Last night I watched a documentary about credit cards and debt that was produced in 2005 known as "In debt we trust." The documentary was free to watch on hulu and spent about an hour and a half discussing what credit cards were, the corruption of the system, and the problems we face with debt as a nation....
With personal finance everything is relative. Reading through blogs and comparing yourself to others using direct numbers might not be the best way to measure your progress, but using personal finance ratios could be a better indicator as to how you're doing. For example, if you're located in Iowa, your income is going to be significantly lower...
Your standard personal finance equation goes something like this. Work for 30-40 years, <a href="http://www.plantingdollars.com/personal-finance/average-us-savings-rate-holding-steady-but-still-low/"save about 10-15% of your income through 401k's, IRA's and even a little extra by paying down your house through a mortgage. This means you'll be part of the working world the majority of your life.
The is the life of a...
If you've got a mental fixation with the image you're portraying to your neighbors you should probably heed the advice of this article. Stop keeping up with the Joneses, nobody really likes them anyways! They're probably fake, focused only on what you care about, and they don't really have much sense of self. Or maybe I'm...
We are the lifestyle we lead, and our lifestyle is allowed by the income we're able to earn to fund that particular lifestyle. When we start out in life we have a low income and thus we buy things like "starter homes" and sleep on futons while eating ramen noodles. It's actually not too shabby starting out...
Increasing your net worth is fairly straight forward. Lower your expenses and/or increase your earnings. There's only two ways to accomplish it. Although increasing your earnings has a much higher potential, the easiest way to start saving money is going to be through decreasing your expenses. For me, that means living like a poor person....
So you've decided that you'd like a credit card, or you'd like to fatten your wallet a bit and add another one. If you're like to average American you'll have a whopping seven credit cards! If you're just starting out be leery of getting into credit card debt. I'm probably preaching to the choir, but I...
I hear the phrase "a lot of money" well... a lot... but what is a lot of money? Recently I asked what you'd do with an extra $20,000 and to some that was "A lot" of money, but to others it was not a lot of money at all. What gives?
Bringing this topic up reminds me of...
The topic of money doesn't come up that much, being a social taboo and all, but when you have to explain your spending habits as a frugal consumer it can create a few odd looks and perhaps a judgment by your peers as being cheap. Being frugal it's safe to say that, you're in the minority... Most people...
With so much talk about becoming a millionaire and becoming financially free it can all seem a bit daunting. After all, only 2% of Americans are millionaires and if you're a just starting out in life (myself included) it doesn't exactly seem realistic to come up with a million dollars or become free by next Tuesday. ...
