<prompt> Human: I was lucky enough to get a 50k a year job, and graduated with roughly 90k of debt. My company didnt offer a 401k until youve been there for 6 months, so for the first 6 months, I saved all of my money, knocked out the highest interest loans about 10k, and consolidated the low interest ones. Since then Ive paid down about another 7.5k, so Im left with about 18k 8, 19k 7.75, and 29k 4.5.My repayment method is simple, I piggyback between the one gaining the most interest. Every paycheck, I go to the online calculators, find out which loan is costing me the most interest per day, and dump my available money in to that one.So currently, Ive been putting 15 into my 401k. I gross 1924 for a bi-monthly paycheck every two weeks, and after taxes and such it amounts to 1467.55. 15 going into the 401k add up to 288.60 a paycheck, leaving me with 1178.95 take home pay.Out of that, I try to make a payment of 1000 to student loans every paycheck and live on the roughly 200 for two weeks. As I live at home with the parents, its not too hard, on a good week, I can manage to have my only expenditures be gas for work and sometimes not even that if I take the company truck home. I do spend the extra money sometimes for beer with friends, or concertsdrum equipmentvery cheap video games, but overall, my pay history for the loans shows a solid 1000 every two weeks occasionally interspersed with a 800 or 600 payment. It goes without saying that I put my complete tax return into student loans. I have about 1500 saved up in case of car troubles or something, and pay my credit card in full every month which only consists of what I would have paid with in cash.My question is, should I be putting more into 401k and less into the loans? Will that benefit me more in the end? Or should I do the opposite, and forgo a higher initial 401k investment to knock out these loans that are accumulating interest? I picked 15 just because I wanted to be on the high side of saving, but if accumulating interest of my loans will continue to slow down my economics in my 20s to the point where the early 401k gains arent justified, it wouldnt be worth it. How do I even calculate this?Also, my long term plan is that once the loans are gone at this rate, hopefully by the time Im 25 or so I want to keep the momentum going and max out the 401k and then a Roth IRA, and then build up the 6 month safety income. Then, in the longer term future mid to late 20s look into getting a Vanguard or mutual fund account. Until then, Id like to take this opportunity where I literally do not have the funds to even be tempted to start investing to do investigating and be informed by the time I can start putting money into it. Ive read all the How to start learning tips on every investing sidebar, but all Ive gotten as a result is lists of books that give you general market tips diversify, dont follow the crowd, etc.... Where do I start researching specific brokers, fees, accounts, and all that? Is there the equivalent of the Stock Market Game that we played in school, but for adults, where I could learn by making fake investments and tracking them?Thanks, I just want every dollar I make to be spent in the most efficient way.EDIT: Forgot to mention, my employer matches to 6, with 100 vesting and all that.EDIT: I also had another question. Within the 401k, Im putting something like 90 to the Retirement fund which I believe is a more safe investment, and about 10 to more market oriented ones, like Vanguard. Should I be going more risky?  <response>: Does your employer match your 401k contributions? The rule of thumb seems to be that you contribute to your 401k up until match. If your employer isnt matching after a certain percentage, its likely that you can use that money to help yourself more in other ways. Example: Assume your loans are gaining interest at 8 and your employer only matches up to 5 of your contribution. Further assume that your 401k is only giving you about 4 return. That means the extra 10 youre putting into your 401k instead of paying off your student loan is costing you 4 because you gain 4 in returns in the 401k but you lose 8 percent in interest on the loan. In that case, it would be more prudent to reduce your 401k contribution to 5 or whatever percentage your employer matches and put the rest toward your loan. I have about 1500 saved up in case of car troubles or something, You should get more serious about having an emergency fund as well. 90 grand in loans with relatively high interest rates means your minimum monthly payment is pretty high. You must NEVER default on your loans. So you should be squirreling away a portion of your money so that if you ever have to go a few months without a job, you can at least pay your minimums on the loans. Is there the equivalent of the Stock Market Game that we played in school, but for adults, where I could learn by making fake investments and tracking them?Its great to start learning about investing. Open a an account with SigFig.com. You can set up a portfolio there and pretend like youre investing. Do as much reading as you can on the subject. Its good that youre being aggressive with your debt while you can. Youll thank yourself when youre no longer saddled with those loans. Youre still young, so youre ahead of the game. Never stop reading. 