RSS
 

Archive for the ‘money’ Category

America on the Precipice: The 3rd Quarter of 2010

09 Sep

I’m not an economist, but I don’t think we’re getting out of this long, dark, tunnel yet. Frankly, I feel that with October all economic indicators will sink again.

What are some economists saying? Double-dip recession. We are telling ourselves that a depression isn’t possible, but I think that the discomfort felt by the shrinking middle-class hasn’t reached critical mass. It certainly will never touch the atrophied sympathetic emotions politicians claim to possess.

I don’t like doom and gloom forecasts, but I feel like we are staring into the eye of the hurricane, thinking that the worst is over. I doubt it. This country spent the last 20-30 plus years binging on credit. The solution was always more credit: funny money that doesn’t exist. If the government was run by responsible people, we wouldn’t have the deficits we have now. We wouldn’t have useless, wasteful, non-essential, and budget busting endless wars.

Our government should be more concerned with building and fixing our bridges, roads, highways and transit systems as opposed to “rebuilding” countries that will stupidly blow themselves up five minutes after the ribbon cutting ceremony.

It’s a waste of our resources.

It’s sad to see this country sink so low, and none of the people that are “re-elected” are making it any better. But the people who “vote” for them are happy with their lot in life. I suspect that a number of these lifetime politicians get by with voter fraud. If there were honest audits for every election in this country, I’d feel secure in the quality of our politicians, but I feel it’s dirty from top to bottom. And not much will change.

As for voting this November. Pffft. Unless there are local issues to consider, I’m not wasting my time.

 
No Comments

Posted in US, US Congress, bank, credit cards, economy, money, recession

 

Work Matters / Career Choices: I’ve Made Up My Mind

06 Sep

I take too long to think about things, but that’s the nature of how I work it out.

I was going to head into the medical field, like nursing, medical research, or clinical trials, but I realized I cannot stand the smell of sick people. I know that sounds offensive, but my olfactory senses are off the charts. I can smell when people are not well. I once had to pick up my Mother from the hospital, and the smell of the place nearly made me gag. I wanted to turn around and leave. I ended up breathing through my mouth.

I am still fascinated by medical news. I follow the theories of causation behind high blood pressure, diabetes and heart disease. It’s interesting to read and watch clips on YouTube as doctors hash out studies and stats on their beliefs that the causes are a result of: lack of exercise, high fructose corn syrup, refined carbohydrates, too much fat, not enough good fats, too much red meat, genetics, and so on. I’ve discovered that dairy and grains (especially breads) do not agree with me. I’ve mostly cut them out of my diet and I’ve not only lost weight, I don’t have indigestion problems anymore.

I will stick with the technical field as my publishing company grows, and I will continue to explore other ventures. Therefore, I’ve decided to master C# (C sharp), refresh my knowledge of Javascript, Visual Studio, Adobe Flash  / Photoshop / Dreamweaver, and the other tools. I will also have to get acquainted with all of Microsoft’s latest tools, which can be heaven and hell.

My biggest complaint with this field is that everyone wants you to be extremely proficient with ALL of these languages and tools, but more than half the time, they really don’t need you to use them on the job. They prefer to draw you into all day meetings. No one seems to understand that programmers need time to think. But then again, most companies have morons in charge – so why expect anything different?

 
No Comments

Posted in .net framework, C#, corporate America, jobs, money, programming, work

 

The Pursuit of Financial Purpose: Sometimes You Cannot Have It All

16 Aug

America is a country that is mostly, if not only, about money.

If you do not heed this lesson, you will greatly suffer the consequences.

There is no emotional or spiritual purity in poverty. It’s a fool’s bet.

Education alone does not create access to money. It may point you in the right direction, but only if a person is savvy enough not to be overburdened with debts in pursuit of an education. Graduation alone does not guarantee a well paying position. The key to financial prosperity is that one must be mentally and socially adroit at exploiting advantageous opportunities. The price for failure is a precipitous drop to the bottom rung. And the way this country is today, it’s quite feasible there will be never be a second chance at redemption. That is the loss of the American dream.

Now, I’ve never had an American dream. I still don’t know what to do with myself when I grow up. I follow career paths based on suitability with my personality, work habits, potential financial reward, and educational preparation.

One of my personal flaws is that I spend a well of time deliberating things when it would be best to flip a coin.

I don’t suffer from magical thinking. I’m someone who believes in Murphy’s Law: the worse that can go wrong, will go wrong. I used to be an optimistic person, but that worked well when I was imbued with sense of direction and limitless energy.

Nothing much interests me these days: not the news, not current events, not the financial markets, not what the fed will decide, and certainly not politics. It doesn’t edify me to follow these pursuits.

After all these years, I still don’t have something I could pursue passionately and be financially satisfied with. I have finally realized I never will, and I am at peace with that knowledge.

I will have to accept the second and third best lukewarm options. Yet, I don’t want to be required to be passionate about the mundane, the uninteresting, yet financially rewarding endeavors I select.

Sometimes you cannot have it all, and you just have to make do.

 
No Comments

Posted in US, money

 

Business: Fulfilling a Need or Creating a Want?

30 Jul

I think the hardest aspects of a business are deciding whether to answer a need, such as food, shelter and clothing, or creating a want for something people don’t necessarily need bottled water (if you already have clean, filtered tap water), gym membership, nail salons and the like. Now, people will say the gym and nail salon have some beneficial qualitites that could improve someone’s life, but they are not necessities.

Our needs are rather basic. Food, shelter, clothes, companionship (with or without sex) and mental / physical stimulation. We need friction to survive. Life without stress is worse than one with a wee bit too much stress. Extremes are not good for us.

Most of today’s businesses look to create a want to drive an increase in sales. We are bombarded with ads that will show us humor or humiliation for not selecting their product. A company has to look for enough resources to drive the demand for their product be it TV, radio, Internet social media, and print media.

I believe companies that make a dent into Internet social media, when they launch a successful campaign, have several things going for them: media connections (TV exposure), money, much much money, and reporters eager to pretend that their “news story” is not a PR campaign. For an individual to pierce this wall they have to be incredibly savvy in exposing their material, have lots of energy, patience, and an ability to follow through with their initial message or offering.

Follow-up is key.

I think the second most important aspect of a business in getting this message across to generate a want, which may fulfill a need, is to have the infrastructure in place to answer the demand. If people want your product or service, there better be the means to answer this demand.

 
No Comments

Posted in advertising, business, consumers, making things, marketing, money

 

New Challenges to Tackle

13 Apr

I’m not a sales person. Don’t have a clue. But I want to dig deep into the psychology of getting marketing and sales done right. Or at least be successful at it.

There are deadlines I have for myself. Especially since it is tax time. Oh, I hate doing taxes. I simply loathe it. Such a waste of $$%$^# time. Really.

I’m in a hurry now, and I’m hoping I don’t do anything in haste in that I may end up repenting for in leisure. Not a good thing. But time is of essence here.

I still remember those plans about working overseas. I haven’t forgotten that. I certainly will be looking into that as well as other plans I have in the fire currently.

It’s going to a hectic couple of weeks. I want to keep the goals simple: there are 4 things I want to accomplish and that’s it. No long lists here.

  1. healthy relationships
  2. make more than enough money (there’s a specific amount in mind)
  3. travel (I’ve got New Zealand and Germany on the brain)
  4. good health (I’m working out now, and have a weight loss goal within a time period)
  • there are things I have no control over, but i still wish the best for everyone around me.
 
No Comments

Posted in budgeting, financial independence, making things, money, taxes

 

A Very Special Madoff: Cash Rules Everything Around Me

20 Dec

I may be misquoting Method Man, or someone else, but I do recall this was a popular rap back in the day.

Truer words were never spoken.

Lemme give some props to Paul Krugman first:

The revelation that Bernard Madoff — brilliant investor (or so almost everyone thought), philanthropist, pillar of the community — was a phony has shocked the world, and understandably so. The scale of his alleged $50 billion Ponzi scheme is hard to comprehend.

Yet surely I’m not the only person to ask the obvious question: How different, really, is Mr. Madoff’s tale from the story of the investment industry as a whole?

….

Yet, at this point, it looks as if much of the industry has been destroying value, not creating it.

….

The answer, I believe, is that there’s an innate tendency on the part of even the elite to idolize men who are making a lot of money, and assume that they know what they’re doing.

After all, that’s why so many people trusted Mr. Madoff.

Now, as we survey the wreckage and try to understand how things can have gone so wrong, so fast, the answer is actually quite simple: What we’re looking at now are the consequences of a world gone Madoff.

I bet he couldn’t resist that pun.

Picture this first image: a black male goes into a KFC. Perhaps robbing it, at gunpoint, of $500 bucks, maybe even $5,000. If he commits this crime some where in the south, especially in one of those “tough on Negro crime” states, he will be sentenced to life in prison. Weirdness of the criminal justice system in all its stupid glory: he’ll spend more time in jail, than if he killed his estranged wife, live-in girlfriend, multiple children, and some neighbors.

In case you think I am making this up. I forget the state, but there was a TV news story done years ago about a southern white woman judge doling out sentences of 100 years for armed (perhaps not?) robbery.

I also know people who work for a correctional facility: murderers don’t spend a very long time in jail, especially when they kill women they know.

I hate thieves. I can’t abide stealing, but she was proud of locking away people for extremely long periods of time. Think of the resources she was draining from the state: warehousing able bodied men without any indication of attempting to rehabilitate them. I wont delve into whether it is possible or not. I wont even talk about IQs, race, single parent homes, poverty, illegitimacy, illiteracy, recidivism, and the like. That’s for the useless experts to hash out.

Picture this next image: an old white man rips off thousands of people, costing them billions. He shows up at court. The judge grants immediate leniency: he can stay under “house arrest” in his penthouse. Gawd forbid, this white man has to stay in jail with the unwashed masses.

The criminal justice system not only acts obsequious, they seem nigh apologetic. “Gosh, we’re sorry we’re disturbing you, oh-magnificent-rich-privileged-thieving-old-white-dude, but it looks like some of your suckers are complaining. We have to pretend we want to do something about it.”

What ever happened to the joys of this wonderfully free unregulated market? Anyone? Folks who invested with this guy are the same ones who told politicians to back-the-funk-off-of-Wall Street. There’s no limit to how much money we can make!

Three-card Monte on the street corner seems more legit. At least you know from the get-go it’s a con.

What? You’re surprised? Why? Oh, that’s right, he went to the right (sotto voce) exclusive, extra extra special, brightest in the room, highest IQs in the world, no coloreds allowed, country club with all the other jackals. He must be legit.

What’s that German word? Schadenfraude.

If he gets even half the time a KFC armed robber would receive, I’ll be shocked, shocked! Bernard Madoff might spend a little time at Club Fed. There he will get to network with the other scheming and sneaky crooks on how to rehabilitate his tainted image. In his case though, he might be too old to start over.

I always thought that the casinos in Atlantic City and Las Vegas made more sense, and was easier to understand than Wall Street (what’s left of it).

 
No Comments

Posted in Atlantic City, Bernard Madoff, New York Times, Paul Krugman, Wall Street, investments, las vegas, money, thief

 

Cutting Spending and Saving Money

15 Jun


I am a spendthrift. Money burns a hole in my pocket. Currently, it is an incredibly deep hole. The philosophy to follow when one is in trouble is to stop digging.

I will stop, and find a way to climb out of this hole. I have to organize. I used to be so proud of being a hustler. I don’t know what’s been going on my head for the past few years. I’ve truly lost track of myself.

Short term goals:

1. Track spending: write down what I spend.
2. Limit my spending.
3. Save weekly what I did not spend.
4. Create additional income.

I don’t follow a budget. I do track current balances, and know where the money is going when fixed bills are due.

I will get more anal, and detail every single cent I spend every day. It’s like being on a diet. I may not like it for the short haul, but over a period of time it works (at least for me).

I’ve been looking for ways to save money. I wont know where to cut until after I’ve studied my spending journal. My gut (har-har-har) tells me I spend too much on food and entertainment. Yet, there is only so much I can cut back in those areas.

I have an investment account I emptied out. Last week, I started squirreling money back into it. Initially, it’s not much. It’s the equivalent of money I spent daily on coffee per week. Later on, I will double that amount.

Last, but not least. I have to look at where to increase my income. I’ve got too much month, and not enough money.

 
No Comments

Posted in budgeting, increase income, money, savings, spendthrift

 

Your Money or Your Life

28 Dec

Your Money or Your Life, is the non-fiction book by Joe Dominguez and Vicki Robin. It describes in a no-nonsense, hype-free manner, the step-by-step way to transform a life full of debt without direction to one of financial freedom and limitless possibilities.

It is not a get rich quick book. To me, it is a how-to on thriftiness, frugality, being poor (not really) and loving it. However, they answer a universal question (well, my universe): Where do I get the time and money to follow a few dreams? The authors flip a number of because-that’s-the-way-it’s-done on its head.

Freedom from debt is the goal. The solution they offer, goes up against a lifestyle of consumption, debt, and scrambling to keep up with the Joneses. Debt is a ball and chain. If it becomes big enough it distorts most decisions made in life.

I’ve read the book several times, it is one of the few I have dogeared. Most books I read are so pristine they look new. I’ve read (and still read) it religiously, but honestly, I am unable to follow all of their advice. In some areas, I can, but the whole kit-and-kaboodle? Nope.

Trying to manage my spending is like trying to watch my eating – it’s an eternal diet. I’ve tried to record my eating and spending. After a while I just forget (fatigue of trying) to tally every penny spent and every bite taken. I can follow most of the goals and hurdles set forth: it is the last steps that I can’t handle.

Your Money or Your Life, is great at emphasizing how to take back control of your life. It’s fantastic for all areas of any sort of money management you desire to follow. Get a different job, a change of “career”, move to a dream location and just be ready to make sacrifices.

It’s an excellent book because of that reason alone.

 
No Comments

Posted in bonds, debt, financial independence, money, residual income, savings, work