USEFUL WEBSITES
bankrate.com, cnnmoney.com, moneycentral.msn.com & mymoney.gov provide timely articles and information about personal finance.
dinkytown.com provides calculators for everything from estimating your taxes to seeing how long it will take to pay off your credit cards.
savingforcollege.com As the name suggests, if you are trying to figure out how best to help fund your children’s education, this is the website for you.
vanguard.com, fidelity.com & schwab.com are three large, established discount brokerage houses.
napfa.org and garrettplanningnetwork.com can help in finding fee-based financial advisors.
Michelle Singletary is the personal finance columnist for The Washington Post. She also appears regularly on NPR and has a radio program on XM Satellite. This is good stuff!
Scott Burns is a nationally syndicated personal finance writer who dishes up great advice in plain English. His website is well worth spending some quality time meandering around!
RECOMMENDED BOOKS
General Personal Finance
Your Money or Your Life – by Joe Dominguez and Vicki Rubin. Have you ever found yourself asking, “Is this all there is?” If so, this book is for you. Your Money or Your Life is the seminal book on how to think about the trade-off between earning money and having time to enjoy the fruits of your labor.
Pay It Down! – by Jean Chatzky. No nonsense advice from a personal finance veteran on how to dig yourself out of debt. If you are struggling under the burden of credit card or other debt, this gem of a book will show you how – on as little as $10 a day – you truly can “pay it down.”
The Total Money Makeover – by Dave Ramsey. Straight-talking advice from the famed money coach and radio host. Dave takes a no holds barred approach to explaining how to have a balanced relationship with your money.
Investing
The Random Walk Guide to Investing – by Burton G. Malkiel. Legendary Princeton professor Burton Malkiel boils down years of academic research into a highly readable primer on the basics of investing. If you read just one book on investing, let this be it!
Stocks for the Long Run – by Jeremy J. Siegel. Highly lauded Wharton professor Jeremy Siegel explains in this classic work why stocks really are the best place to invest if your time horizon is longer than five or ten years. If the thought of investing in stocks gives you the willies, this book is the antidote.
The Little Book of Common Sense Investing – by John Bogle. Vanguard founder and highly acclaimed industry statesman John Bogle points out that when it comes to investing, common sense isn't so common. If you are interested in why index funds are so powerful, this book is for you.
The Sociology of Money
Green with Envy – by Shira Boss. Journalist Shira Boss takes the reader inside the “last taboo” and lays bare the relationship that real people, from a variety of backgrounds, have with their money. After reading this eye-opening book you will understand that more often than not when it comes money and possessions, “things are not what they seem.”
The Overspent American – by Juliet B. Schor. Harvard Professor Juliet Schor applies a scholar’s eye to the topic of excessive consumption. In this thoroughly researched work Schor explains both how and why Americans have ended up in a never-ending spiral of consumerism run amuck.
The Millionaire Next Door – by Thomas J. Stanley & William Danko. Think the average millionaire wears custom made suits and drives the latest model sports car? Think again. Stanley & Danko blow the lid off commonly held misperceptions about the wealthy with this bestselling book.
Career Advice
Getting from College to Career – by Lindsey Pollak. This gem of a book is chock full of actionable, practical, realistic advice... and not just for those right out of school. Even the "not-so-recent" grad can benefit from tips such as #15 (Shine Online), #76 (Think "And," Not "Or"), and our personal favorite, #68 (Follow Every Rainbow). A whip smart Yalie who has herself done a bang up job of getting from college to career, Lindsey Pollak is a woman to be listened to! We only wish this delightful book had been around when we were graduating from college ;
The Anti 9-to-5 Guide – by Michelle Goodman. If you've ever longed for the wide open spaces of a self-directed career, this delightful book is for you. Whether you want to pursue a hobby/project on the side or do a complete career 180, Michelle Goodman's book will give you the roadmap. It's chocked full of powerful advice on the range of questions that inevitably pop up on a such a journey (What do I really want to do with my career? How do I prepare financially for a transition? Where do I get started???). If you've got the urge to "flee the cube," this book will lead you out into the light.
Making Work Work – by Julie Morgenstern. So you like your job, but you want to be more productive...or get more confidence...or move up the ladder, you get the point. Written by a woman who knows how to get even the most chaotic person organized, this book will help you take your work to the next level with sensible, clear-cut strategies.
ON MY OWN TWO FEET Financial Empowerment Club Guide
• Get Empowered: Own Your Finances & Own Your Life
ON MY OWN TWO FEET Sample Budget Template
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PRESENTATION POWERPOINT
• ON MY OWN TWO FEET: Three Power Steps to Financial Success
Sources For Banner Statistics
90% of women will find themselves the sole keeper of their personal finances at some point in their lives From “Women and Finance Statistics,” put out on 4/2/05 by the Nevada State Treasurer’s Office. They cite an Oppenheimer Funds Study as the original source of this statistic. This stat is also cited in “June Cleaver, Do You Know Where Ward Keeps the Family’s Financial Records? Many Women Ill-Prepared to Handle Personal Finances,” an article that appeared on Pioneer Thinking on 4/30/05. They in turn cite the National Center for Women & Retirement at Long Island University (800-426-7386) as their source.
Study after study shows money as the #1 source of fights in a marriage, divorce, and general stress. From page 35 of Jean Chatzky’s Make Money, Not Excuses. MP Dunleavy sites a similar statistic in her 10/22/05 New York Times article “Debunking The Myths of Budgeting” in which she cites a survey of 1,000 women by the Consumer Federation of America which found that 71% of respondents worried about money. Shira Boss sites a similar statistic on page 13 of Green With Envy, citing a 3/31/04 survey by the American Psychological Association called “As Tax Deadline Approaches Americans Say Money is Number One Cause of Stress.”
Over 70% of Americans live essentially paycheck-to-paycheck. From the American Payroll Association’s “National Payroll Week 2005 Survey.” In this 9/9/05 survey of 29,955 individuals, a whopping 73.9% of respondents said they would find it “very” or “somewhat” difficult to meet their current financial obligations if their paycheck were delayed by a week (americanpayroll.org).
Only 40% of Americans have even tried (let alone succeeded at) living on a budget. From a written statement to the House Committee on Financial Services called “Generations Working Together: Financial Literacy & Social Security Reform” as prepared by The Employee Benefit Research Institute and the American Saving Education Council dated 4/20/06 (ebri.org and choosetosave.org).
For 2/3rds of women over the age of 65, meager Social Security checks are their primary source of retirement income. Statistic from National Women’s Law Center. nwlc.org Also cited at Women’s Institute for a Secure Retirement wiser.heinz.org.
In an average year, the typical person has around $2,000 of unexpected expenses; yet the average woman between ages 24 and 35 has only $500 in savings. From April 2005 study results released by Consumer Federation of America (consumerfed.org).
