Archive for the ‘Economics’ Category

An Apartment Rental Epiphany

I spent a good deal of time this week looking at apartments in Brooklyn.  Come February 1st I will be moving in with my longtime girlfriend, Miranda, and in typical New York fashion, we were scrambling to find the perfect apartment with less than 30 days before we had to move. Manhattan real estate is [...]

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Hope in the New Year

It’s hard to look back on 2011 as a good year. -  Since the year 2000 the US National Debt has increased from $5 trillion to $15 trillion -  Unemployment rates have hovered between 8% and 10% for the past two years -  The S&P500 index began and ended 2011 at exactly 1,257 points – [...]

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Routine

Some people have asked me how I make time to write in my blog every single week. Here is my secret: I have a very strict routine. Every day I wake up at the same time (6am) – I pack my gym bag the exact same way, I get on the same train (6:35am F [...]

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The Meaning of “Scale” and How it’s Evolved Over Time

If the entire NYC advertising industry was simultaneously transported back to a single jr. high class – all the cool kids would be talking about “scale”. Over the last year and a half, it seems not a month goes by without me hearing something about scalability, or ideas being scalable. These words are not new [...]

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Why are There So Many Sex Scandals?

It seems that not a season goes by where there is not a major government sex scandal. The most immediate example is Anthony Weiner, but in very recent memory there have also been Arnold Schwarzenegger (had a child with his mistress), Elliot Spitzer (had a thing for high class hookers), Mark Sanford (eloped, leaving his [...]

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Brain Drain

There is currently an ad running for DirecTV (satellite television) that opens with a scene of a dimly lit city being ravaged by criminals. A bomb lights up the sky, a bank is robbed, a getaway car screeches around a corner and a Molotov cocktail is thrown into a police car. The camera cuts to [...]

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People Who Stand Directly in Front of the Subway Doors

I notice it most at 14th Street Union Square when I’m exiting the N, R, or Q trains on the way home from work. It’s usually around 7:30 or 8pm and I’ve got my headphones on trying to clear my head from the workday. The train starts to decelerate as we approach the station stop [...]

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