So, I have a few friends who like to gamble (did my Super Bowl betting post about my friend who won $1500 on the Giants’ safety give that away) but, surprisingly, that hasn’t translated into many games of credit card roulette. There are a few varieties of the game but the basic gist is that you go out, get some food, and when the bill comes, everyone throws in a credit card. The server takes out cards, one by one with a lot of drama, and the last one in there pays the bill. The last time I played was a few weeks ago at a local bar, it was only four people, it was really really exciting, and it was really really awesome when my friend Drew lost.

Hey Drew – thanks for the oysters, beer, and dinner!

What do you think about credit card roulette? Stupid and silly? Or should I have to claim that win on my taxes?

(Photo: stoneflower)

Tell a few personal finance bloggers that you keep cash in your house and you will invariably be asked why. Why keep cash in your account when you can put it into a high yield savings account and earn a percent of interest? What if there is a fire? What if you get robbed? Why not put it in the warm embrace of FDIC insurance at th ebank?

I don’t keep much, usually only one or two hundred dollars, and the reason I do so is so I can get cash easily if I need it, whatever the reason. I don’t keep a lot, I don’t see the point given credit cards, but I do want to keep a little for those times when cash is king and credit can’t be accessed. I’m talking about those rare cases, like a black out or a big snowstorm (like the major snowstorm a few years ago in the Baltimore Washington metropolitan area), where you need some cash but just can’t get to a bank.

To be perfectly honest, the number one reason I do this is because I’m lazy. I don’t really think that there will be a calamity where I won’t be able to get to an ATM or use a credit card, but sometimes I’m going out somewhere and I need cash but don’t want to make a trip to the ATM. It’s nice to have a few bills at home so that I can tap that reserve instead of make that trip. That’s why I keep some money stored away at home, instead of earning a few pennies at the bank.

One final bit of warning, cash is usually not completely insured by your homeowners or renter’s insurance. So if you are robbed and they take cash, or there is a fire and the money burns, you may be limited in how much cash is covered – that amount will be listed in your policy. I don’t recommend keeping thousands of dollars at home, but a few hundred will probably be covered by your policy.

Do you keep cash at home? If so, why?

(Photo: amagill)

The WSJ Wealth Report blog talked about a Pew Research Center study that attempted to find the origins of the conflict between rich and poor, which has been playing out in the headlines lately. While the main story talked about the impression of significant conflict between the rich and poor, the part that interested me was the same one that caught Robert Frank’s eye – did the rich get rich from hard work or their social network? That poll showed that 46% of respondents thought they were born with money or knew the right people, while 43% thought hard work, ambition or education was the root reason.

There obviously isn’t a definite answer, there will probably never be, but the question is an intriguing one. My belief is that both are necessary and the more you have of either, the higher your probability for finding success. Whether that success comes in the form of money or in the form of achievements, it’s hard to argue that you can be successful without hard work, ambition, education, or knowing the right people. Whether you’re rich depends on where you point yourself. You can be a successful philanthropist and not have a high net worth, you’d still be seen as very successful, you just chose a different path.

What do you think?

A recent Gallup poll asked, among other things, respondents how much income they would need to earn a year in order to feel rich. 70% of the respondents that gave a number (10% didn’t give a number) said they would need to earn $100,000 or more with the median number being $150,000. 4% said over a million dollars and 11% said a million dollars. Compare this to 2004, the last time Gallup did a similar poll, and back then $120,000 was the median number, which happens to be $147,665.87 if you adjust for inflation (BLS CPI calculator). The median annual household income, according to the US Census, is around $50,000.

What’s interesting about this poll and the answers is that the median result didn’t change much despite everything that has happened since 2003. In 2003, we were still working out aftermath of the dot com bubble and 9/11 but the stock market was improving after hitting its lows in late 2002. Hopefully we’re going through the same today having seen the lows already.

Here comes the obvious question… how much income do you think you’d need to earn to feel rich?

(Photo: nowhere77)

With the economy as rough a shape as it’s been, a lot of folks are turning towards frugal gift ideas this year. These are gifts that a frugal in the sense they don’t cost a lot of money but what they do replace with dollars and cents is oftentimes worth so much more. A gift doesn’t have to be expensive, it just has to have a lot of thought, care, and creativity in order to be a great gift. As we hunker down and try to end another tough economic year, things like homemade gifts will probably make many an appearance on Christmas day.

What is the best frugal Christmas gift that you’ve given or received? Or even just saw or heard about?

(Photo: Joriel “Joz” Jimenez)

There have been a lot of technology initial public offerings (IPO) this year and they’ve gotten a ton of press. It reminds me of the tech bubble over a decade ago when anything with a .com could IPO and skyrocket in the first day. This year we’ve seen plenty from LinkedIn to Pandora to Groupon and while the first day’s gains were pretty big, subsequent days saw the price fall. The latest hot technology stock IPO to get press is social gaming giant Zynga with their plan to raise as much as $1 billion in an IPO. The plan is to offer 100 million shares at $8.50 to $10, which values the company at around $7 billion. All of those deals would pale in comparison to the looming Facebook IPO.

I’ve never invested in an IPO on that first day (or first month…) and I doubt I ever will. I always see this as gambling because for every skyrocketing day-1 stock there is a ho-hum lackluster day-1 stock. Very rarely do you see a situation like Google where you have IPO at $85, it has a huge pop the first few days and is worth over $600 just a few years later. Just look at Pandora and Groupon today, just a short time after their IPO, and you can see how just holding onto it a little longer could take gains and turn them into losses. Would you take the day-1 gains and be happy? Or would you hold (and guess) hoping for a Google story? That’s why I don’t take part, I’m a bad gambler and an even worse guesser.

I’ll stick with my boring dividend stocks. Do you buy into IPOs?

Here’s a statistic that is always surprising and this year was no different – the average American worker gets 14 vacation days a year and only uses 12 of them. That adds up to 226 million unused vacation days, or approximately $34.3 billion dollars of work. That’s amazing. It’s not that surprising though as we are in one of the worst periods of unemployment in quite some time and many people are probably cutting back on vacation days in order to be more productive. It’s not exactly fair but it’s human nature, if I’m concerned about getting fired then the last thing I’m going to do is take a vacation day. I’m going in to work harder and longer so I can show I’m a valuable asset to the team.

That said, have you used up all your vacation days?

You know I skipped Black Friday (and I stuck to my guns for another year – nothing enticed me anyway) but that doesn’t mean you can’t brag about some loot you scored because you were the early bird.

Did you get anything particularly good this year that you want to brag about? Or just have a good story of something you saw?

Or, if you were like me, did you skip it entirely?

(Not sure what happened but this didn’t up as scheduled on Friday morning … )

They say, sunlight is the best disinfectant. For years, I’d read about how members of Congress were exempt from your typical insider trading rules. If a company insider were to make trades on private insider information, and they were caught, there would be serious consequences. They’d have to pay restitution and, most likely, receive probation or jail time. If they were a member of Congress, well, nothing would happen to them. I’d always been perplexed by this but, in the past, no one had done anything particularly egregious with that “get out of jail free” card.

Then 60 Minutes put it center stage. Last Sunday, they aired a piece about members of Congress profiting from private information and how that was completely legal.

Here’s the funny part… we’ve known about this for years. I certainly heard about this many years ago but it’s one of those things where members of Congress know that it would be extremely embarrassing if they traded on insider information and they were caught. Considering how much money they can make by taking on new roles after office, like becoming lobbyists, it seems silly to make just a few bucks while you’re in office and put that in jeopardy. That was always my thinking anyway.

Anyway, Senator Scott Brown of Massachusetts filed a bill in Congress that would remove that exemption. I think it’s a good idea, what do you think?

I was reading a short little piece on $1 Megabus tickets when I thought back to my experience with one of these buses. I forget the name of the company (it was neither Megabus or Bolt Bus) but I purchased a $20 ticket from Baltimore to New York City to visit my parents when, before leaving Baltimore, the bus broke down. The oil cap had broken and the bus driver was trying to find a way to cap it, including stuffing a rag in it, so that he could make the trip. He only spoke Mandarin Chinese and I acted as translator for him and the passengers. It was a disaster and I opted to not take the bus since I’d rather skip the trip than face potential breakdown on the New Jersey Turnpike!

The most amazing part of that ordeal was one passenger who said “This has happened to me four times, this is unbelievable!” To which I thought to myself… I would’ve stopped using this company after the second time, assuming the first was a fluke. The Megabus and Bolt Buses look much nicer and with Megabus being owned by Coach USA, I’m inclined to believe they’re a more professional and well-run organization.

That said, have you taken one of these buses and what did you think of it?

(Photo: paul_lowry)