And I might do this, however you have to remember about dealing. Frequently if you get into the fine print of the offers it's something like '0% interest OR $2k rebate'.
In which case, on a ~$20k car, you can save a bunch of money paying cash.
I will admit that I have a bias against owing money though.
Presumably to allow a non engineer to check using a photograph.
More than that. Military hardware is frequently built to survive conditions not experienced by consumer machines. Something as 'simple' as moving a cable could be the difference between the part survive an EMP blast and still be operational and frying instantly.
Rather than assuming an operating temperature range of 40-100F, it might have to survive -30 to 190F.
Substituting a non-shielded cable for a shielded cable, even where civilian specs calls for unshielded, can result in betraying RF emissions allowing enemies to gain valuable information.
The most obvious advantage is the privacy it offers visually impared people who would otherwise have to depend on others to follow they wishes. (Kinda uniformed about this so don't kill me if I'm wrong and they have simple usable brail forms)
Some areas do have braille form. And I think it's hard to imagine a worse system for visually impaired voting than touch screen. At least with a keyboard you can have those little ledges to locate your fingers. You'd need a voice system - but then you either need earbuds or set the volume up high enough that everybody hears how gramps is voting.
A post above mentioned doing away with the secrecy aspect in the hope that they can audit their vote. I think this can be dangerous but is on the right track. I would envision an anonymous auditing system where you get a random id assigned to your vote allowing for online validation.
This is your employer* KrizDog, what's your id number? There's very good reasons no verifiability exists for voting.
Although this probably would just provide a false sense of security as their are countless of ways to subvert this.
Pretty much, if I control the backend I can make all the votes show up right while still subverting the numbers unless everybody submitted their votes to an independent counting agency, and sampling wouldn't be enough as long as the guy isn't trying to change a 90-10 vote into a 10-90 vote. Take a 48-52 for example. All you have to do is change that 48% into a 51%, and the 52% into a 49%. You changed 3% of the votes - not enough to detect for certain.
That was one of the objections to the diebold machines actually. It's system was to copy the vote table into another table - used the original table for showing individual voting district results, while the copied table was used for overall results. So as an auditor, unless I called up every single county and did the math myself, I wouldn't necessarily catch that somebody changed the copied table. Spot checks would be generally ineffective, as the machine reports the correct district results, while lying about the overall.
Right now that would probably be caught - but it would require somebody going the extra mile.
*Family, landlord, union boss, mob can all be substituted.
But that's still a solution looking for a problem.
Paper Ballots != punchcard ballots.
While supporters of paper ballots will probably argue as to the exact details (Pen! Pencil! Marker!), the fact is it's trivial today to print out scannable ballots, anybody who's attended school past elementory should be familiar with them, recounting is easy in multiple fashions, and they're far more cost effective - professionally printed paper ballots should cost less than ten cents each. You'd have to feed five thousand people through a single voting machine to make it worth it. To give you a hint: Assume a machine processes a votor every 5 minutes - that's 12 an hour, or a mere 240 people in a 20 hour period - far longer than polls are open. Even if you only give each voter a minute - that's still only 1200 people in an election.
Scalability? As long as you have ballots available, all you need is more pens, tables and maybe chairs.
Sounds strange - and I'm not having much luck with my google-fu. IRS site gives up a bunch of stuff on section 72 when searching for "substantially equal distributions".
I haven't found anything that says you can use that rule to withdraw money early without penalty.
Besides, it's good to have a slush fund available anyways.
Assuming an *Average* return of 10%, and that you invest half your income -
You'd be able to retire* in 8-12 years. 8 years would replace your lifestyle(you're used to living on 50% of your income), 12 years for full income replacement. Given that you are used to a lower lifestyle - that should cover the benefits rather nicely.
Of course, this is forgetting about inflation, pay increases, etc... Assuming a 5% pay increase each year, you'd need 9 years net income replacement, 15 for gross.
Of course, I'm only investing ~20% of my income(at that high of a rate, I can't keep it stable, I invest extra when I can). At that rate, assuming an annual 5% raise, it'd take 28 years for my investments to be able to produce my gross pay each year.
Consider this: If you seriously enter the workforce at 21, assuming no significant debt**, you'd be able to retire at 49.
Yes, this means not dumping all the money into retirement accounts, as you're going to need a chunk of it earlier.
*Don't forget that you'd have to replace job benefits like healthcare in the USA. **By this I mean something that'd prevent you from saving 20% of your income.
Credit reports have that information already in the USA. What I was talking about was a national database that included balances. IE 'Sorry Mrs Hog, but it shows you have $10k in credit card debt so we can't give you a car loan' instead of looking at just more general credit history and what other companies report, like credit limits and payment information.
First, I suggest not posting AC, you deserve to be heard. I hope to hear from you again.
if you refuse to take an easy, reliable >4% return on an amount as large as those involved with a mortgage you will not become of one us (hint even if your tax rate is currently so low that the tax advantages accompanying the mortgage interest do not boost your marginal return above the 4% difference you cited, your tax rate will go up in time to add that bonus).
Your acceptance of risk is higher than mine. I'm a bit scarred in that I first started investing just before 9/11. Lost half my initial investment. On paper, I didn't pull it out, and it eventually recovered. Now, I will admit that I'm paying the minimum on my mortgage and investing instead. Then again, I got a sweetheart interest rate, much better than the 6% I could otherwise get. Still, I'm building equity in the house - which I want. Worst case I can still make it - it's just going to take a bit longer.
Having a fixed-rate mortgage on your house does not risk your house in ways different from those.
I have insurance for the other events. Home Owner's association? I could practically set up a firing range in my yard and the neighbors are more likely to come over and shoot with me than call the cops. As for fixed rate mortgage what I was really talking about was manipulating loans such that you have zero equity most of the time - think 'interest only loan'.
This way I still own my house if the stock markets crash and I lose my job.
If you think buying your car outright means that you can budget the $300/mo that would have been a car payment for repairs instead of considering that money as not-yet-spent funds to purchase the car that will replace the one you're currently driving -- you will not become one of us.
I think you misread me - the $300 payment that represented my car payment when I was still paying it off. What I'm doing now is placing that money into investments each month earmarked 'car'. It's a little more bookkeeping to keep track of the number of shares for that purpose, but whatever. It's a somewhat nebulous fund that's meant to pay for major vehicle expenses - not including gas or routine maintenance, but including buying a new car. Basically, I know that some major maintenance will probably be required between now and 10 years. That $300/month will more than cover that. If the maintenance is too bad, or the car no longer meets my needs, then the fund goes towards a new car; ideally buying it 100% cash. The 10 year point is merely a goal, not a end point. If I still like the car, I could drive it for 12. It's just that I figure after 5 I'll have plenty of money, even assuming some repairs, to buy a new car. The way I look at it - if I end up spending $900 in year 8 to get to year 10 I'm still ahead of the game.
Financially, the difference between buying your car for 'cash' vs. on credit is that you save the interest costs and (if you did it right) had benefited from the returns made on the not-yet-spent funds but you still need to include that 'car payment' in your budget *every* month rather than just the months after your current car dies.
That's what I meant. $300 monthly payment ceased going into GM's pocket and into my portfolio, earmarked 'car'. I just don't feel the need to mark it exclusively for 'new car', instead choosing to allow it to also be used for sane repairs on my existing vehicle - after all, I'm still ahead as long as it's costing less than $300/month to keep running in a suitable condition. Heck, if it reached $100/month to keep going, I'd be car shopping.
I'm firmly on my way to a somewhat early retirement - I'll have the $1million, after starting with essentially 0 as a teen. I could do it faster, but I do like some luxuries, like my $1200 gaming machine(built myself to save money). Of course, my last gaming computer was four years old when I replaced it, so it ends up being a lot cheaper than drinking at a bar.
Here's a trick I was taught: Treat the card like a set of checks.
Seriously, keep the card in your checkbook with a register. When you buy something, deduct it from your checking account. Total up those expenses when the bill comes, verify charges are good, and send them a check in full each month.
The only way CC companies make money off of me is via store processing fees. As the places I shop at don't give cash discounts, that doesn't cost me except in a theoretical way. Before going ape about 'processing fees', remember, there are business expenses related to the handling of cash as well. Handing that $20 to pay for something might actually have more overhead in handing that bill and your change than the processing fees charged by the CC company. Remember, you have to reconcile the till, count and lock up cash, transfer it to the bank, etc...
I haven't paid a cent of interest or fees to the CC companies in a decade. I'll admit I was a bit stupid as a teen - though I didn't dig myself in deep, fortunately. Paid a little interest on my first brand new personal computer though.
On the other hand, the CC company shouldn't be too pissed with me, I'm a quiet customer who pays his bills on time and in full. Sure, they don't get interest from me, but they also don't have to worry much about me not paying my debt and forcing them to write me off as bad debt.
Overturning that stupid ruling that let banks export usury rates.
You think CC cards are high? The complaints I've been hearing is about the payday loan places - many charge so much that their effective interest rate is 400%!! Heck, a federal law recently went into effect limiting the rate charged to military members and their dependents to 36%, and suddenly the payday loan places don't want to talk to military.
Make it illegal to give cards to people who are near their credit limit on most/all their cards already.
Tough to do. You'd need some sort of national database - I don't know about you, but I think that there's already plenty of information on my credit history that's available to the public, I don't really need them finding out about my balances as well.
I think what I'd do is simply make declaring bankruptcy easier again. CC companies aren't stupid, they won't loan to somebody if they think that they're going to lose money. They'll willingly ruin your credit though if they think they can still make back more (IE they make back the money they loaned you +10%, but not the 30% they were looking for). Still, I think that that's a reasonable thing - the person didn't pay per the terms, therefore they're a credit risk. Their own fault. Make declaring bankruptcy easy enough the companies won't loan to the worst offenders, like they used to do in the old days. Of course, back then you needed to be 'upper middle class' to get so much as a regular CC card, much less the premier 'gold card', or the practically unheard of platinum card.
Then again, easy bankruptcy encourages people to play the system - I know, bring back debtor's prison. IE the person goes to jail for X number of days(which sucks), but has his debt wiped out(CC company not interested in financing a deadbeat). Have X dollars be wiped out per day in prison, highest interest rates first(so the home mortgage company loses their claim last).
No "loyalty" cards that have credit attached (i.e. what you see at Best Buy, Circuit City, Nordstrooms, Gap... just about everywhere.
Tough, seeing as how this is how 'credit cards' got their start - it was an extension of the old store credit system. You could buy stuff on credit with Sears before American express
The Diner's club card wasn't started until 1950, AmEx started in 1956. Sears opened it's first retail store in 1925.
Mandatory financial counseling in school (Ohio is moving to something like this I hear) so that kids have a chance to learn this stuff the easy way.
Very good idea. I'd call it 'training' not counseling. Counseling implies a one on one affair like setting up a specialized budget for each student, which isn't necessarily needed. Knowing how to create a budget, balance a checkbook, and some basics about investments is. I say investments because more and more people are having investments - even if only in the form of retirement accounts.
Of course, along with sex&drivers ed, and gun safety*, I think that in some problematic districts we also need to teach 'basic' skills like washing clothing, cooking(even for the boys), basic court system tactics**, among other things.
*personal gripe. **IE written contracts, proof, and not pissing the judge off.
I kinda use my credit card for overdraft protection - charges go on the card, not against my checking account. My account sees about five withdrawals a month - to pay various bills. I always find the $49(or whatever) fees against a sub $20 check funny.
Not only can overdraft allow crooks to charge more up on your account before they're stopped, unless your bank is nice you're out of that money until the investigation is complete.
With a CC card, it's the CC company that's left holding the debt until the issue is resolved. That's one reason I use a CC card rather than a Debit.
True, but the fact of the matter is that people DO get into debt more when they use credit cards.
Of course they do. Then again, with things like payday loans and rent to own(effective interest: up to 400%!), there's plenty of people who get into trouble even without credit cards with an interest rate generally less than 30%.
Many people are not disciplined enough to do what you recommend.
True, of course even though I do the same thing, there are things I could theoretically do to increase my earnings/save money even more, but even though it should be fine, I consider it too dangerous or too much work.
For example, I could get a home mortgage for ~6%. My investment returns are averaging 10%. So I could theoretically make more money keeping my house mortgaged(essentially renting it), and going for that 4% marginal. Sure, I'd have to pay income tax on the 10%, but the interest for the house is deductible. Still, that means risking my house - for a measly 4% on average. Sure, some people do it, but I don't like it.
We'd probably be better off teaching fiscal responsibility and budgeting in HS, but even then - we can't make people listen, and that 52" plasma TV looks real good...
Here I am driving a 5 year old car(bought new, paid off, I plan to drive it at least 10 years. $300/month pays for a lot of repairs. Stuff left over once I decide to get rid of it can go towards buying a new car - possibly entirely. I also have a 7 year old 32" TV I bought on special, etc...
But there's people who make less than me running around with HDTVs and expensive cars etc... My only consolidation is that I'm much more likely to be able to retire early and with a better standard of living than them. My goal is to be one of those 'quiet millionaires'. You know, live modestly, but have no real financial worries.
The statement might not be measurable, but it does have meaning in the context. It hasen't been eliminated at a stage where at least 99% of chemicals would already have been eliminated.
Sure, it might only have a 5% chance of making it*, but it's already further along than most 'potentials' in that it's shown something worth a further look at.
Chemotherapy works in pretty much the same way. You pump what is basically a fairly nasty cell toxic into the body and hope it kills the cancerous cells faster than it kills the rest of the body (I did simplify a bit).
I remember a few years ago that the FDA changed their chemotherapy drug approval requirements. It used to be that all a drug had to do was show a certain statistical probability that it'd reduce tumor sizes.
The rule adjustment was that it would now have to either show better tumor reduction for it's toxicity. IE either shrink tumors the same while being less toxic, or shrink them faster.
To me, it showed that they've developed enough anti-cancer medications that now they're going to get tough and concentrate on improving anti-cancer drugs.
Of course, I'd like to see them take a sample of the cancer, a 'known good' DNA sample, feed the samples(and some patient information like if they have liver damage) into a machine which spits out an individualized treatment course best suited for taking out the cancer. Bonus if it's something like a specialized virus.
The problem with what you hear is that 99% of these potentials fail some point along the way. Either they're too toxic in the human body, or not effective enough against cancers for their toxicity, or just not competitive with existing treatments(no niche to exploit).
I heard once...
It's very easy to kill cancer cultures in a dish. Matter of fact, much of the time the trick is keeping them alive.
It's an entirely different matter to do it in the body.
Makes sense to me. A little splash of bleach and that petri dish won't have any live cells in it. Yet bleach is NOT suitable for internal use.
Don't get me wrong, I hope these possiblities pan out as well. Even with all the failures, we've come a long way.
Except that AT&T doesn't even want to talk to me where I live, there's huge gobs of the country where the IPhone won't even work. Not huge gobs of the population, but still, I'm going to get a cell phone that works where I live. I haven't seen a live iPhone yet because of this.
Irks me a bit, sure, but I just figure it's Apple's loss.
While the apple iPhone is indeed the 'hot' new device, and does offer a currently unique set of features, should anybody be pretending that this will sink any cell phone provider that doesn't get the iPhone?
As for the limited rate selection - why not? It's a PDA, data services are probably assumed.
Basically, the poster received a spam, that used some "personal" details. Apparently the judge is unaware that spam can be personalized. It gets a bit complicated (it always does when you try to figure out the resoaning of the insane) but apparently the fact that the email was signed with a name was part of why it could not have been spam.
I'd address it from the 'ignorance' angle and bring in some personalized snail-mail spam. You know, the ones with your name/information printed in various spots...
Personally, it can be hilareous for me at times because in at least one database they have me down as married to my mother... I figure that it's because at one time I had a joint checking account with her on it because I was in Europe and needed a way to get bills paid back in the states. Joint checking account, male+female = married.
California does similar things, up to and including garnishing wages of people with merely similar names who couldn't possibly be the father(if they miss the short reply deadline merely sent by 1st class mail, not certified or registered).
Adoption wasn't as fast as MS would have liked, and you can see attempts at keeping MS from repeating XP all through Vista's launch.
And I think that this is killing them. In attempting to make Vista *NEW* and *REQUIRED* and *DIFFERENT*, they broke a number of things, introduced a bunch of annoyances - killing any desire many people have for upgrading... DRM is only one of the annoyances - why would you set up an OS to work *worse* than its predecessor?
Sure, it's prettier - but there are still lots of people who the first thing they do on a new box is set the theme to 'windows classic'. Partially as a consequence, it's also slower - enough slower that a number of people have remarked that their new vista machine is slower than their 2-3 year old XP box.
Menus are all different - I've always hated how MS tends to move settings I need to change deeper into the menu. I mean, WTF do I need a 'wizard' that consists of one screen where I hit next to get to the actual menu?
WinNT was really showing its age when 2k came out, and 98 wasn't an enterprise class system. In comparison to NT/98, 2k was a combination of the best features of both as far as I was concerned*.
XP, at least post SP1, was much the same. I don't have the same feeling about Vista, seeing as how XPSP2 installs still go smoothly; software supports it, etc...
If Vista wanted to be better, serious improvements in interface would have been nice. Improved multimonitor support, the flash cache idea would have been great if other performance hits didn't wipe out the benefits, some general code cleanup, etc...
The reason I said displacement is that it's a natural process; distortion generally indicates artificial controls. For example, something happens to ruin much of the apple crop. While apples are obviously the most effected in price, the price may increase for other fruits like oranges and bannanas as people buy more of them to replace the apples they would have otherwise bought, but didn't because apples were too expensive or unavailable.
You can get some downright wierd effects with this stuff on occasion.
In a way I consider a subsidy myself. Instead of the government giving the money, it's future generations who will have to pay. The Inuit in Nunavut are already paying. And not just for Global Warming, but for industrial pollution as well. Although the Inuit neither make nor consume Polychlorinated biphenyl, known to be highly toxic, their blood as been shown to have high PCB levels. Heck they even have high levels of DDT.
If you look at some of my other posts; you'll see that a large reason I want to build nuclear plants is to shut down coal plants starting with the most polluting. I've also mentioned charging for pollution - with no grandfathering. Grandfathering is one of the biggest sources of pollution and inefficiency today.
An existing plant already has advantages over a new plant; a new plant costs money to build while the old plant, while more polluting and less efficient, has had it's building expenses paid off. It certainly doesn't help when you require that a new plant meet stringent new guidelines while grandfathering in the old plant. This encourages waste because it makes the old plant look better. Rules that say that you have to add in new pollution controls when you renovate/upgrade also don't help, it actually delays upgrades(and pollution reduction).
The result is an aging, non-competitive, and polluting infrastructure.
Finally, on appliances and longevity, I had an idea - for major appliances the 'energy star' sticker has to be displayed. Why not require, in addition to energy usage states, appliance expected lifetime?
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And I might do this, however you have to remember about dealing. Frequently if you get into the fine print of the offers it's something like '0% interest OR $2k rebate'.
In which case, on a ~$20k car, you can save a bunch of money paying cash.
I will admit that I have a bias against owing money though.
Presumably to allow a non engineer to check using a photograph.
More than that. Military hardware is frequently built to survive conditions not experienced by consumer machines. Something as 'simple' as moving a cable could be the difference between the part survive an EMP blast and still be operational and frying instantly.
Rather than assuming an operating temperature range of 40-100F, it might have to survive -30 to 190F.
Substituting a non-shielded cable for a shielded cable, even where civilian specs calls for unshielded, can result in betraying RF emissions allowing enemies to gain valuable information.
The most obvious advantage is the privacy it offers visually impared people who would otherwise have to depend on others to follow they wishes. (Kinda uniformed about this so don't kill me if I'm wrong and they have simple usable brail forms)
Some areas do have braille form. And I think it's hard to imagine a worse system for visually impaired voting than touch screen. At least with a keyboard you can have those little ledges to locate your fingers. You'd need a voice system - but then you either need earbuds or set the volume up high enough that everybody hears how gramps is voting.
A post above mentioned doing away with the secrecy aspect in the hope that they can audit their vote. I think this can be dangerous but is on the right track. I would envision an anonymous auditing system where you get a random id assigned to your vote allowing for online validation.
This is your employer* KrizDog, what's your id number? There's very good reasons no verifiability exists for voting.
Although this probably would just provide a false sense of security as their are countless of ways to subvert this.
Pretty much, if I control the backend I can make all the votes show up right while still subverting the numbers unless everybody submitted their votes to an independent counting agency, and sampling wouldn't be enough as long as the guy isn't trying to change a 90-10 vote into a 10-90 vote. Take a 48-52 for example. All you have to do is change that 48% into a 51%, and the 52% into a 49%. You changed 3% of the votes - not enough to detect for certain.
That was one of the objections to the diebold machines actually. It's system was to copy the vote table into another table - used the original table for showing individual voting district results, while the copied table was used for overall results. So as an auditor, unless I called up every single county and did the math myself, I wouldn't necessarily catch that somebody changed the copied table. Spot checks would be generally ineffective, as the machine reports the correct district results, while lying about the overall.
Right now that would probably be caught - but it would require somebody going the extra mile.
*Family, landlord, union boss, mob can all be substituted.
But that's still a solution looking for a problem.
Paper Ballots != punchcard ballots.
While supporters of paper ballots will probably argue as to the exact details (Pen! Pencil! Marker!), the fact is it's trivial today to print out scannable ballots, anybody who's attended school past elementory should be familiar with them, recounting is easy in multiple fashions, and they're far more cost effective - professionally printed paper ballots should cost less than ten cents each. You'd have to feed five thousand people through a single voting machine to make it worth it. To give you a hint: Assume a machine processes a votor every 5 minutes - that's 12 an hour, or a mere 240 people in a 20 hour period - far longer than polls are open. Even if you only give each voter a minute - that's still only 1200 people in an election.
Scalability? As long as you have ballots available, all you need is more pens, tables and maybe chairs.
Sounds strange - and I'm not having much luck with my google-fu. IRS site gives up a bunch of stuff on section 72 when searching for "substantially equal distributions".
I haven't found anything that says you can use that rule to withdraw money early without penalty.
Besides, it's good to have a slush fund available anyways.
Bingo. As far as 'living below your means' goes.
Assuming an *Average* return of 10%, and that you invest half your income -
You'd be able to retire* in 8-12 years. 8 years would replace your lifestyle(you're used to living on 50% of your income), 12 years for full income replacement. Given that you are used to a lower lifestyle - that should cover the benefits rather nicely.
Of course, this is forgetting about inflation, pay increases, etc... Assuming a 5% pay increase each year, you'd need 9 years net income replacement, 15 for gross.
Of course, I'm only investing ~20% of my income(at that high of a rate, I can't keep it stable, I invest extra when I can). At that rate, assuming an annual 5% raise, it'd take 28 years for my investments to be able to produce my gross pay each year.
Consider this: If you seriously enter the workforce at 21, assuming no significant debt**, you'd be able to retire at 49.
Yes, this means not dumping all the money into retirement accounts, as you're going to need a chunk of it earlier.
*Don't forget that you'd have to replace job benefits like healthcare in the USA.
**By this I mean something that'd prevent you from saving 20% of your income.
Credit reports have that information already in the USA. What I was talking about was a national database that included balances. IE 'Sorry Mrs Hog, but it shows you have $10k in credit card debt so we can't give you a car loan' instead of looking at just more general credit history and what other companies report, like credit limits and payment information.
First, I suggest not posting AC, you deserve to be heard. I hope to hear from you again.
if you refuse to take an easy, reliable >4% return on an amount as large as those involved with a mortgage you will not become of one us (hint even if your tax rate is currently so low that the tax advantages accompanying the mortgage interest do not boost your marginal return above the 4% difference you cited, your tax rate will go up in time to add that bonus).
Your acceptance of risk is higher than mine. I'm a bit scarred in that I first started investing just before 9/11. Lost half my initial investment. On paper, I didn't pull it out, and it eventually recovered. Now, I will admit that I'm paying the minimum on my mortgage and investing instead. Then again, I got a sweetheart interest rate, much better than the 6% I could otherwise get. Still, I'm building equity in the house - which I want. Worst case I can still make it - it's just going to take a bit longer.
Having a fixed-rate mortgage on your house does not risk your house in ways different from those.
I have insurance for the other events. Home Owner's association? I could practically set up a firing range in my yard and the neighbors are more likely to come over and shoot with me than call the cops. As for fixed rate mortgage what I was really talking about was manipulating loans such that you have zero equity most of the time - think 'interest only loan'.
This way I still own my house if the stock markets crash and I lose my job.
If you think buying your car outright means that you can budget the $300/mo that would have been a car payment for repairs instead of considering that money as not-yet-spent funds to purchase the car that will replace the one you're currently driving -- you will not become one of us.
I think you misread me - the $300 payment that represented my car payment when I was still paying it off. What I'm doing now is placing that money into investments each month earmarked 'car'. It's a little more bookkeeping to keep track of the number of shares for that purpose, but whatever. It's a somewhat nebulous fund that's meant to pay for major vehicle expenses - not including gas or routine maintenance, but including buying a new car. Basically, I know that some major maintenance will probably be required between now and 10 years. That $300/month will more than cover that. If the maintenance is too bad, or the car no longer meets my needs, then the fund goes towards a new car; ideally buying it 100% cash. The 10 year point is merely a goal, not a end point. If I still like the car, I could drive it for 12. It's just that I figure after 5 I'll have plenty of money, even assuming some repairs, to buy a new car. The way I look at it - if I end up spending $900 in year 8 to get to year 10 I'm still ahead of the game.
Financially, the difference between buying your car for 'cash' vs. on credit is that you save the interest costs and (if you did it right) had benefited from the returns made on the not-yet-spent funds but you still need to include that 'car payment' in your budget *every* month rather than just the months after your current car dies.
That's what I meant. $300 monthly payment ceased going into GM's pocket and into my portfolio, earmarked 'car'. I just don't feel the need to mark it exclusively for 'new car', instead choosing to allow it to also be used for sane repairs on my existing vehicle - after all, I'm still ahead as long as it's costing less than $300/month to keep running in a suitable condition. Heck, if it reached $100/month to keep going, I'd be car shopping.
I'm firmly on my way to a somewhat early retirement - I'll have the $1million, after starting with essentially 0 as a teen. I could do it faster, but I do like some luxuries, like my $1200 gaming machine(built myself to save money). Of course, my last gaming computer was four years old when I replaced it, so it ends up being a lot cheaper than drinking at a bar.
Here's a trick I was taught: Treat the card like a set of checks.
Seriously, keep the card in your checkbook with a register. When you buy something, deduct it from your checking account. Total up those expenses when the bill comes, verify charges are good, and send them a check in full each month.
The only way CC companies make money off of me is via store processing fees. As the places I shop at don't give cash discounts, that doesn't cost me except in a theoretical way. Before going ape about 'processing fees', remember, there are business expenses related to the handling of cash as well. Handing that $20 to pay for something might actually have more overhead in handing that bill and your change than the processing fees charged by the CC company. Remember, you have to reconcile the till, count and lock up cash, transfer it to the bank, etc...
I haven't paid a cent of interest or fees to the CC companies in a decade. I'll admit I was a bit stupid as a teen - though I didn't dig myself in deep, fortunately. Paid a little interest on my first brand new personal computer though.
On the other hand, the CC company shouldn't be too pissed with me, I'm a quiet customer who pays his bills on time and in full. Sure, they don't get interest from me, but they also don't have to worry much about me not paying my debt and forcing them to write me off as bad debt.
Overturning that stupid ruling that let banks export usury rates.
You think CC cards are high? The complaints I've been hearing is about the payday loan places - many charge so much that their effective interest rate is 400%!! Heck, a federal law recently went into effect limiting the rate charged to military members and their dependents to 36%, and suddenly the payday loan places don't want to talk to military.
Make it illegal to give cards to people who are near their credit limit on most/all their cards already.
Tough to do. You'd need some sort of national database - I don't know about you, but I think that there's already plenty of information on my credit history that's available to the public, I don't really need them finding out about my balances as well.
I think what I'd do is simply make declaring bankruptcy easier again. CC companies aren't stupid, they won't loan to somebody if they think that they're going to lose money. They'll willingly ruin your credit though if they think they can still make back more (IE they make back the money they loaned you +10%, but not the 30% they were looking for). Still, I think that that's a reasonable thing - the person didn't pay per the terms, therefore they're a credit risk. Their own fault. Make declaring bankruptcy easy enough the companies won't loan to the worst offenders, like they used to do in the old days. Of course, back then you needed to be 'upper middle class' to get so much as a regular CC card, much less the premier 'gold card', or the practically unheard of platinum card.
Then again, easy bankruptcy encourages people to play the system - I know, bring back debtor's prison. IE the person goes to jail for X number of days(which sucks), but has his debt wiped out(CC company not interested in financing a deadbeat). Have X dollars be wiped out per day in prison, highest interest rates first(so the home mortgage company loses their claim last).
No "loyalty" cards that have credit attached (i.e. what you see at Best Buy, Circuit City, Nordstrooms, Gap... just about everywhere.
Tough, seeing as how this is how 'credit cards' got their start - it was an extension of the old store credit system. You could buy stuff on credit with Sears before American express
The Diner's club card wasn't started until 1950, AmEx started in 1956. Sears opened it's first retail store in 1925.
Mandatory financial counseling in school (Ohio is moving to something like this I hear) so that kids have a chance to learn this stuff the easy way.
Very good idea. I'd call it 'training' not counseling. Counseling implies a one on one affair like setting up a specialized budget for each student, which isn't necessarily needed. Knowing how to create a budget, balance a checkbook, and some basics about investments is. I say investments because more and more people are having investments - even if only in the form of retirement accounts.
Of course, along with sex&drivers ed, and gun safety*, I think that in some problematic districts we also need to teach 'basic' skills like washing clothing, cooking(even for the boys), basic court system tactics**, among other things.
*personal gripe.
**IE written contracts, proof, and not pissing the judge off.
I kinda use my credit card for overdraft protection - charges go on the card, not against my checking account. My account sees about five withdrawals a month - to pay various bills. I always find the $49(or whatever) fees against a sub $20 check funny.
Not only can overdraft allow crooks to charge more up on your account before they're stopped, unless your bank is nice you're out of that money until the investigation is complete.
With a CC card, it's the CC company that's left holding the debt until the issue is resolved. That's one reason I use a CC card rather than a Debit.
True, but the fact of the matter is that people DO get into debt more when they use credit cards.
Of course they do. Then again, with things like payday loans and rent to own(effective interest: up to 400%!), there's plenty of people who get into trouble even without credit cards with an interest rate generally less than 30%.
Many people are not disciplined enough to do what you recommend.
True, of course even though I do the same thing, there are things I could theoretically do to increase my earnings/save money even more, but even though it should be fine, I consider it too dangerous or too much work.
For example, I could get a home mortgage for ~6%. My investment returns are averaging 10%. So I could theoretically make more money keeping my house mortgaged(essentially renting it), and going for that 4% marginal. Sure, I'd have to pay income tax on the 10%, but the interest for the house is deductible. Still, that means risking my house - for a measly 4% on average. Sure, some people do it, but I don't like it.
We'd probably be better off teaching fiscal responsibility and budgeting in HS, but even then - we can't make people listen, and that 52" plasma TV looks real good...
Here I am driving a 5 year old car(bought new, paid off, I plan to drive it at least 10 years. $300/month pays for a lot of repairs. Stuff left over once I decide to get rid of it can go towards buying a new car - possibly entirely. I also have a 7 year old 32" TV I bought on special, etc...
But there's people who make less than me running around with HDTVs and expensive cars etc... My only consolidation is that I'm much more likely to be able to retire early and with a better standard of living than them. My goal is to be one of those 'quiet millionaires'. You know, live modestly, but have no real financial worries.
The statement might not be measurable, but it does have meaning in the context. It hasen't been eliminated at a stage where at least 99% of chemicals would already have been eliminated.
Sure, it might only have a 5% chance of making it*, but it's already further along than most 'potentials' in that it's shown something worth a further look at.
*You can reverse your statement too.
Chemotherapy works in pretty much the same way. You pump what is basically a fairly nasty cell toxic into the body and hope it kills the cancerous cells faster than it kills the rest of the body (I did simplify a bit).
I remember a few years ago that the FDA changed their chemotherapy drug approval requirements. It used to be that all a drug had to do was show a certain statistical probability that it'd reduce tumor sizes.
The rule adjustment was that it would now have to either show better tumor reduction for it's toxicity. IE either shrink tumors the same while being less toxic, or shrink them faster.
To me, it showed that they've developed enough anti-cancer medications that now they're going to get tough and concentrate on improving anti-cancer drugs.
Of course, I'd like to see them take a sample of the cancer, a 'known good' DNA sample, feed the samples(and some patient information like if they have liver damage) into a machine which spits out an individualized treatment course best suited for taking out the cancer. Bonus if it's something like a specialized virus.
I heard once...
Makes sense to me. A little splash of bleach and that petri dish won't have any live cells in it. Yet bleach is NOT suitable for internal use.
Don't get me wrong, I hope these possiblities pan out as well. Even with all the failures, we've come a long way.
Except that AT&T doesn't even want to talk to me where I live, there's huge gobs of the country where the IPhone won't even work. Not huge gobs of the population, but still, I'm going to get a cell phone that works where I live. I haven't seen a live iPhone yet because of this.
Irks me a bit, sure, but I just figure it's Apple's loss.
While the apple iPhone is indeed the 'hot' new device, and does offer a currently unique set of features, should anybody be pretending that this will sink any cell phone provider that doesn't get the iPhone?
As for the limited rate selection - why not? It's a PDA, data services are probably assumed.
Basically, the poster received a spam, that used some "personal" details. Apparently the judge is unaware that spam can be personalized. It gets a bit complicated (it always does when you try to figure out the resoaning of the insane) but apparently the fact that the email was signed with a name was part of why it could not have been spam.
I'd address it from the 'ignorance' angle and bring in some personalized snail-mail spam. You know, the ones with your name/information printed in various spots...
Personally, it can be hilareous for me at times because in at least one database they have me down as married to my mother... I figure that it's because at one time I had a joint checking account with her on it because I was in Europe and needed a way to get bills paid back in the states. Joint checking account, male+female = married.
California does similar things, up to and including garnishing wages of people with merely similar names who couldn't possibly be the father(if they miss the short reply deadline merely sent by 1st class mail, not certified or registered).
One problem
Looks like it happens many places, not just california
Adoption wasn't as fast as MS would have liked, and you can see attempts at keeping MS from repeating XP all through Vista's launch.
And I think that this is killing them. In attempting to make Vista *NEW* and *REQUIRED* and *DIFFERENT*, they broke a number of things, introduced a bunch of annoyances - killing any desire many people have for upgrading... DRM is only one of the annoyances - why would you set up an OS to work *worse* than its predecessor?
Sure, it's prettier - but there are still lots of people who the first thing they do on a new box is set the theme to 'windows classic'. Partially as a consequence, it's also slower - enough slower that a number of people have remarked that their new vista machine is slower than their 2-3 year old XP box.
Menus are all different - I've always hated how MS tends to move settings I need to change deeper into the menu. I mean, WTF do I need a 'wizard' that consists of one screen where I hit next to get to the actual menu?
WinNT was really showing its age when 2k came out, and 98 wasn't an enterprise class system. In comparison to NT/98, 2k was a combination of the best features of both as far as I was concerned*.
XP, at least post SP1, was much the same. I don't have the same feeling about Vista, seeing as how XPSP2 installs still go smoothly; software supports it, etc...
If Vista wanted to be better, serious improvements in interface would have been nice. Improved multimonitor support, the flash cache idea would have been great if other performance hits didn't wipe out the benefits, some general code cleanup, etc...
*May ME burned righteously in hell.
There's a few games which require DX10 but I bet they regretted doing it.
I can testify that they've lost at least 1 sale with me. Probably a whole lot more.
Actually, some did have to give licenses to 2k over XP, at least until service pack 1 or so.
Vista is having some of the pains, looks worse right now, but we'll have to wait and see I think to see if Vista turnes into a ME or not.
But they did get their foot in the door, so to speak, that cartoons *don't* have to be targeted at children.
The reason I said displacement is that it's a natural process; distortion generally indicates artificial controls. For example, something happens to ruin much of the apple crop. While apples are obviously the most effected in price, the price may increase for other fruits like oranges and bannanas as people buy more of them to replace the apples they would have otherwise bought, but didn't because apples were too expensive or unavailable.
You can get some downright wierd effects with this stuff on occasion.
In a way I consider a subsidy myself. Instead of the government giving the money, it's future generations who will have to pay. The Inuit in Nunavut are already paying. And not just for Global Warming, but for industrial pollution as well. Although the Inuit neither make nor consume Polychlorinated biphenyl, known to be highly toxic, their blood as been shown to have high PCB levels. Heck they even have high levels of DDT.
If you look at some of my other posts; you'll see that a large reason I want to build nuclear plants is to shut down coal plants starting with the most polluting. I've also mentioned charging for pollution - with no grandfathering. Grandfathering is one of the biggest sources of pollution and inefficiency today.
An existing plant already has advantages over a new plant; a new plant costs money to build while the old plant, while more polluting and less efficient, has had it's building expenses paid off. It certainly doesn't help when you require that a new plant meet stringent new guidelines while grandfathering in the old plant. This encourages waste because it makes the old plant look better. Rules that say that you have to add in new pollution controls when you renovate/upgrade also don't help, it actually delays upgrades(and pollution reduction).
The result is an aging, non-competitive, and polluting infrastructure.
Finally, on appliances and longevity, I had an idea - for major appliances the 'energy star' sticker has to be displayed. Why not require, in addition to energy usage states, appliance expected lifetime?