How to Recover from Identity Theft
There are a lot of things you can do to protect yourself from identity theft. You don’t want to make it easy for the bad guy. But at the end…
Trick Yourself Into Spending Less and Saving More
Last week we learned about cognitive biases–patterns of flawed judgment or irrational thinking that trick us into making poor decisions, or acting against our best interests. Often, these cognitive biases…
How cognitive biases shape consumer spending
The human brain is a remarkably complex organ, composed of roughly 100 billion neurons firing at a rate of about 200 times per second, resulting in an operating speed of…
What You Need to Know About The Home Depot Data Breach
On September 2nd, news outlets began reporting a massive data breach affecting customers who shopped at Home Depot’s brick and mortar stores since April of this year. As with previous…
The iPhone 6 and The New Consumerism
According to most business and technology news sources, Apple is expected to announce the release of a new line of consumer products—including the latest iteration of the iPhone—in less than…
Don’t eat that marshmallow!
How often do you allow your immediate wants or needs derail your future financial goals? Whether you’re putting money away for retirement or saving for a planned expense, all of…
Zeno’s Paradox and the Folly of the Monthly Minimum Payment
Suppose you want to walk from the Empire State Building in New York City to the corner of Hollywood and Vine in Los Angeles—a distance of about 2775 miles; and,…
Employer-sponsored Retirement Savings Plans
In a previous article for this site, you learned a few methods for calculating your retirement number, the amount of savings you will have to accrue to maintain your standard…
What’s your retirement number?
Benjamin Franklin wrote, “A penny saved is a penny earned”; but when it comes to saving for retirement, it might be best to remember that a penny not saved, is…
Conspicuous consumption and the pursuit of happiness
It’s easy to think that the financial challenges facing Americans today are new, but one needn’t look too far in the past to see many of the same destructive patterns…