I recently shared the story of a woman who wondered, “I make $6.50 an hour — am I poor?” The author had lost a good-paying job, moved to rural Montana, and was struggling to get by. Several readers forwarded a similar story about a woman who is surviving (and thriving) on $12,000 a year.
The authors [...]

Liz Pulliam Weston — one of my favorite professional personal finance writers — has a warning regarding the three worst money moves you can make.
Sound financial advice doesn’t change much from year to year. Bad money management ideas, however, seem to mutate and flourish with each passing season…Ultimately, it’s up to you to resist [...]

Should my wife and I (with drastically different incomes ) file taxes together or seperate? | Ask MetaFilter
It’s AskMetafilter Day in the daily links…
(tags: taxes tips)

RESP…still don’t know what it means for me | Ask MetaFilter
“College savings: Does the government care how you spend a college savings plan in Canada?”
(tags: college savings planning)

Living in a [...]

Raising your own berries, fruits, and vegetables is a fun and rewarding way to save money. Our grocery bills drop dramatically during harvest season, and the food cannot be beat. (I love our salsa recipe.) But my wife notes, “February is the time to start planning your vegetable garden.” This post contains her advice for [...]

Stylehive - Blog: Top 5:  Piggy Banks, Stylish Savings
Me? I use a Mason jar.
(tags: funnymoney change)

Senate targets credit card practices - Jan. 26, 2007
“Restoring small annual fees on cards used by ‘non-revolvers’ would bolster revenues for card issuers, who then in turn might not make life so expensive for those with revolving balances.”
(tags: politics creditcards [...]

Lifehacker points to a MSN Real Estate piece listing the 15 tools every homeowner should own. I’m working on a longer article about home workshops, but this is a good introduction to the subject.
If you don’t have a handyman in your family and don’t have a clue where to begin when it comes to assembling [...]

Last spring I reviewed Why We Buy: The Science of Shopping, a book that explores what motivates us to purchase products, and explains how businesses sell to us. Today guest-author Paul Bausch looks at a similar book, The Consumer Trap: Big Business Marketing in American Life.
We are continually bombarded with advertising, but as savvy web [...]

Reader Poll: What kind of affluent would you rather be? - Lifehacker
Would you rather be rich with time or rich with money? I think an argument can be made that they’re the same thing (”time is money”), but if I had to choose, I’d choose “rich with time”.
(tags: philosophy values money)

Polls indicate youth value materialistic [...]

Yesterday I posted a reader comment on the virtues of a debt-free lifestyle. This prompted responses noting that debt-free living creates its own set of problems, and that responsible use of credit can be a valuable tool.
Greg C wrote:
Some people think credit = debt. It does not. Anyone who can budget can use credit [...]

Marie recently made a terrific response in Ask the Readers: What if you have no credit history? This thread is a month old and most people probably missed the comment, so I’m featuring it here.
I am a bit shocked that someone would be so irresponsible as to tell someone else to “suck it up and [...]