slice of koh

As the first day of 2010 is about to come to an end, I have spent some time today thinking about new year’s resolutions for 2010.  I don’t really recall past new year’s resolutions or whether I have fulfilled them or not, so this time I want to have something concrete and actionable for 2010.

Rather than resolutions, I should call them goals because I’m not drastically changing my personality, morals or lifestyle.  I want to have a set of actionable goals that I can meet in 2010 and feel proud that I accomplished then in a year.

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While I was wandering on the internet and checking on my investment portfolio, I noticed that Google added “Google Domestic Trends” to the left sidebar in the Google Finance page.  Upon opening the sidebar, I became incredibly fascinated by the charts.  They track queries related to key search terms by category and indexed to January 1, 2004.  You can overlay stocks or major indices like the Nasdaq or Dow over these trends. Behold the power of Google mining billions of people’s worth of search data.  My favorite categories are “Investing” and “Unemployment.”  Five years from now, people will look back on this in awe.

I’m facing the same question myself.  The Dow Jones Index has reached levels not seen since I was in seventh grade.  Who thought that would happen?  The investor mantra is to buy low and sell high.  One would think this is a great opportunity for a young investor like myself.

Before you ever consider investing in the stock market especially if you recently graduated, there are five questions you should ask yourself before making committing your precious cash to this investment decision.

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Below is an entertaining yet informative video on the credit crisis.

[vimeo]http://www.vimeo.com/3261363[/vimeo]

Now I know why people turn conservative once they start earning money.  It’s pretty shocking how much gets taken out of one’s paycheck from taxes of all sorts.  The new stimulus package includes about $790 billion in spending.  In other words, they will be spending about $2600 per person  assuming that there are little more than 300 million people living in the United States.  

Here’s the fun part.  It looks like I will only get some part of the $400 tax credit per year for 2009 and 2010.  So what happened to the rest of the $2200?  According to WSJ and AP, It seems like it will be funneled to the following items or people:

1. Unemployment benefits

2. Subsidy for someone else’s health insurance

3. One-time extra Social Security payment

4. People who buy new cars

5. First-time homeowners

6. Higher education and Public Education

7. Infrastructure

8. Alternative energy research

9. Environment

10. Police

Am I bitter?  A little bit.  There is really no incentive for me to help stimulate the economy.  It looks like I’ll focus on paying off my student loans.