First up, a pair of articles (one short and one longer) on how to make your own luck:
How to Increase Your Luck Surface Area [Codus Operandi] – “The amount of serendipity that will occur in your life, your Luck Surface Area, is directly proportional to the degree to which you do something you’re passionate about combined with the total number of people to whom this is effectively communicated. It’s a simple concept, but an extremely powerful one because what it implies is that you can directly control the amount of luck you receive. In other words, you make your own luck.”
How to be lucky [Psyche from Aeon] – “Many of the world’s leading minds have developed a capacity, often unconscious, to turn the unexpected into positive outcomes. Developing this ‘serendipity mindset’, as I call it, is both a philosophy of life and a capability that you can shape and nurture in yourself.”
One thing that jumps out at me is that knowing that it’s often valuable to explore unexpected moments and being able to are two different things. If you have to work long hours, you can’t afford (or have the energy) to explore unexpected moments. You have to get to work. Perhaps this is why the rich get richer? More open time in their date to explore, make new connections, etc.
(as an aside, I really like the organization of this article with its Need to know, What to Do, Key Points, Learn More, and Links & Books sections)
Investing in a Beach House Airbnb [Relentless Finances] – “In this article I am going to do analysis of an Airbnb opportunity in Virginia Beach, VA. I selected this location based off Virginia Beach’s rank in the article Best Cities to Buy Airbnb. Which claims the average annual profit is $33,208. This would include part time listings, small condos, as well as large beach houses in the average. This is enough profit to make me interested in exploring further.” I’ve thought about investing in a vacation house to Airbnb it but never got past the “thought about it” phase – this was a nice deep dive into the level of research I’d need to consider it. One thing I would’ve liked to have seen is how you handle the cleaning and turnover part if you didn’t live nearby, I think that’s a big piece.
Why Rich Countries Should Subsidize Vaccination Around the World [The New Yorker] – “A team of economists affiliated with the University of Maryland, Harvard University, and Koç University, in Turkey, recently published a study about the potentially disastrous consequences, emphasizing both economic and moral imperatives for increasing worldwide access to covid-19 vaccines. The authors of the study (which was commissioned by the International Chamber of Commerce) found that unequal vaccine access among countries will likely lead to a “total cost for the world” between $1.8 trillion and $3.8 trillion, with up to half the losses paid for by wealthier nations.”