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What’s the CRSP U.S. Total Market Index?

My stock market investments include some dividend growth stocks and mostly Vanguard mutual funds, including the subject of our first post – VTSAX.

Bogleheads, or big fans of Vanguard and their founder Jack Bogle, absolutely LOVE VTSAX (and the ETF cousin VTI). What’s not to love?

Invest in the total market for just 0.04% each year. That’s four bucks on ten grand!

It’s based on an index created at the University of Chicago’s Booth School of Business – learn all about it:

The Mutual Fund That Ate Wall Street—Based on an Index Few People Know About [The Wall Street Journal] – “That fund is the $1.3 trillion (yes, trillion, including all share classes) Vanguard Total Stock Market Index Fund (VTSAX) and its exchange-traded-fund shares. The fund, from Vanguard Group, now accounts for 10% of all assets in U.S. stock mutual funds and ETFs in the market, according to Morningstar Inc. No other mutual fund or ETF comes close to it in asset size. The next largest is an $821 billion Vanguard S&P 500 index fund. The paradox is that this biggest beast among funds is tied to the most unassuming of stock indexes—the CRSP U.S. Total Market Index, developed at the University of Chicago’s Booth School of Business.”

Ex-Car Salesman Tells All: How To Beat The Auto Dealerships At Their Own Game [Money Under 30] – “When you want to beat car dealerships at their own game, you need to be prepared, understand the true value of what you’re buying, and skip all the extras they try to get you to buy.”

Finally, a useful little plugin to find out if a brand on Amazon is actually Amazon itself – courtesy of our very own J.D. Roth (not that he made it, but that he found it) – Amazon Brand Detector.

This one has nothing to do with money but carries lessons everyone should use in their life about learning lessons in private, pride, and how if you don’t then you might have to pay a terrible cost in public:

We Only Ever Talk About the Third Attack on Pearl Harbor [But What For?] – “As he had hoped for when his small force set sail, 24 hours off of Oahu thick weather greeted him with conditions that made it unlikely a defending fleet could detect him before it was too late. As darkness fell the night before, his fleet began its approach, charging full speed towards the unaware island, running with lights off and in radio silence amongst rain squalls, low clouds, and strong wind. Pitching in the heavy seas, the admiral held his planes until just before dawn when they were 60 miles offshore. Then, while still in complete darkness, 152 planes took off. Just as the new day’s sunlight was finally hitting the island, the planes emerged from the clouds to find the world’s greatest naval base helplessly asleep beneath them.”