The Tax Man's Salami

Recently, I picked up a few grocery items at my local supermarket.  Now that I have your rapt attention thanks to that riveting opening, I'll proceed to explain that most grocery products aren't taxable in the province of Ontario, where I live, the significance of which will become clear momentarily.

At the checkout, I asked for a plastic bag, as there was too much stuff to carry free-hand.  In Ontario, most grocery stores; in fact, most stores of any kind (though not all) add a small charge for plastic bags.  They pass this off as a "green" initiative, intended to save the environment by encouraging customers to bring along their own re-usable bags rather than accumulating disposable plastic bags which only wind up in landfills, as opposed to calling it an additional cash grab, which is what it is in actuality.  This post, however, is not a rant against stores that charge for plastic bags.  There's been a sufficient number of other writers who have ranted about this practice at least as eloquently as I could hope to.

Looking over my grocery receipt later, I saw the charges for the various grocery items, a five cent charge for the plastic bag, and a one cent charge for H.S.T.; Ontario's harmonized sales tax.  Recall that most grocery items aren't taxable in Ontario, so the item that was being taxed was the five-cent plastic bag.  But there's a problem with this.  You see, Ontario's H.S.T. rate is thirteen percent (which includes 5% G.S.T. plus 8% P.S.T.).  Thirteen percent of a nickel is .0065 cents.  So the tax amount was rounded up to a penny.


"But of course," you may be thinking, "that seems reasonable since, in North America, a  penny is the smallest possible monetary unit.  Unlike Olde England, we don't have halfpennies.  In fact, technically, we don't even have pennies anymore!  So the amount has to be rounded up.  Still, one cent added to a five-cent charge amounts, in fact, to a 20% tax, not a 13% tax.  I had been over-taxed by 7%.


"Come off it," I hear you chide, "it's only a penny man!"  Maybe so, but how many other people conduct similar transactions during the course of a day, a week, a month and a year?  How much extra money are the Ontario and Canadian governments raking in thanks to this kind of over-taxation?


Many of my readers will have heard the story of a rogue Programmer who apparently worked for a bank, and altered the program which posted bank transactions to divert any rounding differences to his personal bank account.  The story goes that, after initially accumulating a healthy sum, he was eventually found out and jailed for fraud.  While the story itself has become something of an urban legend, given that the specific Programmer and bank in question are either not named or, if they are, there is disagreement about their identities, the common consensus is that the story probably does have some basis in fact.  Even if it doesn't, most authorities agree that this type of activity would definitely be fraudulent and illegal if it did occur.  The practice has even been given a name; "salami slicing".


But if taking the fractions of cents that result from rounding, which don't actually belong to anyone and which no-one is going to miss, is fraudulent, how then can the government justify rounding up a fractional tax amount to a full cent and keeping the difference?  Isn't that the same thing?


As is often the case, it appears that different rules apply to government as opposed to the citizenry.  Ironically, salami, being a grocery item, is not taxable, at least not in Ontario.

Wealth vs. Happiness

A friend once e-mailed me the following joke:

An investment banker was taking a much-needed vacation in cottage country when he noticed a fisherman, sitting at the end of a pier, his legs stretched out, smiling contentedly.

"Here on vacation, I presume?" asked the investment banker.

"Nope, I live here most of the year round," replied the fisherman.

"Ah, so you own the place?" asked the investment banker.

"Just my cottage, my boat and my fishing gear," replied the fisherman.

"You look awfully young to be retired," observed the investment banker.  How do you spend your time?

"Mostly fishing," replied the fisherman, "and sometimes taking walks or boating on the lake with my wife, or playing with my niece and nephew and teaching them to fish when they come visit."

"But what do you do for money?" asked the investment banker incredulously.

"I have all I need," replied the fisherman, "or, when I don't, I do odd jobs here and there and sometimes rent my boat out to vacationers like yourself," explained the fisherman.

"But don't you want to earn more than just enough money to get by?" pursued the investment banker.

"Why would I want to do that?" asked the fisherman.

"To become financially secure," explained the investment banker.

“And what would I do once I became financially secure?" asked the fisherman.

"Why, whatever you wanted to!" answered the investment banker.

“But I`m already doing that,” answered the fisherman with a wink and a smile.

I also found a related post on Quora.com.  It had to do with people who earned a Ph.D. degree and wound up being janitors or doing similar menial work.  The question was asked why this happens. One answer, posted by Joseph Wang, who boasts a Ph.D. in computational astrophysics and, ironically, is also an ex-V.P. of an investment bank, proved quite surprising.  Mr. Wang aspires to be a janitor,  He calls it the "perfect job" and goes on to elaborate:

He talks about an "F.U. Number", which he defines as the amount of savings you need in order to be able to tell your boss "F.U.".  The more alternate sources of income you have, the smaller this number becomes. If being an investment banker or an astrophysicist or whatever is your full-time occupation and therefore your only source of income, the "F.U. Number" is fairly high. However, even a modest alternate income source reduces it drastically.  Note that the implication is that you don't much like either your current job, or at least your current boss.

Secondly, Mr. Wang points out that you don't need as much of an income to pay down any student debt that you might have accrued in getting a Ph.D. in astrophysics, since it costs a lot less to achieve that degree compared with getting through medical school or law school.  Being a doctor or lawyer may pay more than being a janitor or an astrophysicist, but you generally need that income just to pay down your student debt, unless you have very rich and generous parents.

Janitorial work is low-stress.  You generally work during off-hours so you tend to be left alone, which is great if you're an introvert, and you don't normally have a supervisor or boss looking over your shoulder.  There are no deadlines or quotas or time limitations.  As long as the facilities you look after are presentable and everything works, everyone is happy.  You're not ruled by the clock.  If you're efficient and can get your work done in four hours, you can go home and still be paid for eight. Nobody knows or cares whether you actually put in your time.

You can do janitorial work and theoretical physics at the same time.  There's nothing to stop you from pondering quantum field theory while pushing a broom or mop or floor buffer, unlike other jobs which demand much more of your attention and thus keep your mind from wandering.

Of course, what the joke about the fisherman and the investment banker and the post about the would-be janitor with the Ph.D. have in common is they make us think about what really gives us satisfaction and makes us happy.  Too many people think that it's about accumulating wealth, but it isn't.  I don't entirely subscribe to the old adage that money can't buy happiness.  I believe that it's much easier to achieve happiness with money than without, The reality is that you need money in order to access the basic necessities in today's world, and if you're not content with just the basic necessities, then you need more money.  However, we need to remember to treat money as a means to an end, rather than as the goal itself.

Penniless

While all the world has been wringing its hands over the dire financial straits of Greece, Spain and Italy, no-one foresaw Canada's recent shocking announcement that the country would soon be penniless. 

Ha-ha-ha!  I refer, of course, to the Canadian government's recent decision to stop minting pennies.  This is a subject that has been under discussion for several years now.  The hard fact is that Canadian pennies now cost more to mint than they're actually worth.  From that point of view, it makes perfect sense to stop minting them.

But it causes problems, doesn't it?  How do sellers of anything justify charging $24.99 for an item when it will soon be theoretically impossible to pay ninety-nine cents?  Do we start rounding all of our prices to the nearest nickel?  But wait; what happens when we apply the 13% tax (if you combine the 5% GST with the 8% Ontario provincial sales tax)?  Suddenly a $10.00 item costs $10.13.  D'oh!

Of course, the difficulty only arises if we try to pay with real, hard currency.  If we use our credit cards or pay by debit or write a cheque we can still pay any dollar fraction that we like, which once again underscores an observation made by myself in an earlier post that money is, after all, only conceptual.  My employer doesn't hand me a wad of bills every two weeks; they just hand me a pay stub and the balance in my bank account increases.  Then I write cheques or pay by debit or via on-line transactions and the balance in my bank account decreases.  Why stop at the penny?  Why not just do away with cash entirely?

I can suggest a two-fold answer to my own question.  First of all, because not everyone has embraced the digital age just yet.  Some people still like to pay with cash now and again, and I even know of some retailers that still don't accept debit.  The second reason is because, if we really did do away with cash, it wouldn't be a great leap for people to start realizing that our entire system of trade, one of the foundations of human society, is built on a fantasy.  It's all just numbers in the computers, with nothing of substance behind it.  And that realization would destroy the foundation upon which the whole system is built and bring it crashing down around our ears, all because Canada decided that pennies weren't worth minting any longer.

How To Save Money Harper Style

Someone once said that a consultant is someone who borrows your watch, tells you what time it is, pockets the watch and bills you.  Whoever said that must have had experience with consulting firms like the one recently hired by the Canadian government.

Global News reported this past week that Prime Minister Stephen Harper's conservative government is paying consulting firm Deloitte Inc. the sum of $90,000 per day to ... are you ready for this? ... advise them about how to save money.

Okay, let's get the obvious sarcastic retort out of the way.  "You want to save money?  Here's an idea; stop paying consulting firms $90,000 per day!"  Whew!  I feel better now.

The opening paragraph of the news story reads "The Harper government defended paying almost $90,000 a day to a big consulting firm for advice on how to save money, saying it can't do the job properly by itself."  Apparently not.  That has to be the most self-validating statement of all time!

All sarcasm aside, let's grant that there may be some validity to the concept of spending money in order to save money.  Ninety thousand dollars a day is an awful lot of money to spend.  That's $450,000 a week, $1.8 million a month.  What value will the Harper government be getting for this money?  What will Deloitte be doing that's worth $90,000 a day?  Writing reports?  It had better be some report!  What are the odds that Deloitte would have accepted the contract had they been offered $45,000 per day, or even $10,000 per day?  That's still pretty good revenue by most business standards.  How did the Harper government and Deloitte arrive at $90,000 per day?  Did the conservatives approach any other consulting firms?  Was there any sort of tender or competition?

Until recently, the Harper government had a knowledgeable, experienced consultant who provided many sensible suggestions for cutting waste and saving money.  Her name was Sheila Fraser.  She was Canada's Auditor General up until her recent retirement and, while she was no doubt well-paid, I suspect she didn't make anywhere near $90,000 a day.  Unfortunately, the Harper government chose to ignore pretty much everything she ever suggested.

I wonder what will happen should the ultimate irony unfold and Deloitte advises the Harper government not to throw away $30 billion for stealth fighter jets that aren't even suited to the Canadian Forces' requirements, or that there's no need to spend $4.4 billion on expanding prisons when stats show that the crime rate is diminishing, and there is no evidence that longer incarcerations are any sort of deterrent to the criminals that are out there.  Both of these projects are near and dear to the conservatives' hearts, and they've clung to them stubbornly despite strong public opposition and hard data showing both to be questionable initiatives at best.  What if their expensive new consultants agree that these are bad, financially wasteful ideas?

I started this post with a quote.  I'll end it with another from George Bernard Shaw who said "Democracy is a device that insures we shall be governed no better than we deserve."  The Harper government has validated that observation as well.

Money Matters: Part 3

I recently speculated that we may someday witness the end of money, as electronic commerce seems to be increasingly replacing the exchange of physical cash. Within a week of that post, I read this news article announcing that Passport Canada has stopped accepting cash. The article, which features a photograph of Santa Claus trying to purchase a Canadian passport with a $50 bill, reports that Passport Canada has decided to stop accepting Canadian currency as payment for the passports which it issues. The agency apparently wants to reduce the risk of theft by preventing its employees from handling cash. Apparently, screening potential employees so that only honest ones are hired is too much trouble.

If I may digress for a moment, I would also like to point out here that this issue pretty much settles the on-going dispute over Arctic sovereignty between Canada, Russia and sundry less important nations. Everyone knows that Santa Claus lives at the North Pole. If he wants to purchase a Canadian passport, he clearly considers himself a Canadian citizen, which makes the North Pole and surrounding territory Canadian soil (or ice, as it were).

Moving toward the other extreme, I came across an editorial article, still more recently, written by a young woman who prefers paying with cash over plastic (credit or debit) cards because it helps her to budget by making her more conscious of her dwindling savings. The author further notes that an increasing number of restaurants are apparently no longer accepting plastic cards because of the built-in transaction fees. It seems even the legendary Bob Dylan refused to allow promoters of a recent show that he gave in California to sell tickets, insisting that all tickets be purchased at the door and that "E-e-e-verybody must pay cash" (to paraphrase one of his better-known lyrical phrases). Of course, this policy does generate a slight risk of a repeat of the tragedy at the infamous 1979 Who concert during which several fans were trampled in the mad rush for seats but, hey, far be it from me to ask Bob Dylan to compromise his principles. Better men than I have tried and failed, I can assure you.

Finally, if that still wasn't "out there" enough, there's the curious story of Mark Boyle, "The Moneyless Man". As incredible as it may seem, Boyle has managed to live without earning or spending a red cent since 2008. He lives in a trailer that was given to him for free, he grows or barters for his food, he uses a solar shower and even makes his own paper. He's written a book about the experience and how he managed it, entitled "The Moneyless Man: A Year of Freeconomic Living" (a title with a delicious double-entendre - er, was that "Freakonomic" living, Mark?) According to Mark, he's never been happier and has no plans to return to a dependency on money. Now, I don't like to question another's motivations but Mark's surname, and his accent in the accompanying YouTube video, suggest that he's of Scottish descent, and we all know about the Scotts' notorious reputation for frugality!


But seriously, I feel nothing but admiration and awe for Boyle, a man who has proven that my idealistic fantasy of a moneyless world could be a reality if only there were more people like him.

The End Of Money

When I was younger, and much more idealistic than I am now, I used to imagine how wonderfully Utopian our world might be if we could only do away with money. Imagine a world in which nobody has to pay for anything. Everyone contributes according to their talents, and takes only what they need. Crime and poverty are non-existent. People are more fulfilled and happy in their work, because they do what they enjoy and what they excel at, rather than what pays the most. Gone is the society in which a privileged few enjoy obscenely ostentatious lifestyles while the unfortunate live in unspeakable poverty. Everyone enjoys a lifestyle that's comfortable, but not extravagant.

Before I go all John Lennon on you, let me assure you that I fully understand why such a system could never be. One problem is greed. There will always be those who crave the lion's share; those who, for some reason, feel entitled to more than the rest. The other problem is laziness. There will also always be those who want to enjoy the fruits of others' labor without contributing themselves. In order for my Utopian society to work, everyone would have to make a genuine effort to contribute to the best of their abilities and learn to be content with a common standard of living.

On the other hand, it seems to me that we may be evolving to a version of my money-less society. I rarely use cash anymore. Almost all of my payments are either by debit card or through on-line banking. I likewise almost never receive cash either. My employer pays me by automatically depositing my salary into my bank account. There's not even a cheque to deposit. I can see society moving to a point at which all transactions are electronic and no actual money ever changes hands at all.

This ties in with my recent post about money having no intrinsic value in and of itself. First, we did away with the gold backing the cash. Now we're eliminating the cash itself. In a sense, you might consider an electronic commerce system as dealing in "points" rather than cash. Each of us receives 'X' number of "points" for whatever contribution we make to society, and we use those "points" to acquire the things that we need and want. The "point" system gets us around the problems of avarice and sloth. It's not exactly the Utopian society that I imagined in my younger days, but perhaps is as close as we're ever going to get.

Financial Cognitive Dissonance

One of the nice things about this blog is knowing that my readers (or my regular readers, anyway) are intelligent people who don't need me to explain that cognitive dissonance refers to the stating of a given belief but acting in a manner contrary to that stated belief. That's probably why my readership is so small.

The G-20's call for austerity, the burgeoning global debt and Greece's recent financial crisis have got me thinking about money, lately. I wonder how many of us recall that paper money has no intrinsic value in and of itself. Paper money is nothing more than a fancy I.O.U.

In medieval times, people would trade goods and services for other goods and services; "you give me that ox, and I'll give you twenty chickens" or "you give me a room and a bed for the night and I'll plow ten furrows for you tomorrow".

Trading literal goods in this way was somewhat cumbersome and arbitrary. Precious metals, such as gold and silver, were far easier to carry and exchange than oxen, and their value was more easily standardized; easier yet if those precious metals were stamped into light-weight, standardized coins.

One of the earliest examples of this originated in the Bohemian city of Joachimsthal in 1518, where a silver coin known as the "Joachimsthaler" or "Thaler" (pronounced "Tahler") for short was minted in large numbers thanks to the rich silver deposits to be found near that town. In fact, the "Thaler" is the origin of the North American "Dollar's" etymology.

Eventually, the world came up with something even lighter and easier to exchange than gold and silver coins; paper money. The idea, originally, was that each dollar (for those of us living in North America) was really nothing more than a government-issued voucher for an equal value in gold; in other words, each paper dollar represented one dollar's worth of gold stored in Fort Knox or some other such place of safekeeping. Rather than lugging around heavy gold coins or bars, people simply exchanged these paper vouchers instead.

In the early seventies, then President Richard Nixon stirred the financial porridge, so to speak, when he decided to kill the gold standard; in other words, he decreed that the U.S. dollar need no longer be directly convertible to gold. Why? Well, because the United States' ill-considered conflict in Vietnam plus increased domestic spending had created these pesky fiscal and trade deficits. Nixon's solution - no problem; we'll just start printing lots more paper money and do away with that inconvenient rule that it be backed up by something of real value.

You'd think that the rest of the global financial community would cry "foul" or something but, oddly enough, they did the opposite. Gradually, country after country began to follow the United States' lead and started printing currency willy-nilly, beginning with West Germany and followed by Switzerland and, eventually, the rest of Europe and, of course, Canada. Because of all this, today international currencies are valued based on their projected future value rather than the amount of gold that they can buy; in other words, currencies today have no real intrinsic value, other than that assigned by speculators.

In an earlier post, I wondered aloud whether the amount of money that is owed by Canada alone, to say nothing of the rest of the world, actually even exists. I suggest this answers that question.

I wonder what would happen if the majority of the world's financial institutions realized that simple fact tomorrow? More interestingly, if we assume that the world's financial institutions are governed and operated by basically intelligent people who already understand this fact, then we can only conclude that they conveniently choose to disregard that knowledge, and carry on as though money were still backed up by something of value. Now wouldn't that be a fascinating example of financial cognitive dissonance?

The Most Unusual Mail Order Catalog

Quick! What's that thing to the left? Yes, I know it's a Hammacher Schlemmer catalog cover, smarty-pants. I mean what's that thing pictured on the cover?

Don't feel bad if you didn't know that it's a Superplexus. Actually, it's "The Superplexus". Hammacher Schlemmer catalogs often feature items on their cover whose identity and purpose could challenge Einstein.

In case you didn't know, Hammacher Schlemmer (H.S.) is a New York based retailer established in 1848. Aside from their New York store, they also sell via mail order and, of course, the internet. So how did one of their catalogs come to land in my mailbox?

Simple. I mail ordered something from somebody else's catalog. I couldn't tell you what I ordered or from whom, but a lot of these vendors love to share their mailing lists. "Hey Alfred! I've got another chump who has too much money on his hands and loves to spend it on stuff that he's only seen pictures of!" Next thing I know, Alfred Hammacher and William Schlemmer's catalog adorns my mailbox, sporting some inscrutable object on its cover. It was probably the inscrutable object on the cover of the first H.S. catalog that I received which coaxed me into opening it (the catalog) in the first place, rather than just throwing it out. "I've just gotta find out what that thing is!" I probably muttered to myself.

Then it happened. Somewhere among the pages of that fateful catalog I saw that Hammacher Schlemmer's inventory included Hasbro's interactive R2-D2; the very same interactive R2-D2 that I described in such detail in last week's post. I had already heard about Hasbro's R2-D2 earlier and, as I explained in my previous post, had already developed a serious case of the "I Wants" for one. Part of what kept me from rushing right out and buying one was the fact that there were none to be found in any of the stores in my immediate locale. I checked everywhere; Toys 'R Us, Sears, Zellers, even various obscure hobby and novelty shops. Nada. But there it was, in full color, among the rest of the H.S. merchandise, right next to the words "In Stock".

I think I began excitedly whistling "I've found it! It's here!" (that was an obscure Star Wars reference for you non-geeks out there) until my wife came over to find out what the commotion was all about. After settling me down with the help of several tranquilizer darts, she managed to convince me to hold off ordering one long enough so that she was able to get me one as a Father's Day gift, because every father should own a toy R2-D2.

There's only one better way of getting on a catalog store's mailing list than by ordering from some other catalog store, and that's by ordering from them directly. Hammacher Schlemmer has been faithfully sending me catalogs on a quarterly basis ever since they received my wife's order for R2-D2.

For those unfamiliar with Hammacher Schlemmer, they are distinguished, in my mind, as being a merchant of unusual and/or hard to find items. If you're looking for a gift for that hard-to-buy-for person who seems to have everything, consult with Hammacher Schlemmer. It also helps to have a whole lot of disposable cash.

Take the Superplexus, for example. You're probably wondering what, exactly, a Superplexus is, even though you've seen a picture of one at the start of this post. I was getting to that. Ever see those wooden labyrinth games where you roll a marble through a maze by twisting the board around using two knobs? The Superplexus is something like that, except that it's three-dimensional, it's enclosed in a glass sphere, it stands just over four feet high and three feet wide, it weighs 65 lbs. and it retails for $30,000. Yes, that's right, I said thirty thousand ... with four zeroes. It's the ideal Christmas gift for Bill Gates' son, who probably already has all the video games he can possibly play; just a tip for anyone who happens to work for Microsoft and is looking for a good brown-nose opportunity.

Hammacher Schlemmer's catalog and web sites are full of this kind of stuff! If the Superplexus seems a bit "frugal", how about a genuine seven foot tall Robbie the Robot (the one that looks like a walking jukebox, remember?) for fifty thousand dollars (actually $49,999.95). Or, if you're a bit more budget-minded and the Lost In Space robot is more to your liking, H.S. will gladly sell you a life-sized one of those for only twenty-four and a half thousand dollars.

It's not just all toys, either. Are you environmentally conscious and in the market for an electric car? H.S. has three to choose from; a 4,000-watt roadster for $13,000, a one-person electric car for $36,000 or an electric two-seater that goes from zero to sixty in four seconds, with a top speed of 120 mph; a steal at $108,000. And, for the kiddies, how about a kid-sized electric SUV for just under $500? May as well start building that spoiled sense of entitlement during their formative years, right?

Not everything in H.S.'s inventory is priced for the Rockefeller set, but even their less expensive items tend to be unique. How about digital copies of every National Geographic magazine ever published on a DVD-ROM boxed set, for $69.95? Or a wallet that can withstand being put through a full dishwasher cycle for $49.95? Let me tell you, if I had a nickel for every wallet I've wrecked by dropping it into the dishwasher... well, let's just say I'd need H.S.'s Balance Keeping Coin Bank to keep them all in.

Another peculiarity about Hammacher Schlemmer's catalog (and web site) is that practically every item's description begins with the definite article, "The". It's not just "Gyroscopic Golf Trainer", it's "The Gyroscopic Golf Trainer". It's not just "A Bucket Seat Bicycle", it's "The Bucket Seat Bicycle". This probably makes sense, since the use of the definite article implies uniqueness, as in "there is only one", and I daresay much of H.S.'s inventory is definitely unique. I mean, how many different Upside Down Tomato Gardens can there possibly be out there?

For their less unusual or unique offerings, H.S. tends to add words such as "best", "most" or "genuine" to their product descriptions, implying top of class or best of breed, such as "The Best Electric Knife Sharpener" or "The Slimmest Bluetooth Speakerphone". While I can't vouch for such claims, as doing so would mean comparing every possible brand and make of a given product in order to determine if H.S.'s is truly the best one, I will say that I've been very satisfied with "The VHS To DVD Converter", which I purchased from H.S. two Christmases ago (yes, I was actually able to afford two items from the H.S. catalog back when I used to have a job).

The VHS to DVD recorder that I received from H.S. turned out to be a Sony model RDR-VXD655. This unit is by no means exclusive to Hammacher Schlemmer and I can't say whether there are better VHS to DVD recorders available elsewhere, but it's interesting to note that nowhere in H.S.'s catalog or on their web site do they mention that the machine is a Sony, let alone its model number. Considering that Sony is a fairly well-respected electronics manufacturer, most retailers would trumpet the brand name as a feature. Not Hammacher Schlemmer. They seem content to let their reputation speak for itself. "If we're selling it, you can rest assured that it's a top quality item." I find that unusual, and refreshing.

Playing With Numbers

The problem with big numbers is that, once they get big enough, they lose their meaning. People need a frame of reference, something with which to compare, in order to have any understanding of scale. One common trick is to express numbers which measure size, volume or distance in terms of time. People seem better able to relate to the passage of time than they are to size. That's how the concept of the light year arose. Tell someone that the nearest star (excluding the sun, of course), Proxima Centauri, is 39,900,000,000,000 kilometers away, and you generally get a blank stare, even if you express that number as "39.9 trillion". The human mind can't comprehend that big a distance. Say that Proxima Centauri is 4.22 light years away, and it becomes clearer. Ah! So even light, which we know travels very, very fast, would still take a little over 4 years to get from here to there. Now we have a frame of reference.

Someone sent me an interesting spreadsheet this week. You enter your birthday, and it tells you exactly how long you've been alive, in years, months, days, weeks, minutes and even seconds. According to this spreadsheet, at the moment that I typed my birthday and pressed Enter, I had been alive for exactly 1,492,450,707 seconds. That's just under one and a half billion seconds. That got me thinking; if someone had been handing me one dollar bills at the rate of one per second from the moment I was born up until the present, I'd have about one and a half billion dollars to my name. Can I think of anybody who has that kind of money? Of course I can.

Everybody loves to pick on Bill Gates, so why should I be an exception? At the time of this writing, he's worth about 40 billion dollars. A person would have to live to the age of 1,269 years and earn a dollar per second during that entire time to come up with that kind of money. Question: Does any one person need or deserve that kind of money? I don't mean to trivialize Mr. Gates' contributions to society and I acknowledge his philanthropic endeavours. It just seems absurd to me that any one person should be rewarded that richly, regardless of what they've done. Nobody needs that kind of money. It's gross over-compensation. Of course, Mr. Gates is not the sole member of the world's Billionaire's Club.

As I write this, Canada's national debt stands at about 512 billion dollars. If the country paid down its debt at the rate of a dollar per second, it would take a little over 16,235 years to eliminate it. Does that much money exist in the world? If not, how did Canada manage to borrow it?

Of course, Canada's national debt pales in comparison to the United States' debt of about 12.3 trillion dollars at time of this writing. You see what I mean? You get to the point where it just seems surreal, doesn't it?

Christmas Bonus

While I was still employed, I was a member of the company social club. The social club was the group that arranged employee social functions throughout the year; mainly the annual company picnic and the two annual Christmas parties (one for adults only and one for the employees' kids). The social club booked the halls and provided the gifts and refreshments for these functions. Since these things cost money, the social club was funded via payroll deduction; three dollars was deducted from each paycheck of each employee belonging to the social club.

At Christmas time, each employee would receive a free turkey courtesy of the company. This was the annual Christmas bonus, and it was provided not by the social club but by the company's owners. As the company is now being liquidated, there is, of course, no staff Christmas party (adult or childrens') this year, nor are there any free turkeys.

Since the social club had been collecting its membership dues for most of the year and didn't pay for any staff Christmas functions, it found itself with a surplus of cash on its hands when the company shut down. To their credit, the social club executive decided that the only fair thing to do was to distribute the remaining monies evenly among the remaining membership (those who were still in the company's employ when it finally failed). And so it was that I received in the mail earlier this week a check from the social club in the amount of just over five hundred dollars.

Ironically, it appears that the best Christmas bonus that I ever received came after the company had shut down. God bless us every one!