Consumerist Personal Finance Round-up…just as depressing as it sounds

And not very useful.  I’d have to say that the only really interesting article here was the bit about retirement.  I didn’t realize that the Social Security numbers have been holding pretty steady as the baby-boomer generation slips slowly into retirement.  That’s AWESOME news since everyone was predicting they were going to drain it in TWO seconds.  The bit about cities to go for work is pretty useless…I have a fair number of friends who are trying to find work in DC and they’ll all tell you there are no jobs so that list seems a little off.  And I want everyone I know to boycott Dollar Tree.  I can’t tell you why but I would just like everyone to use other dollar stores.

Money: Personal Finance Roundup.

Things To Do When You’re Unemployed: Prepare for the Apocalypse

Am I the only one who didn’t know there’s a huge monument with instructions for how to reboot society when the end of days arrives?  It’s in Georgia…naturally…and has instructions in eight different languages.  Yoko Ono knows about it so why didn’t I?  Like anything really cool, it’s shrouded in mystery!  No one knows who commissioned it or why they built it.  But now I have to see it.

American Stonehenge: Monumental Instructions for the Post-Apocalypse.

Health Care Reform-YES WE CAN-and why we have to

Very interesting article on the current health care crisis and one that every American should read.  If the pretty graph that compares your wage increase (or lack thereof) to health insurance premiums increase, read on and figure out if you can come up with a better solution.  I’m one of the lucky few unemployed people who, thanks to the stimulus plan, can still afford her COBRA payments.  If I don’t have a job in 9 months (which is when Uncle Sam stops helping me out with my COBRA payments) I don’t know what I’m going to do for health care.  I’ll be even more broken then than I am now which is going to make private insurance pretty unrealistic…and I’m not going to be alone.  But at least I’m single and don’t have a family that relies on my health insurance too…and at least I’m fairly young and in good health (knock on wood).  But the cold hard facts are that the unemployment rate is climbing to 10% pretty quickly and the health care crisis is just going to get worse if we don’t do something about it soon.  As more people lose their jobs, I betting there are going to be a lot more sugarbabies on that site looking for sugardaddies and this time it’s going to be to pay their health insurance premium instead of college loans or fancy handbags.  There’s something about that sort of desperation that makes it hard to even joke about that site now.  Private health insurance companies aren’t going to lobby Congress or the White House to adopt a plan as radical as this one, so it’s up to the public.  Just something to chew on.  I also have to add that Health Law was one of the scariest classes I took in law school and this article seems to be over simplifying…a bit…but maybe I was over-thinking?  It would be unlike me…but perhaps.

Why consensus health care reform won’t work. – By Timothy Noah – Slate Magazine.

And here’s a Slate editorial response to the above article.  I think the title says it all and I’m too sleepy to ’splain it to you.

Tim Noah Is Kidding Himself About Health Care Costs

My mind is blown and my prayers have been answered!

So this is pretty much impossible for me to wrap my wee little brain around but apparently peeps down at Wake Forest University have developed a technology that will allow people to grow their own organs.  I have been praying and begging for this technology ever since I reached legal drinking age-I will be able to regrow my own liver!  YES!

So I think this also portends the end of days, apocalypse, etc because I just don’t think people will be able to handle living forever…but I could be wrong…but 2012 is soon…think on it…maybe just the introduction of the technology will cause the fall.  I mean, how much does it cost?  What’s to stop everyone from just growing a spare set of everything?  If you’re in a car accident, you don’t know what you’re going to need.  Anyhoo, interesting stuff.

Also interesting to note, O kind of screwed the reduced your calories-you’re going to live forever-benjamin button style people by talking about the diet first (which no one wants to do because you pretty much eat twigs and berries) and THEN the organ growing story (which everyone wants to do because all you have to do is give them some cells!)

Dr. Oz on Innovations in Regenerative Medicine – Oprah.com.

Mad about the bailout? Get enraged!

With the stock market gaining ground again and the administration declaring the economic meltdown to be over and the country back on the road to recovery, it’s important that we all understand exactly what happened, how it happened, and start working to prevent it from EVER happening again.  People are upset about the bailout but view it as necessary…was it?  Is it?  Dave Chapelle talked about the “real” white man and said that there are men you think control the world and then there are the REAL men…the few richer than god men who are actually pulling the puppet strings that control us all.  I’ve seen some things in my day that imply that’s actually the way of it…that the high rollers who donate the most get the meetings…they get the phone numbers that make the difference…and they have the name recognition that gets their calls put through.  This article talks about a great many things that should give all American’s pause…give us some things to think about…and some things to vote on.  It also talks about our good friend Joseph Cassano…of Che t-shirt fame!  Sounds like he’s pretty much a Grade A douche who enjoys parading around lawn parties wearing his Che T-shirt ironically…just like a hipster who doesn’t get the joke.

We need regulation.  That much is crystal clear…but how can we engineer change if the people who influence the most change are the same people engineered the market’s deregulation?  It’s just like the Obama administration not repealing so many of the Bush Administration’s executive power extensions…

Anyhoo, it’s depressing but important so please read it

The Big Takeover : Rolling Stone.

And the Captain Obvious Award goes to…The NY Times for this Headline!

White House Optimism Not Shared by Republicans – NYTimes.com.

Wow…Really?  You’re kidding?  Republicans don’t SHARE the White House’s Optimism?  That’s SHOCKING.  That’s never happened before.  I don’t know what the next year holds or what the next decade holds.  But I do know that it took lot’s of different people around the globe in many different fields to dig the economic hole we’re currently in.and it’s going to take a united effort involving everyone-from main street to wall street and around the globe to fix this.  Republicans can say whatever they want about plans…until they have something better, we’re sticking with what we’ve got.  Also, who got us into this mess?  8 years of a Republican White House…specifically George W. Bush.  Has anyone else noticed that Bush’s name is RARELY used now?  It’s almost as if they are trying to make American’s forget who was at the helm when the warning flares were signally…as if they want American’s to forget how many lives have been lost and how much money has been spent on wars in Afghanistan and Iraq…wars that we’re no closer to winning now than we were when we invaded.  Bankruptcy?  Oh yeah…Obama is the reason the country might be bankrupt in a few years…it has NOTHING to do with the tax cuts or stimulus checks or the FDIC not making banks pay their annual dues or unchecked spending by the former administration.

Rough Day at Katten

The bad news is that there were layoffs…the other bad news is that they will be reducing salaries based on billables.

Nationwide Layoff Watch: Instant Reports From The Katten Meeting – Above the Law – A Legal Tabloid – News, Gossip, and Colorful Commentary on Law Firms and the Legal Profession.

How delightfully bourgeois

 

 

 

 

The kids at the New Yorker have made a charming list of (insert your favorite title for the catagory five financial shit storm we’re weathering) drinks.  I’ve had Trickle-Down Punch before…maybe even last night: 

Trickle-Down Punch
Let last drops of liquor trickle from spent bottles at recycling center into plastic cup. Serve with shame.

Splash of bitters

Oh Nos! There are under 1,000 billionaires now!

 

 

 

That MUST be one of the seven seals, right?  Maybe the one about martyrdom? or famine?  (Or bowls being full or not full?  I wish I could post that Enigma song right now…)  

Moving on.  Billionaires went big and LOST big-especially Uncle Warren who’s always held a soft spot in my heart for donating most of his wealth…actually…so I guess that means the real losers here are the foundations he’s supposed to be leaving all this wealth to.  Le sigh.  On the one hand, it’s a crap ton of money these high rollers lost.  On the other hand, it seems like most of them are still sitting on pretty big piles o’cash so it’s hard to really feel for the bastards.  Also, can someone PLEASE explain where all the money went?  Is it ALL in China and Brazil?  Is THAT what happened?  I mean, someone has to be getting rich in all this…  It sure as shit ain’t me.  

BBC NEWS | Business | Rich list hit by economic crisis.

NYC Taking the Short Bus to Economic Recovery

 

 

 

Apparently the Big Apple is going to be ‘recovering’ at a ’slower rate’ than the ‘rest of the nation’.  The city is hemorrhaging jobs, losing tax revenue, and has a Mayor that doesn’t believe in taxing the wealthy.  Le sigh.  This article did remind me that I need to read Atlas Shrugged.  

 

NYC Economic Forecast Goes From Dismal to Dire – Gothamist: New York City News, Food, Arts & Events.