Great advice and good for thinking. I have a friend who is behind on mortgage payments. When I suggested cutting the cellphone, the internet and the cable, the response was that they were necessities. Our parents grew up without all of that and lived just fine lives. I don't understand why it's now a need just because it's so prevalent. Sure having some type of internet email address and access may be considered necessary in this day, but in that case, the library, ones workplace or a friend's house to check email would work just fine.
I love having a smaller house. Less to heat, less to cool, less to furnish and decorate, and fewer things to maintain! Yet compared to a generation or two ago, or in other parts of the world this would be considered a luxury!
One of my favorite sites, the Comics Curmudgeon, had the Christian singles ad for months. I don't know why the company thought that a bunch of cranky people who get together to complain about the comics in the newspaper would want such a service, but who knows how these things work?
I'm well aware that the advertisements are not created by Facebook. But they use FB info to target their sales. I just think it's odd that something as small as changing my sexual orientation would sudden warrant an entirely new variety of ads that treated me like someone who might need business services, not just a lonely, fat spinster.
The muni market is in disarray, if you google it you will get discussions about the Auction Rate Securities which are Munis. There were all sorts of reports in the media this past year about being told this was as safe as cash and then when they need the money, they cannot get it out because the muni credit market is locked up. Certian funds (not Vanguard) were unable to redeem mutual fund shares either for periods as long as a month. The other side is munis depend on tax revenue and there will be shirtfalls soon
Risk and reward are supposed to coorelate, if you are getting a higher rate then you are presumably taking on more risk
After watching Fast Food Nation I decided I could no longer enjoy cow meat on my plate and decided to become a vegetarian. All the mumbo-jumbo about eating just the right combination of proteins kept me from doing it many years ago when I was first interested for environmental reasons.
I must say that it was an easy change. I have not missed meat at all...I no longer eat chicken and pig meat either. What I have noticed is that I now much more enjoy and savor the "side dishes" which are now my "main event". The meat always used to take center stage and the accompanying carbs and vegetables were not as noticeable in flavor.
Also, I have lost weight without even trying. I still eat some sweets, but have lost much of my desire for those, so going vegetarian appears to be a win-win situation for me. I highly recommend it! If you lean toward it, watching Fast Food Nation will help you take the step :)!
Last, but not least, going vegetarian saves money and helps fight global warming. Take a look at this funny Dutch campaign. It's self-explanatory. Just choose your favorite kind of meat and see what happens :)
I don't really have any training as a counselor, and if there's something that's bothering you persistently it might be worth talking to someone who does.
Having said that, though, what seems to work for me is two things (which both boil down to mindfulness):
Pay attention to what you're doing. If your attention is on what you're doing now, you're not thinking about whatever it was that used to annoy you.
When you do think of whatever it was that used to annoy you, go ahead and think about. That is, instead of wishing that you could stop thinking about it (which never works), just stop whatever else you're doing and think about it. Go on thinking about it until you get bored with that, then turn your attention back to whatever you were doing.
Don't try pretending that it never happened. That's a pointless exercise. Instead, just put your attention on the present. Surely what's happening now is more important than stuff that happened in the past.
It's not a matter of pretending and it's not a matter of forgetting. It's a matter of doing whatever you need to do, and making a habit of putting your attention there, rather than in the past.
When i first registered for facebook, I was attending a christian college. Despite not listing a religious belief but still remaining a member of this network, I'm shown ads for HOT CHRISTIAN SINGLES.
Try police auctions in your area...they will have sales usually every quarter and group things like bicycles together. You can go check out all the bicycles and pick a few that would work for you, then bid on them when they come up.
I recently stepped into my first postion of managment. I am a project manager for elearning projects. Trusting was one of the most difficult things for me to learn. Up until recently I did every step of the project myself. Now the projects are larger in scope and require many more people. My fear of the project growing in ways that I can't control took a while for me to get used to. I think I'm getting it now.
I understand what you're saying about letting go, choosing to see the positive in people and all that fun stuff, but what I have a problem with is tricking my mind into doing all that.
I would like to move on from a couple situations that annoy me, but even if I make some progress towards that, my mind begins to remind me of why I was annoyed in the first place and all progress is lost.
While it sounds good in theory to just pretend like nothing happened and be blissfully happy about everything, but when does your mind finally start believing this so it can in fact, let things go for real?
It's the same situation. for YEARS she has been doing the lottery thing and filling out every. Single. Sweepstakes entry she can get her hands on. Three months or so ago I found out she was sending money to scam artists. BORROWING money to send to scam artists who promised her that she'd won a large sum of money. All she had to do was pay this fee or that fee.
And today she got two checks (totally about $9000) that she deposited. She even opened a brand new checking account with one of the checks. They're both fake - *I* called the issuing banks to check. Luckily she's OC about copying an dkeeping paperwork so I was able to verify that they were fakes.
We have talked to herand TALKED to her and she absolutely refuses to listen. And refuses to change her phone number and now, I find out from this article that POA is a lost cause. So I have to sit by and WATCH while this woman WILLFULLY screws up her life and finances?
Don't get me wrong. I'm furious with the scammers but I'm also absolutely LIVID with my grandmother for COMPLETELY REFUSING to listen to us. And because she CONTINUES to do these things even after being scammed.
It's like dealing with an addict. She LIES to us and HIDES things from us. She tells us it won't happen again. I live right next door to her and have HEARD her talking to these people. IT KEEPS happening.
If we can stage interventions on addicts who insist on continuing self-destructive behaviour, we should be able to stage interventions on our parents and grandparents who are exhibiting the same behaviors.
I'm not a credit rating expert, but just wanted to reinforce your point, Xin, that the market is discounting muni bond issuers as being increasingly risky. Inversion of yields is interesting, but suspect. Most state governments are just as fiscally irresponsible as the federal good ol' boys, but with far less resources under their command.
Definitely a great suggestion and something to look into further!
To piggyback on your "cash is king" comment, we should extrapolate that a bit further and state that capitalization is king. The single biggest reason for entrepreneurial failure is misjudgement of capital requirements and inability to secure favorable financing. Most entrepreneurs find that their most important job is not running their business, but trying to find the next source of financing. In today's contracting credit environment, this unfortunately will become more difficult.
They also look at your taste in music and TV when considering ads. They're always trying to get me to buy Thin Lizzy or Conan O'brien t-shirts. And its the same story with Myspace.
Dr. Bernstein's book and diet are very, very difficult to follow -- but they do work. Personally, I have been floating around in nana land for awhile, somewhat in denial about my diabetes. now it is smacking me in the face and I have to do something about it or just die. We don't have insurance or the means to buy insulin. I am already on metformin but my best chance is to get this weight off by eating like Dr. B says. I have an injured knee that needs surgery, so will have to exercise creatively. Going back to the topic of thin vs. fat people having type II diabetes -- Dr. B has some interesting theories about that. He believes that maybe thin type IIs might actually be like "late" type 1s. Interesting, and that would explain their difficulties. I have an aunt who is like that, and her whole scenario of dealing w/her diabetes feels more like a type 1....harder to control, etc.
The only thing that has made any sense this week!!
The Birk Economic Recovery Plan
-----------
I'm against the $85,000,000,000.00 bailout of AIG.
Instead, I'm in favor of giving $85,000,000,000 to America in a
We Deserve It Dividend.
To make the math simple, let's assume there are 200,000,000 bonafide U.S. Citizens 18+.
Our population is about 301,000,000 +/- counting every man,woman and child. So 200,000,000 might be a fair stab at adults 18 and up..
So divide 200 million adults 18+ into $85 billon that equals $425,000.00.
My plan is to give $425,000 to every person 18+ as a "We Deserve It Dividend".
Of course, it would NOT be tax free.
So let's assume a tax rate of 30%.
Every individual 18+ has to pay $127,500.00 in taxes.
That sends $25,500,000,000 right back to Uncle Sam.
But it means that every adult 18+ has $297,500.00 in their pocket.
A husband and wife has $595,000.00.
This even takes care of the AIG employees that lose their job.
What would you do with $297,500.00 to $595,000.00 in your family?
Pay off your mortgage - housing crisis solved.
If you had insurance from AIG, now you have the money to replace it with a more stable company.
Repay college loans - what a great boost to new grads
Put away money for college - it'll be there
Save in a bank - create money to loan to entrepreneurs.
Buy a new car - create jobs
Invest in the market - capital drives growth
Pay for your parent's medical insurance - health care improves
Enable Deadbeat Dads to come clean - or else
Remember this is for every adult U S Citizen 18+ including the folkswho lost their jobs at Lehman Brothers and every other company
that is cutting back. And of course, for those serving in our Armed Forces.
If we're going to re-distribute wealth let's really do it...instead of trickling out a puny $1000.00 ( "vote buy" ) economic
incentive that is being proposed by one of our candidates for President.
If we're going to do an $85 billion bailout, let's bail out every adult U S Citizen 18+!
As for AIG - liquidate it. Sell off its parts.
Let American General go back to being American General.
Sell off the real estate.
Let the private sector bargain hunters cut it up and clean it up.
Here's my rationale. We deserve it and AIG doesn't.
But can you imagine the Coast-To-Coast Block Party!
How do you spell Economic Boom?
I trust my fellow adult Americans to know how to use the $85 Billion "We Deserve It Dividend" more than I do the geniuses at AIG or in Washington DC.
And remember, The Birk plan only really costs $59.5 Billion because $25.5 Billion is returned instantly in taxes to Uncle Sam.
And theoretically with the boost to the economy most of these people would be more productive and pay enough in additional taxes over a 5 to 10 year period to repay the $59.5 Billion.
You're right Phillip. Bankers are terrified, at least the smaller bankers. I can assure you that JP Morgan with it's rollover assets of 90 trillion is not worried in the least bit. Neither is City Group or Bank of America. Ever the opportunists, they are egging this crisis on so that they can gobble up other banks one by one until they are powerful enough to force us into financial slavery. Wachovia? Going down and City Group is waiting in the shadows to snatch it. One more bank lost in the big bank vortex.
And why is anyone listening to Paulson anyways? He was a partner for Goldman Sachs, ie the the titan of the big banks. Show me a man who isn't corrupt and isn't helping out his banker cronies, and I'll show you a dirty sock I'll begrudgingly eat.
We just sold some office furniture for cheap. It's hard to get rid of used furniture. So you can definitely find great deals for used furniture to buy.
I think you'd find few people who have Facebook accounts that haven't had similar experiences. While even the "targeted" ads from Google Adsense can be all kinds of random, Facebook uses the small handful of demographic information it has about you to "customise" ads in ways that are often deeply offensive. Particularly in the vein of these "30 and STILL Single?" propositions. I've spoken to many people and while invariably such advertising makes them feel bad about themselves, it DOES NOT encourage them to click on these advertisements OR use the services being promoted.
I particularly enjoy the "thumbs down" feature on Facebook ads. It helps get rid of the rubbish and, surprisingly, can actually help direct more relevant information to your attention.
There is no fee at Vanguard or Fidelity to open a regular account I believe. There are expense ratios on the funds and minimum investments. The expense ratios on these funds are pretty low at Vanguard.
It has nothing to do with facebook - advertisers and marketers pay facebook on a per click basis based on the demographic information you added in your profile. Facebook is just the medium through which they do it. The people pushing acai berry campaigns pay more per click than those pushing free Obama stickers, thus the acai ads show up more often (because facebook makes more money themselves when someone clicks on an acai or a dating ad).
While they might not make any money from you, I can promise they make a killing from others on facebook!
Personally I think advertising that changes and displays based on what you like (or don't like) is pretty genius and certainly the future of advertising.
I have also heard from my Republican friends that removing redlining and providing mortgages to minorities to increase home ownership (the implication being that the Clinton administration has caused all of the problem today)is the root cause of the financial collapse. While we know that only 3% of the mortgages are at risk of default, does anyone know how to source the percentage of the bad loans that were minority loans and whether that group of loans has brought down the whole system?
Great advice and good for thinking. I have a friend who is behind on mortgage payments. When I suggested cutting the cellphone, the internet and the cable, the response was that they were necessities. Our parents grew up without all of that and lived just fine lives. I don't understand why it's now a need just because it's so prevalent. Sure having some type of internet email address and access may be considered necessary in this day, but in that case, the library, ones workplace or a friend's house to check email would work just fine.
I love having a smaller house. Less to heat, less to cool, less to furnish and decorate, and fewer things to maintain! Yet compared to a generation or two ago, or in other parts of the world this would be considered a luxury!
One of my favorite sites, the Comics Curmudgeon, had the Christian singles ad for months. I don't know why the company thought that a bunch of cranky people who get together to complain about the comics in the newspaper would want such a service, but who knows how these things work?
I'm well aware that the advertisements are not created by Facebook. But they use FB info to target their sales. I just think it's odd that something as small as changing my sexual orientation would sudden warrant an entirely new variety of ads that treated me like someone who might need business services, not just a lonely, fat spinster.
The muni market is in disarray, if you google it you will get discussions about the Auction Rate Securities which are Munis. There were all sorts of reports in the media this past year about being told this was as safe as cash and then when they need the money, they cannot get it out because the muni credit market is locked up. Certian funds (not Vanguard) were unable to redeem mutual fund shares either for periods as long as a month. The other side is munis depend on tax revenue and there will be shirtfalls soon
Risk and reward are supposed to coorelate, if you are getting a higher rate then you are presumably taking on more risk
After watching Fast Food Nation I decided I could no longer enjoy cow meat on my plate and decided to become a vegetarian. All the mumbo-jumbo about eating just the right combination of proteins kept me from doing it many years ago when I was first interested for environmental reasons.
I must say that it was an easy change. I have not missed meat at all...I no longer eat chicken and pig meat either. What I have noticed is that I now much more enjoy and savor the "side dishes" which are now my "main event". The meat always used to take center stage and the accompanying carbs and vegetables were not as noticeable in flavor.
Also, I have lost weight without even trying. I still eat some sweets, but have lost much of my desire for those, so going vegetarian appears to be a win-win situation for me. I highly recommend it! If you lean toward it, watching Fast Food Nation will help you take the step :)!
Last, but not least, going vegetarian saves money and helps fight global warming. Take a look at this funny Dutch campaign. It's self-explanatory. Just choose your favorite kind of meat and see what happens :)
http://www.nationalecarnivorenenquete.nl/
I don't really have any training as a counselor, and if there's something that's bothering you persistently it might be worth talking to someone who does.
Having said that, though, what seems to work for me is two things (which both boil down to mindfulness):
Don't try pretending that it never happened. That's a pointless exercise. Instead, just put your attention on the present. Surely what's happening now is more important than stuff that happened in the past.
It's not a matter of pretending and it's not a matter of forgetting. It's a matter of doing whatever you need to do, and making a habit of putting your attention there, rather than in the past.
Good luck!
When i first registered for facebook, I was attending a christian college. Despite not listing a religious belief but still remaining a member of this network, I'm shown ads for HOT CHRISTIAN SINGLES.
Try police auctions in your area...they will have sales usually every quarter and group things like bicycles together. You can go check out all the bicycles and pick a few that would work for you, then bid on them when they come up.
I recently stepped into my first postion of managment. I am a project manager for elearning projects. Trusting was one of the most difficult things for me to learn. Up until recently I did every step of the project myself. Now the projects are larger in scope and require many more people. My fear of the project growing in ways that I can't control took a while for me to get used to. I think I'm getting it now.
This is good advice! Thanks for writing.
www.goingcarless.com
I understand what you're saying about letting go, choosing to see the positive in people and all that fun stuff, but what I have a problem with is tricking my mind into doing all that.
I would like to move on from a couple situations that annoy me, but even if I make some progress towards that, my mind begins to remind me of why I was annoyed in the first place and all progress is lost.
While it sounds good in theory to just pretend like nothing happened and be blissfully happy about everything, but when does your mind finally start believing this so it can in fact, let things go for real?
It's the same situation. for YEARS she has been doing the lottery thing and filling out every. Single. Sweepstakes entry she can get her hands on. Three months or so ago I found out she was sending money to scam artists. BORROWING money to send to scam artists who promised her that she'd won a large sum of money. All she had to do was pay this fee or that fee.
And today she got two checks (totally about $9000) that she deposited. She even opened a brand new checking account with one of the checks. They're both fake - *I* called the issuing banks to check. Luckily she's OC about copying an dkeeping paperwork so I was able to verify that they were fakes.
We have talked to herand TALKED to her and she absolutely refuses to listen. And refuses to change her phone number and now, I find out from this article that POA is a lost cause. So I have to sit by and WATCH while this woman WILLFULLY screws up her life and finances?
Don't get me wrong. I'm furious with the scammers but I'm also absolutely LIVID with my grandmother for COMPLETELY REFUSING to listen to us. And because she CONTINUES to do these things even after being scammed.
It's like dealing with an addict. She LIES to us and HIDES things from us. She tells us it won't happen again. I live right next door to her and have HEARD her talking to these people. IT KEEPS happening.
If we can stage interventions on addicts who insist on continuing self-destructive behaviour, we should be able to stage interventions on our parents and grandparents who are exhibiting the same behaviors.
Brilliant - American ingenuity!!
I'm not a credit rating expert, but just wanted to reinforce your point, Xin, that the market is discounting muni bond issuers as being increasingly risky. Inversion of yields is interesting, but suspect. Most state governments are just as fiscally irresponsible as the federal good ol' boys, but with far less resources under their command.
Definitely a great suggestion and something to look into further!
Nora,
To piggyback on your "cash is king" comment, we should extrapolate that a bit further and state that capitalization is king. The single biggest reason for entrepreneurial failure is misjudgement of capital requirements and inability to secure favorable financing. Most entrepreneurs find that their most important job is not running their business, but trying to find the next source of financing. In today's contracting credit environment, this unfortunately will become more difficult.
They also look at your taste in music and TV when considering ads. They're always trying to get me to buy Thin Lizzy or Conan O'brien t-shirts. And its the same story with Myspace.
I have never seen any ads on Facebook. Then again I use Firefox and the Ad Blocker Plus add-on. It must do a good job of blocking the ads on Facebook.
Dr. Bernstein's book and diet are very, very difficult to follow -- but they do work. Personally, I have been floating around in nana land for awhile, somewhat in denial about my diabetes. now it is smacking me in the face and I have to do something about it or just die. We don't have insurance or the means to buy insulin. I am already on metformin but my best chance is to get this weight off by eating like Dr. B says. I have an injured knee that needs surgery, so will have to exercise creatively. Going back to the topic of thin vs. fat people having type II diabetes -- Dr. B has some interesting theories about that. He believes that maybe thin type IIs might actually be like "late" type 1s. Interesting, and that would explain their difficulties. I have an aunt who is like that, and her whole scenario of dealing w/her diabetes feels more like a type 1....harder to control, etc.
BAILOUT
"WE DESERVE IT DIVIDEND"
The only thing that has made any sense this week!!
The Birk Economic Recovery Plan
-----------
I'm against the $85,000,000,000.00 bailout of AIG.
Instead, I'm in favor of giving $85,000,000,000 to America in a
We Deserve It Dividend.
To make the math simple, let's assume there are 200,000,000 bonafide U.S. Citizens 18+.
Our population is about 301,000,000 +/- counting every man,woman and child. So 200,000,000 might be a fair stab at adults 18 and up..
So divide 200 million adults 18+ into $85 billon that equals $425,000.00.
My plan is to give $425,000 to every person 18+ as a "We Deserve It Dividend".
Of course, it would NOT be tax free.
So let's assume a tax rate of 30%.
Every individual 18+ has to pay $127,500.00 in taxes.
That sends $25,500,000,000 right back to Uncle Sam.
But it means that every adult 18+ has $297,500.00 in their pocket.
A husband and wife has $595,000.00.
This even takes care of the AIG employees that lose their job.
What would you do with $297,500.00 to $595,000.00 in your family?
Pay off your mortgage - housing crisis solved.
If you had insurance from AIG, now you have the money to replace it with a more stable company.
Repay college loans - what a great boost to new grads
Put away money for college - it'll be there
Save in a bank - create money to loan to entrepreneurs.
Buy a new car - create jobs
Invest in the market - capital drives growth
Pay for your parent's medical insurance - health care improves
Enable Deadbeat Dads to come clean - or else
Remember this is for every adult U S Citizen 18+ including the folkswho lost their jobs at Lehman Brothers and every other company
that is cutting back. And of course, for those serving in our Armed Forces.
If we're going to re-distribute wealth let's really do it...instead of trickling out a puny $1000.00 ( "vote buy" ) economic
incentive that is being proposed by one of our candidates for President.
If we're going to do an $85 billion bailout, let's bail out every adult U S Citizen 18+!
As for AIG - liquidate it. Sell off its parts.
Let American General go back to being American General.
Sell off the real estate.
Let the private sector bargain hunters cut it up and clean it up.
Here's my rationale. We deserve it and AIG doesn't.
But can you imagine the Coast-To-Coast Block Party!
How do you spell Economic Boom?
I trust my fellow adult Americans to know how to use the $85 Billion "We Deserve It Dividend" more than I do the geniuses at AIG or in Washington DC.
And remember, The Birk plan only really costs $59.5 Billion because $25.5 Billion is returned instantly in taxes to Uncle Sam.
And theoretically with the boost to the economy most of these people would be more productive and pay enough in additional taxes over a 5 to 10 year period to repay the $59.5 Billion.
You're right Phillip. Bankers are terrified, at least the smaller bankers. I can assure you that JP Morgan with it's rollover assets of 90 trillion is not worried in the least bit. Neither is City Group or Bank of America. Ever the opportunists, they are egging this crisis on so that they can gobble up other banks one by one until they are powerful enough to force us into financial slavery. Wachovia? Going down and City Group is waiting in the shadows to snatch it. One more bank lost in the big bank vortex.
And why is anyone listening to Paulson anyways? He was a partner for Goldman Sachs, ie the the titan of the big banks. Show me a man who isn't corrupt and isn't helping out his banker cronies, and I'll show you a dirty sock I'll begrudgingly eat.
Hmmm. I haven't noticed any ads like that. At all. And according to my stats, I'm a 21 year old female in an open relationship.
So I followed Elizabeth's lead and took a screenshot.
There is one dieting ad on there, but I'm suprised at how well targeted a lot of them are.
This is definitely something interesting, and I'll probly be paying attention to it in the future.
We just sold some office furniture for cheap. It's hard to get rid of used furniture. So you can definitely find great deals for used furniture to buy.
I think you'd find few people who have Facebook accounts that haven't had similar experiences. While even the "targeted" ads from Google Adsense can be all kinds of random, Facebook uses the small handful of demographic information it has about you to "customise" ads in ways that are often deeply offensive. Particularly in the vein of these "30 and STILL Single?" propositions. I've spoken to many people and while invariably such advertising makes them feel bad about themselves, it DOES NOT encourage them to click on these advertisements OR use the services being promoted.
I particularly enjoy the "thumbs down" feature on Facebook ads. It helps get rid of the rubbish and, surprisingly, can actually help direct more relevant information to your attention.
There is no fee at Vanguard or Fidelity to open a regular account I believe. There are expense ratios on the funds and minimum investments. The expense ratios on these funds are pretty low at Vanguard.
It has nothing to do with facebook - advertisers and marketers pay facebook on a per click basis based on the demographic information you added in your profile. Facebook is just the medium through which they do it. The people pushing acai berry campaigns pay more per click than those pushing free Obama stickers, thus the acai ads show up more often (because facebook makes more money themselves when someone clicks on an acai or a dating ad).
While they might not make any money from you, I can promise they make a killing from others on facebook!
Personally I think advertising that changes and displays based on what you like (or don't like) is pretty genius and certainly the future of advertising.
I was looking for something just like this. Any ideas on the brokerage fees associated with these types of accounts?
I have also heard from my Republican friends that removing redlining and providing mortgages to minorities to increase home ownership (the implication being that the Clinton administration has caused all of the problem today)is the root cause of the financial collapse. While we know that only 3% of the mortgages are at risk of default, does anyone know how to source the percentage of the bad loans that were minority loans and whether that group of loans has brought down the whole system?