Mock Turtle

Here’s a banking product you really don’t need:

With the Bank the Rest savings program, Canadians using their ScotiaCard to make debit card purchases can choose to round up the total purchase amount to the nearest dollar or five dollars, and have the difference deposited automatically into their Scotiabank Money Master High Interest Savings account where their money will continue to grow.

According to Scotiabank, rounding up your debit card purchases is a “powerful way to save.” Except, you have to save the money in the Scotia Money Master account, which offers an interest rate of 2.25% annually — less than an ING Direct account, which you could hook up to your existing bank account free of charge. Oh, right — did I mention you have to have another Scotia account to open the Money Master account?

The press release even enlists one of the bank’s economists to extol the virtue of the Bank the Rest plan:

“With Canadians confronted by the rising cost of day-to-day expenses, saving for the future can become less of a priority, especially with the economy underperforming,” said Aron Gampel, Vice-President and Deputy Chief Economist, Scotiabank. “Canadians can be expected to build their savings during these challenging times. Every little bit helps towards gaining
financial security.”

Maybe I’m just too dim to follow, but might Canadians confronted by the rising cost of day-to-day expenses not need the rest to buy what they need?

The example included in the press release also mystifies:

For example, if a customer signed up to round up to the nearest dollar, and made a debit purchase for $7.50, 50 cents would automatically be transferred from his/her chequing account into his/her Money Master High Interest Savings account. If that person had decided to round up to the nearest five dollars, $2.50 would be transferred. To look at how savings could add up, someone who does 19 transactions per month, and has chosen to round up to the nearest dollar could save approximately $9.50 per month.

19? Why 19? Who uses a double-digit prime number for an easy-to-grasp example? I smell sabotage.

A cheery financial advisor also offers kind words about the Bank the Rest plan. According to her, “getting ahead financially can be built on small wins.” In this case, very small. Using the handy Bank the Rest calculator shows that by rounding up to a dollar by 75 cents 10 times a month, you’ll accumulate $90 in your savings account in one year. The total contribution from Scotiabank? $2.52 in interest. The magic of compound interest, indeed. I’d recommend throwing change into a jar instead — less work.

Nickels and dimes aside, the real road to getting ahead is making more money than you need to pay for your daily life. You might then have discretionary income to save. So it’s worth considering that the starting pay for tellers at Scotiabank is $12 an hour. Giving the many lower-paid workers at Canada’s big and profitable banks a raise might be a more constructive way to drum up new savings account business.

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From a press release for a media event sponsored by La Senza, Hellmann’s and Tide:

Jane is 34 and she’s a mover-and-shaker at work. At home, think of her as the Chief Household Officer. This also makes her Manager of Nutrition, Investment Advisor, Family Trip Planning Counsel and Director of Hockey Equipment Delivery. And that’s just last weekend.

Shopping and cooking, looking after money, planning trips, gathering sports equipment , wearing lingerie — OH MY GOD, I’m a Chief Household Officer too! Or, as some might think of it, a functioning adult.

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It’s heartwarming to read the unusually warm words spoken about Toronto at yesterday’s emergency session of the legislature. The Premier praised Torontonians for their “characteristic goodwill, patience, and grace”, while Labour Minister — and former Toronto city councillor — Brad Duguid highlighted the importance of the TTC to the city’s operation:

…we cannot stand by while the dispute shuts down this vital transportation system in Toronto, affecting millions of people and businesses…

The TTC is integral to reducing the burden of traffic congestion on the streets and public highways of Toronto. The shutdown will create traffic gridlock. This does more than simply inconvenience drivers. If more cars are on the road, this will translate into higher pollution levels, with the related health effects and impact on our environment. More importantly, this can severely impact emergency services, making it difficult to respond quickly to life-threatening situations.

And both McGuinty and Duguid are at pains to point out the ramifications of a TTC shutdown for the province as a whole.

McGuinty: “It goes without saying that Toronto, our capital city, plays an important role for all Ontarians, and we all need Toronto to be strong so Ontario can be strong.”

Duguid: “A shutdown of the service has severe financial ramifications that extend far beyond the boundaries of Toronto and far beyond the TTC service area.”

So we’re all agreed then? The TTC is important? We need public transportation in Ontario’s capital city for the environmental health of some and the financial wellness of the province as a whole?

Fine. It’s not funded as an essential service, though. When’s the discussion about restoring provincial funding for the operating costs of the TTC?

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Afghanistan’s opium crop is forecast to fall by up to a half this year after 2007’s record harvest, counter-narcotics officials in Kabul said, as evidence emerged that some poppy farmers are switching to legal crops because of rising food prices.

“Anecdotally, a lot of farmers have calculated that, with wheat prices being what they are, they can make money out of planting wheat,” (Brigadier Andrew MacKay) said.

rest here

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Bloggity oddness may occur for the next twenty minutes or so. I’ll post again when it’s all over.

Edit: All done. Those of you who write will notice some difference in the back end when you log in. Note particularly that the categories are now BELOW the post box, not beside it.

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I had M. with me when wine shopping on the weekend, so we ended up with a case full of mostly sub-$13 experiments. (Yay, strong Canadian dollar!)

So far:

Willm Riesling Reserve, France, Vintages, $15.85: all petrol and varnish on the nose. Tastes a bit thin. Won’t buy again at that price, but those fond of very dry, very petrolly rieslings may like it.

Spinelli Montepulciano d’Abruzzo, Italy, $6.95: not a lot there, but very smooth — no harshness at all. Pleasant with food; managed somehow not to clash too badly with my tunaburger and D.’s pork chops. Good alternative to Farnese. Would buy again.

Volto Primitivo, Italy, $13.95 in a PET bottle: thought we’d give it a try because of the PET bottle despite the rather goofy label (at left — purple with a carnival mask). Decent character — nothing special but perfectly drinkable; possibly moreso than the Wolf Blass PET offering. A shoo-in for camping trips. Will definitely buy again.

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I’m sure this headline isn’t unfamiliar, as it’s been everywhere for the past couple of weeks:

Just 20 Minutes Of Weekly Housework Boosts Mental Health

Let’s have a bit of a look at the study behind the headline.

First:

any form of daily physical activity was associated with a lower risk of distress, when other influential factors, such as age, gender, and the presence of a long term condition, were taken into account. (emphasis mine)

They’ve made the usual error, confusing correlation with causation. Does the study show that physical activity causes increased happiness? No; it’s just correlated with it. The more active you were, the lower were your odds of being classified as depressed in this observational study. It could be that exercise causes happiness, sure. But it could also be that happiness leads us to be more active. This is a very basic point and it makes me crazy that even a science-oriented publication such as ScienceDaily regularly falls for it.

And second:

The range of activities, which proved beneficial, included housework, gardening, walking, and sports, although the strongest effect was seen for sports, which lowered the risk of distress by 33%. (emphasis mine)

So why the focus on housework? Oh, right: if we focused on sports as the most beneficial, we wouldn’t be able to get in that not-so-subtle dig at women — “See? Do housework, be happy!”. And to that I say pthththtthththbtbbbbt.

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For “Indignation grows over police story” (print headline in today’s paper), read “The Globe finally got its private briefing with an anonymous Conservative official”:

A senior Conservative official says the raid on Tory party headquarters last week was “over the top,” with flak-jacket-clad RCMP officers storming in and copying everything from payroll information to the strategy for a coming election.

“What, did they expect us to shoot back?” said the official, who asked not to be named.

Monday’s Star:

Investigators lined 16 or 18 people up along a hallway, one party official said, “like we were going to shoot back? I mean they had … unfettered access to every single thing in Conservative party headquarters. They removed 17 boxes of material specific to our lawsuit, all the background stuff.”

The only thing growing is the number of media hits generated by the Conservative spin machine.

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HT to Val Dodge’s blog:

I first saw Beyond the Orchard apple slices in the local Sobeys in early January, but didn’t see it again until mid-March. They’ve been in stock steadily since then, so presumably people are buying them. This package­­­­—a plastic box containing five individual sealed wrappers—contains just 285 grams of sliced apples, equivalent to about one and a half regular-sized apples. Each package contains seven very small apple wedges that together represent about one quarter of an apple.

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Regularly scheduled Bank of Canada interest rate decision announcements are always made at 9 am. The press releases from the big banks, announcing their intention to pass the change onto their customers through the prime rate, usually follow fairly quickly thereafter. Until recently. Below, the time stamp of press releases from TD Bank Financial (usually the first off the blocks) announcing a matching move in its prime rate:

July, 2007 – increase – 10:55 am

November, 2007 – 25 bp decrease – 11:37 am

January, 2008 – 25 bp decrease – 12:09 pm

March 4, 2008 – 50 bp decrease – 2:19 pm

April 22, 2008 – 50 bp decrease – 4:52 pm.

A decision by banks not to change their prime rate would, of course, dampen some of the stimulative effect the rate cut might have on the economy. (It would do some nice things for bank profits, however.) The banks mused about not following the Bank of Canada in January, but so far have continued to take its lead — with, it seems, more hesitancy each time.

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