Don’t Quit Your Day Job – Personal Finance, Economics and Investing

Carnivals and links for the week.

Merry Christmas Eve to all my Christian readers, I’ve got a gift for you a day early. What if you could take your credit card now, make it so you can’t run a balance, and add an annual fee? Sound like something you might be interested in? Me neither. However, that’s exactly how a charge card compares to a traditional credit card.

Writing checks to charities, as covered in previous articles is one way to give to your top causes. However, it’s not the only way for you to make a difference to your non-profit of choice.

Carnivals and links for the current week.

Since I highlighted some fun facts and an overview of giving in the United States yesterday, today it seems appropriate to take a look at giving on an individual level. There are many worthy causes out there, from educational charities (and universities, which also happen to be non-profit), to health care charities. There is a charity out there that calls to you, too. How do you separate the wheat from the chaff, and donate to the charities where your dollar will go furthest?

It goes with the season! With every ring of the Salvation Army bell outside of your favorite big box retailer or supermarket, we are reminded the true aim of the season (whether Christmas is your deal or not)- thinking of others. What better time than December to highlight some fast facts about charitable giving in the United States?

Featured links for the week of December 7.

When it comes to credit card rewards programs, either those run with points or those run with frequent flier miles, you have to spend money to make money. One way to game the system is to spend money on money. While this trick would work with gold (although you lose some- gold is sold above its spot price), it’s also an open secret that the U.S. Mint offers Direct Ship coins, payable by credit card. To sweeten the deal further, they will even pay for domestic shipping.

Is Journalism, as suggested by the Washington Post’s Michael Gerson, dying a slow death? Or is Mr. Gerson simply being melodramatic? The issue boils down to how you define journalism. If journalism- in the mold of the traditional magazine and newspaper journalism- is dying, is that the end of news? Tough questions, for sure, but what is the goal of media? To train journalists?

Great article links for the week.