The rule of 72 is used to find the number of years it takes to double your money at a given interest rate.
(72/[interest rate]) = years until a principle doubles
So, how long will it take to double your money at eight percent interest? Divide 8 into 72 and you get 9 years.
If you collect 7% on your savings in a little over 10 years the amount will be double what it is today.
The rule of 72 also means that you can determine the time
it takes for a population to double if it is growing at a steady rate by solving this function:
(72/[rate of growth]) = years for population to double
The portrait of Abraham Lincoln on the penny shows him facing to the right while all other portraits of presidents on U.S. circulating coins face left.
As of 2007 it now costs more than 1 cent to produce 1 cent.
In 1996, lotteries in North America awarded $52 million in prizes every day – that’s $36,000 every minute, 24 hours a day. This didn’t just suddenly happen. Lotteries have been around nearly as long as civilization has been around. People love lotteries.
"I see in the near future a crisis approaching that unnerves me and causes
me to tremble for the safety of my country . . . Corporations have been
enthroned and an era of corruption in high places will follow, and the money
power of the country will endeavor to prolong its reign by working upon the
prejudices of people until all wealth is aggregated in a few hands and the
Republic is destroyed." Abraham Lincoln, 1864
Paul Revere’s metals company once supplied the Mint with rolled copper for the production of early cents. Impressively, the company is still in business today making top quality aluminum siding.
Some investments perform better than others in certain situations. For example, when interest rates go up, bond prices tend to go down. One industry may struggle while another prospers. Putting your money in a variety of investment options can help to reduce your risk.
"The pain of having less is much stronger than the joy of having more." Workers who discover they're earning more for the same work may be happy, but those who earn less can quickly feel slighted, killing motivation and often the quality of their output.
A new study (2/08) suggests that sadness leads to shopping.
According to the study that will be published in the June 2008 number of Psychological Science, sadness leads to ego-centrist thinking. In other words, a sad person tends to transform into a shopaholic, willing to spend extra money on the same item than neutral-emotion people would buy for a lot less.
“It is the combination of sadness and self-focus that drives the effect, and it turns out that sadness leads to an increase in self-focus,” said Cynthia Cryder, co-author to the study, AFP quotes. “What we think is going on is that sad and self-focused people are feeling pretty bad about themselves and have a decreased valuation, and one way to do this is by acquiring material goods.”
Oh yeah, it also says this therapy does not work. If you’re sad and feel like shopping, don’t!
A blackjack card counter performs a simple calculation...over and over and over again. The goal is to bet more money when a deck is loaded with big cards 10,Jack, Queen,King, & Ace because the chances of a dealer busting increases. To figure out when the deck favors the player they do the following:
The card counter begins with zero. For every card that appears either they add 1, minus 1, or keep it the same.
If the card is a 2,3,4,5,6 you add 1. If the card is 10,j,q,k,ace you subtract 1. If it's a 7,8,9 the score remains the same.
So, a card counter will bet small while they keep count and if their tally reaches +5 or greater they increase their bet. This system relies on the law of large numbers which says while the bettor will lose or win money on a given day over time the bettor will have the advantage and thus be profitable long-term.
p.s. This is much easier said than done. This formula was introduced in Beat The Dealer in 1966 and the casinos are doing just fine. Good luck!
In 1862, to support the Civil War, Congress enacted the nation's first income tax law. Congress eliminated the income tax in 1872 and it had a short-lived revival in 1894 and 1895.
In 1913 the income tax was brought back and became a permanent part of American life. It provided a seemingly unlimited source of funds to finance ever-growing government, and it gave the government an excuse to pry into every aspect of your life.
German cattle merchants reportedly tied their money purses around their Rottweilers' necks, figuring no thief would be brave enough to try stealing from such an intimidating dog.