An Obligatory Note on Debit Cards





I internally cringe when I see someone using a debit card (you're losing the opportunity to earn free money and what happens if your card is hacked!), but for sake of transparency, I will note there are some debit cards that do give rewards if you know where to look, such as Discover which has an online checking account (1% cashback on up to $3,000 in purchases each month using your Discover Debit Card, not the credit card), but the rewards are not going to be as plentiful as credit cards, and you have fewer federal protections if there's fraud or you need to file a chargeback. None of the big four banks are going to give you rewards when you use a debit card.


Comments

Post a Comment

A Google Account is required to leave a comment. Comments are moderated, so please be respectful and kind. Constructive feedback is appreciated, being a jerk is not and will result in comments being deleted.

Popular posts from this blog

Welcome

Image
Hi there, for those who don’t know me, I’m Ryan. If you do know me (hi Mom and Dad), thanks for reading this far! I’m a lit assistant in LA and consider myself very knowledgeable about all things entertainment, finance, media, travel, fighting back when a company is screwing me over, and anything else that involves a deep Wikipedia dive. While I can’t wait to share all my opinions with you all (as if you already needed that), much of the reason why I’m starting this blog is because from my own conversations with friends and colleagues, personal finance is a touchy subject that deserves a lot more attention but told from a less judgmental perspective. "Stop buying avocado toast and Starbucks" is lazy advice when it comes to personal finance, and there's a difference between the occasional toast and Starbucks versus buying it on a regular basis (also, the opinion I've heard is that there are better coffees than Starbucks). We'll see how long this blog goes for, but ...
Read more

A Friendly Note on Tax Rates in LA

Image
While it's pretty well-known that LA can be expensive, it should be pointed out how different cities in the LA area have different sales taxes. I only learned that a few years ago. I pulled up this chart from the Ca.gov website , where you can also look up the current sales and tax rate by address , but you should be aware of what some of these rates are (as of 9/22/2023): Beverly Hills: 9.5% Burbank: 10.25% Culver City: 10.25% Glendale: 10.25% Hawthorne: 10.25% Inglewood: 10% Long Beach: 10.25% Los Angeles*: 9.5% Malibu: 10% Marina del Rey: 9.5% Pasadena: 10.25% San Gabriel: 10.25% Santa Monica: 10.25% West Hollywood: 10.25% *  includes Hollywood, North Hollywood, San Pedro, Sherman Oaks, Sun Valley, Van Nuys This shouldn't be interpreted as don't pay your taxes (since these do pay for city services you may use at some point), but be mindful of where you do your shopping and dining. There's an In-N-Out on Venice Boulevard that you'd think would be Culver City and t...
Read more