Daily Links: Record Day Edition

It looks as if today will be a record day for traffic at Get Rich Slowly! The current record is 48,244 visitors on 31 July 2007 (while we were on our trip to London and New York). 08 January 2008 is a close second with 47,749 visitors. At only 1:30 this afternoon, we’ve already had 42,673 people swing by! (Most of them are coming from this Laura Rowley article to my list of alternatives to Microsoft Money.)

It’s actually been a great week here: high-quality articles, excellent (and plentiful comments), and high traffic. It feels good to see things humming along like this even while I’m absorbed in my book project. Thanks, everyone, for contributing to the conversation. There’s still a chance (a slim one, but a chance) that this will be a record week. From January 4th to January 10th this year, 215,977 people visited the site. So far this week, 176,612 folks have stopped by.

Enough stats geekery! Here’s a round-up of some of the best personal finance articles I’ve read recently:

First, Kevin at No-Debt Plan has an excellent article on how knowing experts could save or make you money. He argues that the larger and more diverse your social network, the more better off your finances are likely to be. I agree 100%. This won’t always be true, of course. But from my experience, the people with the widest social networks (not smarmy networks, but actual networks) have access to all sorts of knowledge and expertise that others don’t. This is a great post.

In one of the best examples of how money is about so much more than math, Lazy Man writes about the wedding that wasn’t. He flew from California to Florida to attend a friends wedding. On the day of the event, the bride’s grandfather died. The wedding was cancelled, despite the enormous costs already incurred. Was this the right decision? The entire article contains much more detail and color, and is a perfect illustration of how financial decisions aren’t all about logic.

MLR at My Life ROI answers the question, “How much do the wealthy really pay in taxes?” He writes that he hears constantly how the wealthiest Americans are being crushed by an incredible tax burden, but the numbers imply don’t bear this out. MLR argues that taxes in this country are essentially flat (except for the lowest income earners). For more on this topic, see my recent article exploring the truth about taxes.

At The Wall Street Journal, Jason Zweig notes that the drought of credit is hampering economic recovery. Consumers are borrowing less and spending less. But the real reason I’m highlighting this article is because I played “matchmaker” to help its production. Zweig contacted me looking for somebody who had used a home-equity loan to finance “fun”. As it happened, I had just spoken with my carpenter about this very thing, so I was able to put the two in touch with each other. (By the way, if you live in Portland and need a good carpenter, I can hook you up!)

Finally, here’s a round-up of this week’s personal finance carnivals:

• JLP at All Financial Matters (one of my favorite personal-finance blogs) played host to the Carnival of Personal Finance #226.
• Stretch Your Dollar hosted Best of Money Carnival #20.
• The Festival of Frugality #199 was held at Yes, I Am Cheap.
• Credit Card Offers IQ featured the Money Hacks Carnival #86.
• And My Journey to Millions rounded up the Carnival of Money Stories #23.

Have a great weekend, everyone! Mine will be filled with food, family, and friends. We have book group on Sunday, will see Kris’ aunt and uncle tonight, and tomorrow we’re going to a dinner party. (And sometime in there, I need to finish chapter three of The Book and write an article for Monday.)

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Related Articles at Get Rich Slowly:

• links for 2007-03-13
• Return of the Daily Links
• Daily Links: Buy and Hold Edition
• Daily Links: Compound Interest, Web Income, and Happiness
• Daily Roundup: Bringing Home the Bacon Edition

Billionaire Charged in Alleged Insider Trading Scheme

A billionnaire hedge fund boss was among five men and a woman arrested by federal authorities Friday in a hedge fund insider trading case that prosecutors say reaped $20 million in illegal profits.

The Yes Men Fix the World

If we can’t count on the government to keep us safe from the the Madoffs, coal ash spills that swallow up entire houses, arsenic in our tap water, or E. coli in our hamburger meat, then it’s nice to have American D.I.Y.-ness to hold big business accountable. Meet The Yes Men, two wacky guys who pose as regular corporate executives and say in public the things they wish corporations would.

"Extreme Makeover: Home Edition" Carpenter Paul DiMeo

Paul DiMeo is the staff carpenter on ABC’s long-running tearjerker real estate hit Extreme Makeover: Home Edition, and he knows a little something about building cool stuff in a crunch.

Credit Card Offers 79.9% Rate!!

Yes, it’s true. It’s not a joke or a misprint. First Premier Bank is offering a “Premier Card” credit card with a 79.9% APR. That’s right, 79.9. And it’s not just the interest rate that’s outrageous. The fees are pretty hideous, too.

Is this a $6,900 home bargain?

For a foreclosure, the house at 15461 Kentfield St. in Detroit needed surprisingly little work. The new owner, an investor from the Chicago area named Kevin Holmes, slapped on a coat of paint, pulled up the dirty carpets, and replaced the stolen water heater. The car stashed out back, he learned soon enough, belonged to a neighbor, not a thief using the three-bedroom as a makeshift chop shop.

Book Review: ‘Super Freakonomics’

If you think economics is boring, this book may change your mind. The authors show how economics touch our daily lives and includes tales of how people respond to incentives and interesting statistics that highlight points you may never have thought of before.

General Electric Profit Plunges 44 Percent

Conglomerate General Electric reports third-quarter earnings of $2.5 billion, or $0.22 per share, including restructuring and other charges. Details to come.

BofA Struggles With Loan Losses

Bank of America Corp. says it lost more
than $2 billion in the third quarter as its loan losses continued
to rise.

Accumulation and Attachment: Finding Balance

This post is from GRS staff writer April Dykman.

A lot has been made of the minimalist lifestyle on personal finance blogs. Some readers love it; some think it sounds like a miserable existence. But rather than focus on how much or how little we possess as a measure of our degree of minimalism, it seems more important to get to the underlying question: How does your happiness relate to the things you own (or don’t own)?

Non-attachment
The Yoga Sutras, a foundational yoga text, outlines a set of moral codes. One code is the concept of aparigraha, which has been translated as “not grasping,” “non-possessiveness,” “non-hoarding,” and “non-attachment.”

This concept is particularly applicable to personal finance. Think about what you believe will make you happy — status, a higher salary, relationships, possessions. Can you enjoy these things, or are are you constantly in fear of losing them?

Non-attachment isn’t about living an extreme, minimalist lifestyle. Non-attachment is letting go of the belief that your happiness depends on holding onto things you think you own. For example, you buy a brand new Mini Cooper, but you worry obsessively that the paint job will be scratched. Or maybe you hoard a lot of Stuff, expending energy with upkeep and cleaning. When the initial pleasure of ownership passes, you put the things in boxes and fill up attic space or rent a storage unit. You don’t want to look at it anymore, but you can’t let go of it, either.
 
That’s a lot of energy that goes into worrying, protecting, and spending. Your Stuff starts to own you. Attachment and possessiveness can extend beyond material possessions, too. Most of us know someone who tried to hold on so tightly to their partner that the relationship crumbled. We’ve all seen celebrities who cling to their youth through plastic surgery, the result being anything but youthful.
 
The idea is not to give up all of your possessions; rather, it is about letting go of the clinging and fear of loss. Because nothing in life is permanent, clinging and fear of loss only cause us to suffer. Focusing on Stuff that can be easily damaged or lost will ensure continual stress and worry until we let go of the attachment.
 
The other extreme
Going to the other extreme — miserliness and self-denial — is just another form of imbalance. If you try to excessively control your money and obsess about every penny, you aren’t much better off than the person who spends with abandon to improve their social status. Both people are consumed by thoughts of money. Neither is free.
 
There are people who simply enjoy shopping, but aren’t particularly attached to the things they buy. If their spending is in line with their budget, these people are probably more balanced than the obsessive misers. We should enjoy our lives and the opportunities that money affords us, and when we can enjoy these things without attachment, we find that we need less because we are not constantly trying to fill a void. 

Observing your attachments
Think about what you hold onto in your life. Aparigraha is about more than material possessions, but material possessions are a good place to start.

Do you have to buy something when you go shopping with friends, even if it’s not something you really want? Do you have to have a new outfit for every social occasion? Is there anything you collect for the sake of owning it rather than for the enjoyment? Do you worry about what others think of you based on the car, house, or clothes you own? What would happen if you lost these things? 
 
We all have attachments to something in our lives. And that’s okay. We’re human, and we have egos. Just notice your attachments, and try not to judge them too much.
 
Cultivating non-attachment
Once you’ve observed your attachments, the next step is to think about what you really need, then taking only that. When you know that you buy more magazines each month than you can possibly read, the next time one tempts you, ask yourself if there will be a real benefit from owning it. If the answer is no, let it go. 
 
Cultivating non-attachment usually begins as consciously letting go of our attachments to Stuff, though there are any number of things we can hold onto in our lives. As we begin loosening our grip, we find that eventually we don’t feel a need to reach out for external validation because we already feel fulfilled within ourselves.
 
Giving — the opposite of attachment
Giving doesn’t necessarily mean donating money, though it is a nice gesture. You can give time by volunteering or simply by being a good listener to a friend. You can hold the door for someone, or let them into your lane on the highway. You can give the benefit of your knowledge by tutoring or by helping someone who is struggling to learn something new. These small acts make life more pleasant and remind you of the good things in your life. You can be happy for those who are more fortunate when you feel that your own life is abundant.

Few of us take the time to observe how we react in situations that involve money. Have you ever observed your own habits? What did you learn from it? What are other ways to cultivate non-attachment?

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Related Articles at Get Rich Slowly:

• Purge Clutter with a De-Accumulation Bag
• Simplify Your Life with a Stuff Replacement Fund
• What Makes a Resumé Scream “Don’t Hire Me!”
• Ask the Readers: How Do You Find a Job?
• The Personal Finance Hour, Episode 3: Finding Balance

A whopping .04% return on savings

Question: My wife and I keep $20,000 in a passbook savings account as an emergency reserve. What’s driving me crazy is that we’re getting only 60 cents a month in interest. I like the security of the account and the immediate access, but 60 cents a month on 20 grand???? How can I do better? –Dale F., Waldorf, Maryland

Stocks: Know when to fold ‘em

After the market dealt you one bad hand after another over the past decade, you may feel relieved that your luck is finally starting to change. Stocks have shot up more than 50% since early March.

Now even God takes credit cards

From churches to courts to Salvation Army kettles, more and more places allow you to keep your cash and pay with plastic. These 9 might surprise you.