When we talk about the National Debt, we are talking about the amount of money that our government owes people, companies, and even foreign nations. This is comparable to a person having a home loan, several car loans, lots of credit card debt, and IOU notes written out to everyone in the neighborhood.

The National Budget Deficit is the amount of money the government spends more than the amount of money the government collects. A person having a budget deficit would likely be putting more debt onto a credit card than payments to pay it off. Every year the government works out the budget, that is, they decide how much money they are going to throw at what. When they’ve spent more money than is collected through taxes, they say, “Oh well, we’ll just take out more loans.” The National budget deficit is the amount by which our National debt increases.

When there is talk about “reducing the deficit,” they aren’t talking about reducing the national debt. They are just reducing the rate at which the government takes out new loans. “Cutting the deficit in half” is saying, “We are only going to take out half as many new loans this year.”

Related posts:

1. Hillary is out of the race and out of money Hillary Clinton recently ended her bid for the presidency. She...
2. Student loans paid off I got a letter in the mail which read: Your...
3. How much is an old computer worth? Occasionally I get asked how much a particular used computer...

One of our favorite stores to shop at is King Soopers, which is a Kroger store.  King Soopers generally has reasonable prices on products, and they will often have some good sales.  Additionally, they will double coupons up to 50 cents, and coupons between 50 cents  and a dollar they will increase to a dollar.  They also accept eCoupons from shortcuts.com or CellFire, which are loaded onto the King Sooper loyalty card and applied automatically when checking out.

One of my favorite King Soopers promotions is $5 off 10 qualifying items.  I think they choose a couple of items on each aisle of the store that quality, causing you to walk up and down all the aisles searching out 10 items which qualify.  This promotion is currently underway at our King Soopers, and when you combine the promotion with coupons, we’ve found some good deals.  For example, our 10 items might be:

Hormel Pepperoni (on sale for $2.99) – $0.35 coupon from the Hormel website that doubles to $0.70.

2 cans of Carnation evaporated milk (on sale for $1) – $0.50 off 2 coupon from a Nestle website that doubles to $1 off 2 cans.

Box of scalloped potatoes (on sale for 1.49) – $0.40 coupon from coupons.com that doubles to $0.80.

Can of Dole Mandarin Oranges (on sale for $1) – $0.50 coupon from Dole website that doubles to $1.

2 boxes of Cheez-Its (on sale for $1.49) – $1.50 off 2 coupon we clipped from the newspaper.

Bumblebee Tuna Pouch (on sale for $1) – $1 off coupon from smartsource.com

2 packages of Keebler Fudge Shoppe cookies (on sale for $1.49 each) – $1.50 off 2 coupon from coupons.com

So the above items would cost $14.44 if we bought them on sale but without any promotions or anything.  Using our coupons and double coupons saves us almost half at $7.50.  Then we save another $5 off by buying 10 participating items.

The total cost for those 10 items above turns out to be about $2.  Winner!  Winner!

Related posts:

1. I almost feel like I’m cheating I’ve been doing some very careful shopping recently, and I...
2. Target printable coupons changing I’ve recently become a bigger fan of using coupons at...
3. Christmas in January I was walking through Lowe’s tonight with Sandy, and we...

Flickr Stock Photo

Occasionally I get asked how much a particular used computer is worth.  Because computer technology continues to increase at a steady rate, computers loose their value quite quickly.

My general rule is that a computer looses about 30-50% of its value every year.  A computer which was purchased at the store for $1000 might be worth somewhere around $300 two years later.  Particular brands and technologies may loose value faster or slower, but generally, all computers loose their value quite quickly.

For this reason I recommend that no one ever buy a computer with the intent to sell it to someone else later.

I also recommend to most people that they do not buy more computer than they need right now.  This means that you shouldn’t buy excessively more memory, speed, or storage because you intend on needing that extra capacity in a year or two.  Ignoring this advice, people could buy too much computer that would be worth half as much when they actually need to use it all.

(photo credit)

Related posts:

1. How much is this old computer worth? I have a friend who is trying to sell her...
2. Better way to timstamp for computer science project pass-offs Timestamps are bad, use MD5 Sums!...
3. SCO goes private According to a story on Slashdot today, The SCO Group...

• Almost one year ago, the stock market hit an all time high.
• Since then, it has fallen over 29%.
• Today, it closed below 10,000 points. (source)
• And closed about 3.5% lower than where it closed last Friday.
• Which is more than 11% lower than where it closed a month ago.
• This is a 4 year low.
• At one point today, the stock market was down by 800 points.
• Which was the worst intra-day fall since Black Monday in 1987. (source)
• But it rallied near the end of the day, to close with a loss of 370 points. (source)
• This is the 19th largest single-day point loss ever.
• The 1st largest point loss occured one week ago.
• The 1st, 8th, 9th, 17th, and 19th worst single-day point losses have call occured in the last month. (source)
• In the last month, shares of Hewlett-Packard have dropped by almost 9%.
• Shares of Apple, IBM, and Dell have all dropped more.
• The utilities and medial sectors have fallen the most, dropping more than 5% today.
• While the transportation industry has dropped the least with less than a 1% drop.

Update Oct 7:

• On October 7, the stock market dropped another 508 points.
• This is the 5th worst single-day point loss ever.
• Adding today to the list, the 1st, 5th, 9th, 10th, 18th, and 20th worst single day losses have all occurred in the last month.
• It has dropped almost 13% in the last week.
• It has dropped almost 2000 points in the last month, or almost 16% of its value.
• And almost a 33% drop in the last year.  Think about that!  It has dropped by a whole third in just a year!

Related posts:

1. The fate of trendy brands Today I read a news report stating that Starbucks’ profits...
2. How much is an old computer worth? Occasionally I get asked how much a particular used computer...
3. Wow they must be hurting Oddly enough, I recently got an invitation from the “new...

Your student loans serviced by UHEAA have been paid in full… Congratulations on paying off your student loans.

I actually paid it off a couple of months ago, I’m not sure why it took them so long to figure it out. It always feels good to be debt free.

Related posts:

1. Deficit verses Debt Some people confuse the terms  Deficit and Debt when talking...
2. Hillary is out of the race and out of money Hillary Clinton recently ended her bid for the presidency. She...
3. Tuition Hike I found out that BYU will increase tuition for 2006-2007...

Then I started to think about how incredibly not aerodynamic the trailer is. Anyone who has participated in a pine wood derby knows that a big block on wheels isn’t the best way to go. If you’ve felt the wind come off the end or sides of one of these trucks as it drives by, then you have felt the energy that is lost because of the inefficient design of the big box trailer.

I suppose they are made that way because that is the most inexpensive way to make a trailer. But with diesel prices near $5 per gallon, maybe it’s time to re-think that.

If big-rig trucks were more aerodynamic, then they would get better gas mileage. If they get better gas mileage, then that reduces the cost of delivery for the products they are delivering. This, in turn, can keep consumer prices slightly lower. Lower prices helps the economy.

So much of our economy depends on the distribution of goods, that maybe it is time to think uniquely about making our means of distribution more affordable.

(Image source)

Related posts:

1. BYU Bookstore DVD Rentals Dear BYU Bookstore, Thank you for providing a great service...
2. Cleaner cars not best for economy Recently, Obama signed a request for the Environmental Protection Agency...
3. A few stock market facts The following facts refer to the Dow Jones Industrial Average:...

Related posts:

1. Hillary Clinton, Yuck! Well, the day after the 2004 presidential election and Larry...
2. Where is Hillary actually from? The Boston Globe is reporting that Hillary Clinton is in...
3. Deficit verses Debt Some people confuse the terms  Deficit and Debt when talking...

I really want a bank that just keeps my money safe and accessible. I don’t want you calling me many times selling some soft of subscription package to your many programs. I signed up for the national do-not-call list, which means that I really don’t like being bothered my various offers made by calling me. Just because I bank with you, doesn’t mean that I really want to be bothered by you.

Tonight you called me, hiding the caller identification of the source call. Thats just plain sneaky, and something I wouldn’t expect from a bank that I would like to trust.

If you call me, I will refuse any offer you present. Please stop calling me. I told that last caller not to call me again. If I receive any more phone calls from you that do not directly concern my financial accounts, I will strongly consider moving my funds to a different institution.

July 17, 2008 update:
BOB, in comment 10180, was very nice to describe to me Wells Fargo’s privacy policy. According to his suggestion, I went to their website and found my privacy settings already set to the following:

My Wells Fargo Privacy Settings

So my question now is the following? Were my privacy settings always prohibiting contact? Or were they changed by the Wells Fargo representative who called me last with whom I requested that they no longer call me?

The good news is that I haven’t been called in quite a while. Also, now I know that any calls I may receive in the future are in contradiction to my privacy settings and against Wells Fargo’s privacy policy.

Does anyone know where I can find similar privacy settings on the Discover Card website?

Update July 24 Today I received another phone call which introduced itself as being associated with Wells Fargo. When I asked the guy if he was aware that I had specified in my Wells Fargo privacy settings that I wish not to be contacted, he asked me what privacy settings I was talking about, and then he suggested that my system was incorrect.

Related posts:

1. History of weird phone calls I’ve notice a pattern of weird phone calls over the...
2. NBCOlympics gave away my email address Before the 2008 Olympics, I was at NBCOlympics.com looking for...
3. Why I won’t be feeding the Elders again A few weeks ago, I signed up to feed the...

SCO has been in loosing in law suits it brought against Novell and IBM.

I couldn’t think of better news. I mean, from the people perspective, any good engineers still left at SCO might not loose their job. From another people perspective, now SCO has money to pay Novell, so they don’t have to lay off people.

All in all, I think all this means is there is a bigger turkey to roast and cut up.

Related posts:

1. How much is an old computer worth? Occasionally I get asked how much a particular used computer...
2. Linux development process Greg Kroah-Hartman came to my Open Source Software Engineering class...
3. Deficit verses Debt Some people confuse the terms  Deficit and Debt when talking...

Related posts:

1. Ethics In one of my classes, we’ve been talking about business...
2. Wells Fargo, stop calling me Dear Wells Fargo, I really want a bank that just...