conversation: User (ryleeamos): "I'm 16 years old and bringing home a paycheck. Should I be saving a certain percentage of my paycheck, or a set amount? If so what should the % or amount be? (Making ~$150 every 2 weeks)"
  Self: "The beauty of savings is that the earlier you start, the less overall you have to put in. There's no magic percentage, but general financial estimates show this just for retirement:\n\n* Start at age 15, and you need to save 8% of annual income for life.\n* Start at age 20, and you need to save 11.1% of annual income for life.\n* At age 25 you need to save 15.4%.\n* At age 30 you need to save 21.4%.\n* At age 35 you need to save 30.1%.\n* At age 40 you need to save 43.2%.\n\n\nSo, right now, you're going to want to save ~10% just for your future retirement plans. If you can save an extra 10% for other things (college, wedding, houses, etc), do that. Then of course, save more when you can. There will be times in your life when you can't save that much, and times when you get a raise and can put 100% of that raise into your savings without increasing your lifestyle costs. "
  User (ryleeamos): "Thank you for the help!"
  rand652 (rand652): "That math assumes constant earnings over life time. \n\nDepending on your expected earnings trajectory current savings might be negligible from future point of  view and only have the the safety function. \n\nI wasn't earning anything before I was 19, but I make 5x more now then I did at 19. Having savings from that period allowed me to take risks later on, but it is a negligible part of my current net worth. \n\nDo not overdo savings. It sucks to realise that you passed on all the cool experiences while younger to save only as much as you save in 2 months years later. \n\nBut as general rule of thumb I'd aim for 10-20% if  feasible. "
  