Do you think the United States is about to collapse? Dmitry Orlov does, but you don't have to agree with him to learn a lot from his new book, which is packed with useful tips on
I don't think much of the "buy low, sell high" model for house purchases. I think a house should be purchased as a place to live, in which case the main questions are whether you
Studies show that a high standard of living doesn't make people happier. People who live in mansions and penthouses aren't any happier than people who live in suburban houses, sma
One of the most universal bits of advice from financial planners is to track your spending. It's also one of the most universally rejected bits of financial advice--rejected by pe
This post is about repurposing a trick that grown-ups use to manage a child's wants. You know the one. It starts with pointing at a substitute. Then, the grown-up frames one of
Back in the days before science and modern medicine made their contributions to the field of mental health, sanity was a pretty arbitrary thing. Even in those dark days, though, i
There's a certain class of ways to get free money or free stuff simply by paying attention, keeping track, and being careful. I don't do these things. It's not because they don't
You can choose how you want to live. If you choose to live simply, you gain a certain kind of freedom. In particular, you're free to choose to do the work that's the most satisfy
Whenever I write a post about energy, I point out that we know it's possible to have a high standard of living while using less energy--people in European countries do, so it must
Nobody wants to be poor. It's a dangerous and constrained position to be in. But there are people out there (me, for instance) who are relatively happy to live at a fairly low st
Is there a link between having a modern society and having a western society? The vast economic and military power of the United States (and before that, the United Kingdom) has m
My brother told me once that, when he was in college, he handled money this way: "When I got paid, I set aside enough money for cigarettes, then spent the rest buying pizza and bee
Suppose you and your friends all want to start small businesses. You've all got money coming in, you're all in a position to save up some capital, but it would take you a year
The US Treasury pays more money to more people than just about anybody in the world. Last year it disbursed more than $1.6 trillion in 982 million individual payments. As you can
Here are two ideas you already know: You won't achieve maximum happiness by always doing the most pleasurable thing you can think of at each moment, but neither will you find it b
There are a lot of ways to become rich. Some people work hard and save their money. Some people win the lottery. Some people invent something wonderfully useful. An awful lot o
The human brain has a powerful capability to spot patterns. It's so good at spotting patterns, it can spot patterns that aren't even there. It's this fact that makes randomness--
As long as prices are free to rise, I wouldn't expect much in the way of gasoline shortages--at least not widespread, long-lasting ones. But it's actually pretty easy to produce a
It might seem like creativity would flourish best in the absence of any constraining routine. In fact, the opposite is true: Having a routine is very useful for protecting your c
With each move by the airlines to claw back a bit of the profit that has vanished into the twin maws of competition and higher fuel prices, and with each move by the government to
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