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Posted
Jun 17 2009, 08:53 AM
by
Karen Datko
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
This devil's advocate post comes from Jim Wang at partner blog Bargaineering.
This devil's advocate post will cover something that's bound to elicit a lot of discussion: Here are four reasons why you shouldn't donate money to charity.
That's right. You read that correctly. I have four reasons why donating your hard-earned money to a charity is a bad idea, and chances are there is at least one reason here that you haven't even considered. If there was ever a devil's advocate post to end all devil's advocate posts (don't worry, it's not the last one), this would probably be it.
Americans are among the most charitable people in the world, donating $314 billion in 2007, according to the Philanthropy Journal. And despite a brutal economy, that dropped only 2% (or 5.7% after adjusting for inflation) to $307 billion in 2008.
In the face of that, I present to you four reasons why you shouldn't donate money to charity.
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Posted
May 28 2009, 08:13 AM
by
Catherine Holahan
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
 The family dog is the latest casualty of rising foreclosures.
As more families are forced to sell their homes, an increasing number of pets are being left behind in shelters or, worse, empty houses. Though it is difficult to put an exact figure on the number of abandoned pets, shelters across the country say they are seeing double-digit percentage increases in the number of animals left in their care. The Humane Society estimates that more than 3 million animals will be euthanized this year.
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Posted
Mar 10 2009, 06:08 AM
by
Karen Datko
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
This post comes from Jim Wang at partner blog Bargaineering.
Starting today, I'll be volunteering every Tuesday morning in the kitchen at the local Howard County Meals on Wheels facility. It's less than five miles away one-way, but I still wanted to research how to claim the driving mileage on my taxes to reduce my tax burden as much as possible.
At 10 miles a week and 52 weeks, we're looking at only 520 miles for the entire year. The deduction for 2008 was 14 cents a mile (IRS standard mileage rates), so we're talking a $72.80 deduction -- but every bit helps.
This is what you need to do to determine whether you can claim it and what you need to do to document it. (This is covered in IRS Publication 526.)
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Posted
Dec 11 2008, 07:51 AM
by
Karen Datko
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
This idea is either brilliant or a stunning acknowledgment of our inability to solve a national disgrace (or both): A nonprofit is distributing military-grade canvas tents on wheels to homeless people. This ingenious contraption, called an EDAR, can be used as a larger-than-shopping-cart conveyance during the day for easy pickup of cans and other recyclables. At night it quickly converts to a tent-like structure, providing a comfortable and dry place to sleep. The Los Angeles Times describes the EDAR as "the offspring of a shopping cart and a pop-up camper."
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Posted
Nov 24 2008, 11:20 AM
by
Karen Datko
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
As part of his popular Save $1,000 in 30 Days Challenge, blogger Ramit Sethi is on to what might be his biggest and best money-saving idea. Tip No. 18 of the challenge is "No Christmas gifts this year."
"This year, Americans are planning to spend over $400 on Christmas gifts," he writes. "Instead of buying things we can't afford, here's a way to do something more meaningful."
For a lot of people who haven't taken steps to brace themselves for the coming economic reality, the first question should be: "Where can I sign up?"
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Posted
Nov 17 2008, 12:29 PM
by
Karen Datko
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
People who've recently dropped out of the middle class are turning to the nation's food banks and soup kitchens for help, further straining agencies that always struggle to keep up.
And that doesn't include the people who are too ashamed to ask for food.
"For some people it's very difficult to go to a pantry -- it's the straw that breaks the camel's back," Paule Pachter, director of the Long Island Cares food bank, told Reuters.
There are several ways you can help.
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Posted
Nov 12 2008, 07:55 AM
by
Donna Freedman
Rating:
Filed under: hot deals, spending, savings, Donna Freedman, budgeting, tips, shopping, free, retail, save money, frugal, donations
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
Last weekend Office Depot changed the terms of its printer ink cartridge recycling program. The good news is you still get $3 per eligible cartridge. The better news is that you can now turn in up to 25 per day, or $75 worth; the previous limit was three per day.
The bad news is that Office Depot will now pay in the form of a quarterly gift card, the way that Office Max and Staples already do. Until last weekend, I could walk into Office Depot with three cartridges and get $9 taken off whatever I bought, whether it was school supplies for needy kids, or a ream of paper or grocery item for me.
Last year at Christmas I used ink cartridges to buy Starbucks coffee for 99 cents a pound. (Not that I drink the stuff myself; the coffee became part of a gift basket.) I also used the cartridges to buy art supplies for kids in a family my sister and I adopted for the holidays. Even though the programs make it harder to benefit (more on that below), I'll still be using them and I suggest that you do, too.
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Posted
Oct 28 2008, 03:41 AM
by
Karen Datko
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
This post comes from partner blog Blueprint for Financial Prosperity. The "poverty line" is published by the U.S. Census Bureau for statistical purposes and the Department of Health and Human Services for administrative purposes. The poverty line is used for a variety of benefit calculations. For 2008 it's set at $10,400 for an individual in the lower 48 states. It's $10,400. That's it. That's $866.67 a month. The federal minimum wage is set at $6.55 an hour (increasing to $7.25 an hour on July 24 of next year). At the standard 2,000 hours of work in a year -- although many people work far more to subsist -- that's $13,100 -- a mere $2,700 above the poverty line. In a world where CEOs get hundreds of millions of dollars, can't we as a society do something about it?
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Posted
Oct 07 2008, 04:56 AM
by
Karen Datko
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
This post comes from partner blog Blueprint for Financial Prosperity. By nature, I accumulate stuff. Three years ago, my office was pristine. Everything was organized, everything had its place, there were no papers strewn about, and there was order in the world (with world peace and the abolishment of hunger mere moments away). But, as the weeks passed and entropy worked its magic, my office became more and more chaotic. I never lost anything, but anyone walking into it would be amazed that I could ever find anything. It was organized chaos. Then I stumbled upon this idea: The easiest way to de-clutter and reorganize a room is to wipe the slate clean and start over. Want to do it? It's easy.
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Posted
Sep 29 2008, 04:42 AM
by
Karen Datko
Rating:
Money Blog: Smart Spending Blog - MSN Money
This post comes from J.D. Roth at partner blog Get Rich Slowly. My mother recently was hospitalized for three weeks. During her stay, my wife and I spent  several afternoons cleaning her house, digging through piles and piles of stuff. Since Mom's been home, the three of us have spent a couple Sundays continuing to sort through the stuff. "Do you still want this?" I've asked Mom again and again, holding up an old computer printer, a plaque with a pithy saying, or a calendar from 1998. "No," she'll say, and sometimes we'll laugh. Who still needs their calendar from 1998? But not everything is funny. "It seems a shame to get rid of some of this," she said as she sorted through her clothes. "They're all still good."
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