Clements’s Favorites
Jonathan Clements | Feb 18, 2023
I’VE PENNED MORE THAN 450 articles for HumbleDollar, so picking 10 favorites could have been a laborious task—if I’d bothered to look back through all the articles I’ve written.
But instead, I took an easier route, simply listing the articles that I could most easily recall. What made these articles memorable? Some were quite personal, while others broached ideas that I continue to grapple with to this day.
- Really Useful Engine (Dec. 14, 2016). While HumbleDollar was launched on Dec. 31, 2016, the site’s initial articles came from an earlier website where I blogged occasionally. This was one of those articles. It grew out of a lunch with my friend Dave, and I believe he was the one who mentioned Thomas the Tank Engine. The topic of intrinsic vs. extrinsic motivation is one I still frequently think about.
- Signal Failure (Nov. 9, 2019). From the time I started learning about investing in the mid-1980s, I was told to pay attention to valuations—and yet, in the decades since, valuations have screamed “stay away from stocks.” This was my attempt to explain what’s been going on.
- Second Childhood (Jan. 27, 2018). The term “second childhood” is how I describe the past nine years, since I last had a fulltime job. It’s been a period during which I’ve tried countless new things and worked harder than ever before.
- 15 Ways to Happy (July 11, 2020). For me, happiness research has been an abiding interest for almost two decades, and I’ve written countless articles on the topic for HumbleDollar. This one offers a summary of 15 key insights I’ve garnered from the research.
- The Tipping Point (March 10, 2018). The initial years as a saver can be discouraging. But if you keep at it for a dozen years, you’ll hit a tipping point—and astonishing things start to happen.
- Great to Gone (Feb. 1, 2020). This piece begins with the story of my great-great-grandfather, who was one of Britain’s richest men at the time of his death.
- Measure for Measure (Aug. 12, 2017). When we think about our portfolio’s riskiness, we need to factor in what’s often our most valuable asset—our human capital. But how? My suggestion: Think about the savings we’ll add in the years ahead as part of our portfolio’s cash holdings.
- Meet BraggingBucks (April 1, 2021). In the British media, there’s a long tradition of April Fools’ Day jokes, such as the famous TV segment on spaghetti trees. This was my attempt to help the tradition cross the Atlantic.
- Timely Tale (Dec. 2, 2017). Financial success may hinge on the details, but it also requires us to see the big picture. This article offers a way to think about our lifetime financial journey.
- A Man Possessed (Dec. 25, 2021). In this short article that I published on Christmas Day, I describe five of my most treasured possessions—all of which have almost no value for others.
This is the final installment in a series devoted to the favorite articles and blog posts penned by HumbleDollar’s most prolific writers. The earlier installments were from Dennis Friedman, Mike Zaccardi, Kristine Hayes, Adam Grossman, Rick Connor and Dick Quinn.
Read more by Jonathan Clements
Thank you for sharing your fav 10, Jonathan. I hope more and more people will read wonderful content you and other create here at HD.com. It is great to learn about personal finance here.
I hope so, too. Thanks for the kind words!
Jonathan…hard pressed to find a favorite but really enjoyed your use of satirical humor in “BraggingBucks”. Good to have a little fun with life’s incongruous moments.
Jonathan, great list. And thanks for the link in yor comment below to the very first HD article, explaining the name. Trying to learn the ropes of personal finance and investing will indeed keep one humble.
Your Meet BraggingBucks article continues to make me laugh out loud and serves as a reminder of some past poor financial decisions I made.
Thanks for these continuing happiness lessons.
This series of articles is so fun because I only started reading HD around 2020, so I’m enjoying going back to authors’ favorites published before then.
I’m curious about the origin of the name “Humble Doliar”?
Before the launch of HD, I blogged occasionally at JonathanClements.com. But when I decided to take the money guide — which had previously existed as a book — and put it on the web, and also have other folks blog, I didn’t want the site to be solely about me, so I went hunting for an alternate name — one where the URL was available. After running through countless iterations, I woke up in the night with the words “humble dollar” rattling around in my head. I immediately got out of bed and bought the domain name.
Here’s the first article published by the site, which talks about the thinking behind the name:
https://humbledollar.com/2016/12/why-humbledollar/
That is very interesting.
Just as a point of inquiry/interest: Since you mentioned the linked article as the “first article published by the site”, are the older articles that are on HD ones that were initially published somewhere else?
Yes, any article dated before Dec. 31, 2016, was written for JonathanClements.com. I bought that URL around 2005, and started blogging every week or so at JonathanClements.com in late 2014. I deleted many of those early pieces — I felt they didn’t have much lasting value — but transferred some to HumbleDollar.
It would be interesting to see the readers’ list of their favorite articles penned by you. The Tipping Point is on my list, I regularly think about it. A couple of others from above often come to mind. Your periodic summaries of your updated thinking about your finances are valuable. Then there’s the Guide…