Have you ever thought about working one day less per week?
Maybe you're a physician working five days a week and would love to move to four. More time with your kids. A regular day to exercise, run errands, travel, or simply have some breathing room.
Then you do the quick math.
If you earn $400,000 per year and reduce your schedule by 20%, your compensation could fall to roughly $320,000.
That's $80,000 a year.
And the idea quickly becomes: “I'd love to work less, but I can't afford to give up $80,000 every year.”
But you may not actually be giving up $80,000 of spendable income.
Start with where your $400,000 is going
Imagine you're 40 years old, married with two children, and earning $400,000 per year.
Like many physicians, you got a later start on saving because of medical school and residency. You have about $150,000 invested and still have $150,000 of student loans.
You're now earning a great income and making up for lost time.
You maximize your workplace retirement plan. Your employer contributes additional money toward retirement. You're paying $30,000 per year toward your student loans. You're putting $12,000 per year into 529 accounts. Your family spends about $150,000 per year. And whatever is left over goes into a brokerage account.
You're doing well.
But do you actually know how much of your income is going toward each of those things?
That becomes very important when you start thinking about working less.
An $80,000 pay cut doesn't mean $80,000 less to live on
If your income falls from $400,000 to $320,000, you won't necessarily take home $80,000 less. That's because some of that $80,000 would have gone to taxes.
For a simplified 2026 Pennsylvania example, assume this physician is married filing jointly, makes the maximum $24,500 pre-tax workplace retirement-plan contribution in either scenario, takes the standard deduction, and has no other income or deductions. Under those assumptions, the $80,000 reduction in gross compensation would reduce federal income tax, Pennsylvania income tax and Medicare tax by roughly $24,000. The reduction in after-tax cash flow would therefore be about $56,000, not the full $80,000. ¹²³
The actual result for any household could be materially different depending on filing status, deductions, other income, state and local taxes, benefits and other circumstances.
That's still a lot of money.
But now ask: Where does that $56,000 actually come from?
Your family doesn't necessarily have to spend $56,000 less.
Your mortgage doesn't change. You don't suddenly stop taking vacations or going out to dinner. You could potentially continue making the same student loan payments, funding your 529s and maximizing your retirement plan.
If you were previously investing $50,000 or more each year into a brokerage account, much of the impact might simply be that you invest less.
So your choice may not really be a $400,000 lifestyle versus a $320,000 lifestyle.
It may be closer to: work five days and save significantly more for the future, or work four days, maintain a similar lifestyle and accumulate wealth more slowly.
That's a very different decision.
But can you still retire?
This is where knowing whether you're actually on track becomes important.
You may have heard the term Monte Carlo analysis. The name makes it sound more complicated than it needs to be.
Think of it as a financial stress test.
Instead of assuming your investments earn exactly the same return every year, a Monte Carlo analysis runs a financial plan through many hypothetical market paths. The result is often expressed as a probability of success - the percentage of simulated scenarios in which the plan does not run out of money before the end of the planning period. In a household plan, that period commonly extends through the assumed lifetimes of both spouses.⁴
For example, a 90% probability of success means that the plan still had money remaining at the end of the modeled planning period in approximately 90% of the hypothetical scenarios. It does not mean there is exactly a 90% chance you will be fine, nor does it account for every adjustment you might make along the way. In real life, you may respond to changing circumstances by spending less, saving more, working longer or changing other goals. The result depends on the assumptions used and is not a prediction or guarantee.⁴
A 100% probability of success is not necessarily an appropriate target for a household. Someone with flexible spending, a willingness to work longer or goals that can be adjusted may be comfortable with a lower modeled probability than someone with less flexibility. Generally, the lower the modeled probability, the greater the likelihood that changes may be needed later to avoid running out of money. The appropriate range is individual and should be considered in the context of the assumptions and available trade-offs.
Suppose you're planning to retire at 55.
Working five days per week, your financial plan might show a 95% probability of success.
Then you model working four days per week while keeping most of your lifestyle the same.
Maybe it falls to 88%.
Those percentages are hypothetical and are included only to illustrate how the decision could be evaluated. An actual analysis could produce very different results.
That's a meaningful difference. But it doesn't necessarily mean you can't afford to work four days.
Now you have a much better question to consider: Is moving from a 95% modeled probability of success to 88% worth having an extra day every week for the next 15 years?
There isn't one correct answer.
What if working less meant working a little longer?
There's another way to look at the trade-off.
Maybe working five days per week gets you to your desired retirement at 55 with a 95% modeled probability of success. Working four days might get you to 55 with an 88% modeled probability.
But what happens if you work four days until 56? Or 57?
Perhaps working a couple of additional years gets your plan back near the same modeled probability of success. Or perhaps it takes longer. The answer depends on your actual financial circumstances.
Now the decision becomes much more interesting.
Imagine your choices were: work five days per week until 55, or work four days per week until 57.
Again, those ages are only an illustration. Your numbers could look completely different.
But consider what you received in exchange for those additional two years at the end.
Working one fewer day per week for 15 years gives you approximately 50 additional weekdays per year.
That's about 750 additional weekdays between ages 40 and 55.
And those 750 days happen now
That's the part a spreadsheet has difficulty measuring.
Those days happen while your kids are still living at home.
They're Fridays when you're 42, not Tuesdays when you're 72.
Maybe you coach your child's soccer team. Take a long weekend with your family. Exercise more. Have lunch with your spouse. Visit your parents. Pursue something you've always wanted to do.
Or maybe you just have a day when nobody needs anything from you.
Those experiences can also produce what I like to think of as memory dividends. The value of a great experience doesn't necessarily end when the experience is over. You may continue enjoying the memories for decades.
We spend a lot of time thinking about how money compounds.
It's worth remembering that experiences can compound too.
You need to know your numbers first
I'm not suggesting that every physician should work four days per week.
If you're 40, haven't saved much yet, have substantial student debt and are spending most of what you earn, the numbers might tell you that reducing your income right now would significantly compromise your goals.
Maybe the answer is not yet.
Perhaps you spend the next three years paying down debt and building your investments, and then revisit the question.
But you won't know until you understand two things:
Where is my money going?
And: Am I on track?
You might discover that working less would require major lifestyle changes or significantly delay financial independence.
Or you might discover that instead of working five days a week to move your modeled probability of success from 88% to 95%, you'd rather accept a little less financial certainty in exchange for hundreds of additional days during an important period of your life.
While I used a physician earning $400,000 in this example, the underlying idea isn't limited to high earners. The numbers and available choices will obviously look very different for someone earning $65,000, and reducing income may require much more significant trade-offs. But the same questions still apply: Where is my money going? Am I on track? And could changes to my spending, saving, or timeline give me more flexibility? Financial independence isn't reserved for people with exceptionally high incomes - the path just looks different for everyone.
Financial planning shouldn't only tell you whether you'll have enough money someday.
It should help you understand what choices your money gives you today.
Sources
¹ IRS, 2026 federal income-tax brackets and standard deduction: https://www.irs.gov/newsroom/irs-releases-tax-inflation-adjustments-for-tax-year-2026-including-amendments-from-the-one-big-beautiful-bill
² IRS, 2026 workplace retirement-plan contribution limits: https://www.irs.gov/newsroom/401k-limit-increases-to-24500-for-2026-ira-limit-increases-to-7500
³ Pennsylvania Department of Revenue, personal income-tax rate: https://www.pa.gov/agencies/revenue/resources/tax-types-and-information/personal-income-tax
⁴ Charles Schwab, Retirement Income Calculator Methodology: https://www.schwab.com/retirement-income-how-it-works
Investment advisory services offered through Fiduciary Financial Advisors a registered investment adviser. The views expressed represent the opinion of Fiduciary Financial Advisors. Information does not constitute investment, tax, or legal advice.