| Baby, you smell better than a Denny's Grand Slam |
[Apr. 26th, 2006|10:18 am] |
Well it seems that the majority of my fellow livejournal users here have migrated to myspace. Hey, if you all want to be sellouts, that’s cool with me. I heard that Jesus hates myspace anyway.
In all actually, I will no doubt in time follow the crowd to myspace. Jesus already hates me for supporting gay rights anyway, so I’ve got nothing to loose. It does seem that there would be some pretty cool things that I could do with my web knowledge. I already have an idea for a Walker Texas Ranger theme site, complete with theme song from the show.
For the time being however, I think that I am content to give up the blog lifestyle for awhile and reading them for that matter. Lately I feel like I have so much that I want to do or accomplish or that I just plain need to get done, that there is not enough time for updating a blog. Shit, the grass needs to be mowed twice a week now that it is nice out and I actually have grass. Not to mention my 3 hour per day commitment to being disappointed by the Cubs. I am also trying to read more informational books that will help me not suck at life. Maybe after I finally fix the hole in my basement wall I will get back to this, till then I am out! |
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| I actually wrote this a month ago but am just now posting it |
[Apr. 19th, 2006|01:02 pm] |
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With tax season upon us I got to thinking as I occasionally do. I got to thinking what are tax rates today and how do they compare historically? Now I must admit that before this year and doing my taxes with my mom I had little idea on tax law. But now that I know somewhat it is interesting because knowing can save me money in the future.
So anyway I found this site that shows what the tax rates where for every year back until 1944:
http://www.taxpolicycenter.org/TaxFacts/tfdb/TFTemplate.cfm?topic2id=30
Here are a few of the numbers that I found for if you are filling as single. Before 1987 I do not believe there was a difference for filling single or married jointly so numbers before then are the same:
2005
| $0 | "$7,300 " | 10%
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| "$7,300 " | "$29,700 " | 15%
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| "$29,700 " | "$71,950 " | 25%
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| "$71,950 " | "$150,150 " | 28%
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| "$150,150 " | "$326,450 " | 33%
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| "$326,450 " | and over | 35% |
1990
| $0 | "$19,450 " | 15%
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| "$19,450 " | "$47,050 " | 28%
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| "$47,050 " | "$97,620 " | 33%
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| "$97,620 " | and over | 31% |
1980
| $0 | "$3,400 " | 0%
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| "$3,400 " | "$5,500 " | 14%
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| "$5,500 " | "$7,600 " | 16%
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| "$7,600 " | "$11,900 " | 18%
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| "$11,900 " | "$16,000 " | 21%
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| "$16,000 " | "$20,200 " | 24%
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| "$20,200 " | "$24,600 " | 28%
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| "$24,600 " | "$29,900 " | 32%
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| "$29,900 " | "$35,200 " | 37%
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| "$35,200 " | "$45,800 " | 43%
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| "$45,800 " | "$60,000 " | 49%
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| "$60,000 " | "$85,600 " | 54%
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| "$85,600 " | "$109,400 " | 59%
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| "$109,400 " | "$162,400 " | 64%
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| "$162,400 " | "$215,400 " | 68%
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| "$215,400 " | and over | 70%
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1970
| $0 | "$1,000 " | 14.00%
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| "$1,000 " | "$2,000 " | 15.00%
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| "$2,000 " | "$3,000 " | 16.40%
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| "$3,000 " | "$4,000 " | 17.425%
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| "$4,000 " | "$8,000 " | 19.475%
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| "$8,000 " | "$12,000 " | 22.55%
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| "$12,000 " | "$16,000 " | 25.625%
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| "$16,000 " | "$20,000 " | 28.70%
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| "$20,000 " | "$24,000 " | 32.80%
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| "$24,000 " | "$28,000 " | 36.90%
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| "$28,000 " | "$32,000 " | 39.975%
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| "$32,000 " | "$36,000 " | 43.05%
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| "$36,000 " | "$40,000 " | 46.125%
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| "$40,000 " | "$44,000 " | 49.20%
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| "$44,000 " | "$52,000 " | 51.25%
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| "$52,000 " | "$64,000 " | 54.325%
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| "$64,000 " | "$76,000 " | 56.375%
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| "$76,000 " | "$88,000 " | 59.45%
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| "$88,000 " | "$100,000 " | 61.50%
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| "$100,000 " | "$120,000 " | 63.55%
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| "$120,000 " | "$140,000 " | 65.60%
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| "$140,000 " | "$160,000 " | 67.65%
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| "$160,000 " | "$180,000 " | 69.70%
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| "$180,000 " | "$200,000 " | 70.725%
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| "$200,000 " | and over | 71.75% |
1950
| $0 | "$2,000 " | 23%
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| "$2,000 " | "$4,000 " | 25%
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| "$4,000 " | "$6,000 " | 29%
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| "$6,000 " | "$8,000 " | 33%
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| "$8,000 " | "$10,000 " | 37%
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| "$10,000 " | "$12,000 " | 41%
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| "$12,000 " | "$14,000 " | 46%
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| "$14,000 " | "$16,000 " | 50%
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| "$16,000 " | "$18,000 " | 53%
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| "$18,000 " | "$20,000 " | 56%
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| "$20,000 " | "$22,000 " | 59%
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| "$22,000 " | "$26,000 " | 62%
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| "$26,000 " | "$32,000 " | 65%
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| "$32,000 " | "$38,000 " | 68%
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| "$38,000 " | "$44,000 " | 72%
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| "$44,000 " | "$50,000 " | 75%
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| "$50,000 " | "$60,000 " | 78%
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| "$60,000 " | "$70,000 " | 81%
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| "$70,000 " | "$80,000 " | 84%
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| "$80,000 " | "$90,000 " | 87%
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| "$90,000 " | "$100,000 " | 90%
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| "$100,000 " | "$150,000 " | 92%
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| "$150,000 " | "$200,000 " | 93%
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| "$200,000 " | and over | 94%
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I find these numbers pretty interesting myself. Going into each of the years, it seems that over the last 50 years, the tax burden has shifted more and more away from the rich. In 1987 under Reagan seems that the tax law changed drastically. Think about this; in 1950 if you made $200,000, you would only take home $12,000 of it. I am guessing that in 1950 however $200,000 would be more the equivliant of 2 million dollars today. Thus you would be taking home $120,000 if you made 2 million dollars.
There are of course other elements of taxes such as Social Security and Medicare. Under current law with Social Security for 2005 you get taxed on 6.2% of earnings up to $90,000. So after you have made more than $90,000 in a year, your additional income will not have social security taken out. Medicare is 1.45% of all earnings.
I am curious to hear what everyone thinks of the current tax law? Should we go back to pre 1987 when it seems the rich were taxed far more than the poor? Or is that not fair? Seems like a good idea to all of us non rich people, but is it truely just? Should we have a flat tax where everyone pays the same percentage of their income? Should Social Security have a cut off where once you make a certain amount you don't have to pay in anymore?
I recently read (and have read many things along these lines before) that last year the richest 10% of Americans made 60% of the income put paid only 50% of the taxes. I can not attest to the reliability of these numbers, because I do not remember where I read them, but they would suggest that the rich do not pull their fair share of the tax burden. How could this be if they are paying a higher percentage of their income? I would gather it is because there are other elements that go into taxes other than your rate, such as deductions and credits. I would also imagine that these people are a lot smarter about doing their taxes since their is more money on the line for them.
What if I reword the above stat and say that the richest 10% pay half the taxes in America? Now it sounds as if they are sheltering an unfair load? Just an example about how numbers can be made to tell different stories in politics. |
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| Dashboard Confessionals |
[Apr. 12th, 2006|10:50 am] |
Hey Everyone,
Dashboard Confessionals is coming to Peoria (Bradley Univ.) Sunday, April 23rd. Tickets are $20. Anyone interested in going? |
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| Weber, I am going to need your Ice Tea making skills |
[Apr. 10th, 2006|12:02 pm] |
It has been over a month since I last updated or even read anyone else’s journal entries. Lately with the coming of spring, I have been back in fix up house mode. I am the type of person that literally has to accomplish something everyday or I go nuts or feel unfulfilled. That is pretty much how I felt all winter since there was not much to do, so lately I have been making up for it.
This weekend I completed the lattice work around the front porch, which makes it look 100% better. I think I am going to get some flowers to plant around there and gay up the front of the house.
I hope to with in the next couple of weeks start to undertake the monumental task of replacing my basement foundation around the house to the French doors in the back. Here are the back breaking steps in doing that, that I would love as much help with as possible. The perk is that you learn the life skill of replacing basement foundations and I do not even charge you for the education.
- Build temporary 2x4 wall to support house when old wall is taken out. Slap high fives after this is done and take a break.
- Tear out old stone wall, and haul away. Grunt heavily while doing this.
- Dig out for new wall and foundation. Find local neighbor kids to do this portion of the work.
- Haul dirt up stairs out of basement. Do this with a broomstick handle over your shoulders and a bucket of dirt on each end
- Haul cement bags down to basement, mix and pour footing. Put hand prints in wet cement that will be buried 10 ft under ground.
- Haul cement blocks down to basement and build wall. Again, Grunt heavily while doing and slap high fives when done.
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| Bearitos |
[Mar. 6th, 2006|08:42 pm] |
So Misty made me this Mexican type dish tonight which was of course delicious. The thing most of you don’t know about Misty is that she is extremely health conscious and usually uses mostly organic foods. Some of these brands of foods are types that you have never heard of. So anyway, after dinner I go to take out the garbage and on top of the garbage was these Bearitos brand taco shells with a picture of a bear riding a donkey. Naturally, I found this hilarious and proceeded to laugh about it for the next five minutes. I especially love the fact that Bearitos is a word play on burritos yet the product is taco shells. I managed to find a picture on the internet to share.
http://www.sunsetwholesale.com/sunset/assets/big_images/0171391.jpg |
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| 80's Party Update |
[Mar. 6th, 2006|07:54 pm] |
Preparations for the 80's party are going well. Thus far, I have downloaded about 150 songs and there are still some more to go. I was set back a little since last week my computer was pretty messed up. I downloaded AVG antivirus (which is a good free program by the way) and it found like 18 viruses on my computer. The problem seems to be under control by now. Some of you may have been getting random instant messages from me that was caused by one of these viruses.
Yes, Weber I have been getting your song replies to the original 80's party entry. For now on you can post them to this one. I have spent some lout getting ready for this party. On Friday I spent about $200 on new surround sound speakers since my sub was taking a crap and last week I ordered this thing of line called a network digital media player which basically allows you to play music, videos or anything of your computer that is located somewhere else in the house on your TV and surround sound. That set me back another $225. Both things are things that I will get good use out of even after the party so I am not too upset. What are tax returns for anyway? Not for paying off credit cards, that’s for sure. I actually got the network thingy in the mail today and after about two hours of tinkering I got it working fine.
This is kind of random but, Misty and I decided a couple of weeks ago that it is easier for a girl to dress for and 80's party than a guy. Weird because most of the time with anything it is easier for a guy to dress.
Does anyone have any ideas for like 80's looking decorations? Or is this even needed? The only thing that I have got so far is one of those balls that hangs from the ceiling and shoots colors out everywhere. I'm going to go ahead and put the dining room table in the garage for this one.
In case anyone was wondering about refreshments, we are going to get a keg. |
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| Ah Yes |
[Mar. 5th, 2006|05:58 pm] |
Does anyone else while they are at work find themselves looking at the clock periodically throughout the day and they figuring out what percentage of their day is over?
Friday at work I had one of the dealers that I worked with send me an email that had the following metaphor in it:
"I am like a shiny nickel in a chicken yard getting pecked to death."
This was in relation to how busy he had been lately I gather. Just thought I would share this, because when I first read it I was like "what the hell does that mean?" Some of these John Deere dealers are pretty deep people. |
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| Baby look, I didn’t even use the puke bag |
[Mar. 5th, 2006|05:54 pm] |
So last night I went to Iowa City to hang out with some good friends. Most of the live journal users were all there. Apparently I drank entirely too much because I was feeling pretty awful. It has been along time since I have been like that and I am still wondering how I got that drunk because it did not seem like I drank that much. Then I thought, “Man I can’t remember one single conversation that I had with anyone after we went out to the bars.” Seriously though I think Weber slipped me a rufie.
One thing I do remember is walking the wrong way down Burlington and Weber having to come and get us. Damn street with its identical looking gas stations. The funny thing is that I know Iowa City pretty well, so I should have known where I was going.
So now I am going to go ahead and open the journal up to people telling me things that I did last night. |
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| The man is trying to put me down again... |
[Feb. 24th, 2006|04:50 pm] |
Now let me prerequisite this entry by saying that I do not believe that there are any truly bad professions, only bad people. Except maybe lobbyists or drug dealer if you consider drug dealer a profession. Maybe we should legalize it so that we can start taxing drug dealers on their income. I believe there are bad doctors, bad lawyers, bad politicians, bad police officers you name it. But I also believe there are many good doctors, good lawyers, good politicians and good police officers. Hell, there are probably even a couple of good insurance adjusters out their somewhere.
So last night around 12:45 I was driving Misty's jeep back from Mac's with Misty and Ron. Had I been drinking that night? Yes Was I intoxicated? Far from it. I do not like to drink that much on weekdays anyway since I have to get up at 6:45 and work the next day. So we left Mac's and I drove down the alley behind Mac's the Carriage House and Daltons and turned left onto Brady St. About half way up the hill I get pulled over by a police officer. We all thought this kind of strange thinking I had done no wrong.
So he comes up to the car and he goes through his whole spiel and I am all polite with him and then he tells me he pulled me over for reckless driving and that when I turned the corner I squealed my tires and he thought I was going kind of fast. The fact that I got over squealing my tires in high school like most people is beside the point. Then he says he was going to give me a warning for the speed since he didn't have me on radar or anything. Which I took as I was getting off.
So he takes all three of our licenses, and goes back to his car for awhile. During this time I joke with Ron and tell him it is probably taking so long because they are pulling up all of his dads outstanding warrants.
So then he comes back and gives me two tickets, one for the Misty's registration being out of date, which she will not have to pay if she takes her proof to the courthouse by a certain date and another one for $63 for reckless driving. Apparently I get a warning for the speed but not squealing my tires. Apparently this also happened at the Intersection of Main and 4th St since that is what the ticket says, despite the fact that I turned out of an alley directly onto Brady. I am pretty sure that he was sitting right after that bridge that eats trucks on Brady since that is where they always sit since I did not see any police officers when turning onto Brady.
This cop was nice guy and everything and I know he is just doing his job, I just honestly don't think I did anything wrong. I have taken speeding tickets to court before in which I was blatantly wrong and I will admit that to all of you. I am kind of pissed now. $63 is not that much money, but I am a man or principle so I will be taking this one to court. Plus with any driving violation, you run the risk of your insurance going up. I'm sure the old boys at Liberty Mutual start salivating when ever a ticket with the terms "Reckless Driving" comes through.
I think cops that time of night look for little excuses to pull people over so they can then nail them with a DUI. This relates to another experience I had with Kuch in IC a couple months ago.
Afterwards, I was like "didn't he say he was only going to give me a warning?" and Misty and Ron were both like, "I thought so."
Here is another thing and I do not mean to put down police officers. But why is it that when someone breaks into your car and you call the station, they take down a statement but send no one to the scene of the accident or investigate at all, or even try to relate it to other break ins in the area; but when someone is parked illegally in front of my house and a neighbor calls, they are there within 5 minutes writing a parking ticket. |
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| Justin Hawker Teaches You Not to Suck at Life |
[Feb. 20th, 2006|07:11 pm] |
Volume I - Don't Live In a Trailer and Own a Big Screen Television
Volume II - Investing
Investing - This may be boring, but I assure you it will help you not suck at life.
Did you know that you are going to need over a million dollars when you retire to live comfortably? The days of company pensions are over (thank you Republicans), so we have to take our own steps in retirement. Many of us at our age do not think about investing, thinking we do not make enough money right now to invest part of it. What is an even greater asset than money that we have however is time. That is right, when it comes to investing, time is more important than money! Check out these charts if you do not believe me. http://ww4.primerica.com/public/exceeds.html, http://ww4.primerica.com/public/high_cost.html
If you invest $3,000 a year from 22-28 (7 years) and then stop all together, that 21,000 investment will grow to $942,000 by the age of 62, and that is just if you stop investing. Imagine if you continued to pay into that. Conversely if you start investing $3,000 a year at age 29 until you are 62 (34 years) you will have $903,000 to show from your $102,000 investment.
How is this all possible? Compound interest, just like your money works against with debt, (I will pay almost $200,000 for my $80,000 mortgage if I make regular payments for 30 years for instance) it works for you with investing. The rule of 72 says that your money earning at a 12% interest rate (I believe 10% is average, but most mutual funds should beat that easily over time) will double every 6 years.
So how do you manage to put money away? It's easy, it's called "Paying Yourself." You treat it like a bill. I started putting $30 a month away towards the end of my senior year of college (I actually started with $300 in there because I cashed in my change jar.) Right now I have just over $1,000 put away and have just recently up'd my monthly contribution to $100 per month. In college I surely did not have that much money to put away, but what is $30 per month? A new trendy sweater, the latest Madden football game, exactly. You have to start somewhere, PAY YOURSELF! The money is automatically deducted from my account each month; I don't even have to write a check, just budget for it. I would honestly love to double that $100 amount, but there is some uncertainty with my current job situation so I am going to hold off until I am full time employed.
I may have mentioned this in an earlier journal entry, but do you ever feel like if you made $5 more an hour, that you could live very comfortably? Truth is, you would find a way to spend it and still not have the money to invest. The key is living below your means and making smart purchasing decisions that add to your equity (worth) as a person. A car for instance is a horrible investment; you pay $15,000 for a car with a 5 year loan which ends up costing you $20,000 all together. At the end of your 5 years, your car is probably worth $5,000. That's $5,000 equity you have to show for your $20,000 investment, not including costly repairs. Conversely if you invested that same $20,000 over the same period, you would have well over $30,000 to show for your $20,000. That's a $25,000 swing in 5 years people.
I do not know how to end this so I will just share how I invest my money some of this knowledge you may already posses I am sure. I invest in what is known as a Roth IRA. It is named after Senator William Roth (I want to say Delaware) and the IRA stands for Individual Retirement Account. It is actually a fairly new concept that has only been around about 5 or 6 years I believe. What makes a Roth IRA so appealing is that the money that you make off interest is not taxed. For instance, normally, if I make a million dollars, the govt. is going to take probably about $300,000 of that or 30%, because it is earnings. With a Roth IRA, they do not take anything; only thing is you can not touch the money until you are 59 1/2 without some sort of early withdraw fee. My Roth IRA is then invested into mutual funds. A mutual fund is a collection of different stocks, the idea being that if one of them is Enron and tanks, the rest of them can pull the load. A mutual fund usually has a fund manager that decides what all companies the mutual fund is divided among. I know my mutual funds used to be heavily weighted towards pharmaceutical companies which are huge money makers (once again, thank you Republicans) but is now only about 50% weighted towards that. Recently the fund manager as directed a lot of the money towards energy companies knowing that prices for energy are going up astronomically.
This is really something I believe should be taught at the High School level, not as an elective but a requirement. Shakespeare and world geography are important, but so is planning for our future. |
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