FINANCIaL
FIELd NOTES
Popular Financial Fraud Tactics in 2024
With the rapid advancement of technology in the financial landscape, financial fraud has unfortunately kept pace with innovation. The financial fraud that was common just 5 or 10 years ago has taken a back seat to more creative and destructive tactics. It’s critical to remain vigilant against the new tactics being employed by fraudsters.
Below are some of the most prevalent fraud tactics that have been making headlines this year…
Why I’m Cashing Out My I-Bonds
In January 2022 and January 2023, I purchased I-bonds to replace part of our family’s cash savings. In 2022, when I-bond rates were over 7%, I wrote about how if you had cash that you could afford to tie up for a year, I-bonds were a good option. Rates then peaked in the middle of 2022 at nearly 10% before starting to come back down. Last year around this time, I wrote about how I still thought I-bonds offered a reasonable rate over alternatives.
In 2023, inflation came down and I-bond rates linked to inflation continued to decline. However, late last year and early in 2024, inflation stopped its downward trend and I-bond rates stayed elevated – over 5%. For this reason, I opted not to cash out my I-bonds. However, the Treasury just announced the new I-bond rate of 4.28%…
How Big Is the Average Emergency Fund?
In the realm of personal finance, few concepts are as universally endorsed as the emergency fund. An emergency fund serves as a financial cushion, providing peace of mind and stability during unexpected events such as job loss, medical emergencies, or major repairs. But how much do people actually set aside?
According to J.P. Morgan, most have somewhere between 4-8 weeks of net income set aside…
Navigating Family Conversations Around Mortality
Conversations around mortality are rare. Usually, the person aging wants to avoid it, and families are more than willing to oblige, given how difficult they are to have. Because of this, end-of-life care is often not handled in a way that most would prefer.
I recently finished a book, Being Mortal, by Atul Gawande – where he shares from his perspective as a doctor how families navigated real-life scenarios, both the good and the bad. Here are my key takeaways…
The Origin of Negative News
I have written here before about the tactics of mass media and how they influence our decision-making. But before the mid-19th century, most media were purely informational. Newspapers came out weekly, cost on average 6 cents, and covered business and politics.
In 1833, a man named Benjamin Day created Penny Press, a newspaper that cost 1 cent. Suddenly the masses were able to read the newspaper as the cost to purchase one plummeted. The only problem was that Day was selling the newspaper at a substantial loss. At this point, he introduced what is now a widely accepted revenue model known as advertisement. He sold ad space in the newspaper that readers would see.
However, to attract advertisers, Day needed more readers. It was at this point that the type of news reported began to change drastically…
Why People Were Happier in the 1950s
In the 1950s, new home builds were roughly 1/3 the size of current new home builds, and when families left those homes for vacation, they camped more often than they stayed in hotels. The real GDP per person was ¼ of what is it today, which means the US produces 4x as much as we did in the 50s even after adjusting for inflation. This has resulted in countless luxuries that we consider necessities today. People in the 1950s could hardly imagine a color TV, but I’m frustrated when there is a one-second lag on the live football game I’m streaming from a smartphone.
A 2017 report found that peak happiness in the UK and other developed economies was the year 1957. Why then were the 1950s a happier time if they had so much less?