2008 was the second full year of existence for The Simple Dollar. Over the course of the year, I posted some 700 articles – some good, some bad, and some ugly. Below, I tried to pick out most of the good ones to create something of an anthology for 2008. Hope you enjoy it! (By

Every few months, I like to open up the doors for suggestions on future directions and post ideas for The Simple Dollar. I often conceive of new areas to cover and ideas to try, but it’s really you, the readers, that decide whether or not those areas are really worth pursuing or not, because if

What costs $7.95, makes for a great gift for all your gift exchanges, and is chock full of the good stuff you’ve come to expect from The Simple Dollar? 365 Ways to Live Cheap, that’s what. It’s my first book, due to be released in bookstores everywhere on December 17, but already available for order

I get emails from readers all the time encouraging me to be more playful and experimental with my writing, so here’s a little experiment, posted quietly on the Saturday after Thanksgiving when no one will be reading. It’s an adaptation of one of my favorite literary passages, Claudius’s soliloquy from Act 3, Scene III of

If you’re in the United States, I hope you’re off somewhere enjoying a great meal with friends and family. I sure am! Normal posting will resume tomorrow morning!

A few days ago, I had a long email exchange with a friend of mine, who seemed genuinely surprised that I had walked away from my previous career and committed to writing The Simple Dollar (and similar things) full time. I truly enjoyed many aspects of my previous job. That job gave me some seriously

The Simple Dollar receives a lot of visitors each day. Many of you pop onto the home page, see what articles are fresh and new, read through them, and bop onto another site. What you might not realize is that there are several very simple additional ways through which you can enjoy and get useful

Today is the two year anniversary of the launch of The Simple Dollar. Last year, to celebrate the site’s one year anniversary, I selected my twenty five favorite articles of the first year of the site. I thought I’d continue that tradition by selecting my twenty five favorite articles from the second year of the

Over the last several days, many readers have asked for my take on the economic crisis. I’m not an economist – my opinion is just that of an average person who has read a number of economics books and talked to a lot of people from all walks of life. Here’s my humble take on

About a month ago, Lola stunned me with this comment, and it’s taken me a while to figure out how to respond to it: Anyway, Trent can spend as much as he wants on food. My point is that a frugality expert should spend much less than average – especially when he recommends coupons, gardening,

A reader, Jimmy, wrote in with an interesting question recently. Where do you come up with your ideas? I know you read a lot, but what do you read for personal finance ideas? Just the books you review? I thought, in response to Jimmy’s question, that I’d list all of the materials I read regularly

A couple of days ago, I finished my first book and turned it in to my publisher. You’ll be hearing a lot more about it in a few months, but this post is for the large number of readers who have sent me all kinds of questions about the book publishing process. It was a

One of the most frequent complaints I get from readers of The Simple Dollar is that I often repeat some of the basic tenets of personal finance. Let’s face it – in some respects, The Simple Dollar is repetitive. By now, I must have riffed the principle of “spend less than you earn” at least

Perhaps the most frequent question I’m asked is how on earth do I find the time to do all of the stuff that I do in a given day? I thought the best way to illustrate this would be to give an outline of a typical day so you can see what I do during

I’m going to try a little experiment here, just to see how it goes. From now until Saturday, March 8, 2008, you can ask any question you’d like in this thread – a specific personal finance question, a philosophical question, a personal development question, a pop culture question (maybe you have a video game related

I quit my job. It is scary as can be to write that sentence. Unbelievably scary. I’m walking away from a good paying and very stable job. I announced my resignation this week, and my final day will happen before the end of March. Why? So, why did I make this decision? There were a

After recently getting rid of many of the ads on The Simple Dollar website because I was bothered by their content, I received an utter tidal wave of responses from readers encouraging me to put the ads back because they created a strong revenue stream for the site and enabled me to move ever closer

As many of you know, I’ve been writing a book over the last several months in my spare time, and it’s basically completed. I wanted to give you an update on the project and let you know where things are going with it. What’s the status of the book? The first draft is finished and

In this post, I’m going to compile five of the most common comments and questions I get from readers, along with my response to them. A Dire Situation Help me! My complex financial situation is incredibly dire! While I’m quite happy to offer suggestions to readers about their finances, I make it clear that I