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The TimelessFinance Sunday Reader is not your typical PF carnival. In fact, it is not a carnival at all. It’s a weekly round-up of interesting and informative articles that I, Joe Wood, serve to you garnished with a healthy dose of my own opinion. For comic relief, and because bad writing and poor decision-making is in no danger of extinction, the PF Fail of the Week tradition lives on. Send your suggestions (and PF Fail nominations) to adinajtf@gmail.com who will help me pick the cream of the crop. |
This week’s Sunday Reader is brought to you by the PF bloggers who realized it was the second week in January and hopped off the New Year’s resolution Greyhound before it plowed into the station and exploded. It’s also brought to you by PHAT L00TS from credit cards, e.g. get a FREE $100 Gift Card from RateSupermarket.ca with a new Scotia Momentum Visa Infinite, Scotiabank Gold American Express Card, or Scotiabank Value Visa Card. And by…
Robb at Boomer and Echo explained why our debt-to-income ratio is misleading, or rather why it’s the wrong metric for gauging Canadians’ financial health. I added a comment because I agree and disagree with various elements of the post. I think Robb is right at the individual level — the composition of a debt load is essential for a proper analysis. Low interest debt acquired for smart investments is entirely different from high-interest credit card debt acquired just cuz. Nevertheless, I think Canadians are generally screwed and the debt-to-income ratio is a perfectly legitimate piece of evidence for this argument.
The Control Your Cash Woman of the Year, Paula from Afford Anything (who certainly understands the difference between consumer debt and investment leverage), wrote about doing less to accomplish more. Instead of divvying up your time, effort, and resources between a long laundry list of goals, set fewer. She recommends picking four important aspects of your life, then identifying the most important goal in each area. Money’s not the only finite resource; so is your time and energy. Trent Hamm should read this article, but he’s too busy boiling chicken carcasses and competing with his son to use less toilet paper.
Nelson at Financial Uproar wrote his application to be the next Governor of the Bank of Canada. Frankly I’d hire him. But I think Adina would make a better candidate. She wouldn’t hit on the chicks secretaries administrative assistants in the office, resulting in way fewer sexual harassment lawsuits.
J. Money at Budgets Are Sexy opined that money may not be the root of all evil. His premise is solid, even though he kind of pussyfoots around it: money isn’t evil, though evil things can be done with it. Just like guns don’t kill people sans a trigger-man. In short, society needs more good guys with guns and money — OK, that might be my conclusion, not his. And, in case you were wondering, the root of all evil is leftism.
This week’s Personal Finance Fail isn’t from a PerFi blog, although it will drain a certain Seattle hipster’s wallet even faster than her stereotypical addiction to Apple products. Beautiful Existence has resolved to only eat at Starbucks for the year 2013. When I say “Beautiful Existence” I’m referring to the woman in question, not her actual lifestyle (which, based on her self-imposed “challenge”, makes her name a bad case of false advertising). Enjoy your biscotti, Dear Readers. We’re so underground.
The root of all evil is leftism….. I think that’s my new favorite quote!
lol for the record I consider myself a moderate. I just see a ton of problems caused by leftist policies, e.g. cheap, subsidized credit with huge risks not borne by free market participants, where the guilty parties haven’t gotten appropriate blame.
Do they serve anything at Starbucks besides biscotti and carrot muffins? This sounds worse than Morgan Spurlock’s month-long McDonald’s binge.
lol I actually went into a Starbucks the other night because my partner wanted to stop by the Chapters. I ended up getting a Jones soda (root beer — not nearly as good as A&W, Barq’s, whatever, let alone a premium root beer like Dad’s) and a chocolate chip cookie. The latter was huge but, meh. I can see the attraction for hipsters — it’s super expensive, elitist, and really no better than what’s offered elsewhere.
My debt to income ratio is 61%. It is a terrible weight to carry around and I struggle with every penny every day to reduce it. As a lower income woman in her late 40s it impacts upon my ability to save or even think about retirement.
That is extremely challenging, unless it includes your mortgage. If that’s just consumer debt then you definitely have a revenue problem; I’m not sure if you have a second job but I’d recommend getting one. I’d circle the wagons on spending — do you have TV, smart phone or phone line, any monthly bills besides utilities, expensive habits, entertainment activities, etc.? Finally the first thing I’d do (although I’m not privy to the composition of your debt load) would be to focus on cutting my interest rates. Get that Scotia Basic Visa for 6 months at 0.99% and then switch it to a card like the Platinum Plus at 1% or whatever for 10 months. Just start shuffling. Call up your loan providers and get negotiating, too.