Some links of interest

I've been doing some reading this morning and thought I'd highlight some posts that I enjoyed . . .

• JLP of AllFinancialMatters shows why investing in the stock market should be a long-term strategy. Great post! What fascinated me is how lousy some of the periods involving the 1970s were . . . I knew none would be negative, but with inflation they got pretty damn close.
• Jim at Blueprint for Financial Prosperity asks, is Zecco a scam? He seems to be leaning toward "no" as his next entry is about opening his Zecco account. :-) As for myself . . . I'm pretty skeptical. I don't trade much, so for now I'll play it safe and stick with Scottrade.
  
• James of DINKs posts something I very much disagree with-- that smart people should not be using credit cards. I think what he is really arguing is that most people can't handle it, so most people shouldn't try. Those of us that are a little more responsible and savvy can use them to our advantage.
• Teri at PFadvice warns us that we may be in a higher, not lower, tax bracket in retirement. This will certainly apply to some people . . . and it just raises the argument for the Roth IRA and 401k even higher. Take the lesser tax hit now and enjoy not paying them later!
• Plonkee talks about randomness and insurance-- and why it's important to consider the consequences of a bad event, not just the probability. This is a great point! If my odds are 1 in 1000 of losing my job in the next year, that doesn't seem like a big deal. But 1 in 1000 type events do happen-- and if this one did, I better be prepared for the consequences. In some cases, this means buying insurance.
• Kevin at HealthyWealthHappyWise makes a great post about frugal computing . . . save money by using Ubuntu linux. Actually, frugality is but one of several reasons to do this, as Kevin explains. I've used Ubuntu before and he is right . . . it's much easier to make this transition than with other linux distributions. Anyone can do it!
  

Great posts abound in the PF blog universe. Thanks for the good reading.