I used to think that knowledge was unilateral and could be acquired primarily through books. This was instilled in me by the education system, and only once I was out of the education system did it become much more apparent that books can only confer a very specific kind of knowledge. If you traveled the […]
Perfectionism is Expensive: Reflections on Car Projects
Strong preferences can severely limit your opportunities to save money, but a special form of this – perfectionism – has even greater power to limit these opportunities. I would not describe myself as a perfectionist, per se, but I have some “perfection-istic” dispositions, and one of those is in relation to my car. For the […]
The Difficulty of Providing Public Goods
I occasionally hear people talk about housing and food as basic human rights, but there are some philosophical complications with this, not the least being the fact that we live in a world of specialization and that self sufficiency is largely impossible without some prior investment. The entire concept of human rights is complicated, but […]
Housing Ecology: New Perspectives on Rent vs. Buy
When considering assets and capital, we tend to group things based on their general characteristics, and we name these groups by what we call “class”. So when talking about investments, we break them down into “asset classes”, often real estate, stocks, bonds, or commodities, and this makes it easier to talk about these things based […]
Tradeoffs in Quality and Price: The Insane World of Aftermarket Parts and Social Expectation
I’ve often mentioned that I prefer to install original Toyota parts in my car, but this certainly comes at a price. Sometimes I’ve paid up to 4 times the cost of an aftermarket part that is otherwise considered to be good quality. There’s always this nagging question inside of me, though: is it worth it? […]
Debt as a Tool?
Every now and then, I come across an article or forum post describing debt as a tool. There is a certain amount of risk to debt in the first place, but there are circumstances in which going into debt can be leveraged for gain. However, I would say that debt can be a tool, but […]
2021 in Car Projects
I’ve done a lot of work on my car this past year. From a functional perspective, much of this hasn’t been necessary, but from a maintenance perspective, it has been great. I’ve learned a lot this year and have actually had quite a bit of fun, and wanted to share some of my stories. Hub […]
Thoughts on Currency
I don’t have a background in finance, so there are a number of concepts about banking and currency that are way over my head, but the most interesting thing that I’ve started to pick up on over the past few years is that the topics of banking and currency are still being figured out: nobody […]
Creatively Small Appliances: Their Advantages and Disadvantages
Several years ago, I learned about the existence of mini-washing machines. I thought they were super cool. I had spent several years volunteering with refugees, and one issue with the apartments they lived in was the lack of washer and drier hookups. To avoid the cost and hassle of going to a laundromat, many would […]
Income Levels and Whether it Makes Sense to Buy a House
For the past year or so, it’s occurred to me that people at the lowest income levels are usually getting screwed by most policies. Not only is there very little money left over after expenses for things like contributions to a 401(k), but the tax incentives are almost nil for that anyway. Prices skew toward […]