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Don't Quit Your Day Job: The Intersection of Personal Finance, Economics, and Politics.

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There’s No Such Thing as a Free Lunch (Or Gas Mileage)

Posted By PK    Last updated August 29th, 2012 24 Comments

Setting aside my esteemed co-writer’s obsession with hypermiling (not practicing, mind you, joking about), there really is no such thing as a free lunch – especially when it comes to fuel economy. The Government, however, as demonstrated by recently finalized mileage laws, wants their lunch on the house.

As the saying goes, “you can’t legislate innovation”, and fuel economy standards give car manufacturers very interesting incentives.

Filed Under: Economics Tagged With: aluminum, cash for clunkers, classic cars, Economics, Engineering, free lunch, milton friedman, steel

The Philosophy of Don’t Quit Your Day Job…

Posted By PK    Last updated May 24th, 2012 20 Comments

One of the interesting things about writing on a Personal Finance site is that while you write for your readers and yourself, you are part of a broader community which informs your opinions and gives you reason to examine your own views on many topics. We at Don’t Quit Your Day Job have now been around for (almost) three years, covered a large number of financial topics, introduced a number of personal financial strategies, and delved into too-great detail on subjects which had mildly interesting data.

Filed Under: Offbeat Tagged With: cultural references, Economics, humor, Personal Finance, Politics

The DQYDJ Weekender (Week of 12/19/11)

Posted By PK    Last updated December 24th, 2011 5 Comments

Welcome to the Christmas/Holidays/Winter Solstice version of the DQYDJ weekender!  The three writers on the web site are Catholic (we’re from Boston, remember?) so this is being sent out on Christmas Eve for us.  Happy Holidays to you and your families, and enjoy this wrap up.

We’ll be back next week with more controversial stuff, but for now we leave you with the cream of the crop for the week!

Filed Under: Weekender Tagged With: carnivals, Economics, money

Carnivals and Links, Week of November 7, 2011

Posted By PK    Last updated November 9th, 2011 9 Comments

Welcoming The Frugal Toad to our blogroll, linking great stuff, adding a Facebook page, an eBook from MD at Studenomics and so much more!

Filed Under: Featured Links Tagged With: blogroll, carnivals, Economics, frugal toad

Why You Should Stop Worrying About Median Wage Decreases – and Keep Worrying About Unemployment

Posted By PK    Last updated October 21st, 2011 Leave a Comment

Oh no! The Social Security Administration recently released it’s Wage Statistics for 2010 to little (official) fanfare. To read a little financial press, it’s the end of the American Dream (buy guns and gold!), however. Here’s a little secret: the problem isn’t that employers are colluding to ratchet down the income of the United States. The true reason for the reduction in median income is the shifting demographics of employed workers. You can break it down in many ways, but I’ll break it down into age brackets… and you should be convinced that while unemployment is a problem, the falling wage is just a symptom of everything else, and not something you should spend too much time worrying about (let DQYDJ do it for you!).

Filed Under: Economics Tagged With: avaerage income, averages, baby boomers, demographics, Economics, generations, Median Income

Is Operation Twist a Failure? The Fed’s Two Left Feet.

Posted By PK    Last updated October 12th, 2011 2 Comments

“Oooh-yeah just like this
Come on little miss and do the twist” – Chubby Checker, The Twist
I thought the quote was pretty clever, but you could also attach one of a couple of subtitles on this post: “Why Thomas Sargent Deserves Half the Nobel Prize” or, if you like classic entertainment, “A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Dance”! Let’s stick with Thomas Sargent, who just won the Nobel Prize in Economics for his work in the field of “Rational Expectations”. “Rational Expectations” in Economics, as you might guess, refers to the changing expectations of the market (investors, citizens, whomever) to policies that will affect them. Basically, you cannot assume that the reaction to a new policy will have the desired effect.

Filed Under: Economics Tagged With: 2 year bond, 30 year bond, Economics, Finance, rational expectations, treasury yields, unintended consequences

Tax Exemption of Charitable Contributions

Posted By CameronDaniels    Last updated November 19th, 2012 2 Comments

Charitable contributions are an important part of the American political system and the American tax code. In this article, Cameron Daniels questions whether the tax exemption for charitable contributions is a good policy decision.

Filed Under: Economics, Politics Tagged With: charities, donations, Economics, religion, religious, tax exempt

Live Blog on 11/2 Midterm Elections

Posted By CameronDaniels    Last updated November 2nd, 2010 6 Comments

Live blogging for the midterm 2010 elections. Keep refreshing! 5-10 minute updates.

Filed Under: Economics, Politics Tagged With: 2010, democrat, econ, Economics, election, gubernatorial, house, midterm, republican, senate

Substitution vs. Income Effect (and its Implications)

Posted By CameronDaniels    Last updated February 20th, 2013 7 Comments

Substitution and Income Effect: These two terms are very familiar to anybody who has taken an intermediate course in macroeconomics. With the recent articles regarding volunteerism and labor statistics, I thought that it was very timely to write on these two very important concepts.

Let’s start with a thought experiment: if you were to receive a 10% increase in your hourly wage, would you increase, decrease, or maintain your hours worked? Believe it or not, any answer is correct, despite many assumptions regarding the positive slope of labor supply curves. The reason that any answer is correct lies in an understanding of substitution and income effects.

Filed Under: Economics, Featured Tagged With: charity, Economics, goods, Income, labor, labor supply, leisure, substitution

EU vs. The US. The Numbers Have It!

Posted By PK    Last updated January 22nd, 2010 Leave a Comment

A popular topic in the blogosphere, given new life after comments by Nobel prize winning economist Paul Krugman, is the relative success of the United States vs. the states that make up the European Union. The European Union is a loose confederation of 27 countries in Europe, ranging from Spain to Estonia. Krugman goes so far to suggest that “[y]ou should always bear in mind that when the question is which to believe — official economic statistics or your own lying eyes — the eyes have it.”

Filed Under: Economics, Politics Tagged With: countries in europe, economic statistics, Economics, European Union, eurostat, Eyes vs. Numbers, many eyes, nobel prize, Paul Krugman, Science, Statistics, unemployment, united states, visualizations
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