frugal underground

If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!

Welcome to the almost-Valentine’s-Day edition of the Carnival of the Capitalists. This week (okay, every week), we have a wide variety of posts on a wider variety of topics, ranging from freelancing to crime and punishment to investing. With this kind of scope, I found it tricky to come up with categories that were both broad enough to accomodate the posts, and specific enough to make sense—so I stuck with the tried-and-true categories suggested by Gongol. The entries are arranged in a “super secret” order (since it seems that you people read them somewhat randomly anyway) but I’ve added the icons to help you pick out posts of particular interest.

Without further ado, the carnival!

	Law and Regulation		General Business		Marketing and Sales
	Technology		Health Care and Social Services		Entrepreneurship
	Economics and Finance		Education

Paul Krugman and VA Health Care
From the author, Different River: “Paul Krugman extols the VA health care system as a model for how government health care can be better than private health care — but he gets some key facts wrong, and with those facts corrected, his whole argument falls apart.”

BrainWare ABC - Alzheimer, Bilingualism, Creativity
From the author, Barry Welford: “Research shows that bilingualism increases the ability to multi-task and encourages creativity and problem-solving. More importantly it can retard the onset and severity of aging cognitive disorders such as Alzheimer Disease and dementia.”

Why Is Prostitution Illegal?
Funky Dung seeks to understand why prostitution is illegal from an amoral perspective. “The arguments presented in favor of making it legal touch upon topics related to commerce (and by extension capitalism).” It should be noted that this is an intellectual exercise and the author is not actually interested in legalizing prostitution.

Japan’s Retail Sector is Back!
From the author, Steven Towns: “A quick look at the resurging Japanese retail sector and some American companies that stand to benefit.”

Innovation is dead: The History of Copycats
noah kagan provides a brief look at tons of internet sites who copied originals.

Paco Underhill Series, #3
From the author, cehwiedel: “A well-known bricks-and-mortar marketing book is consulted for ideas to adapt to a website.”

Copyright Tutorial
From the author, Betsy Palmieri: “A nuts-and-bolts look at copyright law and why it matters for your business.”

H&R Block Moat Check
George examines whether or not Magic Formula stock H&R Block has a wide moat.

Coach K: In Touch With His Feminine Side
From the author, Mark: “Duke Basketball Coach Mike Krzyzewski has a lucrative second career as a corporate speaker on leadership - does his leadership model actually produce leaders?”

Inflation Disinformation!
From the author, Mike Landfair: “If we are going to fix the problems after the currency collapses, we need accurate information and we need to recognize that the Federal Reserve and the US Government are ‘in cahoots.’”

New Investment Opportunity? Person to Person Lending
From the author, Jeffrey Strain: “A new site is offering person to person lending opportunities which could lead to some higher investment returns, but also comes with a variety of risks.”

Facts Of Life On Buying and Selling “Without an Agent”
Dan Melson explains the role of an agent and the risks of FSBO.

Managing Six Sigma Teams
From the author, Junelle Caravana: “A Six Sigma Black Belt is the team leader and the key change agent for the Six Sigma process. The role of the Black Belt is to facilitate the Six Sigma adoption as part of the culture.”

A proposal for Iraq
James Hamilton offers some thoughts on how to get the vast oil wealth of Iraq working most quickly and effectively to benefit the Iraqi people.

Sell College to Your Kids
From the author, FMF: “The value of a college education — in dollars!”

Stakeholder Engagement: The next box on your org chart?
From the author, Steven Silvers: “Wal-Mart’s creation of a senior-level Director of Stakeholder Engagement is classic PR strategy to align itself with critical interest groups by adopting the inflated phraseology of the Corporate Social Responsibility movement.”

Mortgage Pre-Payments at Slowest Pace Since 2003
From the author, David Porter: “If you plan to stay in your home for more than three years, and have an adjustable mortgage, you better get off the fence!”

Search Toolbars (ala Google) are Big Business
From the author, Scott Milener: “Until you’ve researched the numbers, it’s easy to think the toolbar plugin is a minor addition to web apps. But search toolbars are a major revenue driver for the search players.”

Recession Threat Growing
From the author, Michael Cale: “The probability of a recession in the next 12-18 months has hit a new high, according to one model. It currently shows a 27% chance of recession, up from 19% a month ago.”

U of O President Dave Frohnmayer has some explaining to do
From the author, Gullyborg: “Lots of photos, commentary, and links exposing the ‘carousel of information’ to help illegal aliens get government benefits in Oregon”

Capitalism, Culture and Google
Jack Yoest examines how different cultures interact in business.

Replying to Bruce Kesler and Tom Smith re Corporate Management and Social Responsibility
From the author, Steve Bainbridge: “There are basically two ways for a democratic capitalist society to regulating corporate behavior. First, you can do so directly by taxing or regulating corporate behavior you don’t like. Second, you can authorize corporate managers to be ’socially responsible.’”

Poverty is Stupid
Gavriel Raanan takes on poverty statistics and shows why he thinks they are meaningless.

The Economics of Super Bowl Ads
nickle questions the wisdom of GoDaddy’s Super Bowl expenditures. I have to say that I’m with him on this one.

30 boxes your schedule
Junelle Caravana walks us through using 30 Boxes, a new social calendar that can work well for freelancers.

Leaving a Trillion on the Table
From the author, David Foster: “Why did Europe fail to take advantage of the semiconductor revolution? What lessons can be drawn about the limitations of centralized planning?”

Virtually Saving the Day
From the author, Rosanna Tussey: “This article tells one way that small business owners and other professionals can learn to use their time more effectively through delegation of administrative tasks that don’t require their specialized knowledge.”

Asleep at the Wheel
From the author, Nina Smith: “The real estate market hits home for most people.”

Would an E-Mail Surcharge Help Deter Spam?
From the author, Brian Gongol: “Some reasons why the AOL/Yahoo spam-surcharge proposal may or may not actually deter spammers from sending unsolicited e-mail.”

World’s Worst Savers: Guess Who?
Amanda reflects on some recent surveys indicating America to be the least likely developed nation to save: why did this happen and what is being done to change this?

Listing Ineffective Government Programs
Ironman runs some numbers related to ‘ineffective government programs.’

Keeping up the PACE
From the author, Henry Stern, LUTCF: “Part 2 of an exclusive look at a new way for small companies to use the same tools as large corporations to save money on health insurance costs.”

A Thesis for Re-Invigorating the News Business
From the author, Ed: “My prediction: 2006 will see important steps by news companies to turn the tide, re-invigorate their businesses and grow readership, and a few will find a new formula to succeed at this for the long haul. Here’s how.”

What lee scott didn’t say
From the author, David Gerstman: “Maryland’s General Assembly seems to have killed the goose.”

Most Demanded Technology Consulting Jobs
jim lists the top tech jobs and wages.

The Hardest Part of the Job
From the author, Skip Angel: “Letting a person go from your organization is the hardest part of the job (at least for this manager).”

Is Sweden Moving From Socialism to Capitalism?
From the author, Jeff Cornwall: “It now appears that the Swedish government may be moving ahead of the US in recognition of the global shift to a new entrepreneurial economy.”

The New Gatekeepers
From the author, Tristan Louis: “In this entry, I contend that we have created new gatekeepers in the blogosphere.”

Return to Sender
From the author, Big Picture Guy: “If junk is anything you no longer use, what then would you call e-mails that were not useful in the first place? A sardonic look at e-mails running rampant in The Small Office.”

Effective Interest
From the author, Jose Anes: “How to calculate the effective interest of an investment, after taking into account taxes and inflation, and which avenues we have to invest safely while avoiding the effects of these maladies.”

Natural Gas Prices
From the author, The Real Returns: “Has natural gas already peaked?”

The good news and the bad news about the budget deficit
From the author, Jim Glass: “Following the lead of the departing head of the Congressional Budget Office, Douglas Holtz-Eakin, this post looks at what matters regarding the US national budget — and finds a whole lot of people are sweating the small stuff, while ignoring the big stuff.”

Investment Risk & Indexing
EarlyRiser explores Index Investing and some new ideas about risk and return.

Overworked? Try too productive
From the author, Retireat30: “Despite the constant complaints, leisure in america has actually been increasing over the past 30 years.”

Making Money over the Internet
From the author, Anita Campbell: “Denise O’Berry joins us for a broadcast of Small Business Trends Radio on the subject of making money from passive Internet income. As an added bonus, she also includes a link to a 22-page download called Passive Income Guide, that she created specifically in honor of the show.”

What’s The Expected Value Of A Snowball’s Chance X $865,235,387?
From the author, Joe Kristan: “Chrysler litigates a seemingly hopeless tax position dating back to 1984. Were they using the IRS as a lender of last resort?”

Business problems: Seek them out
From the author, Wayne Hurlbert: “Become a seeker of problems. They are precious gifts representing golden keys to your future business success.”

It Usually Begins With…
From the author, Kenneth R. Gregg: “2/8 is Jules Verne’s birthday. Verne was the originator of “hard” science fiction and the premier author of the “enterprising spirit” of the 19th century.”

Summit County
boringmadedull looks at a proposed building project in Summit County and questions the benefits.

I hope you’ve enjoyed your visit to the carnival. The Stalwart is hosting next week, so read the rules and send in your post!

ShareThis

It’s true, friends. Just a week after hosting the fabulous Festival of Frugality here at frugal underground, today marks the beginning of a new week of Carnival of the Capitalists submissions, all of which I’ll be pouring over lovingly. That’s right—the Carnival is coming here next week. Read the rules and submit your favorite post of the Capitalist persuasion.

ShareThis

Welcome to the eigth Festival of Frugality. There’s plenty here to keep you occupied on a lazy Tuesday, and it’s good enough stuff to make it worth your while even if your Tuesday is more crazy than lazy.

$20 isn’t what it used to be
muse discovers that the “shrinking chocolate bar” effect isn’t limited to candy.

How does FREE wireless internet sound?
From the author, Will Kirby: “This article looks at the growing movement to offer free wireless internet and how to take advantage of it.” I am definitely in favor of that, and the resource Will references found me lots of good options in my area.

The Most Frugal Medicine of All: Your Funny Bone
From the author, Heidi Mapp: “Laughter is even cheaper than an apple a day!” I had to smile myself as Heidi reminded me of the documentary I saw about The Laughter Club.

Easy Curry Chicken and Rice
Jane Dough of Boston Gal’s Open Wallet breaks down the cost of one of her favorite meals, complete with a great recipe and colorful photos.

Dry cleaning silk and wool
From the author, mapgirl: “These are just some tips about how to save money caring for stuff people usually dry clean. It’s a lot cheaper to care for your clothes at home the send them out to a dry cleaner. It’s a practical article about buying silk garments and what temperature water to use for wool.”

Frugal Family Fun
This post is loaded with great ideas for families. Extremely practical.

Money Saving Tip: Don’t Let a 7-year-old Operate Your Digital Camera
From the author, FMF : “A sad, but true, story gained from personal experience.” Ouch.

The real me
From the author, Kay Bell: “What does it cost to check your credit report? Nothing! So do it! That way you won’t end up like Kay, tyring to clean up the mess after someone stole her ID.”

What the heck do you eat?
I’m a big fan of meal planning, and Tracy has a detailed plan that reveals how her family keeps the groceries under $25/week.

Our Frugal Baby, Part II
From the author, Terri W.: “A bare-bones guide to new baby gear necessities for the frugal mom.” This is a remarkably helpful post should you be in a position to use its advice (or know anyone who is). It’s getting bookmarked just in case I ever decide to procreate.

Gadgets That Were A Waste Of Money
From the author, Cercis: “Some of the gadgets I have that I thought would save me money, but never have.” I can sympathize! I love kitchen gadgets and now have way too many that I don’t actually use.

Spend, Spend, Spend
From the author, Frugal Cheap Pants: “My struggle on what I will and will not spend money on.”

How Far We Have Come
From the author, Perky: “The things I’ve changed in the last year to live a more frugal life.” Some good, specific information.

Frugal Exercising
From the author, ~Dawn: “I hate spending money to work out, so here are some of my ways to keep it simple and spend NOTHING!”

Frugality and Index Fund Fees
From the author, jim: “The price of an index fund is in its fees, why pay more when you don’t have to?”

I Love Yard Sales
From the author, Dawn Norton: “Some of the great finds you can get at yard sales.” I’m looking forward to seeing some more yard sale tips from Dawn in the future.

Dream Dinners - Make Your Own Take-Out?
From the author, Jonathan: “I came across a new type of food service that allows you to go there and cook up a bunch of meals using their prepared ingredients and equipment, and you bring it home to your freezer and bake when needed. I decided it might be worth the money and time saved, so I will try it next month.”

Start Investing with Only $100?
JLP takes a look at a way you can start investing with $100. I found the comments on this post to be especially interesting.

Kill-a-Watt
nickel profiles a gadget that might actually save you money. Now I want one!

The Brown Bag Revisited
I love this long-term analysis of “unglamorous” brown-bagging.

Check Those Add-Ons
Adam Graham encourages you to take advantage of the add-on services that you may already have access to for some savings.

Save Big Bucks on Recurring Expenses
Seattle Simplicity recently reduced two major recurring expenses. Can you do the same?

Thanks for reading. Leave a comment and tell everyone which articles were your favorites. Next week’s Festival will be at Blueprint for Financial Prosperity (the festival’s home turf!) so read the rules and get your submission in.

ShareThis

I’m going to be hosting the fabulous Festival of Frugality next Tuesday, so read the rules and get your submission in this week!

ShareThis

Just a quick note to mention that the Carnival of Personal Finance is up over at Savvy Saver. My favorites:

• An unexpected benefit of budgeting @ Fearless Money
• Workforce @ Sitting Pretty
• Generation X … I mean P … I mean … @ MightyBargainHunter.com

ShareThis

Welcome to the 25th Carnival of Personal Finance! We have a great selection of fabulous entries this week, and in the interest of almost-randomness, I’ve organized them in order of word count. Start at the beginning for bite-sized chunks flowing into essay-length pieces. Want to get down to the meaty stuff first? Start at the end and work your way up.

Take a tongue-in-cheek look at your grocery budget with Kim C of Life in a shoe: a peek into the methods and madness of one mother of 7 in her post, “Feel better fast about your food budget“: In it, she looks at what the USDA estimates to be the cost of feeding a family and provides some good (serious) links.

Tis the season for sale shopping. Savvy Saver discusses some of the perils that lurk in her post, “Foiled by a Sale.”

Canadian Capitalist tells it like it is in “To Not Diversify is Just Stupid“: “In a recent article, Robert Kiyosaki (of Rich Dad fame) suggests that investors looking to succeed should focus their investments and not diversify. While it is true that some very successful investors concentrate their portfolio, not diversifying is a terrible idea for the vast majority of investors.”

Jane Dough of Boston Gal’s Open Wallet declares, “I am going to try using FatCash while shopping online this month.” Jane Dough is continuing to try to save in everyway she can this holiday season. With that in mind she is going to try using the FatCash Cash Back feature on FatWallet.com to capture additional dollar savings.

Flexo of Consumerism Commentary takes a look at a recent article by guru and author, Robert Kiyosaki. Kiyosaki passes on some advice from his “rich dad” about diversification with investments, but is it good advice? Find out in “Diversification is for Amateurs.”

Tracy of Healthy, Wealthy, and Wise puts her money where her values are with “Socially Responsible Investing“: “Why my husband’s employer chose the investment company for his 403(b) and a link to a list of other socially responsible investing options.”

I love happy surprises! Foobarista of Foo Bar and Grill describes a nice one in “403(b) found money: does this happen often?“: “I didn’t know I had a 403(b) account at a job from 12 years ago, but I guess I did!”

New personal finance blogger Early Riser provides an interesting formula for evaluating employee stock options in the first post of a series, “Employee Stock Options - Part 1.”

Despite the fact that it doesn’t fit neatly into my quirky organizational system, Ironman of Political Calculations has done us a big favor with “Will You Be Checking Any Bags Today?“: “Strapped for cash, many airlines have turned to charging for things they used to provide for free. Political Calculations provides a tool for finding out how much it’ll cost to take that extra or heavy bag with you on your next trip!”

Most of know we should be planning for retirement. JLP of AllThingsFinancial takes a look at the connection between “Inflation and Your Retirement Plan.”

mbhunter of Mighty Bargain Hunter scores a great deal on a “Scratch and dent dryer“: “We ran across a ’scratch and dent’ dryer for a really good price just as our dryer was acting up.”

Yay, pre-tax dollars! Henry Stern of InsureBlog points out some good, encouraging statistics in “The ‘A’ in HSA“: “Folks with HSA plans are really starting to see their dollars grow.”

Looking for ways to cut energy costs? Chrees of Chrees’ World explains that you might have more incentive soon in “New tax credits.” The post is about new tax credits available for increasing energy efficiency. The credits are available for two years starting in 2006.

Financial advice from a cat? Why not? Zorro’s Stenographer of Zorro’s Retirement makes “A December Resolution“: “There is a time and place to buy giftcards and why wouldn’t you take advantage?”

Dustin of Financial Freedom 4 All urges you to “Sharing Services, Saving Serious Cash“: “Splitting the cost of various monthly services to save money and retain various ‘wants’ in life.”

What path you take depends on where you’re trying to go. TT of Retire at 30 questions assumptions and comes up with his own in “Rational Assumptions for Personal Financial Freedom.”

It’s all about balance, right? Cathy of CFO: Chief Family Officer explains how she finds balance in “Grocery Shopping: Health vs. Wealth.” She offers tips for eating healthier without spending a lot more money.

Take some advice given to someone else and read this post by Empty Spaces of Adventures in Money Making called “Living off dividends [or how to invest in Real Estate for cashflow].” The advisee wants to be able to live off his dividends at some point and he’s wondering how real estate fits in. The advice here on real estate investing is solid and a great starting point for anyone who wants to know more about the topic.

jim of Blueprint for Financial Prosperity presents insightful viewpoint on the direction of real estate in his post, “Expect Housing Sale Price Drops As Rates Rise“: “As interest rates rise, don’t be surprised when a $300,000 house sells for $270,000. A $300k mortgage at 5.5% has the same monthly payment as a $270k mortgage at 6.5%.” There are also some excellent comments on this post.

ncnblog of No Credit Needed frequently gets the question, “You Can Do That?.” In this post, he relates some of the things he does for his financial well-being that surprise people.

Nina of Sitting Pretty ties childhood game strategies to investing in “Board Games“: “Cash is king – both in childhood board games and real life.”

Tom Hanna of Financial Options gives us an overview of “The Week Ahead - December 3, 2005.” This day-by-day outline points out the important financial landmarks for the next five days.

It’s Christmas shopping time! If you’re in a hurry (or are just impatient), nickel of Five Cent Nickel has some good information for you about the”Free 4 Month Trial of Amazon.com Prime“: “Just in time for the holiday shopping season… A free trial of Amazon Prime, a special shipping program from Amazon.com. Your mileage may vary in getting in on this deal, but free two-day shipping and cheap overnight shipping just might save your butt as Christmas draws ever closer.”

Deputyheadmistress of The Common Room shares a beautiful, frugal “Easy Christmas Decoration.” I’m going to have to start scouring the thrift stores for ornaments now.

Clint of Million Dollar Goal takes second look at the whole idea that everyone needs a traditional three to six months worth of expenses emergency fund in “Do You Need an Emergency Fund?”

Free Money Finance gives us a good summary of an MSN article in his post, “13 Ways to Live Well on Less.” The full series gives readers 13 simple ways to easily cut spending.

Kay Bell of Don’t Mess With Taxes provides very well-written commentary on homeowner tax breaks. Take a look a t”A new homeowner tax break on the horizon?“: “Rather than reduce homeowner tax breaks as recommended by the Tax Reform Panel, it looks like Congress may create a new one.”

David Porter of Pacesetter Mortgage Blog looks at three ways that people deal with their home equity in “Will Americans Spend the Wealth Created by the Housing Bubble Boom?“: “Americans have only three choices regarding their home equity: 1. Do nothing; 2. Spend it; 3. Invest it.”

Old Niu of Old Niu’s Blog covers one idea-spurring indicator in “Buy the Expensive“: “When you look for investment ideas, companies or industry sectors that commend the pricing power are definitely worthwhile looking into. Better yet, you could spot the pricing power as a savvy consumer.”

In a thorough and well-informed post, Dan Melson of Searchlight Crusade takes on the task of “Debunking The Fallacy of Index Funds“: “This is nothing short of the most successful sales pitch based upon a straw man argument in history.”

Thanks for stopping by the Carnival this week! Next week’s Carnival will be held at Wealth Junkie. Read the rules and submit an entry of your own before 5 p.m. EST on Sunday.

ShareThis