Is your pay check stretched to its maximum? You may want to consider moving to one of these cities to get more bang for your buck.

Salary.com revealed the top (and bottom) US cities for building personal net worth, taking into account local salaries, cost of living, and unemployment relative to the national average. This year's list also factored in qualitative measures including diversity of industry, education level of the cities' population, proximity to post secondary institutions, percent of population below poverty level, and median travel time to work.

If you currently live without a budget you should try our free budget spreadsheet and some budget training. This alone can help stretch your dollar.

Top 5 Cities
Rank City
1 Plano, TX
2 Aurora, CO
3 Omaha, NE
4 Minneapolis, MN
5 Albuquerque, NM

Bottom 5 Cities
Rank City
1 New York City
2 Washington, DC
3 Los Angeles, CA
4 Honolulu, HI
5 San Francisco, CA

Labels: hack, Job, money saving tip

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Posted By: Joe on Monday, July 21, 2008
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Yea, that's right. You can get paid to be a guinea pig.

I saw a brief report on CNN about joining paid medical research and as usual they don't list their internet source. People have many different reasons for joining a clinical study or medical study. Some are healthy volunteers who may join in exchange for payment. Other volunteers are individuals with different illnesses, like diabetes, liver disease, depression or anxiety. People with known illness may enter a trial because it may directly help them get better, or because they know they are helping others with similar problems. You DO NOT always have to take drugs.

A number of study volunteers participate primarily to earn extra money. Payment is most often used as an incentive to recruit healthy volunteers who derive no direct benefit from the research, such as in most phase I studies. Depending on the trial, testing phase and the company sponsoring the research, this can be a significant amount, from $100 to more than $1,500. Some of the testing involves overnight and multi day stays and requires you to do nothing. Sounds like a great opportunity for a blogger to get a lot of postings accomplished with minimal interruptions.

There are a lot of sites that you have to pay for a newsletter that will provide you with links or you can use this free service provided by Uncle Sam. Most of your questions and concerns can be addressed in this publication, Informed Consent: A Guide to the Risks and Benefits of Volunteering for Clinical Trials before joining a study. This publication also lists additional sources for you to find studies that you can join.

Labels: Job

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Posted By: Joe on Monday, July 14, 2008
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A lonely pensioner who could not find a friend to enjoy a pint with was celebrating last night.

In an earlier post, I told of Jack Hammond, who's son put an advertisement in his local post office window offering $14 an hour for someone to meet him in his local pub and talk with his father on the nights he could not be there.

After sifting out all of the applications, the great grandfather has picked out two new friends after father and son had a drink with all the candidates from a shortlist.

Mr Hammond, a retired engineer from Lancashire, had to drink alone after moving to a care home in Winsor, Hampshire, to be near his family.

All but one of the other residents are women, not natural candidates for an evening in the Compass Inn discussing military history and Preston North End soccer team.

Mr Hammond and his son have now picked out retired kitchen fitter Trevor Pugh, 78, from Southampton, and 58-year-old Henry Rosenvinge, a former doctor.

Mr. Pugh and Mr. Hammond are both ex-Army so we have that in common.

Dr Rosenvinge and Mr. Hammond are both from Lancashire so there is a lot they can argue about.

I'll drink to that!

Labels: Job, retirement

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Posted By: Joe on Saturday, April 26, 2008
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How would you like to be paid to drink and converse with Jack Hammond?

He recently moved into a nursing home in Winsor, England to be closer to his family. His new home has only one other male resident and while he found himself with a good local pub, he had left all his old drinking friends behind.

While his son Mike takes Mr. Hammond out for a drink once a week, they thought it would be good for him to expand his social circle a little.

The advertisement reads: Person to accompany elderly gentleman to the pub. Possibly two evenings a week. Probably two hours per evening. Seven pounds an hour plus expenses.So far four people have applied to join Mr. Hammond at the Compass Inn in Winsor twice a week for a couple of hours.

Mr. Hammond is a very intelligent man with a physics and maths degree. He used to go to the pub three or four times a week and have a couple of beer with a neighbour who was of a similar age. Possible topics of conversation include the Second World War, in which Mr Hammond served as a radar engineer in Bombay and Kuala Lumpur, and the challenges of running a power plant.

Sounds like a great service to start if you are a good conversationalist.

Labels: Job, retirement

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Posted By: Joe on Monday, April 07, 2008
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