Hard Externalities in a Long Supply Chain

USA Today recently put out a great in-depth report on short-haul trucking out of LA, called "Rigged". These are not the 18-wheelers you pass on a cross-country road trip, but rather trucks that take goods from a port in Southern California to local warehouses and rail yards: "one small step on their journey to a store near you." 

After taking on unexpected debt at the behest of their employers, these short-distance truckers became embroiled in what has been described as a modern day form of sharecropping: coerced into debt by employers who then used that debt to exploit them, and to keep the workers captive.

Our Trip to Asia

We're about to leave for our next travel hacked trip, thanks again to the help of Brad at Richmond Savers and ChooseFI. We're making a little loop in northern Europe, from Denmark, to Germany, then Sweden, Iceland, and Scotland. It'll be our last hurrah before we settle down and try to make Baby Done by Forty.

And I'm realizing I never bothered to write up a post on our last trip to Asia. We'll keep it short on the words and heavy on the pictures this time around, for some easy Monday morning scrolling.

Interview on LifeHacker

The sun has shined on our little blog, as Kristin Wong, she of LifeHacker and New York Times fame, asked to interview me recently on a post I wrote back in April: "Boredom, Cognitive Ability, and the Mental Retirement Effect". After Mrs. Done by Forty and I danced around the living room like children, and I texted every person I know to brag, I said yes.

You can read her piece, "Why Early Retirement Isn't as Awesome as It Sounds," along with all the rest of Kristin's excellent work, on the Two Cents section at LifeHacker.