With no DNA on the part of the fictional rich, we base our matching type on self-confessed author inspirations, historical analysis, leadership and wealth accumulation patterns and the most important of all, fan fiction observations. Hints of semblance can also be useful, as we shall see later on.

So who are our film and television versions of the Rhodes, the Rothschilds and the Rockefellers? And who are the real people starring in life imitating “art”? Here’s our list of the filthy rich TV and film characters and their real-world counterparts.

1. Smaug the Dragon

Fiction note: Played by (voiced and “motioned”) Benedict Cumberbatch in the 2013 film The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug.

Net worth: Anywhere from $62 billion to $870 billion

Source of wealth:  Looting

Forbes listed Smaug as the wealthiest fictional character, with treasures valued over $62 billion dollars. This set a barrage of protest from the more calculating fiction fans (not just Tolkien fanbase), armed with accounting and inflation adjustment calculations that prove Smaug is worth at least $870 billion at a conservative estimate!

For those who are yet to make Smaug’s acquaintance, he is the  vast and bat-winged dragon in JRR Tolkien’s The Hobbit, and appears in the book’s film series adaptation by Peter Jackson. Cutting a mythopoeic work into fractions, Smaug ruined the city of Erebor, home of the dwarves and lay claim to the Lonely Mountain and the treasures that lay there. The inventory is very impressive: gold, gemstones, mithril, silver, elf gems, pearls, crystals, emerald, sapphire, diamond, and the glory of Thorin, the Arkenstone. No wonder fans the world over made such a deal with a measly $62 billion!

Aside from a mountain of wealth, Smaug also exhibits the common traits of the filthy rich (keen senses, dangerously sharp mind and an encyclopaedic knowledge of their treasure hoard ( Smaug knew outright that a single gold cup is missing from his lair, stolen by the hobbit Bilbo).

Real-world counterparts:

Since Smaug is the undisputed filthiest, richest character (film and literature), it would be easy to assume that his real-life counterpart in the net worth department would be Carlos Slim Helu, the Mexican telecom billionaire with $73 billion as of Forbes 2013 listing. But much closer to Smaug in network sparring is actually Microsoft’s Bill Gates with his $67 billion.

But aside from the vast money, there are so few points of comparison between Smaug and Helu and Gates except maybe the possession of a soft belly (which only Helu and Gates can confirm).  The two real-life billionaires are also known to be physically active and not just lying around on mountains of gold and diadems. With these, Smaug’s real-world counterpart is more of another filthy rich creature of his own kind, from kingdom animalia. We have two candidates:

Gunther IV, the German shepherd. Though he is way below Smaug in the bloated wealth league (only $140 million), the definitely no slum dog inherited German countess Karlotta Liebenstein’s wealth, which first passed on to Gunther III, the fourth’s father, originally at $80 million, and grew to current valuation through investments. To date, the fashionable dog counts Madonna’s 8-bedroom Miami villa among his assets.

Silverstone the tortoise. Yet again, the dog match may not satisfy some readers, who would clamor for a physical likeness to Smaug aside from wealth.  So we will also consider Silverstone the Tortoise as the Smaug of the real world. Though extremely below the opulence rank of Smaug (only $200,000 in net worth, inherited from bookshop tycoon Christina Foyle after her death in 1999), Silverstone shares more similarities with Smaug – they are both “reptiles,” they can be gold plated all over, they have the same smug smile typical of the insanely rich, and the simplest tie that binds – their names both start with the letter S.

2. Lord Tywin Lannister

Fiction note: Played by Charles Dance in HBO’s Game of Thrones,  an adaptation of the book series A Song of Ice and Fire by George RR Martin.

Net worth: $2.1 billion

Source of wealth: Inheritance from father, money lending business, earnings from investments in Westeros’ war economy as well as profit shares from his appointments as Hand of the King (an administrative function) first in the Seven Kingdoms and later on for his grandson Joffrey Baratheon.

Unsmiling Tywin Lannister, Lord of Casterly Rock, was dubbed the richest man in the Seven Kingdoms and Lord Paramount of the Westerlands. His wealth primarily comes from his shrewdness and ruthlessness. His ironhold for money was tied with his personal views about power. Seeing his father Tytos unable to manage House Lannister’s honor and wealth (uncollected debts, gratuities for the “undeserving” and bannermen drinking and partying like rockstars), Tywin rebuilt his family’s fortune by eliminating bad Houses, hoarding, investing and using money to grow it further.

Real-world counterpart: King Edward I of England.

While many SOIF fans have varying opinions about the real-life version of Tywin, some have gone to the extent of scouring historical annals not only for the wealth comparison (which would be the easier part), but in his character traits. So far, the closest human version would be King Edward I. While Tywin dealt with annihilation, particularly of erring Houses Reine and Tarbeck, Edward I dealt with the Welsh and also led some infamous annihilation in English history.

Very much like Tywin in political leadership, estate administration and military prowess, Edward I was also involved with the political intrigues of his father, King Henry III who had to deal with unnerving English barons (like the Lannister bannermen.) Edward I  was eventually crowned King while Tywin eventually claimed the Lordship.

In the physical sense, Edward I was described as rather tall for the period he lived hence he was nicknamed “Edward the Longshanks.” In terms of character, he was said to be temperamental and with his towering height, he instilled intimidation and fear among his friends and foes. Tywin is tall, slender, broad-shouldered, green-eyed and with a “very powerful presence combined with an unflinching gaze that can make lesser men swiftly turn away.”

3. Anthony “Tony” Stark

Fiction note: Played by Robert Downey, Jr. in all film adaptations of the Marvel Comics series, including The Avengers.

Net worth: $9.3 billion

Sources of wealth: Inheritance from father Howard Stark and profits from Stark Industries plus multi-billion defense project contracts.

Tony Stark is an engineering genius, producing biomimetic armors, nuclear-powered refrigerators and ultra-fast cars. He is also friends to some superheroes and does part-time superhero duties himself. Stark is downright intelligent with a willful and unstoppable power of concentration. He is also a futurist, able to predict and experiment with the outcome of future events with the goal of aiding humanity in future catastrophes.

Real-world counterpart: Elon Musk

With a net worth $2.8 billion as of March 2013, “futurist” can also be rightly said of Elon Musk, the South African-American inventor and entrepreneur involved in outer space navigation, futuristic cars, solar power and cash remittance (before). Musk is now better associated with SpaceX (Space Exploration Technologies), a space aviation company that designs, develops and manufactures spacecrafts and commercial space vehicles, where he is chief “designer.”

Before this, Musk was known as the guy who founded PayPal (then X.com). Like Stark, Musk’s company SpaceX deals with government contracts, particularly getting funding from NASA space development programs. He is also chairman, CEO and product architect for his other company Tesla Motors, sharing an interest with Stark in electric vehicles. Musk has a bachelor’s degree in Economics from Wharton and in Physics from UPenn’s School of Arts and Sciences. On the other hand, Stark, according to his LinkedIn, was educated in MIT with doctorates in physics (a field shared with Musk), philosophy and artificial intelligence.

4. Charles Foster Kane

Fiction note: Played by Orson Welles in the 1941 film Citizen Kane.

Net Worth: $8.3 billion today

Charles Foster Kane is a publishing mogul who dealt with personal and professional struggles, and whose life mystery centers around his childhood memory of Rosebud.

Real-world counterpart: William Randolph Hearst

The general consensus remains strong that William Randolph Hearst was the primary inspiration for Kane, mainly because the fiction-fact overlaps  proved too convincing and too many to ignore. These include their parents’ mining businesses, Harvard education, publishing empires, New York political bids, palatial residences (Kane’s Xanadu and Hearst’s 56-bedroom Hearst Castle) and “poignant” life struggles.

But it was their oddly similar personal affairs that was cited as the reason real-life Hearst used the power of his money and influences to stop the film’s release, but failed, in an attempt to bury his scandalous affair with actress Marion Davies (which was the same with Kane’s failed efforts in making his second wife Susan Alexander a famous opera star in the story).

Welles and co-writer Herman J. Mankiewicz remained steadfast in claiming that lives of other rich men including Harold McCormick, Samuel Insull and Howard Hughes were used to profile Kane, while names of other media moguls like Ted Turner and Rupert Murdoch have also been mentioned. But while Hearst left offsprings to carry on the name and the wealth (his grandson William Randolph Hearst III heads Hearst Corporation today with a net worth of $2 billion), Kane left no heir. Both died of old age.

5. Lillian Celia “Lily” van der Woodsen (née Rhodes)

Fiction note: Played by Kelly Rutherford in the CW Network television series Gossip Girl, an adaptation of the book series by Cecily Von Ziegesar.

Net Worth: $2 billion

Sources of wealth: Rhodes family fortune, Bass Industries majority share plus her own personal wealth from marriages to billionaires, among them Dr. William van der Woodsen and Bartholomew “Bart” Bass.

Lily van der Woodsen is the youngest daughter of music executive Richard “Rick” Rhodes and socialite Celia “CeCe” Rhodes. A true-blue  Upper East Side queen, Lily is a ballerina and was educated in Brown University. Living in LA in her 20’s made significant changes to her life, but her deep understanding and respect for societal constraint and hierarchy remain.

Real-world counterpart: Gloria Vanderbilt

Anyone of the same breed, family legacy and marriage history (with the exception of King Henry VIII) is a likely candidate for Lily van der Woodsen’s factual version. But the closest we can get as far as life and personal style are concerned would be no other than Gloria Vanderbilt.

Gloria is the famous American artist, author, actress, heiress, and socialite identified with her famous family name, a designer jeans and CNN anchor Anderson Cooper (her son). She is worth $200 million today. There may be some contrasts, including Lily’s love and devotion for her socialite mother CeCe with that of Gloria who cut ties from her mother Gloria Morgan (involved in the young Gloria’s controversial 1934 child custody case).

But on the majority, Lily and Gloria share the same wealth and life patterns. Like Gloria, Lily comes from the gilded age lineage and was raised amid industry and philanthropy. And while the Vanderbilt family fortune diminished by the mid-20th century, they remain the 7th wealthiest family in history at around $168 billion net worth. Apart from the socialite, philanthropist and artist tags, both Lily and Gloria share the same fondness for wealthy marriages, four for Gloria and three (known) for Lily.

Are there other wealthy characters that have real-world counterparts that you can think of?

Zombies. Vile, evil, unsightly and undead, they can use some tips from vampires on how to live in style.

We’ve culled six tips, in fact, why zombies are not getting any richer than their vampire counterparts, who we have seen to have had owned plantations and lived in mansions, commandeered castles; earned medical degrees or driven in style from thoroughbreds to an Aston Martin V12.

If the U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention can come up with a zombie preparedness kit to drive attention to real emergency situations, a zombie financial 101 might as well be in order.

Seriously, risky behavior results in chaotic outcomes and zombie behavior tells us why we’re not seeing any undead millionaire any time soon.

Zombie survival tip #1: Have a plan and common sense

They have problems finishing off a small band of humans for four Walking Dead seasons now. You’ve seen them attack without care even if their heads are blasted off. Even with missing limbs and in front of a shotgun barrel-toting Rick Grimes, the zombies just walk straight to their destruction.

In the meantime, Bill Compton and his True Blood “co-suckers” know better that humans are one pesky species that won’t go without a fight. It will be safer and profitable to learn to live with them and enjoy the future with the occasional human blood discreetly handed out.

Zombies lack a plan so they lose.

The same thing can blast away your savings if you’re reckless. Avoid the risk-averse attitude of a zombie. Know your financial strengths and weaknesses before walking straight to invest in this volatile global economy.

Study the historical value of a “winnable” stock before buying. In most cases, an attractive stock will reach popular attention just when it’s about to plateau.

How much mortgage can you really afford? How much credit can you meet? It only takes common sense to know your credit window, the amount you can pay off regularly. You should have enough cash to meet your daily living costs—food, fuel, utilities—minor contingencies and even entertainment for, say, watching zombie movies. Whatever left in your budget, that’s how much you can take in as credit.

Zombie survival tip #2: Learn the tools

Many humans say zombies can’t learn tools. Well, they haven’t played Plants vs. Zombies. Pogo, Football and Ducky Tube and other zombies employ crude tools, such as buckets, ladders and floaters. But still, they fail miserably how to use the tools and they remain sitting ducks to all sorts of plant armaments from peas and butter to spicy bombs.

Zombies will also rush against a fortified building or camp with only their bare hands. And even if they overcome the fortress, at what cost? Too many heads, limbs cut off from their bodies.

Meantime, the vampire Viktor of the Underworld raids medieval villages with ease and ruthlessness. The vampires ride war horses and swing swords and fling arrows with precision.

Like vampires, you need to master the tools to get the best bang, that is, off the more sophisticated financial instruments. If your investment amounts to only having a savings account or cash stashed under the bed, your money is a sitting duck to inflation. You’re likely losing a chunk of its value as years roll by.

Learn securities trading, its risks and benefits. Explore bonds and insurance. With the U.S. dollars on a strong upward swing in the next few months, start venturing into foreign currency (forex) trading. The Internet has tons of free tutorials to start building your financial knowledge.

Zombie survival tip #3: Replenish your resources

Zombies will cross any path and take all the risks to get that grey matter between your ears. Not even the lawnmower can save you. But then what when all human brains are used up?

The Night of the Living Dead zombies just take everything they come across. On the other hand, Lestat and his vamp buddies in Interview with the Vampire know they can’t just suck the blood out of anyone. They pace their hunt so the blood keeps flowing in.

Every zombie just wants to eat; no one seems to be “farming” brains to ensure the future of the undead. While the Walking Dead zombies are scampering for human brains, the True Blood vampires are having the grand time living and knowing that supplies won’t run out. Because vamps replenish their resources; zombies don’t.

Plow back a portion of the profits you earn from stocks to buy more stocks. Improve your property to increase its value. In times when you need to use your life savings for an emergency, replenish it back once you have recouped the money. Let your investments keep creating wealth.

Zombie survival tip #4: Diversify

Zombies’ dependence on human brains is their undoing. In the face of a total human wipeout, the undead need to go beyond the brain and diversify.

Meantime, Edward and his vampire family in Twilight take this need to diversify seriously, if only to live peacefully and assure their future and, yes, avoid killing Bella. The vampires feed on animal blood and lock away in the deepest recesses of their mind their dark fantasies of tasting human blood.

Human brains and blood aside, you too need to diversify. Long before Warren Buffet has advised us, peasants in medieval Europe knew that they shouldn’t be putting all eggs in one basket. You can’t go wrong with that centuries-old tip.

Have some savings that you can easily dip your hands in. Invest in some stocks for fast, bigger returns. Buy some bonds as a long-term plan. Get insurance for stability.

Create wealth across various investment channels and you’re more shielded from anticipated events like inflation and recessions; and unexpected outcomes like housing crashes and bubble bursts.

Zombie survival tip #5: Stop living from brain to brain

The Walking Dead just keep walking. The zombies can’t take a rest and enjoy their dying world. They will need to hunt just as they’re done lunching on a brain. It’s an endless race that zombies will be taking to their, well, grave.

Not the Cullens in their suburban rest house. Nor Louis and Lestat in their colonial mansion. Nor Viktor and Markus in their castles. They all live in style and in full comfort while the world goes by.

Don’t be a zombie. Exist to live and not live to exist. You may be surviving from paycheck to paycheck today, but plan your way out of the rat wheel. Build another income source or create wealth from savings. Again, invest and reap more bang out of your salary.

It doesn’t matter to start small, get a hundred gram to try forex trading maybe. Forego a car upgrade and instead buy a life insurance that yields a good margin in ten years. The point is to make it a habit to build more off your paycheck, rather than waste it on things that devalue over time.

Zombie survival tip #6: Improve the self incessantly

Edward Cullen. Louis de Pointe du Lac. Dracula. Selene. Beautiful, elegant and articulate, vampires outscore zombies in assets, looks and social graces.

Then there’s Bud at the other end of our spectrum. The Day of the Dead starrer, perhaps one of a few popular zombie characters, is the most intelligent zombies we’ve come across. And he drools uncontrollably and has the motor skills of a one-year old,

While zombies remain the scum of the earth, vampires have been a count, a noble, a professional, a colonial master, even a really rich Republican. Ever wonder why the fanged ones have it better than the undead? They better themselves. They have a high regard for excellence. Get into the act of self-improvement and don’t stop.

Get more education. Learn new things. Master a skill. Network with like-minded people. Understand how the world goes around and outside of you: your career, business and across social classes.

Excellence is not one-upmanship; it is outperforming your previous achievement. That’s how Olympic records are broken; why marathon runners keep running; new inventions are created; professional knowledge is advanced and businesses expand.

CONCLUSION

The Zombie Apocalypse is not coming. It’s already here in the form of more Americans without savings and health coverage, the widening gap between incomes, the diminishing middle class population, local businesses moving out to emerging markets, stagnating education… all these can bring you at wit’s end. Ditch the double-barrel shotgun; the six tips above are your real zombie survival kit.

Income inequality on a global scale is surging, and while the eye of the storm is focused on the United States because of the alarming gap and trend among the rich and the poor and it’s ironic impact on the so-called American Dream, many countries around the world are exhibiting wide income distribution gaps at a fast and alarming rate.

A report by the Paris-based Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) showed that while globally, household income increased overall by 1.7 percent yearly, not all income levels have benefited equally. The world’s bottom earners’ income grew annually by only 1.4 percent in the last 30 years while the top earners grew by 2 percent. The world’s bottom earners saw their income grow annually by only 1.4 percent in the last 30 years while the top earners grew their income at an annual rate of 2 percent.

Factors cited by the OECD for the surge in global income inequality include globalization, technological innovation and regulatory environments that have become relaxed  have contributed to the growing gap between the rich and the poor.

Data aside and simply looking beyond national boundaries and listening to global economic woes, income inequality is a confirmed global phenomenon and it is getting worse. Let’s thumb through the income inequality scenarios around the world.

In Brazil, the plutocrats or the global super rich have always hugged the news amid poverty issues in the developing nation. In India, the poorest of the poor in Calcutta and the low-wage farmers in Bihar contrast with the image of technology and innovation being projected in Delhi or Mumbai.

In China, despite its emerging economy, the lack of relevant skills for rural workers to fit in industrial urban job requirements the income disparity, and worsens low competitiveness and wage rates. Turkey’s low average education, low direct taxation and nil participation of women in the workforce were cited as just a few of the reasons why it still has the most unequal income distribution among European Union countries.

TRACKING THE GLOBAL INCOME INEQUALITY

The OECD, in its Factbook 2011-2012: Economic, Environmental and Social Statistics, reported on the income inequality data of 33 countries, with the best and worst-performing countries based on their GINI coefficient, as follows.

TOP 10 COUNTRIES WITH LEAST INCOME INEQUALITY GAP	TOP 10 COUNTRIES WITH HIGHEST INCOME INEQUALITY GAP
1. Slovenia: 0.24	1. Mexico: 0.48
2. Denmark: 0.25	2. Turkey: 0.41
3. Norway: 0.25	3. United States: 0.38
4. Czech Republic: 0.26	4. Israel: 0.37
5. Slovak Republic: 0.26	5. Portugal: 0.35
6. Belgium: 0.26	6. United Kingdom: 0.34
7. Sweden: 0.26	7. Italy: 0.34
8. Finland: 0.26	8. Australia: 0.34
9. Austria: 0.26	9. New Zealand: 0.33
10. Hungary: 0.27	10. Japan: 0.33

GINI is a metric of inequality used to measure the income gap worldwide. It rates countries from 0 to 1, where zero indicates perfect equality and one indicates all wealth goes to a single individual. There is considerable variation and factors in income distribution and factors across countries.

WHAT IT MEANS BEYOND INCOME AND WEALTH

As the rankings showed, although income structure and distribution is in its core, income inequality is so much more complicated.

High rates of income inequality might come as a no surprise for developing countries like Mexico or  Portugal and Mexico, but data also shows the richest and most powerful countries like the US, UK and China belong to the same high gap category. Even countries with historically low income inequality index like Sweden, Denmark and Germany are also experiencing gap increases over the past decades, and mitigating the surge is something that they should always watch out for.

Perhaps, the most important point to emphasize is that income inequality issue is not only an issue about the rich and the poor extremes. The middle-class has been left behind in the income growth benefit. In general, the highest 10 percent of wage earners have been leaving the middle earners behind faster compared to the pace of the lowest wage earners drifting away from the middle, the OECD report also noted. This is largely exhibited in the US, where income distribution for the past decades suggests that the American middle class has crumbled.

GLOBAL EFFECTS OF WORSENING INCOME INEQUALITY

More than social class acts and financial equality, a look at varying degrees of income gaps around the world and the reasons given for its surge highlight its threat to global stability and solidarity.

As one of the most visible and sensitive reflections of drastic differences in living standards (and therefore, social injustice), income inequality can come at a great cost, especially when unchecked for long and remained viewed as just a “natural” economic phenomenon.

PUBLIC RESENTMENT. Stagnant growth in the quality of life and living often results to lower productivity especially for those who have been doing backbreaking work for a long time, and with no tangible benefit. Growing despair and dissatisfaction results to a myriad of social problems, and like it or not, this has a negative effect in world economy.

GLOBAL MISUNDERSTANDING. High income inequalities showcase a waste of human resource with a large number of the citizenry out of work or stuck in low-paid, low-skilled jobs. Yet still, the inequality web transcends more than employment solutions and higher salaries. In this context, employment is a major issue and the shift of labor from one country to another has cropped up in many discussions, with overwhelming emotions on how employments are robbed and gained.

But never as simple as losing and winning jobs, income inequality involves the more complex issue of labor and capital. Actual jobs transferred from one location to another does not necessarily equate to greater income gains or automatic unemployment for the parties concerned. The global income inequality data and specific labor, income and living standards data for each country would prove otherwise. The same understanding is also called for in related issues of migrant jobs, competitiveness  and equality within one country and location.

PUBLIC PROTEST. On the economics side, political and economic stability often precedes public action that can turn to violent protests. The dissatisfaction scale is heavy as the ones we’ve seen in the US Occupy series, while serious consequences have resulted in the Middle East and North Africa protests.

GOVERNMENT PRESSURES. When public clamor turns to violence, a nation’s economy can be crippled even if just monetarily – stock markets closes and then crashes, work and business stops and commodities are hoarded in fear of the unknown, resulting to instant inflation increase. Governments often resort to iron-handed controls that hurts everyone.

The ill effects of a worsening income inequality on a global scale impacts negatively on one’s own country, on global policies and relations and even on a personal level. The global effects couldn’t get more personal when you think about your family, friends and loved ones (or a business interest or humanity advocacy) in a country beset with out-of-control inequality issues, and where it could lead.

The onset of commercial space travel brings NASA’s rendition of interplanetary highway closer to reality

Commercial space travel has developed to include not only convenience in space transportation for astronauts, but also once-in-a-lifetime outer space exploration for the idle rich known as space tourists. Before, astronauts traverse the space in capsules, rockets and orbiters. But with commercially designed space vehicles developed under NASA’s collaborative programs with space aviation agencies, a more convenient and “human-friendly” mode of space movement now enable non-space professionals (99 percent of our readers) the rare experience of a space holiday.

The world is indeed getting smaller every day. It’s not that Earth, as official home for humans, is diminishing in size. It’s the feeling of running out of tangible space, what with overpopulation, and virtual space narrowing as a consequence of the information age. The good news is there is a vast space out there, and these days, you can literally go far from the madding crowd, as long as you have the bucks.

Inter-galactic researches and space travel tests have paved the way for safe outer space travel experience for non-astronauts. The current safety standards require operating companies to meet the FAA requirements and standards for safety of the public, both during ascent and during the final re-entry. The law also require crew and passengers to sign informed consent agreements.

Although outer space tourism is still in its baby steps, bookings for some space tourism operators are now on-going. Like any trip preparations, space travel entails questions that a smart and savvy tourist always ask. What are the trip’s highlights? How long will it take? Is it safe? What is the cost of a trip to outer space?

We’ve rounded up facts and figures on space tourism gigs that you may want to save up for. There is one that is free, but with just one little condition. Find out your options.

1. Virgin Galactic SpaceShipTwo Space Trip

Company: Virgin Galactic. It pioneers commercial outer space flights and the world’s wealthiest are naturally first in line to sign up, led by reel stars Brad Pitt, Angelina Jolie, Leonardo DiCaprio, Ashton Kutcher and Justin Bieber.

Price: US$250,000. Required for a guaranteed seat for the earliest available flight. Bookings are easily accomplished online or through the firm’s accredited space agents. The earlier the reservation is made, the sooner one takes on the space travel.

Travel dates: First flight is scheduled later this year.

Vehicle: SpaceshipTwo featuring the Astrobatic cabin, it is capable of carrying six passengers up to 68 miles above the earth’s surface.

The Trip: The firm calls its space passengers future astronauts, numbering to about 600 already. They embark on a 3-day preparation with the crew, and are set to an initial 50,000 feet launch, afterwhich the vehicle hauls itself into space at 3 times the speed of sound. The dream experience documentation reads a lot like any other first-time tourist diary, making the actual trip a must for those who need more than words like “spectacular views” and “the silence of space.”

Freebies: Aside from the outer space trip, paid passengers are also given access to exclusive Virgin Group events like the G-force training, test flight celebrations in Mojave Desert and some trips with company founder Sir Richard Branson.

Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo will carry stars like Angelina Jolie, Brad Pitt and Leonardo DiCaprio on an outer space holiday (www.virgingalactic.com)

2.  SpaceX Dragon Space Trip

Company: Space Exploration Technologies

Travel date: 2015

Price: The company announced in 2012 that its target launching price for the trip is $140 Million (7-crew package) or $20M per seat

Vehicle: Dragon capsule. This is a free-flying and reusable spacecraft that made headlines last year for being the first commercial space vehicle in history to attach successfully to NASA’s International Space Station (ISS) through its robotic arms. It is used to transport cargo and crew, for in-space technology demonstrations and scientific testings. With the Dragon space trip, one can ride this famous space shell.

The Trip: The Dragon space trip is a kind of low Earth orbital flight. It is in line with SpaceX founder Elon Musk’s mission of revolutionizing access to space. The upcoming Dragon flights would include non-NASA crew members, the first of which is timelined by mid-2015. The trip is an orbital flight into a 370-kilometer orbit. (More revolutionary space flights are planned by Musk, including flights enabling human exploration and settlement of Mars in 10 to 20 years’ time under the company’s Mars One colonization project.)

3. Zero-G Weightless Experience

Company: Zero Gravity Corporation

Travel Date: Ongoing

Price: $4,950 plus 5 percent tax

Vehicle: Modified Boeing 727

The Trip: Lasting some 90 to 100 minutes, the Zero-G space trip enables one to “float like an astronaut and fly like a superhero in weightlessness.” It consists of parabolic arc flights, which simulates weightlessness in space, much how like we see astronauts on space station interviews. The flight swirls the passenger to 15 individual parabolas, consisting of one Martian gravity simulation, two Lunar gravity simulation and 12 weightlessness simulation.

Because the parabolic arcs simulates the space experience, the Zero- G space trip is much cheaper than full-on space travels. Still, with the Martian and lunar gravity close-to-real experience, it is value for money already.

Freebies: The Zero-G flight suit and merchandise, certificate of weightless completion, photos and video, Regravitation Celebration. The trip also offers family and friends bonding time via the Non-Flyer Guest Package, where companions who do not wish to fly can still join the many pre- and post-flight events.

What if living on Earth proves too much already? Is there a one-way outer space ticket for the Earth-worn and tired? Consider signing up for the Mars One project. As of mid-2013, around 78,000 people from 120 countries have already applied (some people reportedly even signed up their own family members) for a one-way trip to Mars to join an experimental settlement project in the red planet.

4. The Mars One Project

Company: Mars One Foundation and Interplanetary Media Group

Price: Free (selected volunteer basis)

Travel Date: 2023

The Trip: The recruitment dubbed “Inhabitants Wanted” started in April this year via a televised global selection process. Anyone 18 years old and above can apply, with intelligence, mental and physical health and dedication to the project being the highly important criteria. The selected “inhabitants” will undergo 8 years of training before the 2023 flight.

Preparations for the trip include a series of robotic cargo missions and outpost building for Earth simulation between 2016 and 2021. The first four immigrants will arrive in 2023, followed by more settlers every two years. The “pioneer settlers” will not return to Earth, but will live and work there, making it their permanent new home. This mission will be broadcasted, from the inhabitants selection to arrival and day-to-day living on Mars.

NASA image of Martian homeplate captured by Mars Rover Spirit shows landforms and surfaces similar to Earth

The Future of Space Travel: Can You Afford it?

So what’s the future of outer space travel especially in terms of cost and affordability for the 99 percent? Industry observers think that once commercial space tourism become steadily successful, it won’t be long before high demand and more industry players scamper to take a piece of this highly profitable pursuit.

It will take over 83 months of diligently saving one’s $3,000 gross monthly salary to raise the Virgin Galactic reservation deposit, let alone the whole package. Is there a chance space travel becomes more affordable like airline industry fees? There could be.

The initial high cost of space travel is intended to fund more researches and conduct the model flights, all meant to lower human space travel cost in the future and enable the experience for all, without having to shell out tetragazillion dollars. While expanding the playground for the idle rich, it is also expected to open the floodgates for new opportunities in career, business, education, science, technology, finance, law and commerce (especially true for space apps and widgets developers).

With this, it won’t be long before we see the days of traditional earthbound events and activities expanding into outersphere proportions, more important of which is the Ms. Universe pageant and then some spacesports (Space Olympics, NBA Space Series, FIFA Space Cup), spaceshopping (God knows Earth has ran out of land to satisfy megaretailers’ demand for more malls) and spacepublishing beginning with The Ultimate Space Travel Guide for Under $300 or Cheap Martian Hotels from $19.99.

Are you willing to save up big for a dream outer space travel?
Or do you have ideas that will replicate the experience minus the high-heavens cost?

As with the European cities, our travel costs include roundtrip airfare, 3-star hotels, meals in midrange restaurants and taxi ride around a 10-mile radius every day for one person, and the point of origin is Kansas City.

Summer Vacation no.1
BANGKOK, THAILAND

Expect to shell out around $1,994

Airfare and taxi ride are the most affordable in Bangkok’s travel costs, averaging $1,527 for airfare and $30 to go around the city for ten days. However, you’ll need about $250 for restaurant meals; and hotels are around $17 per night, which is about in the middle among our Asian cities. Bangkok is known for its pagodas and plenty of oversized phalluses, such as the Wat Arun, Grand Palace and Wat Pho. Not to be missed out, too, is the floating market, where you can savor the culture with a bowl of hot Tom Kha or Tom Som Pla Sai.

Summer Vacation no.2
HO CHI MINH, VIETNAM

Expect to shell out around $2,247

Named after the country’s revolutionary leader, the city is a contrast of French colonial architecture, war remnants and Buddhist temples. Ho Chi Minh is our second cheapest on the strength of being at the mid-range for costs on airfare, restaurant meals and taxi ride. The city is most affordable for its restaurant meals, and that’s a good thing considering the popular and flavorful Vietnamese cuisine, notably its soups. The War Remnants Museum is poignant and historical; a monument to the only war defeat by an American expeditionary force. You can also go cultural at the Golden Dragon Water Puppet Theater and philosophical at the Cao Dai Temple. Ho Chi Minh is also noted for colonial architecture such as the Ho Chi Minh Square and the Saigon Opera House.

Summer Vacation no.3
BEIJING, CHINA

Expect to shell out around $2,459

The capital of the world’s most populous country and an emerging superpower is surprisingly affordable. Taxi ride in Beijing is around $5 per day, but meals are a bit pricey at $36 per day. Hotel rates are about $29 per night and flights to the city is $1,808, just about in the middle of our list. Beijing is a jump-off point to see the Great Wall, probably the main reason you’ll visit the city. The Forbidden City is also a marvel as Lama Temple is enveloped in the city’s cold mystic. But the city is also ultra-modern with the Olympic buildings worth your walk and the National Center for the Performing Arts an impressive looking spaceship-like architecture.

Summer Vacation no.4
SHANGHAI, CHINA

Expect to shell out around $2,466

Coming at the fourth spot is Beijing’s southern cousin, the booming Shanghai. It is called the New York of the East and not without a reason. It is a global city with influence in commerce, technology and transport, challenging the old structure of Western-dominated global trade. Apparently, it is more expensive to ride a taxi here than in Beijing, at $6 per day. For airfare, restaurant meals and hotel bookings, Shanghai is comparable to China’s capital. But unlike Beijing, the skyline here is replete with skyscrapers accented by the iconic Oriental Pearl TV Tower. You can also enjoy endless shows of acrobats at the Shanghai Acrobatic Dome or visit the Old French Concession. But perhaps the best bargain in visiting Shanghai are, well, its bargains of clothes, watches, jewels and other luxury items.

Summer Vacation no.5
JAIPUR, INDIA

Expect to shell out around $2,499

This pre-modern Indian destination dates back to the 16th century. It is a favorite cultural place for its mystic and heritage. Airfare to Jaipur is average, at about $2,089; so are its hotels at about $23 per night. Good to know, eating out in this city is the cheapest among the Asian cities; around $18 per day will allow you a sumptuous meal for lunch and dinner. The city has also the lowest taxi fare at $3 per ride. What’s in Jaipur? The Amber Fort and Palace may top the list. You can also marvel at the prints in the Anokhi Museum. For the brave hearts, try Jaipur dishes such as Dal, Baati and Lashun Ki Chutney. We leave it up to you to identify the different flavors that go in these dishes.

Summer Vacation no.6
GOA, INDIA

Expect to shell out around $2,650

Another Indian place makes its way in our list, and it is as nearly affordable (or pricey, depends on your view) as Jaipur. Goa is best known for its beaches, heritage sites and places of worship. Airfare to the city is nearly the same as Jaipur, but hotel rates in Goa are the lowest in our list at $14 per night. Like its sister Indian destination, Goa has very affordable restaurant meals at $18 per day; while taxi fares are around $4 per day. The first thing to do in Goa is head off to Agonda Beach or Mandrem Beach or Cavelossim Beach for a nice tan. Interestingly, you can visit a Catholic church in this Hindu place, the Basilica of Born Jesus or the Old Goa, remnants of Portuguese influence.

Summer Vacation no.7
TOKYO, JAPAN

Expect to shell out around $2,681

On the far end of Asia is our next city: Tokyo. Surprise! the city has the cheapest round-trip plane tickets from the U.S. in our list at $1,500 on the average. Not surprising is that restaurant meals in Tokyo are at $70 and taxi rides are at $31 per day, both the most expensive among our cities. Tokyo is vibrant and exciting highlighted by the Shinjuku district; but the city also offers serene and zen-like sites such as the Asakusa Shrine, the Shinjuku Gyoen Garden and the Nezu Museum.

Summer Vacation no.8
SEOUL, SOUTH KOREA

Expect to shell out around $2,683

Nearly as costly as our previous city is Seoul, which is smacked right in the middle of our list. Airfare to Seoul is around $1700 and hotels are at $52 per night, both higher than in Tokyo. But restaurant meals and taxi rides are less costly than the Japanese capital, at $46 and $12 per day, respectively. Seoul is a mix of culture, modernity and history. Visit the War Memorial of Korea or watch a talented troupe of acrobats at the MyeongDong Theater. Appreciate the country’s art at the National Museum of Korea or marvel at the World Heritage site Changdeokgung Palace.

Summer Vacation no.9
HANOI, VIETNAM

Expect to shell out around $2,817

The capital of Vietnam, Hanoi is more expensive than its cousin in the north, Ho Chi Minh. Airfare leans more on the expensive end at $2,432, but Hanoi hotels at $14 per night are the second cheapest in our list. Restaurant meals are also affordable at $24 per day, the third cheapest among our cities. However, taxi ride in this city is in the midrange, about $6 per day’s ride. Hanoi’s attractions include the Old Quarter, a district that features the country’s colonial past; the Lake of the Restored Sword, a lake filled with mystic as relaxing breeze; and the Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum, where the country’s modern founder is buried. Also savor Vietnamese dishes as Pho, Cha ca, Banh xeo, Cao lu and Rau muong.

Summer Vacation no.10
SINGAPORE, SINGAPORE

Expect to shell out around $2,972

The ultra-modern, cosmopolitan city of Singapore is expectedly costly. Although its airfare is a little affordable at $1,686, just behind Seoul, the hotels are the second most expensive in our list at $65 per night. Restaurant meals are a bit high, too, at $63 per day, which is a pity considering Singapore offers a slew of culinary delights. Going around is average at around $7 per day. Singapore is small and ten days are probably more than enough to enjoy its attractions. These include the National Orchid Garden, the Singapore Botanic Gardens and the renowned Singapore Zoo. You can also “fly a plane” at the Flight Experience Singapore, the first flight simulator for the public in Asia.

Summer Vacation no.11
KYOTO, JAPAN

Expect to shell out around $2,982

More expensive than Tokyo, Kyoto comes around at 11th place with its taxi fare and restaurant meals costing as much as in the Japanese capital. But its hotels are more expensive than Tokyo at around $61, our third highest in the list. Kyoto is a heritage city. Enjoy its zen parks like the Golden Pavilion, the Eikan-do and the Sanjusangendo Hall. The city’s temples are also a must-see, namely, the Sanzen-in Temple, Ninna-ji Temple and Kiyomizu Temple. The best time to visit Kyoto is in spring when the cherry blossoms are out in the open.

Summer Vacation no.12
HONG KONG, CHINA

Expect to shell out around $3,113

Who doesn’t want to go to Hong Kong with its glitzy nights, bargain shops and cultural, culinary and artistic points-of-interest? The city has the most expensive hotel rates in our list at $82 per night. But airfare to Hong Kong is somewhat average, at $1,747 for a round trip. Restaurant meals are just a notch below Singapore at $54 per day, while taxi rates are nearly as costly as in Seoul at $13 per day’s ride. Enjoy a dinner by the balcony amidst the Hong Kong skyline. For a panoramic city view, walk the trails to the Dragon’s Back or the Victoria Peak. Not the least, drop by the famous Ocean Park.

Summer Vacation no.13
PHNOM PENH, CAMBODIA

Expect to shell out around $3,288

It used to be called the Pearl of Asia and the most charming French-built cities, and it probably is today. Phnom Penh is a little expensive, perhaps, because the infrastructure is limited amidst high tourism traffic. Airfare is the single most expensive cost when traveling to the city, which is around $2,889, the fourth highest in our list. However, hotel rates and restaurant meals are more affordable at $16 per night and $24 per day, respectively. Meantime, taxi rates are somewhat in the midrange at $6 per day’s ride. The Killing Fields site and the Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum are haunting and a must if only to get a glimpse of a dark chapter in our collective history. But Phnom Penh has stunning centuries-old temples, too, including Wat Ounalom, the Silver Pagoda and Phnom Chisor Temple.

Summer Vacation no.14
SIEM REAP, CAMBODIA

Expect to shell out around $3,374

Just a notch higher than Phnom Penh is another Cambodian city, Siem Reap. It features Chinese and colonial architecture, a reflection of the country’s past influences. Like Phnom Penh, Siem Reap is quite expensive largely due to the lack of infrastructure to accommodate droves of tourists. Airfare is the second most expensive in our list at $2,979, which drives the city up in our list. Restaurant meals are affordable at $24 per day, just as hotel rates at around $16 per night, a notch higher than Hanoi. Siem Reap is best known for Angkor Wat, the breathtaking ancient ruins and a World Heritage site. Other equally stunning heritage sites are Ta Prohm, Bayon Temple, Angkor Thom and Banteay Srei.

Summer Vacation no.15
TAIPEI, TAIWAN

Expect to shell out around $3,766

A surprising second most expensive city in our list is Taipei. It has the third highest airfare at $2,924 for a roundtrip and the fifth highest hotel rate, $52 per night. Eating out in the city is somewhat manageable at $32 per day and taxi ride per day costs about $9, the fifth in our list. Little is known about Taipei compared to China’s major cities. But it is not without sites worth visiting such as the Yangmingshan National Park, the Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial Hall and Tamshui district with its promenade, shops and local eateries.

Summer Vacation no.16
KATHMANDU, NEPAL

Expect to shell out around $4,311

High in the Himalayas is the mystical Kathmandu, Nepal’s gateway to tourism and literally the highest place in our list. It is said to be 2,000 years old inspired by Hindu and Buddhist influences.  It is the only Asian place in our list to breach the $4,000 mark on the average, notably because the average airfare is at $3,867, the most expensive in our list. Other than the plane ticket, Kathmandu’s other travel costs are affordable: hotels at $18 per night; taxi rates at $5 per day’s ride; and restaurant meals at around $26 for lunch and dinner a day. Bodnath Stupa, a Buddhist site, should top your must-see list, so does the Swayambhunath Temple, a Hindi site. The Garden of Dreams lives up to its name, while the Kopan Monastery may be the closest stereotyped monk’s lifestyle you can experience.

Then again, if Asia is outside of your budget this summer, why not “visit” our very own United States. Take a road trip or camp out—it is as good as summer goes and you can bring the whole family.

BARRING THE COSTS, WHICH EUROPEAN OR ASIAN CITY
IS YOUR FAVORITE DESTINATION AND WHY?

Cheap summer vacations in Europe and Asia are possible; you just need to separate the affordable chaff from the costly grain.

Both continents boast of cities with rich history, heritage, culture and cuisine. But both cannot be farther from each other as apples to oranges. Visit all or any of their cities and you’ll be most rewarded with travel memories that are worth telling a friend.

To help you decide where to go we had fun playing around the costs to see how far your dollar can take you in these two great continents.

If you’re thinking of a European or Asian escapade this year, we used Trip Advisor’s 2013 travelers’ choice destinations, but with a tweak: we arranged the cities by travel cost, the average sum of airfare, hotel room, taxi ride, and restaurant meals during this summer.

How we compute the summer vacation rates

Our costing is not mathematically precise; rather, they are estimates based on popular online sources, such as Expedia’s airfare and hotel booking system and Numbeo.com’s cost-of-living indices.

We simply averaged the first 10 cheapest rates that popped out of an Expedia search: roundtrip airfare and 10 summer days in a 3-star hotel with breakfast for one guy.

As for meal costs, we used the Numbeo index, which pegs restaurant prices to New York City rates. For simplicity, let’s say your restaurant meals will equal $100 NYC worth per day. Restaurant meal rates in foreign cities can be more or less expensive; we’ll just add or subtract the difference based on the index.

For taxi fares, we estimate that you’ll be traveling for 10 miles per day in and around the city for the duration of your travel and convert the fares to U.S. dollars.

Oh, and we smack the origin of destination right down at the heart of continental America as a kind of balance between the east and west coasts; that should be Kansas City International Airport in Missouri.

The little details aside, we can now see how much each popular an European or Asian city costs for an American wanting to get lost in these stunning cities.

EUROPEAN CITIES

In Europe,  especially in the central eastern front, less than $3,000 will go a long way. As for the rest of Europe, prepare the wallet and plastic.

Summer Vacation no.1
PRAGUE, CZECH REPUBLIC

Expect to shell out around $2,734

The city has one of the cheapest hotel rates in our list and restaurant meals are around $41 per day, the lowest among our European cities. It’s a heritage and historical paradise with more than a hundred old architectural structures to visit. A walk around the old town, the heart of Prague, alone will reveal 13th-century houses and churches. Some of the must-see recommended by travelers include the Old Town Hall and Astronomical Clock, the Carolinum, and the Estates Theater.

Summer Vacation no.2
KRAKOW, POLAND

Expect to shell out around $2,790

Krakow hotels have one of the lowest rates averaging about $38 per day for a 3-star facility. Eating in Krakow is also cheaper than the other European cities, where $44 per day will allow a three-course meal. Don’t be afraid to flag a taxi. Krakow taxi fares are the lowest in our list at a mere $9 per ride. So where to go in Krakow? The city dates back in the 7th century so it’s a nice place to see some centuries-old buildings. In fact, the Historic Center in Krakow is Europe’s largest market square and it is thirteen centuries old. Historical catholic churches are expected, notably the Franciscan Church and the Wawel Cathedral. The city also throws us back to the remnants of the Holocaust with the Galicia Jewish Museum to remind us about this dark chapter in mankind’s history.

Summer Vacation no.3
BUDAPEST, HUNGARY

Expect to shell out around $2,800

Our third European city goes to Budapest, the largest city in East Central Europe. Neither cheap nor expensive, the cost of flying to the city is right smacked in the middle of our list, around $1,911 for a round trip. However, Budapest has the lowest hotel rates at around $30 per day for a 3-star hotel. The city is known for the numerous baths, springs, and spas. Check the neo-baroque Szechenyi Spa and Rudas Spa, a Turkish pool and one of the favorites among travelers. Roman ruins such as the Aquincum Museum, Heroes’ Square and Statue Park are photos waiting to be taken.

Summer Vacation no. 4
LISBON, PORTUGAL

Expect to shell out around $2,941

Nearly as cheap as Budapest is Lisbon, but it’s a totally different setting. The city was once the center of the world, the place that heralded the Golden Age of Exploration and, we can say, why you’re in America today. It’s Portugal’s largest city with about half a million people who are a little wary of the Euro. Ten dollars can get you around the city, one of the lowest rates in our list. But there’s a better way to go around the city: via its iconic trams that will take you through narrow cobbled streets. The National Tile Museum is an interesting site, a throwback to a time when Portugal is Arabic. You can also check the Alfama, an old district in the city, which provides an impressive panorama of the sea, the same sea that had tempted explorers of the past to discover the world.

Summer Vacation no. 5
ISTANBUL, TURKEY

Expect to shell out around $3,133

Istanbul has one of the more expensive airfare and hotel rates, but getting a taxi and eating out lean more on the cheaper side. Riding a taxi is around the same cost as in Lisbon. As for eating out, $460 can give you the pleasure of a ten-day food orgy in the city. And Turkey has really nice cuisine, a fusion of Central Asian, Middle Eastern and Balkan cuisines that date back to the Ottomans. Try Lahmacun, a pizza-like dish with minced meat and spices on thin dough, or Doner, pieces of meat seasoned with lots of local herbs and spices. Fried vegetables in garlic are also common in Turkish cuisine. Enjoy the city’s attractions, but focus more on the dishes.

Summer Vacation no. 6
BARCELONA, SPAIN

Expect to shell out around $3,196

Barcelona comes around in the middle of our list even if it has the third lowest average airfare: $1,684. However, hotel rates, restaurant meals and taxi rides in Barcelona come out as more expensive than most of the cities in our list; thus, leveraging Dali’s favorite city to the side of not-so-cheap city destinations. The city is rich in arts, not the least Gaudi’s famous works, the Sagrada Familia and Casa Mila. You can also check Picasso Museum, which shows the artist’s works from his early to later years. The National Museum of Art of Catalunya is also a must-see for the budding or professional artist.

Summer Vacation no. 7
LONDON, ENGLAND

Expect to shell out around $3,349

London has the cheapest average airfare at $1,373. Incredibly, it has the most expensive taxi fare in our list at $48 per day ride. But restaurant meals hover around $94 per day and hotel rates are at a mid-range of $55 per night, enough to put the city in the middle part of our list. London is an exciting city of food, museums, modern art, and, of course, royalty. Among the top tourist favorites are: the Buckingham Palace, Tower of London, and the Houses of Parliament. The city, of course, is also a center of theater shows from Les Miserables to Matilda and the Lion King. Likewise, what is London without the numerous quaint stalls offering steakhouses, pies, fish and chips and even churros?

Summer Vacation no. 8
PARIS, FRANCE

Expect to shell out around $3,438

The city of lights is easily the favorite destination in the world. It feels good to know it is somewhat in the middle of our list, neither expensive nor cheap, just enough to make the trip worth investing in. Paris flights are around $1,538 roundtrip, the second lowest next to London flights. But unlike London, Paris taxis have more sense; they charge at a reasonable $16 per day ride. Driving up the Parisian tour are its restaurant and hotel rates that are at the better part of the expensive column. Museums, cafes, a tower that seems misplaced, the street lights, boulevards, romantic churches… we don’t have to spell out the things to see in the world’s romance capital.

Summer Vacation no. 9
ATHENS, GREECE

Expect to shell out around $3,454

What is a European travel without Athens? Restaurant meals, taxi fares and hotel rates are more costly in this city, perhaps because it is one of most popular destinations in the world. Of course, the Acropolis will be at the top of your must-see list. The Agora market is also haunting, a public center of activity during Socrates and Plato’s day. But Athens is not all Ancient Greece; there is Anafiotika, a nineteenth century district of bougainvilleas and whitewashed walls and Plaka’s constricted streets of stalls selling trinkets and knick-knacks of all sizes and stories. Like its nemesis, the Turkish, Greek dishes are liberally spiced up and they provoke a deep explosion of flavors. Moussaka, the famous casserole of eggplant and spiced meat is a must for the first-time visitor. Other popular Greek food favorites are Baklava, a traditional pastry, Horta Vrasta, a concoction of leafy greens, and Tzatziki, a kind-of yogurt done the Greek way.

Summer Vacation no. 10
DUBLIN, IRELAND

Expect to shell out around $3,520

Average airfare to Dublin is $1,771, the second lowest in our list. Yet the city of pubs—thank you, Dublin for Guinness—is one of the really expensive places to eat out. You’ll probably need a little above a hundred dollars per day to hop from one restaurant to another and a pint in every meal, perhaps. What the city lacks in impressive architecture it makes up with cultural activities that tourists recommend. The Comedy Crunch tops the list, a perfect reason for a hilarious night out with friends. Gaelic games are aplenty in sports facilities, bringing you closer to experience Irish antiquity. You can also try an Irish candlelight dinner in a pub replete with a telling of folklores and fairies.

Summer Vacation no. 11
BERLIN, GERMANY

Expect to shell out around $3,616

The single most expensive item in flying to Berlin is, well, the airfare, an average of $2,061. Next to the plane ride, another expensive item in this city is, surprise! the taxi ride, which costs about $28 per day.  Is it because their taxis are Mercedes? Berlin hotel rates and restaurant meals are somewhat in the mid-range, making Berlin at least not the most expensive in our list. The city is classical, and at the top of your activity list must be a concert date with the Berlin Philharmonic. Not to forget, the Berlin Wall, or what remains of it, still gives you the goose bumps when Europe was, in fact, two worlds. A visit to the Reichstag, Germany’s parliament, is perhaps akin to seeing the Buckingham Palace in London. Like in Krakow, Berlin hosts a haunting reminder of World War II, the Holocaust Memorial.

Summer Vacation no. 12
ST. PETERSBURG, RUSSIA

Expect to shell out around $3,684

St. Petersburg’s hotels are costly at about $864 per night, and they drive the city near the top of our list. Airfare to the city from Kansas is around $1,910 and restaurant meals per day is about $74, not much compared to Dublin. Going around in taxi is a little expensive though; it will send you back about $17 around the city per day. The city is renowned for its palaces and museums. Marvel at the State Hermitage Museum and Winter Palace, one of the most popular museums in the world. Likewise, the Catherine Palace and Park is a must-see, a stroll down Russia’s glorious past. Also a landmark in the city is the Peterhof Palace and Garden built for Peter the Great. When not impressing you with royalty or art, St. Petersburg sways you with its classical ballet and opera at the Mariinsky Theater.

Summing up our list are five expensive cities:

Summer Vacation no. 13
VIENNA, AUSTRIA

Expect to shell out $3,699

Airfare to Vienna averages about $2,114, but hotel costs is a little manageable at $575 per night. But like in Berlin, Viennese taxis can be luxurious at $20 around the city per day. The city is easily an expensive city, but one that’s worth your money. You can’t get more classical in this city. It’s the place that gave us Mozart, Strauss, Schubert, and Haydn. No doubt, the State Opera House will give you the world’s best in operatic performance and symphonies. Other must-see in Vienna are its palaces: the Imperial Palace; the Belvedere Palace and Museum; and Schonbrunn Palace, among others.

Summer Vacation no. 14
DUBROVNIK, CROATIA

Expect to shell out around $3,715

It is a city frozen in time. Dubrovnik is romantic, historical, and alluring. Except that its hotel rates are right up there, averaging a high $1,007 per night for a 3-star accommodation. Taxi fare is a little costly, too, at $18 per day ride. But eating out is encouraging: a mere $56 per day cost, but don’t expect Croatia’s finest wine is included. The city’s ancient city walls is a favorite, as the Old Town provides a historical significance of Europe centuries ago. You can also ride a cable car to get a breathtaking view of Dubrovnik, the clay-tiled roofs cascading down to the deep Adriatic blue. Or you can catch a beach break in the nearby Lopud Island and enjoy a Mediterranean-like sunbathing.

Summer Vacation no. 15
ROME, ITALY

Expect to shell out around $3,837

It has the second most expensive airfare at $2,168 and third most expensive restaurant meals on the average. But its taxi rates are affordable at $11 per day ride and the hotel rates are manageable, about $49 per night. When in Rome do as the tourists do: they visit the Colosseum and marvel at the Vatican City. Of course, Rome is more than just a ruining stadium and a religious headquarters. Roman dishes are exceptionally a must and the city is filled to bursting of cafés and cafeterias. Bruschetta, Pecorino Romano, Porchetta, Gnocchi alla Romana… just reading the dishes make you salivate and crave for anything Roman.

Summer Vacation no. 16
AMSTERDAM, NETHERLANDS

Expect to shell out around $4,503

Airfare to Amsterdam is the most expensive in our list, at an average of $2,407. Restaurants are costly, too; about $108 per day, the second most expensive in our list. So while you’re in this city, make sure not to miss its points-of-interest as not to waste a good travel cash out. The clogs and cheese are cute, but do check out the city’s true attractions: its canals and parks. Get a sense of Europe that is at once rural and ultra-modern. Amsterdam’s museums are heritage as its modern art is cutting-edge. It is also a music capital that attracts droves of indie artists and bands during festivals.

Summer Vacation no. 17
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND

Expect to shell out around $4,988

And the most expensive city in our list is… a city that seems to sleep early. It tops our list of having the most expensive restaurant meals ($142 daily); the highest 3-star hotel rates ($139 per night); and it is the city with the second most expensive taxi fares ($38 per day ride). The only thing breathable going for Geneva is the airfare, averaging at $1,800 round trip. But to see Lake Geneva, the Swiss watch museums, the maze of cobblestone streets and alleys strewn with cafes and boutiques and all things Swiss will make up for the travel expense. It is a traveler’s dream destination, as dreams are often expensive in real life.

Of course if Europe seems expensive, you can always explore the beautiful country of the United States without spending much.  A road trip or camping escapade is always a good cheap alternative for that memorable summer escapade.

NEXT: CHEAP AND THE NOT-SO CHEAP ASIAN DREAM CITIES

]]> http://financesonline.com/cheap-summer-vacations-and-the-not-so-cheap-europe-and-asia/feed/ 0 http://financesonline.com/income-inequality-in-the-us-green-bucks-of-wrath/ http://financesonline.com/income-inequality-in-the-us-green-bucks-of-wrath/#comments Tue, 11 Jun 2013 10:09:23 +0000 Julia Trello http://financesonline.com/?p=3054

Income inequality refers to an income distributions in which a smaller group’s share of the total income is larger than the share of the larger population. For instance, in the United States where income inequality persists, the top 20% of U.S. households accounted for more than 50% of the total US household income in 2011.

Although income inequality varies from state to state (Texas having the biggest gap while Maine registered the lowest gap), one thing is certain – the disparity of income between the wealthiest Americans (the top 1 to 5 percent in economic status) and the rest of the nation’s population persists, and is becoming wider.

As of 2006, the United States had one of the highest levels of income inequality among similar developed or high income countries. And how does the US fare compared to its immediate neighbors? The landscape is even worse. The 2013 income inequality report by the UN Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean shows that income inequality in the United States exceeds the rate of Latin America, long viewed as region with the worst wealth inequality in the world.

The explicit scenario is that the wealthiest 20% in the US earns 16 times more than the poorest 20%, or a 16.0 gap. Countries who were often hit for unsound economic policies like Nicaragua and Argentina now fare better than the US where income disparity among the population is concerned.

FACTS AT A GLANCE:

• The rich have gotten much richer in the US, while just about everyone else has had very modest income growth.
• Most of the growth has been between the middle class and top earners, with the disparity becoming more extreme the further one goes up in the income distribution.
• It appears that going “from rags to riches” is relatively rare among Americans today; and instead, where one starts in the U.S. income distribution greatly influences where one ends up.

WHAT IS HAPPENING

Though economists and scholars differ on the root cause of income inequality, one factor always crop up in cause-effect discussions – wage stagnation for American laborers, beginning in the 1980s (a period of successive financial crises) and persists up to this day.

The 1980s was a challenging decade for the US, with severe recession hitting the nation in 1981 due to tightening of the money supply to counteract the very high inflation rate at 13.5 percent. Unemployment hit a historic 7.5 percent in 1980 and rose to an all-time high of 10.8%, the highest since the Great Depression. While savings, loans, banks and other financial institutions recovered after the dark decade, the gloomy employment scenario in the US would become a persistent problem.

Fast forward to the present, the US unemployment rate remains the waterloo of every US administration since the Reagan era of the 1980s.

In the words of Forbes‘ Robert Lenzner, “the current job-creation numbers are meaningfully below the level we might expect during a period of record corporate earnings and the reaching of new peaks in the major stock market indices.” Statements such as this simply underline the worsening income inequality in the US, which seems to thrive behind rosy economic developments like stock market gains and foreign direct investments.

EMPLOYMENT

Poor and middle class wages in the US stagnated during 1980-2011, with the periods between  2007 to 2009 among the painful blows to working Americans. This shows that even though there is some kind of recovery that took place after every crisis, employment never rebound in full.

The US employment sector is unable to make a full rebound after the economic crisis in the 80’s.

New businesses may have created 95,000 new jobs in March 2013 but many people believe that most of those are part-time jobs. Data showed that about half a million Americans still left the workforce in March, most of whom were  unable to get full-time employment.

This fact supports the observation that old economy jobs are disappearing. The new and additional jobs heralded by labor agencies mostly refer to lowly paid service jobs like wait crew, retail clerks, bartending and social assistance works, with little impact to the “new economy.”

To make matters worse, the very recent controversy involving the “beautification” of unemployment rate by the Obama administration, who released a 7.6 percent data as opposed to 14.3 (or almost double) “real unemployment rate” as revealed by Forbes, prompted public outcry especially among the working Americans.

TAXATION SYSTEM

Another factor in the intricate income inequality web is the US taxation system. To clarify things beforehand, tax, for all what’s said about it, is the bloodline of an economy. Everybody should and must pay their fair share of tax to the community (government), rich or poor. Many rights, from exercising leadership and fellowship to engaging even in bickering about governance (and income inequality) is tied to the responsibility of paying one’s taxes.

Suffice to say that tax payments do not select based on amount of wealth, but the minimum qualification to give back based on a standard calculation of income. However, in the case of the US, the taxation system though exhibiting the standard taxation procedure, seem to favor the wealthier Americans, and with this, we mean those that own businesses and manage capital and employment.

In the recent US budget cuts, taxes are not raised but spending is reduced. This means high-income families and business owners continue to enjoy the 2001 tax cuts granted by the Bush administration, to avoid entrepreneurial demotivation, pulling out of investments and slowing down of businesses.

A recent study by the World Bank has analyzed the effect of U.S. tax reforms on income distribution from 1978 to 2009 and found out that the Bush era tax cuts had an inequality-increasing effect. The research further recommends that if these tax cuts are not withdrawn and growth that should have been transferred to the poor do not materialize, income inequality will significantly increase putting at risk “the solidarity among U.S. citizens.”

SHIFT IN VALUES

Inequality imposed by greed and materialism and a culture that allows the few to suck money out of the working public is also a factor in the worsening wealth gap. Shifts in values that promotes aggressive commercialism especially in media encourages new norms in money outlooks and views, perpetrating avarice by those who have so much already. Those in the financial bottom display a willingness to succumb to financial re-engineering (easy credit, instant loans, pay-later plans and the like).

The “heinous” gap in income between Wall Street executives and the ordinary laboring American prompted the series of Occupy Wall Street (OWS) protests across the US in 2011, organized by those against the culture of financial greed and corruption in the US. Although the protests turned low key, it helped bring the issue of income inequality and fairness forward to international consciousness and American political agenda.

EFFECTS

There are those who pronounced that income inequality has no clear relationship with national prosperity. Some US policy makers outwardly dismiss inequality and focus instead on overall growth. They say some income inequality is necessary to encourage innovation and entrepreneurship, and people works harder in response to some government policy incentives. But big, shameful income gaps cannot justify national economic agenda.

1. Threat to upward mobility and the old American dream. Imagine talented, energetic youths struggling with access to education with their labor-weary parents resenting the meager items in their grocery bags, huddled in a cramped social housing complex. When the future is compromised and the very physical bodies are threatened, GDP and national economic indicators do not matter one bit.
2. General discontent and dissatisfaction. Income inequality is damaging to a person’s sense of justice. Those who do backbreaking work without feeling the benefit of gradual, fair-paced growth is now doubting the old American Dream. For them, the adage “opportunity lies before everyone who works hard” is far removed from reality.
3. Damage to health and lifespan. Richer (and better-educated) people live healthier and longer than poorer people. Based from the National Longitudinal Mortality Survey, people whose family income in 1980 was greater than $50,000 (top 5 percent of incomes in that period) had a life-expectancy at all ages that was 25 percent longer than those in the bottom 5 percent (family income was less than $5,000).
4. Damage to national economy’s stability and growth. Professor Raghuram Rajan of the University of Chicago’s Booth School of Business said that in a democratic economy like the US, people don’t really accept weaker spending power and compensate by easing credit standards and encouraging the poor to borrow. With loan payment failures and the like, it will then become a cycle of recession all over again.

Social housing programs reflect the low living standards and dissatisfaction of America’s poorest 20 percent.

WHAT CAN WE DO

Policy reforms is high on the solutions list, but how can inequality reforms take place when some policy makers themselves continue to espouse the national benefit of income inequality and its motivating effect on labor, savings and business? There is a need to recognize income inequality for what it really is, especially in the national political level.

Where inequality hurts the most, meaning taxes and employment, various solutions have also been proposed. The US may well take a look at how developed countries tax their rich. French president François Hollande advocates for a top income-tax rate of 75% for the wealthy, while in Portugal and Spain, new surcharges on the rich are just part of the national austerity programs.

Some retrospection may also be in place, especially the lessons from previous crises of the 1980s, where sustainable economic reform is possible only when the benefits are widely shared.

Finally, remembering, thinking and planning are not any good unless the next step is undertaken: for a firmer and more decisive hands to take the responsibility and enforce the iron-clad reforms as soon as possible.

Conclusion

While income inequality is not confined to the US, with rich countries like Britain, Canada, Sweden and even China exhibiting wide inequality gaps as well, the American income inequality stands out for its chronic, continuing and worsening negative effects. There is a need to act fast on the solutions proposed as every tick of the clock may mean another frustrated and disheartened American losing the faith in the great American dream, succumbing to slack, non-productivity and apathy for their fellow Americans and for the nation.

In the World Wide Web, the battle for survival and supremacy can be reduced to two basic strategies. First, you want people to find you. Then, you want people to like what they see. Owners of small and medium enterprises (SMEs) know they need to be online to grow. Most small business owners are also cybercitizens; they realize that business websites can help them build an identity, widen their customer base, and provide 24/7 marketing services. What they don’ realize, however, is that simply being on the web won’t do the trick. But that’s getting ahead of the story.

Chaos in the Wild Wild Web

Tim Berners-Lee gave the Internet its Big Bang moment by inventing the World Wide Web, which was his way of making sense of all the technology currently available and make them work together seamlessly. Swamped by all the documents and data that needed to be managed, he rose above the chaos, looked at the big picture, and realized that he needed to make everyone speak and understand a common language. HTML was the answer.

Because this happened at a time when computer hardware technology was advancing rapidly, HTML also enabled computers to display content in a WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get) way, much like pages of a book or magazine.

The huge business potential of the World Wide Web was instantly recognized and a mere four years after Tim launched the first ever website in 1991, two giant browser companies were locked in a battle to dominate cyberspace. Microsoft and Netscape tweaked and modified HTML to such an extent they became proprietary and were virtually incompatible with each other. A website coded for Microsoft’s Internet Explorer would not display properly on Netscape, and vice-versa. Imagine your business today in this tangled wilderness then. You can’t, right? Imagine how irritating it would be for your customers to see a “Works best with Internet Explorer” when they’re browsing your broken site in Firefox on a Linux machine.

That situation threatened to fragment Tim’s big picture. The universal language which made this all possible was morphing into exclusive dialects that didn’t translate well. This despite the fact that a year earlier and perhaps because of the growing confusion, he co-founded W3C – the World Wide Web Consortium. When the browser war was raging, the standards set forth by W3C were in wide circulation, but they were largely ignored because software companies thought that the browser dominating the landscape would be able to impose its standards de facto. As the war escalated, this proved to be mission impossible. There was, however, a vision possible.

WaSP to the rescue

Backed by w3c, the Web Standards Project (WaSP) was born. Glenn Davis, George Olsen, and Jeffrey Zeldman co-founded WaSP with the primary objective of convincing browser makers to support the standards set forth by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). They knew that without a common standard, fragmented web technologies would jack up the cost of building and maintaining websites and consequently denying users access to services and content they needed.

By rallying a virtual Who’s Who of web design and development behind the cause, WaSP achieved its stated objective and by 2001, the browser war was largely over. However, Zeldman soon realized that it was one thing to make browsers agree to conform to a single standard and a totally different ballgame to convince programmers and designers to adhere to these standards. The former was easy. At most Wasp only needed to talk to five or six groups and convince them that common web standards a winning proposition. But how does one do that for the hundreds of thousands of developers and designers who code and create for the web day to day?

Fast forward to 12 years after the ceasefire and we’re now in world where Internet use is slowly migrating from fixed desktops to mobile devices with significantly smaller devices with extremely high resolutions. The war has shifted from browsers to mobile operating systems. iOS, Android, Windows, Blackberry, Firefox and a host of other startups are all jockeying for places in this extremely tight race. Clearly, the work of WaSP is far from over.

WaSP and small businesses

WaSP soon spawned many other projects, each with a different focus. Some, like A List Apart, advocate standard-compliant on design and content. Others, like Web Standards Sherpa, focus on education and the widespread use of best practices in web development. Another group overseen by Aaron Gustafson started an outreach project that educates small businesses about why they should care about web standards.

Why small business, in particular? Simply because they’re the sector that will benefit the most from online presence and e-commerce, and also because they have lesser resources to allocate to make this happen. Big companies get all the attention, but small businesses drive the economy. Consider these small business statistics excerpted by crowdsourcing advocate ICO from a report commissioned by US Department of Commerce and the Census Bureau:

• 99.7% of all employer firms are small businesses.
• Half of all private sector employees are employed by small businesses.
• Pay 44% of total U.S. private payroll.
• Generated 65% of net new jobs over the past 17 years.
• Create more than half of the nonfarm private GDP.
• Hire 43% of high tech workers (scientists, engineers, computer programmers, and others).
• 52% are home-based and 2% are franchises
• Made up 97.5% of all identified exporters and produced 31% of export value in FY 2008.
• Produce 13 times more patents per employee than large patenting firms.

Web Standards

HTML (HyperText Markup Language), the backbone of the World Wide Web, uses tags to structure the different page elements and tell the browser exactly how to display them.

XML (eXtensible Markup Language) supports most of the fixed set of elements in HTML 4.0, but also allows customization of new tag elements according to a pre-set type definition or one that’s personally defined. XML is much more flexible than HMTL and is the standard through which the Web’s full potential can be achieved. It’s also the standard that allows easy transport of huge amounts of data.

CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) are the mechanism through which changes in appearance and position can be assigned to HTML or XML elements, simply by declaring that they are of a specific style. The overall appearance of entire sites can be defined with CSS. To remodel the appearance only the CSS (not the individual elements) need to be changed. Less work, faster turnarounds, cheaper cost, and more reliable results.

DOM (Document Object Model) defines the logical structure of documents and the way a document is accessed and manipulated. With it programmers can create and build documents, navigate their structure, and add, modify, or delete elements and content. It can be used with any programming language in a wide variety of environments and applications.

ECMAScript (the standardized version of JavaScript) is a client-side, object-oriented scripting language that manipulates objects specified by the DOM. Through it, elements can be manipulated, moved, or have some properties changed, allowing Web developers to implement such effects as animated text and graphic rollovers that allow users to interact with the page and change its content without the need to reload.

Sources:

• http://www.whatwg.org/
• http://www.w3.org/

 Why care about web standards?

The motive is simple. Businesses want all users to have access to their website from all devices using any browser running on any operating system powered by any platform. Sounds like a tall order? Fortunately, if a website is built to comply with web standards this shouldn’t be a problem. Unfortunately, this is not a given. Business owners will have to take it upon themselves to ensure that the people they hire will build the business website compliant to web standards. And comply they must for the following reasons cited by WaSP:

• Compliant web pages are easy to search

  The structure is easy for search engines to access and evaluate increasing the chances that your site shows up in when relevant keywords are phrases are used in Google, for example. If you want to add a search function to your site to make it easier for users to find information, the same principle applies.

• Compliant web pages live forever

  Old browsers, new browsers, and even browsers of the future can display your existing pages. No special effort is required. You don’t want to be spending on development or maintenance costs each time new web technology comes out, do you? Complying with web standards means you don’t have to.

• Compliant web pages are faster

  There’s a rule of thumb that says it only takes users 8 seconds of waiting to cancel your page and move on to something else. Because web standards specify the separation of content from presentation, your pages need not load everything before it displays properly. Content can be fetched as needed by users.

• Compliant web pages perform better

  Web standards allows you put in the bells and whistles to make your pages more interactive and enrich user experience without worrying that the fancy stuff won’t work.

• Easy conversion and migration

  Your content can be exported to any format that serves the user’s purpose. Migrating content to new systems? No problem, because there’s a web standard for data transport that takes care of this. [XML]

• Pain-free maintenance

  If it’s around long enough, your website will cycle through several batches of developers. If it complies with a commonly understood standard, new developers will have no trouble understanding how the site was originally built.

• Compliant web pages increase access

  Online presence is all about access. Complying with web standards is the first step in ensuring that your content can be consumed by people with special or unusual requirements (e.g. those with disabilities). They will need special equipment to do this and that equipment will need to understand how to your website is built in order to render them in the manner required. These equipment will look for signals and cues specified by web standards. Also, there is a US government mandate for accessibility that comes with its own standards. Access is not just about people disadvantage by disability. It’s also about people with disadvantaged by infrastructure. If you’re running an online tutorial and education business, for example, and you want to reach globally to areas with low bandwidth then you will want to ensure that your site can be displayed as text-only pages.

FinancesOnline.com supports web standards

Because FinancesOnline.com is dedicated to the financial well-being of its users, we strongly support web standards for small business websites. We believe in the potential of small businesses to transform lives, as much as we believe that the Internet can transform small businesses.

If you’re a small business owner or plan to be one, tell us what you’d like to know about web standards in the comments section below. We’ll do our best to provide the information you need.

Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg’s book Lean In has been causing a lot of buzz among women in the workplace—and women looking to jump (back) into the workplace—since its release a few months ago. People are talking about the book and Sandberg’s advice all over the internet, fans of the book have built quite a growing community around it, and Sandberg herself is making media appearances left and right. Lean In has been referred to as a feminist manifesto, or a guide for working women. But is it?

Admittedly, all of the advice is well thought out, and the book is written in an extremely entertaining way. However, Sandberg’s book and her advice are certainly important within a certain “high powered highly educated” business context. It’s hard to ignore that Sandberg is an extremely wealthy high-powered business woman—she talks about graduating from Harvard Business School and working at places like Google, after all. Most of us will never have the same experiences as Sandberg when it comes to our own workplace experiences, and most of us will never be multimillionaires.

I agree with Alyssa Rosenberg in thinking that I think Lean In would be a better fit in the business section of any bookstore, rather than being labeled as a “feminist manifesto”, it’s just not really relevant to all women in many of its aspects. Yet, I do think that there are some important lessons that can be gleaned from Sandberg’s analysis of navigating the business world that can be useful for everyone.

Despite the fact that Lean In is a little too outside of the reality of the daily lives of  working-class women, I do think that Sandberg’s anecdotes do have some value outside of the wealthy world of education and business, so I’ll share those parts of Lean In with you and you can decide for yourself if it’s worth the read.

Leaning In

The main things that Sandberg discusses in her book are: overcoming fears and self-doubt, throwing yourself into the business world, navigating your likability (or lack thereof) among your peers, finding a mentor to look up to in your field, pregnancy and families in relation to work, and finding a partner who is supportive and willing to work toward a 50/50 career and home life balance.

Saying “I do” to a supportive partner

Perhaps Sandberg’s most useful advice is to marry a person who is supportive of you and your career, and willing to split household chores with you 50/50. For white collar families this is probably great advice; split the work and double your already high income. Let’s be honest though, many families cannot afford the increasing cost of childcare. If you have kids and it is economically safe for both you and your partner to work, much more of Sandberg’s book might be relevant to your situation. Not all families can afford for both parents to work full time before their children are old enough to be in school full time.

So can anything be gleaned from this idea? Sure! The idea that you should try to marry a partner who wants to split workload with you 50/50 is still an excellent idea, and probably a profitable one. Who said that just because a family cannot afford childcare it has to be the mother that stays home? In fact, women are currently the primary breadwinners in 40% of US households—up from only 11% in 1960. It might be an economically better decision for many women to work while their husbands stay at home if childcare is not an option.

Women are also currently the primary caregivers in US families though, so if your family cannot afford childcare and depends on mother’s income for support, you need to be sure that you have a partner who is willing to take on the role of primary caregiver so as not to take on too much stress.

Don’t Feel Too Guilty About Being a Working Mother

Sandberg also gives a lot of advice for dealing with the guilt that comes with being a working mother, especially in comparison with the seeming lack of guilt that many working fathers experience. It is pretty disheartening that Sandberg’s own experiences with childcare involve nannies who are able to give far more individual attention to her children than even what the average family can afford if they can afford childcare, but I do think that her reflections are still useful.

Sandberg discusses feeling guilty when dropping her children off at school and interacting with other stay at home mothers who are able to volunteer their time to help out in the classroom—something that I am sure that any working mother whether they are the COO of Facebook or a substitute teacher can relate to. No matter her career and goals, many-a-mother has felt guilty dropping her child off at daycare.

As Sandberg notes though, studies show that children of working mothers do not develop any differently or perform any worse cognitively than their peers who are raised by stay at home mothers. Mothers do not have to feel guilty for working outside of the house. They are in no way causing harm to their children through working alone.

So if working outside of the home is an economically better decision for your family; go for it, and there’s no reason to feel guilty.

You’re not that Different from Sheryl Sandberg

By far the most useful thing that I gained from Lean In, as someone who is quite actively working outside of the field of high-powered-business herself, was learning about Sheryl Sandberg’s own painful self-doubt. Her brutal honesty and anecdotes about feeling like she was not good enough to be a student at Harvard, feeling like she is not worthy, and her stories about her co-workers and peers who feel exactly the same are very heart wrenching stories to be sharing with the world.  Yet, they strangely make the reader feel a lot better about her own self-doubts and lack of self-esteem.

If even Sheryl Sandberg—one of the wealthiest, hardworking, and most successful women in the United States, in a field that is traditionally male-dominated—feels crippling self-doubt, could it be that self-doubt is normal among all women?

In fact, it is. Not only do Sandberg’s own humbling stories mirror many women’s personal experiences, but she cites studies that back up these feelings as well. Certainly one of the most overwhelming things that face women in the business world is self-doubt—and it’s not something unique only to business. Most women face extreme self-doubt in a way that men do not, and while many of Sandberg’s anecdotes are business-world-specific I think that her humbling tales can certainly be learning experiences for your own life.

While I still maintain that Lean In does not have nearly the “feminist manifesto for all women” vibe that marketers are making it out to have, this aspect of the book is something that probably all women can rally around in some way. Are you feeling down and doubting yourself today? Don’t worry; even Sheryl Sandberg has been there. Just lean in. If you’re looking for a way to feel better about yourself and get motivated, just read Lean In.

So, is it Worth Reading?

I highly recommend reading Lean In to anyone looking to go into business, or who are already facing the normal struggles that come with being a woman in today’s business world. If this doesn’t sound like you though, I still think that Lean In is worth a read, but probably with a more skeptical perspective.

If you do decide to tackle Lean In, it’s a short, easy, fairly humorous, and enjoyable read. Just keep in mind that it’s not necessarily a guidebook to obtaining million dollar relationships and success. More than a guidebook, Lean In is a book meant to build a community around the self-doubt and discrimination that women face in the workplace.

Have you read Lean In yet?
Leave a comment and let us know what you thought!

Many relationships, from close family members to great friends have been strained because of misunderstandings and fights arising from troubles of being a co-signor in a loan. Indeed, agreeing to be a loan co-signor involves a lot of financial, legal and personal risks.   What are these risks and their effects to the unwitting debt co-signor? How can one protect himself or herself from these risks?

When a friend or a relative wants to take out a loan, say a personal debt or a home mortgage loan, he or she may ask you to be a co-signor, especially if you have the right financial credibility that will improve someone’s chance of  getting approved for a loan. Many who have co-signed for a loan do so to help a less established friend or relative secure an urgently needed money.

What it means to be a debt co-signor

What should be clear to those who are being asked to co-sign a loan is that agreeing to such a role goes beyond signing on the dotted line and acting as a kind of guarantor that the person who is actually borrowing will not default on his or her payment responsibilities. Once you signed, it entails important responsibilities including accepting that in the future, you may actually shoulder the payment duties of the original debtor.

For many co-signers, signing a pledge of payment guarantee on behalf of another person’s loan was not a hundred percent free will. Being obliged to family, relatives or friends and simply finding it hard to say no and turn one’s back to a friend in need made them sign on the dotted line and lose some portion of their peace of mind, at least until the debt has been paid.

Being a co-signor is a risky decision since you do not have an interest on the loan, and instead, will have to put up with the payments to the lender if and when the debtor cannot make the payments. Agreeing to be a co-signor is something of a noble act, and should not be abused by the actual debtor.

This obligation is agreed upon, first, so that the friend or relative can actually be granted a loan, with the trust to this original debtor that he or she will not default on the payments, barring unforeseen circumstances. In short, this is an act of extending a helping hand first and foremost so the debtor will have the needed money, and not an act, in its primal motive, to agree to take over payment duties. Understanding this should discourage any debtor to take advantage or abuse the co-signor’s trust.

If someone approaches you to be co-signor or a co-borrower for a loan, what should you do? Here are some guides to help you in this decision.

Understand the role of co-signor, surety or guarantee provider

A co-signer guarantees to pay for someone else’s debt if the borrower defaults on a loan obligation. His or her signature implies that the co-signor pledges their own assets or financial means when the actual borrower cannot fulfil payment duties. It provides the lender with protection from default by the original borrower. The co-signor affixes the signature after the borrower completes the loan application. In this way, a co-signor is like a surety or guarantee provider.

While the co-signor’s income, assets, liabilities, and credit history are also considered in determining credit-worthiness, he or she  does not have any interest and cannot get benefit from the property purchased or from the loan proceeds.

(This is different from a co-borrower role, whose name appears on the  loan application and on the property’s title in the case of a home loan, meaning the co-borrower has a title to the property, making him or her  obligated on the mortgage note. Given this, it can be emphasized that a co-borrower is an equal in the loan interest and responsibilities, while a co-signor pledges to be responsible to the lender in making up for default payments of the original borrower.)

Know the effects of being a co-signor to your finances and credit rating

When someone agrees to be a co-signor in a loan, he or she is risking his money, resources, credit rating and even the family’s future by putting them as guarantee for a financial package that he or she does not have a right to or an  interest in. But what happens when the original borrower defaults?

If for any reason, the original borrower is unable to fulfil payment obligations, here’s what the co-signor ends up with: pay loan requirements, including late charges, legal fees and other duties. You cannot complain that a collection party is trying to make you pay for someone else’s loan – you agreed to it.

An unwitting debt co-signor puts himself to a lot of personal, financial and legal bounds and risks.

The default payment history and the total unpaid debt if that is the case will reflect on the co-signor’s credit rating. If that loan is reflected on your credit report, it will be considered and viewed as your own bad debt, and will be in your record for up to seven years.

3. Learn how to protect yourself as a co-signor

If you are willing to co-sign a loan for someone, here’s what Wold Law Direct suggest you do before affixing your signature so that you also protect yourself.

1. Seek the lender’s signed agreement that you will not be obliged to pay until the borrower actually defaults on the payment.
2. Have an agreement that will limit your co-liability to only the unpaid principal and only the amount at the time of default, no more, no less.
3. Once the loan has been approved, it is also smart that you exercise vigilance over the payment responsibility of your friend or relative. As you have given your trust and your signature, you can very well ask the lender to oblige you with some safety precautions. For instance, the borrower should  notify you for any late payment or if a late payment is looming.
4. Consult with your lawyer before signing and when the debtor proves to be irresponsible. State laws on a co-signor’s liability may vary.
5. While there are ways that you can protect your credit history, these entail time, money and a lot of patience. You can negotiate for the original borrower to pay you directly under a separate, legal terms if you want to pay the other person’s loan just so your credit rating will be protected.
6. For requests of work colleagues whom you really do not know very well and those not very close to you but are offering some “incentives” like a part of the loan proceed on personal arrangement, decline the responsibility. This will prove the better for you, your money and your family’s future.

While it is a noble act to help someone in need especially if they are family or friends, even financial experts agree that one should think carefully before agreeing to become a co-signor of a loan.

Got your own thoughts and ideas about being a loan co-signor that all of us can learn from? Share it with us!

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