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Bonds are for losers

November is Financial Literacy Month in Canada

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First things first: No, I’m not dead.

Principal photography for “Million Dollar Neighbourhood”, which will air on The Oprah Winfrey Network in Canada starting in January 2013, wrapped up a week ago and so now I have time to focus on all the things I’ve neglected since filming began. Like blogging and podcasting. During the shoot, the days were long and taxing, and I was also writing a book (because I’m a masochist like that), which will be published in January of 2014.

So yes, the blog will be back in action as of right now. I decided to give the site a makeover. I hope you like what I’ve done with the place. It’s a work in progress, but if you notice anything weird, give it a day or two as I’ll be experimenting with the design, and since I’m no coding ninja, I expect to break the site frequently. ;)

Financial Literacy Month

Well, we’re a long ways away (still) from a cohesive national strategy on tackling financial literacy but just imagine what the national debt-to-income ratio would be without the work that has been done so far. Ok, don’t imagine it. We’re at an all-time high at about 163%. That number, while not enough to give a detailed picture about debt distribution, is scarier still since the boomer demographic, sometimes described as the pig in the python, is entering their retirement stage and the proper debt-to-income ratio for someone near retirement should be ZERO. So with the population distribution skewing older, that number should have a significant downward drag, which indicates those who DO have a debt problem, REALLY have a debt problem.

November is Financial Literacy Month in Canada and there are a number of financial literacy events taking place across the country. But my friends at The Investor Education Fund have an “event” you can take part in with your computer right now. Their Cranial Cash Clash is a pretty nifty little game that helps assess one’s financial literacy. Try it out, and maybe share it with your kids, friends, and family. And next time they ask to borrow money, you can look up their Cranial Cash Class score first, to see how much interest you should charge.

Click on the image to try it out on their website.

Reader Interactions

Comments

  2. Glad to see you “back” :)

    I honestly have no idea where you find the time to do what you do.

    I look forward to watching the show in a few months.

    And the book? Can you provide more details?

    Cheers,
    Mark

    • Well, NOW I have the time because I won’t be working full-time doing anything else :)

      The book actually won’t be launched until 2014, so I have lots of time to tweak it until then. But it’s a primer with the focus being education on the fundamentals that matter (not MER, not strategy, but putting money away, for example). It’s written as a way to increase one’s D- grade with personal finance to an “easy A”, and if they want to get an A+, then there are thousands of books out there to help them with the minutiae (like MER, portfolio strategy, advanced tax planning, etc.). It will be published through Penguin/Random House (who apparently just merged last week).

      p.s. I’ll be in Ottawa later in November. Perhaps I’ll see you soon!

  3. Great look to the blog Preet. Look forward to watching the show in January. I agree there is a great void for the type of  book you are writing and will sure to pick it up when launches and share. By the way we have started a LinkedIn group that you and others here may be interested in. Over 200 financial professionals from across Canada sharing tips to help their clients improve their finances. http://www.linkedin.com/groups?gid=4061544 Will be sure to post a link to your blog today :-) Cheers, Eric

    • Thanks Steve!

      I’m biased, but I think it will be very entertaining. There were a lot of really amazing families on the show.

  5. You look familiar- did you used to have a website? :)

    Will you be continuing the podcasts? They were great for my drive to work!

    Steve

    • Yep – I should be able to put one out within the next week, and have a guest lined up for the next episode, so yes, the podcast should be be back up on a weekly schedule starting next week. :)

  6. I have to chime in and say that I love the new theme as well. A vast improvement over the last one for sure! I also love the big bold title fonts – they are definitely in your face.

    Glad to hear you’ll be blogging a lot more again now. Looking forward to it.

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