Like the Religion

Most of the banks revealed their holdings of European government bonds for the first time, addressing a key source of market angst.

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-WSJ

As a relatively disinterested spectator in all of this, I’m actually a bit optimistic about the results. The next step is for most banks to stop lending to banks that own too much Greek (or whatever) debt, unless those crappy-asset holding institutions raise new equity capital. Regardless of who passed or failed, or what the regulators say, the other banks should now be able to single out the weak institutions and force them—by eliminating their access to short-term capital—to dilute their obstinate shareholders and become unimpeachably solvent.

Except for the German banks, which seem to have refused to release their sovereign debt holdings. In my ideal world, no one would lend them any money until they released their holdings, and raised any needed new capital.

1 month ago | Tags: EU stress tests finance

Among couples who score high on marital happiness tests, a distinguishing characteristic is that they typically do not have major debt problems. Happy couples have fewer worries about money and agree on the proper amounts to save. Stop for a minute and think about what this finding means to your own relationship happiness. If you solve debt problems, you will go a long way to solving your marital problems.

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- more from For Better, by Tara Parker-Pope.

Luckily we don’t have debt problems and are both pretty tightfisted. I do have an ocean of student loan debt, but it’s not a problem.

1 month ago | Tags: debt marriage * tara parker-pope

The most important lesson from the scientific study of conflict is that you don’t need to worry about what you fight about or how often you fight. Instead, just focus on the first three minutes of your argument. Improving the way you and your spouse start a conflict discussion will ultimately change the tenor of the entire fight and better your chances for resolving the dispute.

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For Better, by the fantastic (inimitable?) Tara Parker-Pope, formerly of the Wall Street Journal, now of the NYT.

Don’t say “you”, say “I” and other conclusions from actual research on what does and does not work in marriage. A good book.

1 month ago | Tags: * how things work tara parker-pope