Michael asks…
Do you guys agree with me that the future of the NBA is dark?
Based on how things are going, the future of the NBA is very VERY dark.
LeBron and Wade and the Heat will most likely get home court advantage in the regular season. But in the playoffs, the Celtics will dominate them once again, like usual.
Then in the Finals, once again, the Lakers will play best when their best is needed the most, and the Lakers will most likely once again 3-peat.
Then in the next few years, the Lakers and Celtics will get old, and Miami and probably New York will dominate (Melo, Amare, maybe CP3). It’ll get boring watching the same teams win again and again.
Maybe LeBron doesn’t win any rings in his career because he wasted 7 years in the craphole called Cleveland.
These days, players coming into the NBA are more about money and weed than basketball.
At this rate, the NBA will be out of business in 7-8 years.
Am I being pessimistic, or do you agree?
Nagesh answers:
Are you serious?
Rose, Durant, Griffin, Gordan, Westbrook, Evans, etc.
The future looks nice.
Steven asks…
Mortgages finance question?
The sovereign debt crisis in Europe and a slowing US economy have dented consumer and business confidence in the western world. There has been an increase in talks of a possible recession in the U.S and the likely effects of it on the Canadian economy. In the midst of this, your family friend Ms. Hazel Diego and her fiancé have decided to purchase their dream home. Their dream home is listed for $900,000; if they decide to purchase the house this week they can get an additional $30,000 off the list price. They do not want to pay CMHC (Canadian Mortgage and Housing Corporation) insurance premium and have decided to make a 25% down payment (which is 5% higher than the minimum required to avoid the insurance premium).
Hazel and her fiancé follow macro events globally and have friends that work in the investment industry. Based on their own research and recommendation made by friends they feel we potentially have a banking crisis unfolding in Europe and that the US will either go into a recession or at best be in stall speed (1%-2% GDP growth) for several years. The banking crisis in Europe coupled with a recession/stall speed in the U.S will lead to a global economic slowdown and potentially reduce the demand for commodities and other services. This global slowdown can negatively affect the Canadian economy, which in turn will force the Bank of Canada to keep interest rates at current levels or do further monetary easing.
Following are the two mortgage rates offered by a local bank in Toronto that they can choose to finance their purchase:
1.5-year fixed rate mortgage at 3.95% or
2.5-year variable rate mortgage at prime minus 0.50%.
Hazel knows you are taking ADMS 3530 at York University and she has come to you for advice. Below are the questions she needs help with:
Questions:
a)How much will be the principal outstanding on the mortgage at the end of five years under the two options? (10 marks)
b)If Hazel and her fiancé decide to increase their bi-weekly payments by $50, how much sooner can they expect to be mortgage-free under both the scenarios? (10 marks)
Assume prime rate in Canada is 3.0%, mortgage payments are bi-weekly, amortization period is twenty-five years and interest rates stay at current levels over the next five years.
Nagesh answers:
First, To avoid having to pay CMHC you only need to put down 20% of the purchase price.
Assumptions:
Purchase price is $870,000.
Your lender requires 25% down payment ($217,500)
Mortgage amount $652,500
Variable at the end of 5 years you would owe $552,262
Fixed at the end of 5 yeras you would owe $567,532
b) and extra $50 a payment to a variable rate mortgage would be paid off 1 year and 2 months faster
add an extra $50 a month payment to the fixed rate and it would be paid off 1 year and 3 months faster
Susan asks…
Is insurance a worse scam than Social Security?
Insurance is a con. Worse than Social Security, even – because you pay in and (normally) never get anything back.
Consider: You pay say $800 a year to insure your car. Over a ten year period that comes to $8,000. Gone. Out the window. You’ll never see it again.
Think about this. Most people don’t have major accidents. Insurance companies know this – and bank on it. For every dollar they pay out (grudgingly and after much-ado, usually) they take in probably ten more. Insurance companies are hugely profitable enterprises. I won’t call them businesses, because businesses – properly described – provide a useful product or service. They also don’t force you to to be a “customer,” as insurance companies do, having successfully egged on their bought-and-paid for agents in state government (that is, politicians) to pass laws making insurance “coverage” mandatory.
It is no coincidence that the bankrupting of America has tracked parallel with the rise of FIRE (Finance, Insurance, Real Estate). When you add up car, life, health and home insurance, many people are spending $10,000 a year or more for …. nothing! They’ve been gulled into believing they’re “covered” but they’ll be disabused of that notion if they ever have to file a claim. Yes, the insurer might pay… something… eventually. But if it does, it will also double – or cancel – your premiums for future “coverage.” Ask anyone who has filed a major claim. Even after decades of just paying in. As soon as the math starts working out in favor of the insured – even a little bit – the terms of the relationship are swiftly altered to correct the imbalance.
Now let’s talk about car insurance specifically. It was made mandatory on the argument that it’s just not right to permit people to operate potentially lethal and always dangerous motor vehicles on public motorways without the driver having the means to compensate potential victims for any damages or injuries he might cause.
But that was just window dressing. The real motive was to create a coerced and captive “customer” base that had no choice but to pay up. Government-enforced cartels are secure from market pressure; they don’t have to worry about pleasing people – because the people have no choice. Oh, they can shop Tweedledee, perhaps. But he’s not much of an improvement over Tweedledum.
read the rest: http://www.lewrockwell.com/peters-e/peters-e40.1.html
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I’ve long felt the same way about insurance (actually, I’m much more opposed to insurance than the author of this article is). Most people who purchase insurance are basically just throwing their money away. Basically, you would be better off if you took all the money you use to purchase insurance and stuffed it under your mattress (although that isn’t a good idea because the Dollar’s value is only heading down and I doubt it will ever increase in value again).
I agree that the rise of “finance” and real estate as major sectors of the economy has been disastrous. The entire “finance” industry is basically backed by the Federal Reserve’s policy of endless inflation. The finance industry is a “good investment” during the artificial booms (fueled by the Fed), but when the inevitable crash hits, you will lose your money. Real estate was just a massive bubble which fraudulently sold consumption goods as “the best investment you can buy” (does this remind you of today’s college advertising?) and got a bunch of suckers deep in debt to the banks.
Nobody my age (early 20s) who isn’t wholly ignorant of reality (and yes, there are many people my age whom that description applies to) looks at Social Security as anything other than a Ponzi scheme that will transfer our wealth from us to our parents (who blew their wealth on real estate, insurance, and on dubious investments with the finance industry). Nobody under 30 will ever see a penny from Social Security (I doubt anybody under 40 will). One of these days, people will look back at the Obamacare debate and see how the Democrats compared that debacle to the even worse debacles of Social Security and Medicare (as if these were good things!) and be horrified that people actually held such views. Yet, the insurance industry is even worse than Social Security when it comes to cheating people out of their money for little or nothing in return. It is truly sad that people are willing to hand over their money (and other things much more valuable than money) for nothing more than (often empty) promises of “security.”
Nagesh answers:
Like most people, you don’t seem to have the slightest idea about the value of insurance. It most certainly is a good business, and if you’ve ever been sued for damages you’d understand that. Contrary to your statement they do NOT take in ten dollars for every dollar paid out in claims. They do make a profit, and they allow many Americans to reduce their risk by sharing risk over a larger pool of people. For example, Liberty Mutual had an underwriting profit of $0.006 for every dollar in premiums they received – a small fraction of a percent in profit:
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-02-16/liberty-mutual-profit-jumps-22-to-576-million-on-private-equity-rebound.html
Even under the most aggressive accounting, Liberty Mutual paid out $20B in claims, benefits, and expenses* on $30B in revenues (not including operating costs and amortization, which came to ~$9B). (A claim is what the insurance company pays you for; a benefit is like a free rental car while yours is being fixed; an expense is like the cost of lawyers and claims people to go out to a home site after an incident.) Most of the money for these expenses ends back in the policyholders’ hands.
See page 36 of their annual report for details (page 38 of the PDF):
http://www.libertymutualgroup.com/omapps/ContentServer?c=cms_document&pagename=LMGroup%2Fcms_document%2FShowDoc&cid=1239994248881
Insurance is far better than Social Security – I seriously doubt that I’ll ever see a penny of that money. And even those who receive their money in return only get a fraction of the value of the money they put into the system – years later and without interest.
Lisa asks…
major problems at work lots of opinions please urgent?
Ive been having problems with two guys at work. well call them jack and sam. Now for quite awile jack has been harassing me at work. he has tried blocking me in the freezer multiple times, tried running me over with the cherry picker, hit me with frozen boxes of food big ones, hit me with edges of cardboard, threatened and tried hitting me with metal poles and broom handles, hit me with flyswatters, ect. he has repeatedly told me on a daily bases i will never make as much as him and that the department doesnt need me. on top of that a new guy was (sam) and has been siding with jack by saying nasty things towards me. Ive been constantly complained at by my manager for working to slow, but its hard to put effort into a job because of this. despite the fact i have worked very fast and put alot of the effort into this job 98 percent of the time but jack has and continues to take credit and hide my work. He has been in the dairy department since the store opened 4 years ago and he is considered by them as their “best and most valuable worker” and he gets lots of congrats medals and gets lots of power in that department.
growing sick of this i finally decided to report it to the store director and human resources department there. they told me the first week they would move me to a new department. two weeks went by more hitting and harassment. i went again and asked what was being done. they told me that i need to provide them with dates and times of when this happens. i told them its hard to come up with dates when i was afraid of going against my store to begin with for fear of them sideing with jack over me. but i said just pick a day when we work together and look cuz he has done it almost everytime we work together.
i waited another few days. looked at the schedual one day and found out the next day i was working with jack and sam together this time. i went in before work and talked to the high ups again. they let me work a few hours and go home early before both guys came to work.
now the store director called me in today and talked to me. mind you in the beginning they wouldnt listen to me completely and said they cannot go by word of mouth. well now they did go by word of mouth. they asked other employees (of which i dont know of course) about the problems between me and these other guys. the employees said it was a two way street and that i had pushed and hit jack as well. my store director said that i was to tell him the truth and that if i didnt i would be fired. i said he has hit me and i have never physically touched him. why would i as this is a job i depend on for food and bills. he said so your just and innocent bystander that jack harasses? i said yes i take it smile and keep working. so as a result i am getting written up and moved (pretty much demoted) to a cart pusher. on top of that i have no clue what my schedual is as my store director said that he must go confirm once again that the other employees said that i have pushed and hit jack and if they say yes i will be fired. i asked when i worked next and the store director said we will call you and tell you when you work.. giving them time to see if im fired or not… for no reason.
my gf and my father suggest that since my gf is getting a new job making twice as much as what we make now together i quite my job now when she starts unless they fire me before that, go get my dipoma (please no comments about that), work on the businesses i am currently working on building online, and either get a new job when i get my diploma or go to collage. and in the mean time file for unemployment as well.
opinons please and what would be my rights and the best thing to do? i know i didnt hit this kid, he has hit me many many times and many times leaving bruises i know i should have taken pics of but i never came to mind. and now my job is going against me and this jack and sam both still have their job and nothing affecting them out of this really.
Nagesh answers:
Sounds like you are being bullied and of course your line manager has a duty of care to you, unfortunately its your word against the other person, does anyone witness this bullying ?
Ken asks…
Husband-to-be cheating…how do i confront him?
It would mean the world if you can help me out here. I recently posted another question, regarding my engagement status. I have been with someone for a very long time, and he’s been nothing but great to me. We both based our relationship on honesty and trust. Once, we were talking about our relationships in the past, and even though I told him I had been with several guys before him, he told me that I was the FIRST woman he’d ever fallen in love with and gotten into a serious relationship with. (NOTE: THIS IS A VERY IMPORTANT PART OF MY STORY) He denied ever being in a relationship with a woman. This made me admire him even more.
Since we live together, we were planning our wedding schedules and all the dates and numbers.
For a few months he was coming home late. Blaming his work. Sometimes he said he was at a friends house and etc. I kind of got suspicious for whatever reason.
For a few weeks, I asked him to stay more at home and help with the wedding arrangements. He agreed. One night, he was taking a shower, and his computer was on Facebook. He told me he’d take a quick shower, then get dressed to take me out on a dinner date on our anniversary. As he was away, I heard a msg pop in his browser. I ignored it as it was none of my business. But several messages kept coming and made me wonder if someone really wanted to talk to him. It was a woman, I had never met or heard of, and she was begging him to take her back and that she would promise to be better than me (his fiancee). It was a little shocking. I am not a person to invade privacies, but this was outrageous. In a moment of emotional rush, I checked his message history. I couldn’t believe my eyes. He had been with, at least 20 girls in the past, and I’m talking about serious relationships. There were flirtatious messages he had sent to girls he did not know. And there were extremely dirty messages involved.
When my fiance came out of the shower i told him I had a very bad headache and we stayed indoors.
The thing is, I couldn’t care less if he had been with a thousand girls if he told me the truth from the beginning. He told me I was the first woman involved in his life… to find out there were at least a dozen more women in his life and that he lied about them…just broke my heart, considering that my BEST friend from childhood was one of these random girls he’d sent messages to.
I need to talk to him and confront him about lying to me. AGAIN I wouldnt care about the girlfriends if he had come clean from the beginning. I’m not sure how to confront him… would you please help me out? Im outraged and disappointed in him 🙁
Thanks everyone
Thanks so much Sue C and Tia, your answers really calmed me down. Feels as if someone understands where I’m coming from.
However, for those who question my morals, please don’t post rude or irrelevant posts. It really doesn’t solve or help anything in this situation. I am a lady and a gentleman’s daughter and I have my own morals.
Nagesh answers:
I am one firm believer in that things DO happen for reasons. I feel you were meant to find all this out & this is the way you unfortunately or fortunately did. IF he is STILL getting messages from another female, this means he IS STILL doing it behind your back! He not only lied prior, he’s lying now. The way this all happened is one PERFECT way for you to bring it ALLL up…everything! Do not accept the unacceptable! When you talk to him, say what you mean, mean what you say. Look him directly into his eyes when you’re talking to him. Honey, getting this ALL out now is a must. This definitely did happen for a reason, take full advantage of it & get to the bottom of it ALL…Let him know the thing that hurts the most is he was & still is being dishonest with you….I SO wish you the best…:)
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