like you and me need to give ‘em a nudge.

(Let’s hope we’re not too late.)

But don’t worry, the entire burden for change doesn’t land on your shoulders.

You don’t have to do all the things.

I’m not going to implore you to become a vegan, or join a protest march, though please feel free if that’s your jam. I’m not going to insist you give up your pets because they’re a burden to the climate.

And of course *we* as a society have to do all the things to turn this ship around. Ideally we’ll do it equitably. There are plenty of incredible folks who have visions for how to do that (you might like to follow Gillian Marcelle PhD as a starting point if that’s of interest).

But don’t let that overwhelm you.

You don’t need to do everything yourself, you just need to do something.

It’s not about being perfect. It’s about starting, and heading in the right direction.

And look, bluntly, veganism and protests are not for me. At least, not yet. I’ll be keeping the pet rabbits too. Here’s a gratuitous photo of them just coz I can. That’s Caramel with the carrot and Toffee in the background:

I won’t be doing *all the things* because, like all good engineers, I’m lazy.

I want small-effort, big-impact actions I can do once and forget about.

That’s what I’ve gone hunting for, and I’ve found them, in my wheelhouse of all places – personal finance!

Turns out moving money is very effective.

For example, aside from installing rooftop solar on your home along with a battery, moving $50k from a super fund supporting fossil fuels to one that doesn’t could be your biggest climate improvement lever:

From the ‘A little goes a long way’ report, January 2023

And I use the following image from Future Super’s Carbon Transparency Report in 2020 every time someone says ‘well, if you care so much about the climate, why don’t you go vegan then?’

In short, biggest bang for buck? Move your money.

So, what do you need to do?

I’ve got a series of one-off, simple, cheap or free money-related steps you can take to help keep the pie big so we can all be future rich together. Kumbaya, my darlings.

From here, you’ve got three options:

» Option 1: On the same page as me already?

Don’t need further convincing that climate change is going to take a wrecking ball to our collective wealth and would like to stop it, now if you don’t mind?

You can Pass Go, collect $200 (figuratively speaking only) and head straight to the Move APACE posts:

What can you do? It’s time to Move APACE
Audit: First things first: where’s your money at?
Plan - Introduction: Planning a move? Read this first!
Plan - Banking: Bank funding fossil fuels? Maybe it’s time to stash your cash elsewhere
Plan - Super: Retirement fund not so super? Perhaps a switch is in order
Plan - Shares: Fossil fuels in your shares? Might be time to tick(er) them off
Act - Introduction: Mapped your move and ready to go? Before you Act, read this primer
Act - Banking: Bye bye old bank, hello new bank!
Act - Super: Putting the ‘super’ back in your superannuation
Act - Shares: Get your share of a rich future
Check: ‘Trust, but verify’ to make it stick
Explore: Channel your inner adventurer and get exploring

You may also like to use my auditing tool to check where your money’s at right now. Still in beta mode, all feedback welcome.

» Option 2: Feeling sceptical?

Doubting it’s as big a problem as I reckon it is?

I’ve got you covered. Strap in my friend, down the rabbit hole we’ll go, and I promise: it’s content from your favourite capitalist institutions, not greenies or ethical investors.

Head to the ‘Why?’ posts, preferably in this order:

» Option 3: Prefer to pretend this isn’t happening?

Want to deny climate change, or stick your head in the sand?

You can jog on now. This site is not for you. Wishing you all the best, and please don’t come crying to me over your shrunken pie in a decade or so.

Here’s to becoming future rich, dear reader. Let me know how you go.

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