Don't Quit Your Day Job…

Carnivals and featured links for the week!

DQYDJ: surprising our readers with yet another week where we submit articles to a carnival!  Maybe we’ll keep it going this time.

A recent article reviewed the new debt agreement as follows: “It’s like a 400-pound man boasting that he plans to drop 20 pounds over a decade, while his doctors warn about the risks of losing weight so fast.” I found that analogy grossly misinformed. It’s much more like a 400-pound man who is gaining 50 [...]

Check out our carnival entries and featured links for the week!

I recently purchased my first house here in the Bay Area, and I did it in a decidedly non-traditional way.  For a few years I had been reading about a smaller real estate company known as Redfin which operated in a more hands-off way than a normal real estate firm.  Redfin leverages technology and a slick user interface to help its users (most of which will not use Redfin to buy a home, but the search feature is that good) find homes on their own.  Once a house is purchased, Redfin actually refunds some of the brokerage commission.  In most places, 3% of the purchase prices goes to the seller’s agent, 3% to the buyers, and 1.5%, 50% of Redfin’s commission, goes back to the end user.  So… what’s the catch?

There is a German word which perfectly describes a feeling we often get… in English-Speaking America.  ”Schadenfreude” means to derive pleasure from the misfortune of others.  Generally, when schadenfreude appears in print, it refers to the failings of a high powered sports team, such as the New York Yankees or (not this year!) the Los Angeles Lakers.  These teams are historically so good (note I left out my favorites, the Boston teams, although they could certainly apply) that other sports fans will cheer for two things – their team to win, and team X to lose!  On that note, today I bring you a link which will most likely make you happy – and the ‘team’ is Bank of America.

Guess what?  DQYDJ actually entered a carnival last week!

• Check out “The Housing Double Dip“, which was hosted at the Carnival of Personal Finance over at (our newfound and liked blog!) Control Your Cash.  In fact, subscribe to them while you’re over there!

I hear you: DQYDJ needs to enter more Carnivals.  Fine, we will!

Ahh, the free market. Like ‘freedom’, ‘family’, ‘patriotism’ and other such words, the phrase ‘free market’ means different things to different people. Yes, a free market, one unencumbered by the price fixing of governments, has different meanings around the world. GlobeScan took the liberty of actually running the poll – asking numerous people in a small selection of countries whether or not they trust the free market.  The results are,as you might expect, somewhat surprising.  China has more trust in the free market than the United States (they have more respondents who say they ‘strongly’ or ‘somewhat’ think the Free Market is the best Economic system).

… the dollar bill, a huge sign of freedom and independence in this country, is not made out of paper. In fact, it is actually made of a blend of cotton and linen, and purchased from Crane & Co. in Dalton, Massachusetts. Why is this relevant? Well, it just so happens that the very commodity used to weave our dollar bills happens to have experienced quite a bit of a price hike lately. The hard numbers? The cost of a dollar bill has increased 50% since 2008.

DQYDJ was featured in a carnival for an unprecedented 3rd straight week!  Please go check out the Carnival of Personal Finance, hosted this week at Saving to Invest… and look for “Hedge Your Gas Prices!” in the Budgeting and Money Management section!