When traveling abroad, one thing you always need to look out for are the pick-pockets. Well, in London a new phenomenon has emerged called “Put-pockets”.  Rather than stealing your wallet, these former pick-pockets are sneaking small amounts of cash into the pockets/bags of unsuspecting folks.  It’s organized and the cops are aware of the plan.  So, if a pick-pocket gets caught, can he try and claim he was really just a put-pocket?

Giving to charity is certainly noble, but is it always the best thing? Well it might not be if your selected charity doesn’t get much of your dollar to the mission you think you’re supporting. But how do you know how well a charity does in this regard? Try Give Well. They rate charities on their efficiency in supporting their stated mission.

Kiplinger’s Personal Finance has a nice article called 20 Ways to Waste Your Money.  It’s an article that shows some ways to spend your money a little more wisely.  Some of the ideas have been discussed on this blog, but I found some other excellent points as well.  One point that was new to me was about using the dollar store.  I tend to avoid those stores, but it’s actually a good place to get greeting cards of 1/7 of the regular price.  I found the article good for all economic times, not just recessions.

A lot of businesses have been getting bailout money.  One organization that won’t need any would be the Ayn Rand Institute.  Apparently the financial crisis has led to a spike in the sales of Ayn Rand’s tome Atlas Shrugged.  Be sure to pick up your copy today.

Right.org has a slew of videos about the recent bailouts.  The site is of course opposed to the bailouts.  They are accepting submissions of anti-bailout videos for a $27,599 prize.  You can also calculate your share of the government bailout.

The Cato Institute recently released a text of a speech by Jeffrey Miron entitled “In Defense of Doing Nothing“ about the recent government bailouts.  Miron is a fellow at the Cato Institute and a professor of economics at Harvard University.  In his speech he makes the case that the bailout are the wrong course for solving the current economic problems and that the government caused more problems that greed run amok.  He makes several good points and challenges the idea that the bailout is a no-brainer.  It is a worthy read for anybody, whether you agree with the conclusions or not.  The article is linked above.

I hope everybody has had a chance to see the Sham-WOW commercial.  It’s become one of my personal favorites.  I think it’s Vincent the pitch man that really does it.  Here are two clips, first is the original commercial for the Sham-WOW, followed by somebody’s investigative look at the commercial (not the best, but at least he’s trying).  Whenever I see somebody like this on TV, I always make sure my wallet is safe.  Can’t trust ‘em. If anybody has tried the Sham-WOW I’d love to know if it actually works. Of course I’d love to test the product myself, but I don’t want to spend the money.

It’s that time of year for resolutions. Most of us have trouble sticking to them for more than a week, on a good year. There’s a website out that wants to help you put your money where your mouth is. It’s called stickk.com. In short you set a goal and name your price. If you meet your goal, you keep your money; fail, and it gets wired to a charity of your choice. Stickk.com was created by Yale professor Dean Karlan, who has put the idea into practice himself to achieve some exercise goals. Give it a try and let your money work for you.

I saw an interesting article from Yahoo/NY Times. I thought it was relevant for those out there buying new TVs wanting to get the most for their money. Apparently your TV might not be as big as you think; you’ll have to read the small print on the box. According to the article, TVs are measuring in at .5″ less than stated on the box. I guess that’s where rounding comes into play. My TV is about 6 years old and I just measured and it’s a quarter inch larger than advertised (27″), so I must have lucked out. Here’s the article in the NY Times.

Here’s a video from the Brookings Institution about the economic crisis.  I can’t say I agree with everything and I find the Cato videos to be more informative (call it bias).  I still thought it was worth watching.  Barry Bosworth is fiscal policy expert and worked in the Carter administration (his CV is available here).