Free Republic

Introduction The world has grown safer over the past few hundred years as murder rates and even the number of full scale wars have declined. However, that does not mean that we can relax and stop being vigilant. Implementing these tips will improve the security of your home, your family and your home business if you have one. Securing Your Home Close the garage door when you leave the house. An open garage without any cars is an easy entry point for thieves while it gives a clear sign that you are not home. Put a lock on your shed....

"Upcycling" is what you do when you're converting waste materials or useless products into new materials or products of better quality. When you upcycle, you aren't wasting potentially useful materials. But what if you could make money upcycling? Today, many folks have to supplement their incomes, but have little money to invest in raw materials or goods to be sold. Clever ones upcycle by finding cheap or free items they can then sell for profit. "Jack" never starred in a horror film, but used his chainsaw to make a "killing." After a storm, he went door to door offering to...

<p>Saving money is a great first step to turning your finances around. This resource shows you 123 ways to accomplish that goal. For this resource, saving money is considered putting more money in the bank or investment accounts, spending less money on things you already pay for, increasing efficiency to spend less money later and other tricks to either spend less money and/or put more money in the bank over the long run.</p>

With 2014 and the enactment of Obamacare only days away, we’re all wondering what this so-called Affordable Care Act will really cost us. Will your premiums be higher? Or your deductible? Will you lose employer-based coverage? Will your doctor simply give up and retire? But Obamacare is not all bad. I view it as a wake-up call. In fact, I wouldn’t be writing this article nor teaching people survival medicine skills if not for our current president. People tend to blame Obamacare for all the upcoming health care woes, but many of the looming hassles (from a doctor’s point of...

Here's a new twist on an old New Year's Resolution: If you want to give yourself the security of financial independence, try budgeting the way many wealth accumulators do. The secret? They don't budget. Your first reaction might be, "Of course these people don't budget! They have so much money that they don't need to." That may be true for some of those who have money today, but I'm referring to people who want to remain wealthy or those who are "wealth accumulators." These are people who don't start out with money, but who build up significant wealth over time....

As parts of the United States prepare for record-breaking cold temperatures, a YouTube video showing an alternative way to heat your home might come in handy. The video, which we first found on Why Don't You Try This, was made by journalist and boat-owner Dylan Winter. All you need to make this do-it-yourself heater are tea lights, a loaf tin, and two clay flower pots. You can find tea light candles at pretty much any drug or hardware store. A pack of 50 is only $5.99 at CVS, for instance. In the video, Winter places four tea lights into a...

In the field of higher education, reality is outrunning parody. A recent feature on the satire website the Onion proclaimed, "30-Year-Old Has Earned $11 More Than He Would Have Without College Education..." "Patrick" shouldn't feel too bad. Many college graduates would be happy to be $11 ahead instead of thousands, or hundreds of thousands, behind. The credit-driven higher education bubble of the past several decades has left legions of students deep in debt without improving their job prospects. To make college a good value again, today's parents and students need to be skeptical, frugal and demanding. There is no single...

I'm in real trouble. I've been living on the edge for months. I'm just barely able to pay my bills. I don't spend anything on myself. Last week, my boss cut my hours. I'm really stressed out. What can I do when I've already cut my budget to the core? Brooke If you've been following the news lately, you've seen the headlines. You're not alone. Because of the economy or concern about the costs of covering full-time employees under the new healthcare law, a number of companies are reducing the hours of their employees. That can be a serious problem,...

Generic drugs now account for well over 80% of all prescriptions. Just 10 years ago, less than half of drugs sold were generics. Much of the growth is because employers make generics extra-affordable through mail order programs (pharmacy benefits managers). Then you also have the grocery stores and big box retailers who do $4 generics. Meanwhile, a lot of breakthrough drugs that were patent protected are no longer so and are now selling as generics. But what you don't know about the pricing of generics can hurt your wallet. The big pharmacy chains discount generics 30% from the brand name...

I’ve mentioned countless times before that paying directly for health care can result in big savings, especially when seeking treatment at providers and facilities that cater to self-pay patients. This applies to people who are uninsured, have high-deductible plans, or who have more comprehensive health insurance plans that don’t cover a particular treatment or provider. There is one pretty big caveat for the insured, however. Because of the way insurance contracts are typically structured between providers and insurers, the provider is required to charge the full “negotiated” rate they and the insurer have agreed to, even though the patient is...

We the people can nullify Obama’s unconstitutional communist POS by simply refusing to submit. If the majority of the people don’t sign up for it, it dies on the vine. In fact it wouldn’t take anywhere close to a majority. Twenty to thirty percent ought to do it. It's not going to work anyway. Socialism never works. We need to kill if it we want to save our constitutional republic! No surrender, no retreat!! Do not sign away your freedom!! Do not submit to the godless leftist wannabe dictators!! We are the resistance!!

Anyone who thinks it is a fantasy that government will simply just confiscate 10% of everyone’s accounts in Europe better have another look at the fool they see in the mirror staring back at them. This IMF solution is traditionally French and is really coming because the people in charge are effectively Marxists and this idea came from the IMF under the control of French ideology. They will expropriate these funds to save a banking system that they screwed up and will never reform anything because they are incapable of admitting any mistake. These European government officials really are playing...

The zone of state toll systems that are part of E-ZPass now stretches far beyond the New York metropolitan area where it began. Now you can use your E-ZPass in toll-zapping booths in 14 states, a vast road-trip zone stretching from Virginia to Illinois to Maine. It’s all a compatible system, but different states set their own fees to issue the transponders and maintain your account. What not all consumers know is that you don’t have to buy your pass from the state where you live, and you can save money by ordering from across the border. Whether this is...

Late yesterday the Obama administration announced that the millions of Americans who had their previous health insurance policies cancelled because they didn’t offer all the benefits required under Obamacare would be exempt from having to pay the tax for being uninsured, and would also be eligible to purchase what are known as ‘catastrophic’ health insurance plans. Fans and foes of Obamacare are both weighing in with their take on this, and if you’re interested in hearing these opinions a quick glance at any news site will provide no shortage of commentary. I thought I’d offer something a little different, and...

Most of us are convinced that if not for insurance we would all be dead tomorrow. Politicians have been telling us that for the past few years, but it was likely the insurance companies themselves that perfected the creation of not just marketing talk, but of a paradigm. They did a great job of it. But when you step out of the world of insurance and into the world of health care sharing, you discover not just a different way to have medical bills paid, rather you discover an entirely new paradigm. Paradigms don’t change easily, but once they are...

I’ve mentioned and explained health care sharing ministries several times in the past, and when I discuss alternatives to conventional health insurance they are usually the first thing I mention. To summarize the key benefits of these voluntary organizations of like-minded individuals that agree to share medical bills between members: They offer protection from large medical expenses that are generally comparable to conventional health insurance The cost of membership is typically much less than conventional health insurance Members know that they aren’t supporting what they might consider immoral or reckless lifestyles or paying for objectionable services like abortion Members of...

If you saw a fat man in a sleigh distributing presents this week, he was in violation of several government regulations. The Federal Aviation Administration has complaints about his secret flight path. The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources might shoot his unauthorized reindeer the way they shot a baby deer named Giggles at an animal shelter this year. His bag of gifts definitely violates numerous charity tax rules. In real life, government barely lets people give each other rides in cars. But now the Internet has given birth to some exciting new businesses that challenge this conceit. Companies called...

December has arrived, and the deadline to apply for health insurance through the Affordable Care Act (better known as Obamacare, of course) that will be effective January 1 is looming large. Recent press accounts suggest the online exchanges are working somewhat better than before, although there are still problems with the federal site and several of the state sites as well. At the same time that people are being urged to sign up for health insurance by the Obama administration and its allies, others are urging people to ‘opt out’ of Obamacare, particularly the young who are generally being asked...

Sometimes being a publicly traded company may not seem like it’s worth the hassle. Quarterly earnings reports, disclosure of stock sales by insiders, a raft of government regulations, it’s all a lot of rules dictating how one does business. And, whether public or not, there’s any number of government regulations to follow at the local, state, and federal level. Not to mention local, state, and federal taxes. It’s enough to make one seriously consider taking it all underground. What would it be like? To operate a company without any concerns other than profit and your employees? To keep all of...

It is hard to find the words to adequately describe how much of a disaster Obamacare is turning out to be. The debut of Healthcare.gov has been probably the worst launch of a major website in history, millions of Americans are having their current health insurance policies canceled, millions of others are seeing the size of their health insurance premiums absolutely explode, and this new law is going to result in massive numbers of jobs being lost. It is almost as if Obamacare was specifically designed to wreck the U.S. economy. Not that what we had before Obamacare was great....