While recently winging my way across the South Pacific, I spotted an unusual job offer: WANTED: Social worker, tax free salary of $60,000 with free accommodation and transportation, no experience necessary, must be flexible and self-sufficient. With the unemployment rate stuck at 9.1%, and running as high as 45% for recent college grads, I was [...]

I was driving through a prominent San Francisco neighborhood last Sunday, looking for a McMansion open house. When I came to one key intersection there were more than a dozen signs directing me to competing offerings. What a joke. And the agent told me that market conditions were gradually improving! It looks like current and [...]

I am constantly barraged with emails from gold bugs who passionately argue that their beloved metal is trading at a tiny fraction of its true value, and that the barbaric relic is really worth $5,000, $10,000, or even $50,000 an ounce (GLD). They claim the move in the yellow metal we are seeing is only [...]

With smoke still rising from the ruins of the recent silver crash, I thought I’d touch base with a wizened and grizzled old veteran who still remembers the last time a bubble popped for the white metal. That would be Mike Robertson, who runs Robertson Wealth Management, one of the largest and most successful registered [...]

I am writing this from the polished teak floored, white columned, veranda of the historic Raffles Hotel in Singapore. Exotic tropical birds with huge curved bills are calling each other from the betel nut trees. I am somewhat peeved, as the Sir Stamford Raffles Suite which I have reserved is not yet available. A visiting [...]