Here are a few articles worthy of review.
Lazy Man and Money wonders whether you should have an emergency charity fund. He plans on splitting his charitable giving in three parts: 50% to the American Cancer Society and split the rest between Kiva and any natural disaster that happens to strike.
Generation X Finance suggests protecting one’s self from catastrophic loss with an umbrella insurance policy. Insurance, in general, has been a topic I’ve mainly overlooked both on Consumerism Commentary and in my own life. I’m making an endeavor to look at my insurance situation more closely over the coming weeks.
I linked to this article in last week’s Carnival of Personal Finance, but I believe it’s worth an extra mention. A co-worker in my office has been soliciting many of us to buy jewelery from her as part of a direct sales operation where she earns either free jewelery for herself, cash, or a combination of the two. I always want to help out people I like, but I don’t want to be a part of these operations. The sales techniques pray on guilt and kindness of friends. Money Smart Life doesn’t agree or disagree in particular, but asks readers to weigh in with their opinions.
MyMoneyBlog points out a rule for the economics of shared living. Essentially, your cost of living is a factor of the number of individuals (adults?) in the household. Determine your cost of living factor by taking the square root of the number of adults sharing the house. If you live by yourself, the factor is the square root of 1 (or 1). With one roommate, your factor is the square root of 2 (or 1.414). This means your total household expenses increase by 41.4% when you take on a roommate, but that expense to you, if shared equally between the two roommates, is 70.7% of your original cost. The source of this idea is a recent article by Scott Burns.
My Federal Tax has a quick and dirty explanation of the Alternative Minimum Tax, as it currently stands.
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