How to Waste $42 Million (and Blog Roundup)

“The check is almost in the mail.” Shortly, the IRS will send letters to everyone who filed a tax return for 2006 to let them know about the economic stimulus rebate checks. The actual checks won’t be in the mail until at least May. On one hand, it’s good to get information into the hands of people across the country who have been living under a rock, but it comes at a great expense — an expense of $42 million.

The letter will also explain how the tax rebates “work,” but I have no doubt the text in the letter will raise more questions than it will answer. Still not sure how much of a rebate you will receive due to this new stimulus package? You can calculate your refund here. This calculator has been viewed by over 240,000 people.

Let’s get away from taxes for a little bit and look at a few articles posted elsewhere:

Lisa Tiffin, a guest writer on Get Rich Slowly, informs readers how to inoculate your children against advertising. “We didn’t sit the boys down for long lectures; rather, every time we noticed that a commercial or a print ad caught their attention, we asked them if they thought the product really did what the commercial claimed.” Engaging children in intelligent discourse is the best course of action; shielding them from the media will only breed confusion and misunderstanding as the grow up.

Speaking of children, do you consider the cost of children before having them? This question was asked by Free Money Finance. It would be safe to say that many people do not think of the financial considerations before having children. In 2005, it cost a family an average of $190,980 to feed, house, clothe and entertain a child from birth until age 18.. But if everyone waited until they could afford to have children, I find it unlikely that the species would survive.

Greg from Consumer Reports has gone thirty years without a credit card (sort of). Greg actually uses American Express for some expenses, particularly for renting cars and booking hotel rooms. It seems what Greg is really trying to say is that he has gone thirty years without carrying a debt balance on a credit card. He is required to pay his American Express card every month or else face a fee. I’m not required to pay my credit card off every month, but I do in order to avoid interest charges, and millions of households do the same.