Political Calculations Insurance: On the Moneyed Midways

Welcome to the December 9, 2006 weekend edition of On the Moneyed Midways, the blogosphere's only weekly review of the best business, management and money-related posts from each of the week's major blog carnivals! Each week, we select not only the best posts from each of the blog carnivals we read, but we also select one post as being The Best Post of the Week, Anywhere!^(TM)

In addition to The Best Post of the Week, Anywhere!, we've also identified posts that you can't miss reading - what we believe to be Absolutely essential reading!^(TM) You'll find them all below - just scroll down for the best posts of the week that was....

On the Moneyed Midways for December 09, 2006
Carnival	Post	Blog	Comments
Carnival of Career Intensity	The One Skill You'd Better Look For	Water Cooler Wisdom	Employers look for a lot of skills or specific types of experience, but Andrea Levit argues they should be really seeking the ability to learn.
Carnival of Debt Reduction	The Debt Mindset	Debt Consolidation	Are the people around you a bad influence where debt is concerned? Mark Shead lists seven traits for which to watch out. Absolutely essential reading.
Carnival of Fraud	How to Buy a PlayStation 3 for $0.99	The Digerati Life	"Don’t try this at home or anywhere," the Silicon Valley Blogger advises, because "you WILL get into trouble."
Carnival of Investing	Where to Get Financial Data	The Dividend Guy Blog	The Dividend Guy lists good sites to get data for doing due diligence when making investment decisions.
Carnival of Marketing	The Big Google Adwords Experiment	The Get Known Now Blog	Suzanne Falter-Barns failed with Google's Adwords before, but is now trying a new approach in using them to attract customers more effectively.
Carnival of Passive Income	The Best Way of Making Money on a Blog is Through Sponsorship	Instigator Blog	Has Ben Yoskovitz decoded the secret to making money that millions of bloggers would like to know?
Carnival of Personal Finance	The Young Tightwad's Guide to Holiday Tipping	Money Under 30	How much to tip at the holidays is always a mine-filled topic, and David of Money Under 30 provides guidance for how much and to who!
Carnival of Real Estate	Economics vs. Risk Management: Today's Housing Market	Sadie's Take on Delaware Ohio	You'd think that as buyer incentives increase that more house sales would follow (as suggested by economics), but the evidence is that they're not. Toby explains how a change in the mindset of buyers for managing their risk has redefined the rules of the day.
Carnival of Real Estate Investing	Working with an Out of State Property Manager	TheLandlordBlog	Anesia Springborn discusses the ins and outs of owning rental properties far away from where you live.
Carnival of Taxes	How the New Tax Laws for 2007/08 Could Affect You	My Two Dollars	David highlights some of the neater changes in U.S. tax law that actually benefit U.S. taxpayers.
Carnival of the Capitalists	Utopia Crashes to Earth	Wisdom from Wenchypoo's Mental Wastebasket	Wenchypoo measures the central economic policy tenets of liberal Democratic Party politics, comparing them to reality, and wonders if they ought to consider their continued existence as a political party.
Cavalcade of Risk	The End of Insurance	Worker's Comp Insider	Will today's new datamining technology rewrite who can be insured as the concept of pooling risk becomes a thing of the past? The Best Post of the Week, Anywhere!
Economics and Social Policy	Utopia Crashes to Earth	Wisdom from Wenchypoo's Mental Wastebasket	Wenchypoo measures the central economic policy tenets of liberal Democratic Party politics, comparing them to reality, and wonders if they ought to consider their continued existence as a political party.
Festival of Frugality	Don't Like Your Gift Cards? Trade Them or Sell Them for Cash	Money, Matter, and More Musings	Talk about markets in everything! Did you know that there's an aftermarket for gift cards where you can buy, sell or trade them? Absolutely essential reading for the holiday season!
Festival of Investing	Private Equity Bubble Trouble	SOX First	Leon Gettler finds the buzz surrounding the recent frenzy in private equity may be on its way to reaching dot com bubble proportions.
Festival of Stocks	2 x 2 Matrix: Less & More	Long or Short Capital	We love it when MBA type analytical tools make their way into blog posts, and Mr Juggles doesn't disappoint with his analysis of the media industry!
Personal Development Carnival	New Year Preparation - Clean House	Balanced Life Center	Now is the time to begin preparing to start the new year off right, and cleaning out your house, schedule and address book are the places to start.
Personal Growth Carnival	How to Use a Sick Day to Change Your Life	A Better You Blog	Patricia outlines the things you can do to make your sick days genuinely productive.
Wealth Building Ideas	Insurance Expert Discusses Health Care Crisis. Sort of.	Rdoctor.com	Aleksandr Kavokin interviews health insurance expert Hank Stern, who rejects a lot of conventional wisdom held by many people about it. Absolutely essential reading!
Working at Home	What Monks Can Teach You About Healthy Computing	Ririan Project	Ririan shows how your aching neck might be cured by following the example of illuminating monks!