Penelope Trunk’s Brazen Careerist. Advice at the intersection of work and life.
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Browsing category "Money"

New financial data highlights generational rifts

Posted to: Fulfillment |  Money |  Time management
May 31st, 2007
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A group of think tanks, lead by the Pew Charitable Trusts, found that for the first time, men in their 30s are earning less than their parents. For the first time ever, this generation will not be more well-off financially than their parents. What should we make of this new finding? Does this [...]

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Twentysomething: Paychecks are boring

Posted to: Fulfillment |  Goal setting |  Money
April 25th, 2007
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By Ryan Healy — Unless you are a professional athlete or working on Wall Street, an entry-level salary is not very exciting. When you couple this with the fact that the average college student graduates with tens of thousands in student loan and credit card debt and the cost of renting a place in [...]

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You don't need to love risk-taking to start your own business

Posted to: Entrepreneurship |  Money
April 23rd, 2007
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A lot of people who would like to start a business think the task is too daunting. But following a passion is not as high risk as you may think. Conventional wisdom about entrepreneurs being big risk takers and living on the edge is not all that realistic. In fact, there are ways to minimize [...]

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Use money to buy time

Posted to: Money |  Time management
April 18th, 2007
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Time is more important than money. You think that you know this, but you probably don't act on it as much as you could. If you spend your time buying material things then you are using up the one thing that can make you happy (time) on things that definitely don't make you happy (stuff).
In [...]

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My financial history, and stop whining about your job

Posted to: Career fulfillment |  Money
March 19th, 2007
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I tell people all the time to change their job if they don't like it, and people tell me this is totally impractical advice. A lot of people write to me to say that my advice only applies to rich people. Or they tell me that single parents, families living paycheck to paycheck, people in [...]

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Yahoo column: Deductive reasoning for the modern taxpayer

Posted to: Money |  Working from home
March 1st, 2007
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It's tax time, and every year I think to myself that I should be deducting everything. Really. All my income comes from freelance writing, and since there's almost nothing in my life that I don't write about, maybe I can deduct everything.
After years of thinking I should do this but not really doing it, I [...]

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Financial freedom is outdated; try optimism instead

Posted to: Fulfillment |  Money
December 22nd, 2006
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I am sick of advice about how to achieve financial freedom. Freedom from what? I have asked some people, who I will not link to, since I'm dissing them, and the most common answer is that they want to be able to make decisions about their life based on what they want, not on what they can [...]

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Taking good care of a family is relative

Posted to: How to blog |  Money |  Parenting
September 7th, 2006
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In response to my musings about what it means to be a blogger who is just a blogger, Alexandra Levit sent me an article about bloggers who support themselves blogging. I read it twice. Then I started checking out all the blogs, trying to uncover the secret of the million-dollar blog.
Here is what I uncovered: [...]

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What to do in college to be successful in your career

September 3rd, 2006
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For those of you about to start another year at school, here's a list of things to keep in mind: Twenty things to do in college to set yourself up for a great job when you graduate.
1. Get out of the library.
"You can have a degree and a huge GPA and not be ready [...]

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Your family would be better off with a housewife (so would mine)

Posted to: Fulfillment |  Money |  Parenting |  Women
August 27th, 2006
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Men should not marry women who have careers, according to an opinion piece at Forbes.com. The statistics are clear:
"Marrying these women is asking for trouble. If they quit their jobs and stay home with the kids, they will be unhappy (Journal of Marriage and Family, 2003). They will be unhappy if they make more money [...]

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Three more ways to think about career happiness

August 22nd, 2006
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If you ask most people if they like their jobs, they'll say yes. Alan Kreuger — scintillating economics professor at Princeton, whom I interviewed this morning — says that this is not because people have jobs they like, but because people have cognitive dissonance and are hard-programmed to like what they have.
On the positive side, [...]

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I'm moving out of New York City

August 10th, 2006
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It used to be that people moved to where their job was. But where you live has a lot of impact on how happy you are. So it makes sense that today people pick a city first and then find a job, and cities maven Wendy Waters thinks this trend will increase. I will be [...]

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How much money do you need to be happy? Hint: Your sex life matters more

Posted to: Finding a career |  Knowing yourself |  Money
August 3rd, 2006
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How much money buys happiness? A wide body of research suggests the number is approximately forty thousand dollars a year. Daniel Gilbert, professor of psychology at Harvard University, says once you have enough money to meet basic needs – food, shelter, but not necessarily cable —incremental increases have little effect on your happiness.
Aaron Karo, comedian [...]

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How to get a raise

Posted to: Leadership |  Managing Up |  Money |  Negotiating
July 18th, 2006
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You do not deserve a raise just because you have been doing your job well for x amount of months. It is your job to do your job well. That's why you were hired.
Also, do not complain about your salary not being at market rate six months after you take your job. Because if you [...]

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How to find happiness: Listen to scientists who study it

July 18th, 2006
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We spend so much energy trying to decide what career will make us happy, what job to take, what kind of boss we need. But today happiness is actually a science, and we can teach ourselves to make better decisions faster based on what we know about happiness.
This science of happiness is such a popular [...]

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The workplace favors athletes, so do your best to be one

Posted to: College students |  Money |  Women
July 10th, 2006
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Here's some career advice. Stop obsessing about how smart you are. Instead, get some exercise and you'll perform better at work — athletes do better in the workplace than non-athletes. Even off the field. This advice is true in a wide range of scenarios — across age groups, job descriptions, and types of exercise.
Athletes make [...]

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How to reach the new American dream

June 26th, 2006
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American dream has changed. It used to be a college education, a steady job, a nice house (and a family to fill it), and a better financial picture than your parents. There is a new American Dream that is still about "doing better than your parents" but not in a financial sense. This dream is [...]

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Moving back home with your parents is a good career move

Posted to: Finding a career |  Goal setting |  Job Hunt |  Money
May 15th, 2005
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In the list of what’s hot and what’s not, blowing all your money on an overpriced apartment is out and sleeping on the twin bed at your parents’ house is in. Bobby Jackson is a senior at Williams College who will graduate this June. He will move back to Washington, D.C. after graduation and look [...]

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Career change is inevitable, so plan for it

May 7th, 2005
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Everyone should plan for a change in career. Statistically, you are likely to wish you could change. Financially, you are likely to be too scared to take action, unless you plan for change early, before you want to make a leap.
Today people start working when they are 22 and don’t stop until they are 65 [...]

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Preparing for a layoff

Posted to: Money |  Office Politics
May 3rd, 2005
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My husband is probably about to be laid off. It’s a touchy topic, though, and he is not very chatty about it, so I am left to guess. What he has told me is that that his company is out of money, but the CEO thinks she might be able to drum up more funds [...]

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