Small investments with major returns
January 12, 2009Most of us are feeling the financial squeeze. So what to do about it? I am not a big fan of get-rich-quick ideas. I tend toward thinking that there is never a free lunch in life. But still.
I decided to do some thinking about saving and budgeting and was looking for some ideas on ways to make the most of my assets. So I clicked on the link to an article written by Brett Arends in the January 5, 2009, Wall Street Journal: Small investments (that’d be the kind for me) with major returns (that’d be the kind I want.)
I scanned through the ideas first to see what kind of interest rates were listed as expected. #3 jumped out at me. It said: “Return: Infinite”. Shoot, I wanted in on that. Who doesn’t want an investment that yields unlimited benefit?
Guess what investment yields infinite returns?
That’s right. A library card. Here’s what it says:
- Take out a local library card. Cost: Nothing. If it saves you $10 a month on books, that’s $120 a year. Return: Infinite
There are many good ideas in the article. But, in my opinion, that one is really the best.
It also reminded me that investing in the library itself, by donating to the library’s capital campaign, yields a community-wide investment whose return is also actually…infinite.
(Okay, you knew I’d get back to that, didn’t you?)
