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The Simple Dollar

Simple, applicable personal finance advice for the modern world.

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Latest Posts from The Simple Dollar (page 264)

When One Partner Is Self-Employed

Published Tuesday, October 13, 2009 - 16:00 by The Simple Dollar

Whenever I mention that I’m self-employed and work from home while my wife works outside of the home, I usually receive a question or two from readers who are thinking about a similar arrangement. They want to know about how we balance things. How do you balance household chores? How do you balance parenting chores? […]

The Forgetful Mind

Published Tuesday, October 13, 2009 - 10:00 by The Simple Dollar

I’ve written many, many times about how relevatory keeping a “thought notebook” in my pocket has been for me. Whenever I have a stray thought that might be useful at all to remember later, I jot it down in the notebook and then review it later, usually a couple of reviews a day. Figuring this out has truly been world-changing to me. […]

The Challenge – and the Advantage – of Going Minimal

Published Monday, October 12, 2009 - 16:00 by The Simple Dollar

A few days ago, an article about minimalist money appeared at Get Rich Slowly, in which the guest author (Leo) advocated going strongly minimal with your spending – opting out of consumerism as much as humanly possible, cutting every optional service, and essentially starting again from a blank slate. Some of the readers unsurprisingly reacted negatively to this idea. […]

Reader Mailbag #84

Published Monday, October 12, 2009 - 10:00 by The Simple Dollar

Each Monday, The Simple Dollar opens up the reader mailbags and answers ten to twenty simple questions offered up by the readers on personal finance topics and many other things. Got a question? Ask it in the comments. You might also enjoy the archive of earlier reader mailbags. How do you minimize distractions while you’re working? […]

Review: It’s Not About the Money

Published Sunday, October 11, 2009 - 16:00 by The Simple Dollar

Every other Sunday, The Simple Dollar reviews a personal finance book. I’ve always been interested in the areas where spirituality and personal finance meet. […]

Mirror Neurons: Why Watching Others Succeed Won’t Help You Succeed

Published Sunday, October 11, 2009 - 10:00 by The Simple Dollar

When I first started becoming interested in cooking, I went through a short period where I watched a lot of programming on Food Network. […]

The Simple Dollar Time Machine: October 10, 2009

Published Saturday, October 10, 2009 - 16:00 by The Simple Dollar

Many newer readers of The Simple Dollar haven’t been exposed to the hundreds of great articles in the archives of the site, so this is a weekly series that highlights the five best posts from one year ago this week, as well as the five best posts from two years ago this week. […]

Never Eat Alone: Build and Broadcast

Published Saturday, October 10, 2009 - 10:00 by The Simple Dollar

This is the twelfth of sixteen parts of a “book club” reading and discussion of Keith Ferrazzi and Tahl Raz’s Never Eat Alone, where this book on building a lifelong community of colleagues, contacts, friends, and mentors is teased apart and looked at in detail. […]

The “Local Store Premium” – How Much Is It Worth to You?

Published Friday, October 9, 2009 - 16:00 by The Simple Dollar

When I was in college, there was a local independent bookstore – the name completely escapes me now, but I could still almost walk to it blindfolded – not too terribly far from campus. It was a very popular hangout for the heavy reading crowd and the store did all they could to maximize customer loyalty, both with students and people in the broader community. […]

Frugal Soups and Stews: Great Solutions for Busy Weekends

Published Friday, October 9, 2009 - 10:00 by The Simple Dollar

Many weekends – like this upcoming one, for instance – our family is quite busy. We have guests over. We go on family excursions to places like the Science Center of Iowa. We shop for groceries. We go to club meetings. We go to church. We play for hours with the kids. We get caught up on housework – and on our reading. […]