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Apex Money Posts

The hidden truth behind retail pricing.

Hello, my friends, and welcome to Friday. Today, I have four articles for you — and I like each one of them quite a bit. I mean, I always like the articles I share with you, but these four seem especially good today…

The past is not true. [Derek Sivers] — “We think of the past like it’s a physical fact – like it’s real. But the past is what we call our memory and stories about it. Imperfect memories, and stories built on one interpretation of incomplete information.” [A short, powerful message — one I am constantly re-learning.]

Why 72% of retirees are happy. [The Retirement Manifesto] — “What is it about the 72% of retirees who are happy vs. the 28% who are depressed? What should you think about as you plan for retirement to increase your odds of falling into the happy camp?”

The hidden truth behind retail pricing. [Becoming Minimalist] — “Most of us don’t know the actual cost of manufacturing a blender, delivering it to a shelf, or staffing the store. Or forget blenders, we don’t know the actual cost of any item we purchase — be it a pair of pants, a purse, a car sunshade, or a new set of golf clubs. We just take the retailer’s word for it.”

The evolution of financial advice. [A Wealth of Common Sense] — “We now have all of this technological innovation, lower fees, better investment products, fewer barriers to entry and more information than we know what to do with. So what’s left? Behavior is and always will be the final frontier.” [I’m a fan of articles on the history of personal finance, so really liked this piece.]

And that’s it for this week. I’ll be back in ten days to share more great stuff with you. Jim will return on Monday.

Petty moments at work.

Good morning, Apexians, and welcome to Thursday. I’ve got some good money stories for you today. Let’s dive in.

First up is a podcast sent to my by my ex-wife. I’m not joking! Kris thought this was interesting, and I do too.

Are personal-finance gurus giving you bad advice? [Freakonomics] — “What if the economists have better financial advice than the authors of these books? Wouldn’t that be worth knowing? Choi set out to compare the advice from these books to similar advice from the economics literature. He focused on a set of typical issues, like home mortgages, debt repayment, spending versus saving, investment style, things like that. And he found what he calls “some pretty significant differences” between the economists’ recommendations and the advice in the books.”

The resourceful life. [Ribbon Farm] — “The resourceful person rarely asks is this worth it, because by a rarely questioned default, it always is. Resourceful people have extremely stable commitments to extremely stable goals and desires, by default. It’s not specific goals and desires. They’re that way about all goals or desires. If it’s worth doing, it’s worth doing.”

The deliberately terrible lunch, the vindictive daffodils, and other petty moments at work. [Ask a Manager] — “Last month I asked about the pettiest things you’ve seen (or done!) at work. There were so many hilarious stories left on that post that I couldn’t fit them all my favorites into one column. Part 1 was here, and here’s part 2.”

The romance scammer on my sofa. [The Atavist] — “You just have to mention the words Yahoo boys to a Nigerian and watch their reaction to understand how deeply embedded scammers have become in the national conversation. A lot of people see them as young men who’ve chosen a life of crime, preying on foreigners and marring Nigeria’s reputation…There’s another side to public opinion, however, one that sees Yahoo boys as young men pushed to the brink by their circumstances.”

A friend asked me for investing advice recently. Rather than offer a sloppy explanation of passive investing in index funds, I sent her this hour-long video of J.L. Collins speaking to the folks at Google.

That’s everything anyone needs to know about how to invest successfully.

Too many people try to overcomplicate investing. Too many people pay others to provide subpar investment results. This really is something you can do yourself — and Collins offers the best explanation I’ve found so far.

Okay, that’s it for Thursday. I’ll be back tomorrow to take you into the weekend…

The pros and cons of having a nice car.

What’s up, money nerds? We’ve gathered four top money stories to share with you today…

Fish tacos and a tiny dog. [The Contessa Counts] — “If you know many 8 year olds, you might recognize that they share some attributes with 80 (or 100-) year olds. They both see the world with no b.s. The things they want have few bells and whistles, whether it’s a puppy or a grandchild, a beach vacation or a sunny porch with a rocking chair. They want mean people to leave them alone, and for nobody to boss them around. They mostly want to hang with family and friends, and they like it when someone else cooks and cleans the house. They want to live their best life, with no crap.” [Short and sweet.]

Make “doing nothing” the default. [Behavioural Investment] — “It seems ridiculous to suggest that thinking of ways to reduce our activity could be a route to better investment outcomes. Yet, as always, the things that seem unfeasibly simple in investing come with significant behavioural challenges. These are not impossible to overcome, we just need to find a way to do less in a system that incentivises and encourages us to do more.”

Overdoing delayed gratification. [Life After the Daily Grind] — “We’re not immune to having our health or life suddenly cut short. So while planning for the future is important so is living life for today as we don’t know how many tomorrows there will be. And even if we live a long healthy life, that life is surely better with some indulgence thrown in along the way.”

The pros and cons of having a nice car. [Money with Katie] — “It’s fun to care about something that doesn’t involve a screen or extreme engagement of my prefrontal cortex. Buying a Porsche might mean my personal finance club membership is revoked, but I’ll go be sad about that in Sport mode.”

That’s it for Tuesday. The folks from Plutus will pop in tomorrow, then I’ll be back with more great stuff on Thursday. See you then.

Contrarians are usually wrong.

Welcome to Monday, Apexians. J.D. here with another week of money stories to share with you all. I’m leading with yet-another story about electric bikes. (Can you tell I’m researching them for myself?)

“Electric bike, stupid love of my life.” [Craig Mod] — “In the past eighteen months I’ve put several thousand kilometers on my electric bikes. It feels like cheating in every best possible way.”

Contrarians are usually wrong. [A Wealth of Common Sense] — “Going against the grain at opportune moments can be a wonderful strategy. The best investment opportunities almost always occur when there is blood in the streets. The problem is you can’t be a contrarian at all times. Most of the time the trend is right and fighting it is a losing strategy.”

What really happens to the clothes you donate. [GQ] — “Only between 10 and 30 percent of second-hand donations to charity shops are actually resold in store. The rest disappears into a machine you don’t see: a vast sorting apparatus in which donated goods are graded and then resold on to commercial partners, often for export to the Global South.”

So, the video I have for you today is going to seem a little strange. This eight-minute segment is a training video for Bell Labs’ Holmdel Computing Center.

I found this video while researching my favorite architect, Eero Saarinen. Saarinen designed the Bell Labs Holmdel Complex, and I thought it’d be fun to see what it was like to actually work there. Turns out the video is also fun because (a) it’s a soft of time capsule and (b) it highlights what computer technology was like fifty years ago. We’ve come a long way!

Okay, that’s it for today. I’ll see you all again tomorrow.

The Real Price of Success

There’s a great Bill Murray quote about being rich and famous – “To people who want to be rich and famous, I’d say, “Get rich first and see if that doesn’t cover it””.

Being famous, as it turns out, sucks. There are downsides of being famous and poor but there are no downsides of being rich and unknown.

The Real Price of Success [Sahil Bloom] – “I was recently struck by a realization: The people I read books about are very rarely the people I would ever want to trade lives with. Why? The price of their success was not one I would be willing to pay.” I agree with this sentiment and it echoes one I heard recently on a 3-year-old old podcast episode from The knowledge Project with Naval Ravikant)

You missed it [This is the Top] – “Just look to the first half of this year as the perfect example of how failing to invest excess cash might lead to missed opportunities. The S&P 500 climbed over 14%, and the tech-heavy NASDAQ set a new record by surging an astonishing 38.8%. Meanwhile, the 1-year T-bill you purchased in January at a rate of 4.72% earned just 2.36%. That’s a massive spread in returns. From a market standpoint, you missed it.”

As we glide into the weekend, I want to share a story that might put a smile on your face. Did you know that there are 9 dogs who have been elected major of their small towns?

Yes!

Reliable, friendly, and masters of one-way communication: Meet the dog mayors of America [Insider] – “Small towns in California, Minnesota, Colorado, Kentucky, as well as San Francisco have all had dog mayors. Mostly, the dogs are figureheads. Their elections are used to raise money for animal shelters, or for the towns. Elected dogs also tend to last a long time in office, in dog-years anyway.” (I don’t think they needed to say the dogs are figureheads though 😂)

Optimizing for joy

I’ve known J.D., my partner in crime on Apex Money, for almost twenty years. I’ve long been a fan of his writing and was excited to hear when he bought back Get Rich Slowly from the folks who he sold it too many years ago. I was also a little sad to hear he was letting it go (to his business partner, who I am also friends with)… but it’s for a good reason.

All too often we don’t take care of ourselves before others. Or we let the pressure (real and imagined) from others dictate our actions.

I’m glad to see J.D. is doing neither… and optimizing for joy.

Optimizing for joy [JD Roth] – “So, I’m going to return to writing for the web. But I’m not going to write on just one topic. I’m not going to publish at a niche site…like Get Rich Slowly. I’m going to write at my personal blog in a personal style. If there are people who want to read what I write (and even join the conversation), great. If not, also great. I’m going to write for myself — because it’s what I need to do to process my thoughts and feelings, because writing has been a part of who I am for nearly fifty years.”

The Mystery Millionaire of Gage Park [Chicago Magazine] – “When Joseph Stancak died, he left behind a secret: He was worth $11 million. How did a reclusive electrician living in a modest bungalow amass the largest unclaimed estate in American history?”

What’s driving the record-breaking heat wave hitting the U.S.? [NPR] – “You know, one is El Nino, which is a naturally occurring phenomena where ocean temperatures are hotter in the Pacific, which causes hotter temperatures around the world. That started this year and means we’ll likely be looking at soaring temperatures again next summer. But the other major driver here, of course, is human activities. We are warming the planet by burning fossil fuels and adding more greenhouse gas emissions into the atmosphere. Scott, I like to think of greenhouse gas emissions like carbon dioxide – you know, the stuff we spew from our tailpipes – as kind of like down in a blanket or coat. It insulates the planet, capturing heat.”

10 Surprises From the First Half of 2023

2023 has been a surprising year on a variety of fronts, and our first post collects quite a few of them in the financial sphere:

10 Surprises From the First Half of 2023 [Charlie Bilello’s Blog] – “In December 2022, nearly everyone was in agreement: the U.S. economy was either already in a recession or headed for one in 2023. The list of indicators said to be predicting a recession was a long one, including a falling stock market, historic lows in consumer sentiment, and the inversion in the yield curve. But as Yogi Berra famously said, it’s tough to make predictions, especially about the future. And halfway through 2023, we’re still waiting for the recession prophesies to be fulfilled.”

I’d never heard of baby bonds before but with Connecticut now offering them, I found this explainer to be quite informative!

Baby Bonds: A Guide To Saving For The Future [Kid Wealth] – “Baby Bonds are government-sponsored savings accounts for newborns. The idea is that each newborn would receive a seed deposit from the government, which would grow over time thanks to compound interest. The funds in the account would be available for the child to use when they reach a certain age, typically 18 years old, for expenses such as education, buying a home, or starting a business.” I hope this idea expands!

Why Do All American Diners Look Like That? They’re modeled after (train) dining cars! (so fun!)

Woulda, coulda, shoulda

I’ve long been a fan of the regret minimization framework. I learned about it in a video with Jeff Bezos and it’s stuck with me ever since.

Turns out it’s supported by science:

Woulda, coulda, shoulda: the haunting regret of failing our ideal selves [Cornell] – “Our most enduring regrets are the ones that stem from our failure to live up to our ideal selves, according to new Cornell research.”

35 Words of Wisdom You Will Never Forget [Lolly Daskal] – “Here are 35 of wisest truth, if you can make them part of your daily life and never forget them, you are well on your way to cultivating a life that you have always wanted.”

Here are the Economics of Broadway:

Why are houses so expensive?

Well, we’ve made it to the end of another week. Hurrah! But before you go on your merry way, I’ve collected four last stories to share with you. Here they are.

Why are houses so expensive? [Of Dollars and Data] — “Home prices will always be based on the same thing—supply and demand. So if we want less expensive homes, we either have to increase supply, decrease demand, or do both. Unfortunately, finding effective ways to do this (without negative consequences) is the hard part.”

Money has become ‘numbers on a screen’. [The Belle Curve] — “Dealing with money is less tangible today than at any time in the history of money…Over the past 10 years, I’ve found fewer and fewer reasons to carry cash, let alone withdraw it from the bank. It sometimes feels like money is nothing more than numbers on a screen.”

“I have become the rich relative.” [Bitches Get Riches] — “Is this whole article just a flex? A humble-brag? You bet your shapely ass it is! More than any other financial milestone — becoming debt-free, buying a house, saving my first $100,000 — being able to easily provide for others makes me feel like I’ve made it.”

Investing for money vs. investing for happiness. [Money with Katie] — “I should clarify two things right now: Spending more will absolutely result in you having less money, or, at the very least, the same amount of money, but later. And that’s okay, because the point isn’t to accumulate as much money as possible (or even to be financially independent as quickly as possible), but to achieve the most total cumulative happiness.”

That’s it for today. I’ll be back in ten days to share more good stuff with you. Jim will be here on Monday. Take care!

How to do great work.

Today is Thursday, my friends, and I’ve collected some interesting articles about personal finance to share with you — just as we do every weekday here at Apex Money. A couple of these are longreads, but they’re worth it…

How to do great work. [Paul Graham] — “One way to aim high is to try to make something that people will care about in a hundred years. Not because their opinions matter more than your contemporaries’, but because something that still seems good in a hundred years is more likely to be genuinely good.”

The impossible paradox of car ownership. [Vox] — “Anyone who has ever struggled to afford a car, or lived without one, knows how complicated life can get without access to a vehicle. Car ownership has always been expensive, but recent trends suggest that it is getting worse. New car prices have risen so much that purchasing one is quickly becoming out of reach for many buyers.”

Confessions of a luxury-wedding planner. [The Atlantic] — “I was used to my wealthy clients thinking they could bend reality to their will, but I got truly taken advantage of only once. The bride called us to say that she and her younger sister were both getting married in the same year at the same venue. For what seemed like obvious reasons, she did not want to work with the same planner as her baby sibling. I quoted her our rates and there was silence. Her sister’s planner, she said then, was cheaper — something like $12,000 less. To which I replied: Good for your sister!” [My brain hurts after reading this.]

I recently read (twice) music producer Rick Rubin’s book, The Creative Act: A Way of Being. Never in my life have I read something that so closely captures my way of thinking. The philosophy Rubin outlines so closely mirrors my own current philosophy that I found it eerie. It was as if he were in my head.

Anyhow, I didn’t know much about Rubin before reading The Creative Act (my girlfriend gave me the book for my birthday because she thought I’d appreciate it), but I’ve since taken some time to read more about him…and to watch YouTube videos like this one where he explains how to stop overthinking.

“It doesn’t really matter what anyone else thinks.” It took me 54+ years to reach this understanding, but I’ve reached it. My entire 2023 is built around that idea.

Here’s a motto I’ve tried to live by for the past decade: Do your best. Do what’s right. Accept the outcome. That’s basically what Rubin says in this clip. I love it.

Anyhow, that’s it for today. I’ll be back tomorrow to take you into the weekend…