Apex Money Posts

Our first post is a great one about how we think about risk all wrong and Tanja is completely right. A scary story about Mark illustrates the point perfectly.

Also, her book Wallet Activism comes out in three weeks. Read the origin story of the book (some pre-order bonuses too) and consider getting the book.

We Think About Risk All Wrong // How Riding a Bike Almost Ruined Everything [Our Next Life] – “One day back in July, Mark was riding his mountain bike on the Tahoe Rim Trail, something he loves to do, in an area he’d ridden plenty of times before. Every year, all summer long, and as much of the spring and autumn as possible, Mark is on that bike. And given who he is, he’s both adventurous and careful, always looking to improve his technique and fitness so he can ride more and more challenging terrain, but do it safely. That’s let him reach an expert level without taking careless risks. He’d just gotten through a techy (meaning technical, or rocky) section and relaxed a bit when he felt his wheels wash out. Though he didn’t go over the handlebars or hit his head, he landed hard on his left side ribs right on top of a jagged spur of granite.”

Extreme couponers were sent to prison in $31.8 million fraud scheme [CNN] – “The FBI is revealing new details about a $31.8 million counterfeit coupon scheme that landed a Virginia Beach couple in prison for nearly 20 years, combined. In a press release last week, the agency said that investigators found fake coupons in “every crevice” of the house belonging to Lori Ann Talens and her husband, Pacifico Talens, Jr.. The falsified savings were worth more than $1 million. They also found designs for coupons for more than 13,000 products on Lori Ann Talens’ computer.” Wow!

10 Odd Status Symbols Throughout Time [Saving Advice] – “Crakows were a type of shoe that became popular in the 15th century in Europe. They were incredibly impractical, featuring long, extended toes that went anywhere from a couple of inches to 20 inches or more past the end of a person’s foot. The long toe was simply a fashion statement, though some associated longer lengths as a sign of the increased “masculinity” for the wearer.”

And to help you into the weekend, ever wonder how cast iron pans are made? (via Kottke.org)

Have a great weekend!

I really like novel solutions and this suggestion by Alex Tabarrok on Marginal Revolution certainly fits the bill:

Be Green: Buy a Coal Mine! [Marginal Revolution] – “It’s time to reup the idea of buying coal mines and shuttering them. I wrote about this a few years ago based on Bard Harstad’s piece in the JPE and it came up again on twitter so I went looking for a coal mine to buy. Here’s a coal mine for sale in West Virginia for only $7.8 million! According to the ad, the mine produces 10,000 tons of coal monthly and has reserves of 8 million tons. Now here are some back of the envelope calculations.”

The gist is that if you want to reduce carbon dioxide, just buy a mine and shut it down. Buying the mine pays for itself (in carbon offsets) in about 3 months!

When the Place You Live Becomes Unlivable [The Atlantic] – “After Hurricane Ida, New Orleanians are weighing the emotional, cultural, and financial costs of leaving the place they call home.” Rising temperatures that lead to more extreme weather is only going to make this worse.

What Actually Happened During the Cuban Missile Crisis (And What You Can Learn About Influence)… fascinating behind the scenes look at the backroom deal between Kennedy and Khrushchev.

How I Accidentally Wrote My Son Out of His Inheritance [Financially Alert] – “Oops. Yes, you read the title right. I accidentally wrote my son out of his inheritance! Sometimes we can have the best of intentions, and yet our actions end up not being aligned.” DIY has its risks!

A lot of people like Warren Buffett because they consider him an investing genius (he is). I find that aspect of him to be very impressive even if the totality of his life isn’t something I’d aspire to (his personal life is one aspect I do not like all that much).

One professional characteristic that I do find enviable is his ability to keep things simple. Berkshire Hathaway owns many companies with hundreds of thousands of employees but the headquarters has only about two dozen!

Here are the six strategies of Warren Buffet, as interpreted by Michael Simmons on Accelerated Intelligence:

Warren Buffett: “Really Successful People Say No To Almost Everything” [Accelerated Intelligence] – “As we grow in our careers, in our companies, and in our lives, it’s extremely easy to add complexity. In fact, it’s the norm. As you get more profit, it’s normal to hire more employees. As you earn more money, it’s normal to spend more and more. What’s truly powerful and unique is to keep things simple. That takes effort and skill. And, that is part of Buffett’s genius.” It’s hard to keep things simple.

How We Manage Our Money [The FIoneers] – “I have a confession to make. Until 2018 and the age of 31, I wanted nothing to do with our finances. […] As a feminist, I’m now a huge proponent of women having their own money and being full partners in the management of money in their households. I can’t believe it took me so long to get involved.” A peek into how Jessica and Corey manage their finances.

They reference the Anti-Budget, which is a great concept:

Hate Budgeting? Here’s the Easiest Budget Ever [Afford Anything] – “There’s no need to track how much you’re spending on groceries, electricity, restaurants and clothes. You don’t need to line-item your sunglasses, toothpaste, and that time you dropped $80 at the bar.”

Billions of banknotes are missing. Why does nobody care? [The Economist] – “One Saturday evening last October, a young woman called Tara Hanlon arrived at Heathrow airport with five suitcases. When a customs officer asked why she had so much luggage, she explained that she was going to Dubai with friends and didn’t know what she might want to wear. Hanlon’s long hair, plump lips and sculpted eyebrows gave her a passing resemblance to Kim Kardashian, but her diva-ish explanation didn’t satisfy the customs officer. Her bags were searched. Inside were stack upon stack of banknotes – £1,940,120 ($2.7m) in total – strewn with coffee in an apparent attempt to confuse the sniffer dogs.”

I love how publicly irascible Bill Murray always seems. I wonder if it’s an act or what but I hope it isn’t and he’s living his best life.

As for his best quote, this is it:

Bill Murray once said – “I always want to say to people who want to be rich and famous: ‘try being rich first’. See if that doesn’t cover most of it. There’s not much downside to being rich, other than paying taxes and having your relatives ask you for money. But when you become famous, you end up with a 24-hour job.”

As for fame, it probably sucks to be famous. I’m not famous, do not want to be famous, and rather how things are… though I don’t know if I’d have the self-awareness that Tim Minchin did during his ascension:

http://‘There is a reason why famous people are often screwed up’: Tim Minchin on quitting comedy [The Guardian] – ““Fame” takes that internal camera we call the “self” and puts it on a massive selfie stick, so when you are in public a percentage of your brain is always occupied by observing yourself in the third person. And eventually you don’t know how to reel that camera back in, even when you’re at home with your partner and kids. You start to believe that you are an entity. You learn to like yourself as much as you are liked, which means, when the trolls come trolling, you tend to hate yourself as much as you are hated. There is a reason why famous people are often screwed up: it’s not that wankers become famous, it’s that fame makes you a wanker.”

Ever wonder what an early retiree does all day? Wonder no more! Purple recorded everything she did for the last year, down to the hour.

I Recorded Everything I Did Every Hour For A Year: Here’s What Retirees Do All Day! [A Purple Life] – “As y’all know, I’m a super nerd. And part of being super-nerdy involves being curious about what in the world I would get up to in retirement with 24/7/365 freedom. I also knew that weeks and even months can seem to pass so fast that it’s difficult to recall what I actually did with all those hours. So with that knowledge, I decided to record everything I did in retirement in hourly increments. Originally, this was going to be a month-long experiment, but it took so little time and was so fascinating to me that I kept going…and before I knew it, a year had passed 🙂 . So now I have an actual record of what I did every hour for my first year of retirement and I wanted to share that with y’all today.” Wow, so cool.

I chose to study Computer Science in college because of the dot com boom. It was 1998, tech was the next big thing (comparable to crypto today, except more people understood and accepted it), and so I went to Carnegie Mellon to study it.

I wanted to get on a rocketship and my ticket (or so I thought) was a CS degree from a good university.

Then 2001, the bubble burst, and all rocketships and jetpacks were grounded.

So my first job out of college was at a large defense contractor. It was neither a rocket ship or a jet pack but a nice locomotive that would put a roof over my head and food on the table. It wasn’t until years later, basically by accident, I had built a little jetpack in my proverbial garage (blogging) and took off. Funny how the world works.

Stepping off a Rocketship. Strapping on a Jetpack. [The Jungle Gym] – “As it turns out, working for Guild was even better than I imagined. The company has strong product/market fit, fast growth, amazing leaders, and a business model that incentivizes doing good. While no employer is perfect, Guild has been as close to an ideal place to work as one can find. I couldn’t be prouder of everything our team has accomplished and the economic opportunity we’ve created for America’s frontline workers. This begs the obvious question– why am I leaving?”

From the Department of “Internal Competition Sounds Good!”… as it tore Sears apart:

Failing to Plan: How Ayn Rand Destroyed Sears [Verso] – “It is no small irony then, that one of Walmart’s main competitors, the venerable, 120-plus-year-old Sears, Roebuck & Company, destroyed itself by embracing the exact opposite of Walmart ’s galloping socialization of production and distribution: by instituting an internal market.” The internal workings of Sears were horrible!

50 First Levers (How to start building Leverage) [Eric Jorgenson] – “Leverage is everywhere. You felt it as a kid shooting peas across the room with a spoon. Or when you first used a calculator, and wondered why your teachers made you do long division by hand for 3 years. At some point it clicks — “oh shit, I just accomplished something surprisingly big for the effort it took!”” Some good ideas in this one, maybe will give you a few clever automations.

Hello, Apexians, and welcome to Friday. Before you head into the weekend, I’ve gathered some recent money stories to share with you. Enjoy!

Why do people stay poor? [MIT Economics research paper] — “Our results point to the existence of a poverty threshold, so that households with a starting level of productive assets below that threshold are trapped in poverty, while households who are able to get past that threshold accumulate capital and approach the level of the richer classes.”

The art of not taking things personally. [The Founder Coach] — “‘Emotional generosity’ is the ability to see past behaviours that we don’t understand and proactively look for compassionate ways to explain them. It’s easy to do this for young children. If they start crying or throwing a tantrum, we wonder whether they are hungry, or tired, or hurt. Sadly, it’s harder to do this for adults — and especially our co-workers. And yet a more generous interpretation of their difficult behaviour often ends up being right.”

How the toy shortage could affect your holidays. [NerdWallet] — Holiday shortages are nothing new. Most years, some trendy toy or gaming console becomes the hot, hard-to-find item when manufacturers and retailers misjudge demand. What may be different this year is the number of toys in short supply. Most toys and electronics are manufactured in Asia, but bottlenecks at ports are delaying deliveries, while shipping costs have skyrocketed.”

People share the reasons they left their jobs. [BuzzFeed News] — “With so many American workers imagining a new relationship to their careers, I set out to talk to people who either had already quit or were planning to quit their jobs…Some people I spoke to quit their jobs entirely while others opted for freelance work so they could exert more control over their lives.”

Let’s wrap up the week with a movie. That’s right. Today sees the release of the new Dune adaptation. I’ve been waiting years for this moment. Dune is one of my favorite sci-fi books and Denis Villeneuve is one of my favorite directors. My expectations are high. And the film’s trailer only raises my expectations even more.

Who knows? Maybe I’ll be disappointed. The good thing is that David lynch’s 1984 adaptation is so bad that there’s no way for the new film to be any worse!

(I still haven’t seen the new Bond film yet. Or Shang-Chi. Plus, there’s a new Wes Anderson movie out and soon we’ll have a new Matrix film. It’s going to be a good winter for movies!)

Okay, that’s it for this week. Jim will be back with more on Monday. See you then.

Welcome to Thursday, money bosses, and welcome to another edition of Apex Money. Today, as every weekday, we’ve gathered some interesting recent money stories to share with you.

Is $1 million enough to retire in the U.S.? [Visual Capitalist] — “The average American needs their retirement savings to last them 14 to 17 years. With this in mind, is $1 million in savings enough for the average retiree? Ultimately, it depends on where you live, since the average cost of living varies across the country.”

The relationship between money and marriage. [Incognito Money Scribe] — “Although we’ve long moved on from the ancient practice of marrying for the sake of status, money is an irrevocable part of marriage, at times, for better, and at times, for worse. Here is what research has uncovered about the relationship between money and marriage.”

Amazon rigged search results to promote its own brands. [Reuters] — “Thousands of pages of internal Amazon documents examined by Reuters – including emails, strategy papers and business plans – show the company ran a systematic campaign of creating knockoffs and manipulating search results to boost its own product lines in India, one of the company’s largest growth markets.”

Here’s the thing. I have a lot to say about this and related subjects. In fact, for the past year I’ve been working on a mammoth article about just how much I hate the modern web precisely because companies pull stunts like this. It pisses me off. (And if you think Amazon is doing this only in India, I have a bridge to sell you.)

It’s not just big companies that do this either. I’d say that 90%+ of websites doctor their articles and search results based on what makes them the most money. Some folks have no problem with this. I do. When I find a list of “top savings accounts”, I want to believe that list includes actual top savings accounts. Yet, because I know how the sausage is made, I realize those lists rarely feature the best choices. They feature the choices that pay.

Do I sound cynical? Maybe so. But, as I say, I’ve been thinking about this (and writing about it) for months, and it makes me both sad and angry.

Come back tomorrow, won’t you? I promise I will be neither sad nor angry, but that I’ll have a last handful of money stories to send you into the weekend…

Welcome to Tuesday, my friends. Today is a special day. Today, I’m opening comments here at Apex Money.

You see, I feel like I need to add some new sources to my news feed. I scan a couple of hundred blogs and news sites each week to find the best personal finance stories to share with you. But more and more, the blogs especially seem…well, dead. There’s just not a lot of interesting stuff to share. Boo!

So, I’m asking you to pop into the comments today in order to share one or two of your favorite sources of money news that I might be overlooking. Can you do that for me? Thanks!

Now let’s get to today’s stories…

What makes a job meaningful? [The Brookings Institution] — “Despite what most economic models predict, work is not just a source of income but also provides identity and individual self-esteem. As such, work is a pivotal part of human life.” [See also: What makes work meaningful? at IZA Institute of Labor Economics and Accepting lower salaries for meaningful work at Frontiers in Psychology]

Lying flat: Asia’s first steps toward financial independence. [Millennial Revolution] — “One of the best things about the Lay Flat movement is that it’s popular enough to worry the communist government. After all, they have experience quashing unrest and protests in the streets, but what do you do when the form of rebellion is passive resistance?”

Why coffee prices are skyrocketing. [Fast Company] — “The history of coffee has been characterized by extreme price volatility. Periods of excessive supplies have progressively driven down prices until a catastrophic event—either environmental or political—results in a correction.”

To close things out today, here’s a fun 12-minute YouTube video from Kurzgesagt that attempts to answer the question: What did dinosaurs actually look like?

True story: Our new neighborhood is populated by several gangs of wild turkeys. They’re around constantly. As a result, I get to observe them constantly. (I’m watching them out my window as I type this.) More than anything, they make me think of dinosaurs. And, in fact, that’s what I’ve begun to call them. I don’t say, “The turkeys are in the yard.” Nope. I say, “The dinosaurs are in the yard.” It’s more fun that way.

Okay, that’s it for today. I’ll be back tomorrow with more great stuff. See you then…

Greetings, everybody! It’s J.D. back with another week of personal finance stories at Apex Money. Let’s dive right in.

You don’t need a bachelor’s degree to land a high-paying job. [NPR] — “Even for people with just a high school diploma, Farrell says there are a number of high-paying trade jobs where workers get on-the-job training or can acquire skills through an apprenticeship. That’s how Isis Harris, in Portland, got her training to become an electrician, a career, she says, that helps her feel fulfilled both physically and mentally.” [This is an interesting story but the headling is a tad misleading. Education is still the number-one predictor of lifetime earnings.]

How to use social media intentionally. [Becoming Minimalist] — ” I’ve been using social media to spread the inspiration of minimalism and intentional living for over ten years. And along the way, I’ve developed ten rules to help me use social media in an intentional way and keep it from becoming too much of a distraction. Maybe you’ll find them helpful.”

Today’s bonus video is about a recent personal interest. You see, my favorite part of gardening is pruning. I love to prune trees and shrubs and bushes. When I was married, my wife thought I was obsessed with pruning. Now, Kim thinks the same thing.

After we moved six weeks ago, she came home one day and said, “I went to the local nursery today. They have a big bonsai section. I think you should take up bonsai as a hobby. It would indulge your pruning fetish.”

I had never considered getting into bonsai. I really know nothing about it. But based on Kim’s encouragement — and a random conflux of bonsai-related stuff in my life — I’ve come to realize she’s right: Bonsai would be a perfect hobby for me. So, I’ve begun to watch bonsai videos on YouTube to get some sort of idea where to begin.

Today’s video, then, from the Herons Bonsai channel on YouTube, which is amazing — so calming and informative and beautiful. In this recent episode, the host conducts an interesting conversation about bonsai as therapy. It’s fascinating. (To me, at least.)

I’m curious to see where I go with bonsai. Maybe nowhere. But I suspect that it’ll become a sort of outlet for me. The Herons Bonsai video on getting started with bonsai for free using seedlings was particularly inspirational. Our new back yard is packed with holly and pine and fir seedlings. Next week, I intend to dig up some promising specimens as my first bonsai plants…

Well, that’s plenty for today, right? I’ll be back tomorrow with more about money…and less about bonsai. See you then.

Why is daycare so expensive? It’s worth it!

We joking have told our local daycare, which has cared for each of our four kids, that they should name a wing after us. I haven’t summed up how much we’ve spent there (though the pandemic did “save” us some money I suppose) but it’s a massive sum. I think it’s worth ever penny and fortunate that we have the means to do it.

The Real Benefits Of Daycare: One Man’s Six-figure Expense Revisited [Goverment Worker FI] – “High-quality daycare can lead to stronger reading skills and aid in social development. But let’s be real for a minute. Daycare also costs a tiny fortune. And is it really worth the massive cost? We live in a country where parents have to fend for themselves with little-to-no financial assistance for raising young children. Here are my unfiltered thoughts as a dad of 3 who just finished 13 years of paying to have children in daycare.”

34 Mistakes on the Way to 34 Years Old [Ryan Holiday] – “That’s another lesson learned the hard way: Don’t say “Maybe” when you really want to say “no.” Just say no. The only person making a big deal about it is you. Just say no. How many events/meetings/wastes of time are you going to agree to and then regret before you learn this?”

Always do Extra [Ben Northrop] – “One thing I’ve noticed over the years is that there is at least one thing that seems to be common to every good, veteran programmer I know. They all follow the same deliberate and dare-I-say selfish rule to how they approach their time: Always do Extra. Now before you call “bullshit”, let me explain what I mean…” The context of this discussion is software development but it is quite applicable in a variety of arenas. There are a lot of ways we can do “Extra” and how it’s important that we know the difference (and importance) of it and “More.”

I normally reserve the last spot on a Friday to something fun – today it will be fun but only if you’re into numbers and are a nerd like me.

This last post is about a concept known as the Simpson’s Paradox. It’s when something may be true of two separate populations but disappears when you combine them, usually because of the denominators. It’s relevant because of the pandemic and the impact of the vaccine. Read the article, probably twice, and it’ll really sharpen your understanding of this important paradox.