Just Say No...to Millions of Dollars??

This is quite a story, about a major league pitcher who walked away from millions of dollars because he didn't feel he deserved it.

Pitcher Spurns $12 Million, To Keep Self-Respect

The guaranteed contract is a fundamental principle of Major League Baseball, as
much a part of the game as balls, strikes and outs. No matter how a player
performs, or how his body holds up, he must be paid in full. Only in rare cases
— an injury sustained off the field, gross personal misconduct — does a player
forfeit his paycheck.

But the case of Gil Meche is rare for an entirely
different reason. Meche, a 32-year-old right-handed pitcher, had a contract that
called for a $12 million salary in 2011. Yet he will not report to Surprise,
Ariz., with the rest of the Kansas City Royals for spring training next month.
He will not have surgery to repair his chronically aching right shoulder. He
will not pitch in relief, which involves a lighter workload.

Meche
retired last week, which means he will not be paid at all.

“When I
signed my contract, my main goal was to earn it,” Meche said this week by phone
from Lafayette, La. “Once I started to realize I wasn’t earning my money, I felt
bad. I was making a crazy amount of money for not even pitching. Honestly, I
didn’t feel like I deserved it. I didn’t want to have those feelings again.”

I hope he makes a second career of giving speeches to corporate CEOs-- some of them could certainly stand to learn from his example!

2010 Year End Recap

Well the year came to a close in an interesting and good way.

First of all, let's look at my net worth as of 12/31/10:
Cash and Bank Accounts: $66,039
Retirement (401k and Roth IRA): $320, 626
Other Investments (mutual funds @ E*Trade): $51,294
Bonds $5,197
Home Equity $82,592
Credit Card Balance -$2,615
TOTAL: $523,133

Now you may be thinking, as I did, whoa! Her net worth as of a month before was only $479,273! Did her net worth really increase 9.15% in one month? Well, I did receive $9,000 more of my inheritance from Great Aunt Minnie, and the stock market did ok... but what I also discovered is that I had the wrong symbol in Quicken for one of my mutual funds and therefore the wrong price, so my net worth has been understated by several thousand dollars for I don't know how long. So I not only blew away my original year end goal of $450,000, I sailed past the half-million dollar mark, which was totally unexpected. Pretty cool.

As for my income and expenses, here's a look at the totals for 2010 vs. 2009:

	2009	2010	Var.	% Var.
Income
Bonus	$11,765	$17,288	$5,523	47%
Gift Received	$1,309	$24,200	$22,891	1749%
Interest Inc	$776	$502	-$274	-35%
Other Inc	$6,503	$6,386	-$117	-2%
Salary	$96,206	$99,373	$3,167	3%
Tax Refund	$4,211	$2,873	-$1,338	-32%
Total Income	$120,770	$150,623	$29,853	25%
Expenses
Bank Charge	$160	$97	-$64	-40%
Business expense	$0	-$7	-$7	N/A
Charity	$468	$1,055	$586	125%
Clothing	$1,639	$2,648	$1,009	62%
Dining	$7,895	$8,552	$656	8%
Education	$406	$455	$49	12%
Entertainment	$663	$448	-$214	-32%
Gifts Given	$962	$1,924	$963	100%
Gym & Fitness	$1,317	$1,361	$44	3%
Household	$1,337	$760	-$577	-43%
Home Insurance	$335	$335	$0	0%
Housing	$14,384	$14,171	-$213	-1%
Medical	$1,938	$4,556	$2,619	135%
Misc	$2,215	$3,412	$1,197	54%
Taxes	$30,325	$34,053	$3,728	12%
Subscriptions	$956	$743	-$213	-22%
Travel	$1,712	$4,803	$3,091	180%
Utilities	$1,936	$2,454	$518	27%
Total Expenses	$68,648	$81,819	$13,171	19%
Net Savings	$52,122	$68,804	$16,683	32%
% of Gross Income Saved	43.16%	45.68%

A few notes:

• As noted elsewhere, I received a $24,000 inheritance from a family member.
• Other Income is matching 401k contributions from my employer.
• Interest is down because I shifted quite a bit of money from bank accounts into investment accounts.
• Charity and Gifts Given are up for reasons explained in this post.
• Medical is way up because I had a crown and root canal and exceeded the annual cap on my dental insurance.
• Miscellaneous is up mainly because I bought an iPhone and some apps.
• Travel is up because I didn't do much of a vacation last year, but this year I went to Turkey and splurged a little on hotels even though my air ticket was purchased with frequent flyer miles.
• Utilities is up because of the higher monthly costs of the iPhone.
• Subscriptions is down because I canceled my NY Times delivery at home, since I spend so much time at Sweetie's place. Household is lower for the same reason
• I'm pretty consistent but I let a few categories creep up a bit without any real reason, particularly Dining. I still like eating out and drink too much-- everyone has to have a vice, right?
• Clothing was also higher but I really needed some new work clothes and shoes, so I'm not too concerned about that.

But the bottom line is that I continue to save a lot of my income. If not for the inheritance, I would have saved less than I did last year, but at least some of that was due to more giving, and higher taxes because I earned more. It's not like I went crazy buying tons of stuff, even if I did allow myself a few treats like an iPhone, some clothes and a vacation.

Now I have to look ahead at 2011... what should my next net worth goal be? Should I make any changes to my budget? This could be the year when I rent out my apartment and move in with Sweetie, which could change things a lot. And I need to take a close look at my investment allocations, which I haven't done in a while. So much to think about! And write about here... I'm going to try to post more frequently this year. So happy 2011! As always, onward and upward!