4 Amazing Life Lessons from Scrooge McDuck

When I was a little boy, Donald Duck was my favorite comic series, and I used to read it every week. The ducks are caricatures of us human beings, which makes it interesting reading, and there are always some philosophical lessons to be learned in the comics.

One of the most interesting characters is Scrooge McDuck — a greedy capitalist that is the richest duck in the world. His only goal in life is to get richer, no matter what he has to do in order to succeed financially.

Like in every person and duck, there are both good things and bad things in Scrooge. We can learn from both the positive and negative sides of the world's richest duck. Maybe there is something that he has done right to get into the financial position he is, or maybe his greediness is a something we should avoid. It is up to you how you decide to see it.

Here are four important areas in life in which we can learn something from Scrooge.

Wealth

Heavenly heather! The genie in the magic lamp! The fortunes I could own! I could have the world's biggest diamond! No! The world's biggest diamond mine! No-no! All the diamond mines! No! The entire mining industry! Yes, yes, yes! I can see that this is going to take some careful thought.

According to Carl Barks, Scrooge is worth five billion quintiplitilion unptuplatillion multuplatillion impossibidillion fantasticatrillion dollars. No matter what the actual amount is, Scrooge is never satisfied with it and always wants more.

While the good thing about Scrooge is that he has been able to build his fortune from the scratch by clever moves and working hard, moderation apparently isn't one of his virtues.

Of course, most people want a certain amount of money to get a decent living in a Western society, but after a certain point, additional money does not make us any happier.

Giving does.

When you have enough (which is, by the way, often quite little compared to Western standards), why not learn from Scrooge's mistakes and, instead of trying to get more things to yourself, give value to other people and focus on making other people happy?

Even some of the world's richest men like Bill Gates and Warren Buffet have given a huge part of their fortunes away, and there is certainly a reason for it. It makes them happier than keeping the money.

Education

It appears that Scrooge isn't properly educated and has quit school at an early age, but it is unclear why he did it. However, Scrooge is a clever duck and is always willing and ready to learn new things — which is much more important than formal schooling.

Getting a nice degree will open some doors in life, that is for sure. It also never does any harm to be educated. In my opinion, however, the most important things that I have learned during my studies are how important good language skills and networking with the right kind of people are — everything else can be learned quite quickly from books or Google, when needed.

Willingness to learn new things constantly is much more important than formal education, and usually the most important things in life are not taught in school, anyway. At least I wasn't being taught social skills or how to make my own living by starting my own business — I have to learn those things by myself.

Appreciate education, but remember that education can be anything you do to learn new things in life. It isn't just formal schooling.

Morality and Beliefs

As a businessman and treasure hunter, Scrooge always needs to set new goals and face new challenges. For Scrooge, there is always another rainbow, so to say. His motto is "Work smarter, not harder."

We should all learn from Scrooge's positive attitude towards success and work. Like he believes, it is possible for everyone to do almost anything, if there is just enough persistence involved.

You should also always remember to work smarter, not harder. The amount of work becomes insignificant if you are doing the wrong things, so focus on doing the most important things efficiently and try to skip all the insignificant tasks.

Scrooge seems to have a personal sense of honesty that offers him an amount of self-control, but as a businessman, he often resorts to aggressive tactics and deception by manipulating people and events towards his own ends.

It seems that some successful entrepreneurs are quite selfish and only give to other people when they expect to get something in return in the future. If you have seen the movie There Will Be Blood, you know what I mean.

I don't think that any amount of money in the world is worth losing yourself in the process. When you lie in your dying bed, do you want to be remembered as a greedy and lonely guy who was filthy rich or a lovable person who made everyone feel good and whom everyone loved?

Relationships

Here I sit in this big lonely dump, waiting for Christmas to pass! Bah! That silly season when everybody loves everybody else! A Curse on it! Me — I'm different! Everybody hates me, and I hate everybody! — First line, inChristmas on Bear Mountain (1947)

Scrooge is described in some comic strips as an old, bitter, and lonely person, who does not enjoy being around other people unless it involves making more money. It is a caricature taken to extremes, but I don't think that it is too far from truth for many people around us.

The inability to build good relationships is a major obstacle when trying to find happiness. Maybe some people enjoy being alone more than others, but deciding to hate everybody and assuming that everyone hates you is an extreme example of harmful negative energy.

Before you get bitter because of feeling lonely, try to see if there is something wrong with your own attitude. Other people are often mirrors of our own attitudes, so it is very useful to test what happens if you, just for one week, decide to only think good things about everyone and genuinely assume that everyone likes you.

It easily becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy that makes you happier in a short period of time.

Should you get a credit card?

The misunderstanding in this world is that debt is always bad. Governments, corporations, small businesses, working individuals, even students all have DEBT and it is believed that DEBT will be the downfall of society. However debt is not itself the evil force behind recessions, repossessions, retrenches and credit crunches!

BAD DEBT is the problem. Debt itself can be a wonderful tool when used effectively. However when used ineffectively, ‘good’ debt can quickly turn to ‘bad’ debt which can leave you in a nightmare situation. So before choosing which credit card is suitable, make sure you keep the following in mind before applying:

SaveMoney Credit Card Reminders

1. Credit cards are not additional income streams so don’t increase daily expenditure just because you can spend on credit.

2. Always borrow as little as possible and pay the debt off as quick as possible because the quicker you can repay, the cheaper it will be for you.

3. Beware of the Credit Card fees because If you fail to repay in full, you’ll pay interest on the whole amount regardless of any payments made.

4. Avoid late payments as it may lose you any cheap interest rate deals, pay penalty fines and/or hurt your credit rating that may affect future credit card applications.

Should I still get a Credit Card bearing in mind all these potential hazards?

As mentioned earlier, credit cards are not the root of the problem. In fact, if you are disciplined, credit cards have many benefits. It can help keep track of your monthly expenditure, push your monthly payments until after your salary gets paid, earn you rewards or even save you money if used correctly.

Much like lighting a match that has many positive uses such as lighting a candle or providing light for a short period of time, there is a reason why parents always tell children “do not play with fire.” This is because young kids do not know the extent of damage fire can cause in the wrong hands. Same applies for credit cards so keep in mind the following Save Money points.

SaveMoney’s Credit Card Top tips:

1. Best to pay off credit cards in full if you can stay within your budget!

2.  When using credit cards with 0% purchases, ensure that you don’t miss the minimum payment during the 0% period.

• Set up a direct debit to pay the minimum repayment each month of your credit card balance. This way you avoid any late penalty fees or lose out of 0% interest cards
• The minute you pay less, pay late or miss a payment, you lose the 0% bonus rate and get charged the usual high interest rate on this type of credit card.

3. For 0% easy repayment plans over 12 or 24 months for purchases such as mobile phones, home appliances etc, always meet the repayment each month.

• Otherwise you will usually lose your 0% rate over the entire term of the repayment plan

4. Apply for credit cards that can give you the most rewards from your spending habits

• If you spend a lot of your hard earned cash at certain stores, find the credit card that can give you the best return on your spending

Not sure what you should apply for?

If you still don’t know where you should be looking, why don’t you take SaveMoney’s Credit Card quiz which will do its best to help recommend you a card:

Question 1

Will you be able to pay off your credit card in full every month?

NOGo to Question 2 so we can try to minimize your interest payments to save you money.

YESCongratulations, you have landed on cloud 9 of credit card choices.  As you can pay off your credit card in full each month, you don’t have to worry about interest rates. Focus on the best card that rewards you best for your spending. For example, if you are a hardcore movie buff, then finding a credit card that gives you rewards at the Cinemas could be your ideal card. Browse through our Cashback credit cards as well as our reward credit card page.

Question 2

Will you clear all the debts from spending on the card at the end of the 0% period?

NO
Go to question 3

YES
Go for the longest new customer 0% rate for purchases available, giving you time during the 0% period to earn and save enough money to pay off the debts without any interest cost.

Question 3

Are you likely to make a disciplined effort to apply and change cards, on time, roughly every 3-6 months?

NO
Go to question 4

YES
Grab the longest new customer 0% rate for purchases available. Apply for a new credit card with the longest 0% Balance Transfer when the 0% interest period is nearly over (usually 3months or 6months) and transfer the remaining debt onto the Purchases Card.

Question 4

You need to spend using a credit card but unable to make full payments and not willing to apply for new cards every time the 0% period ends?

Your best option is to apply for the lowest interest rate credit card for purchases, and stay away from 0% credit cards. This is because after the 0% period, the interest rate will jump considerably higher than the lowest interest credit cards available out there

Basic Investing Strategy

Investing your money can be a great way to ensure your financial future. With the right investment choices, you can be sure to have money for emergencies, to put towards the education of your children, and to have available when the time comes for you to retire. There is a key word in the preceding phrase however- “right”. If you make the wrong investment choices, you may just end up where you started or worse, flat broke.

Most people who invest wisely by making the right decisions with their money follow the same basic investment pattern, although they may define it by another name. It might be that you are the cynical type who chooses to believe that the basic rules could not possibly be as easy as they seem, in an area that seems so complex. It is true. However, that these rules have withstood the test of time.

First of all, make sure that the money you choose to invest is indeed earmarked for the purpose. As in any form of gambling, there is nothing to be gained and everything to be lost when it comes to investing. Do not put up money that you cannot afford to lose should the market take a downturn.

One rule that people seem to refuse to apply in any area of their lives, including the world of investing, is lean not on your own understanding. Most of the time, this is the result of people balking at entrusting another person with their money, believing that with a little understanding they can work the market themselves. This reasoning is fundamentally flawed. In the first place, most people will not be able to begin to unravel the complicated graphs, pie charts, and statistics by which the investment world relates its information. In order to understand what the numbers mean, you will need to have some basic training. There may come a time after you have had some experience in the market that you will be able to make sound decisions on your own, but the initial get-your-feet-wet phase is not the time to attempt it. Check the background of the advisor you choose, as there are a lot of brokers out there looking for a quick fleece. The best brokers will have years of experience, a variety of investment backgrounds, and will probably cost you much less than you might think.

Think long term. Unless you invest millions of dollars initially, it will take time for your investments to mature and begin to accumulate substantial gains. The best investments are proven over time, and thus it is best to place your funds in long term choices. The details of this are plain- it is best to forget about this money in terms of a cash fall back, at least for a number of years.

Diversification is an oft-flogged truism of the investment world. A good portfolio will include cash and cash equivalents (GICs, fixed annuities), growth investments (stocks), and growth and income investments such as mutual funds. Diversification ensures that you do not have all your eggs in one basket should any part of the market experience a downturn. Note that diversification means not only investing in several areas, but also making sure that no one area contains a disproportionate percentage of your funds.

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Do women really want to marry for money?

Your husband sweeps through the door this evening, Mad Men style, just as you’ve settled at the kitchen table, slumped over some reports. He strides over, encircles your waist and tells you he’s had such a whopping pay rise that his pretty liddle lady Need Never Work Again.

Do you a) feel insulted by his inherently unegalitarian, outdated patrimony: b) politely demur; after all you’ve spend years effortfully hauling yourself up the career ladder, one broken nail extension at a time or c) rip up your spreadsheets in a joyful frenzy and actually volunteer to have conjugal relations – after you’ve quickly logged on and ordered the Aga?

When I heard the news that these days modern women crave a wealthy breadwinner rather than a high-flying career, I had to pause and think about it. For a nanosecond!

Of course we do! Since when did the bleedin’ obvious qualify as news? Past the age of 35, where two or more of us are gathered together in a room, the talk invariably turns to wistful longings of “getting some chickens”, which as we all know is code for “a property porn house in a shire with Cath Kidston tea towels, Emma Bridgewater crockery and a City husband who is so preposterously well-remunerated he can almost afford the outrageous commuter rail fare rises.”

According to a report researched at the London School of Economics and published by the Centre for Policy Studies, women are more determined than ever to bag a partner who will improve their financial prospects – think Jane Austen, but with Dragon’s Den venture capitalist Deborah Meaden as Mrs Bennett.

“Women’s aspirations to marry up, if they can, to a man who is better-educated and higher earning persists in most European countries,” says the report’s author, Catherine Hakim, a senior research fellow in sociology who is no stranger to controversy, having last year coined the neologisms “erotic capital” and “beauty premium” to describe the key professional attribute of our times.

Presumably this is why, to quote the old joke smart girls get minks, the way minks get minks.

“Women continue to use marriage as an alternative or supplement to their employment careers,” she concludes. Cue howls of outrage from the sisterhood.

At the risk of being clubbed to death with a copy of the Female Eunuch; what’s so wrong with that? By logical extension, it would appear men are keen to “marry down” , although nobody seems to query, much less gather statistics on, their matrimonial motives.

Apparently in the 1940s, 20 per cent of British women “married up.” By the 1990s that had climbed to

38 per cent, with a similar pattern in Europe, the US and Australia. I would aver this reveals more about social mobility in general than gold-diggers in particular. But even if women are becoming shrewder in their criteria for choosing a mate, surely that makes them sensible rather than cynical?

Look at any female executive returning to work after maternity leave, and once the thrill of wearing proper shoes and being asked her opinion has worn off, a single glass of wine will often see her tearfully confess she’s desperate to get pregnant again so she can give up work, go part-time or set up a kitchen table industry involving local, organic, Fair Trade, biodegradable children’s eco-muffins.

“I was dying to give up work after Number One, but nobody else did, so I felt obliged to stay in my job,” says my friend Elaine, 38, who has two children aged six and two. “There’s an unwritten rule that Number Two means you get to go part-time or give up altogether if your husband earns enough. If you want to make absolutely certain, you brace yourself and have a third, which means you definitely don’t go back to work but it’s murderously hard when they’re all little.”

It’s not then, that women of my generation are lazy (although maybe a little work-weary), just Ready to Reprioritise. Remember you read it here first; and doesn’t it sound intelligently wholesome rather than shockingly retrograde?

For my Girl Power generation, it’s been a bit of a toughie to admit that Having It All really isn’t the same as Having a Ball. As I shoulder-padded my way through the late Eighties, I would never have contemplated marrying for money. Then again, I wouldn’t even let any of my suitors pay for dinner. More fool me.

But does that mean I envy iPhone widows whose high net worth husbands are so immersed in derivatives or mergers they rarely see daylight and forget their children’s names? Yes, but only occasionally, I swear.

Before you judge, let me say I know for a fact – a fact, I tell you – I’m not alone in feeling that I’ve done the whole career thing and now I’d like to try the whole flapjacks and hand-stencilling the nursery thing. If my husband could please just sell a little bit more of his soul?

“I see a lot of previously ambitious women who are very confused by a sudden urge to bake cakes and sew curtains, which totally flies in the face of everything they strived for,” says clinical psychologist Kathleen Cox. “They begin to wonder 'Who am I?’ because they don’t recognise themselves any more. I see it as a positive thing, because society allows women to question their role, whereas men are expected to knuckle down and keep on doing jobs they may hate.

“Does that mean women are hardwired to stay at home and look after the nest? The longer I live the more I think perhaps, yes.”

Seditious talk maybe, but perhaps it’s time we tackled the ultimate taboo and rehabilitated the “H” word; after all, if you look deep into your social circle, you may discover some of your best friends are housewives in all but name.

“I never refer to myself as a housewife,” says Kate Brown, 37, who gave up her job in the retail industry last year to care for her twin girls, aged 18 months. “If anyone asks me what I do, I simply say I’m micromanaging twins, which is pretty self-explanatory. My husband doesn’t earn a huge amount, but it was more than I did, so it made the decision easier.”

Oliver James, author of the parenting book How Not To F**** Them Up, applauds any couple where mother or father takes childrearing seriously enough to take time out. He has written at length about how the first six years of a child’s life are crucial in safeguarding their future mental health and economic independence.

“I want to see a world where women or men want to care for their children, and if that means 'marrying up’ to ensure they are bringing their children up in a solvent household, where one of them can stay at home and do the most important job of all, then that’s fine by me,” he says.

Arguably, there’s nothing surprising in these findings. A study by the National Centre for Social Research, commissioned in 2009 by the Department for Children, Schools and Families, revealed that a third of all mothers would prefer to give up their jobs if they could afford to and three fifths said they would want to work fewer hours.

Life coach Fiona Harrald insists that women are only doing what comes naturally, and have been hardwired for millennia to “marry up”. It’s only relatively recently that they have had any other realistic chance of improving their lot in life.

“My mother’s generation couldn’t even open a bank account or enter into a hire purchase agreement to buy a sofa without a husband’s signature,” she says. “These days we can chose to work or choose to concentrate on being at home with our children – that’s the essence of feminism and we should all just calm down, stop being judgmental and get comfortable with the choices we, and other women, make.”

If all things were equal – looks, charm, humour, a decent head of hair – any sensible girl unencumbered by professional ambition would probably choose a prince over a pauper. Just ask Kate Middleton.

And if I’m honest, if I were still 28 and with the benefit of hindsight, I’d do exactly the same. Yes, I once wanted to smash through the glass ceiling. But now, truth be told, I’d much rather polish it. Pass the Windowlene on your way out to work, darling.

YES, says Jemima Lewis

Women want rich husbands… and this is news? Perhaps we don’t often say it – perhaps we don’t even care to admit it to ourselves – but women are practical creatures. A rich husband gives you options.

One of the perks of being female is that you grow up knowing there’s a chance, however slim, that you might be able to marry a gazillionaire and retire from office life before you hit middle age. If you have babies, of course, you’re in for a different kind of work – every bit as gruelling in its way, but at least a change of pace. Most working men (gazillionaires included) are stuck in Groundhog Day for around 50 years, with no prospect of a significant change in their daily routine until they are fit for nothing but retirement and death. It’s amazing, when you think about it, how cheerfully they accept this.

If he is rich enough, your husband might pay for teams of nannies to look after your children while you busy yourself with pilates and managing the estate. Working mothers like me tend to regard such well-kept wives with a disapproving eye. We call them “trophy” wives, as if to distinguish them from the real thing, but that is partly just to distract ourselves from the boiling envy inside.

Whether you fill your days with pilates or child-rearing, not having to work is… well, less like hard work. Unfortunately, it turns out that rich husbands, like handsome princes, are not so easy to come by. This survey, after all, is about women’s aspirations, not their reality.

Most of us, not moving in gazillionaire circles, are likely to fall in love with and marry a more humble Joe. In the meantime, you might have built up a career that you are proud of, and reluctant to give up. If you then have a baby, you are doomed to an inner life of conflict, vacillation and guilt as you try to find a way to bring up your own child without going bankrupt or doolally.

Like a winning lottery ticket, but one you could warm your feet on at night, a rich husband would solve everything at a stroke, allowing you to calibrate your work/life balance to suit yourself, rather than your mortgage provider.

Myself, I’m thrilled to have found a husband at all, and in real life I would no more swap him for Sir Philip Green than he would swap me for Scarlet Johansson (or would he?). What this survey tells us is only this: a girl can dream.

No, says JoJo Moyes

SO, today’s young women, having observed mothers for whom “having it all” seems to mean “having all the domestic responsibility”, “having the odd nervous breakdown” and “still having to wax one’s unmentionables”, have decided they’d prefer a WAG lifestyle.

Who can blame them? There are times – usually when sick children and deadlines collide – that I think the same thing.

But marry rich, and you may marry a man who views you as a commodity. You may spend much of your time alone; a high-flying career often means an absent husband and father. You can marry for money, but it’s not a marriage. It’s a deal. And I suspect only the toughest of women can see that with the clarity it requires.

The divorce courts are littered with high-earners, as well as the shattered dreams of traded-in middle-aged wives. My children have long played a game called “Who’s got the sourest face?” in Waitrose. It’s always the wives in the really expensive cars.

My husband and I have taken turns as the highest earner. Earning my own money means I don’t have to justify my shoe habit, and he doesn’t shoulder the mortgage alone. And having a career brings me more contentment than a designer handbag.

So, I wouldn’t be delighted if my daughter ended up with a yurt-dweller. But I’d feel worse if she thought the most important thing about a man was his bank balance.

What Starts with F and ends with K

A first-grade teacher, Ms Brooks, was having trouble with one of her students.  The teacher asked, "Harry, what's your problem?" 

Harry answered, "I'm too smart for the 1st grade. My sister is in the 3rd grade and I'm smarter than she is!  I think I should be in the 3rd grade too!"

Ms. Brooks had enough.  She took Harry to the principal's office. 

While Harry waited in the outer office, the teacher explained to the principal what the situation was. The principal told Ms. Brooks he would give the boy a test.  If he failed to answer any of his questions he was to go back to the 1st grade and behave.  She agreed. 

Harry was brought in and the conditions were explained to him and he agreed to take the test. 

Principal: "What is 3 x 3?"

Harry: "9."

Principal: "What is 6 x 6?"

Harry: "36."

And so it went with every question the principal thought a 3rd grader should know. 

The principal looks at Ms. Brooks and tells her, "I think Harry can go to the 3rd grade."

Ms. Brooks says to the principal, "Let me ask him some questions."
The principal and Harry both agreed.

Ms. Brooks asks, "What does a cow have four of that I have only two of?"

Harry, after a moment: "Legs."

Ms Brooks: "What is in your pants that you have but I do not have?"

The principal wondered why would she ask such a question! 

Harry replied: "Pockets."

Ms. Brooks: "What does a dog do that a man steps into?" 

Harry: "Pants."

The principal sat forward with his mouth hanging open. 

Ms. Brooks: "What goes in hard and pink then comes out soft and sticky?"

The principal's eyes opened really wide and before he could stop the answer, Harry replied, "Bubble gum."

Ms. Brooks: "What does a man do standing up, a woman does sitting down and a dog does on three legs?"

Harry: "Shake hands."

The principal was trembling. 

Ms. Brooks: "What word starts with an 'F' and ends in 'K' that means a lot of heat and excitement?"

Harry: "Firetruck."

The principal breathed a sigh of relief and told the 
teacher, "Put Harry in the fifth-grade, I got the last six questions wrong... "

The Internet is a F-ed Up Place...

Enjoy..!!!