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"The main reason for the explosion in billionaire wealth over the course of the pandemic has been the asset-purchasing programs undertaken by central banks. In the wake of the financial crisis, and following in the footsteps of the Bank of Japan after its crisis a decade earlier, central banks set about creating new money to purchase long-dated government bonds and some other assets in order to reduce yields (previously, they had primarily dealt in short-dated bonds as a way to influence interest rates).

The idea behind what is now commonly known as quantitative easing (QE) was that pushing down yields on long-dated government bonds would encourage investors to purchase other assets, like equities [i.e. stock shares]. Some argue that this was simply a measure designed to increase lending and investment; others argue that central banks were actively attempting to increase asset prices, enriching the wealthy based on the assumption that that wealth would 'trickle down' to everyone else.

Whatever the original intentions, central bank asset purchases have unquestionably led to significant asset price inflation and increased wealth inequality. If that trend was not obvious in the run-up to the COVID-19 pandemic — US equities had undergone their longest bull run in history and many observers were pointing to a bubble in high-yield corporate debt — then it is certainly obvious today.

Saying that central bank asset purchases have increased wealth inequality is another way of saying that the state has intervened directly in order to increase the wealth of those at the very top. In this context, the idea that billionaire wealth simply represents a reward for effort and innovation — the size of which is determined by the 'market' — is clearly absurd. These billionaires didn’t earn the massive increases in their wealth seen over the last year — they were effectively handed this wealth by the state.

And QE is not the only form of upward redistribution promoted by capitalist states today. Even before the pandemic, the United States had a massive problem with so-called corporate welfare. Special interest groups — from oil to agriculture to aviation — received huge direct handouts from the US state in the form of tax breaks and subsidies.

The response to the global financial crisis could itself be considered a form of corporate welfare. Some of the largest banks, insurance companies, and other financial institutions received massive direct or indirect bailouts for undertaking activities that many of their senior executives were aware were incredibly risky.

These bankers no doubt knew that their organizations were 'too big to fail': they knew that their collapse could bring down the world economy. The trump card held by these large organizations is a form of structural power inherent to the functioning of capitalism: as long as a small number of people control most of the world’s resources, they’ll be able to blackmail even the most progressive governments.

The pandemic has seen a massive revival of corporate welfare — only this time, rather than bailing out their financial sectors, governments are bailing out the entire capitalist class. On top of the $9 trillion worth of QE that’s been undertaken since the pandemic began, governments all around the world have spent trillions on loans and subsidies to big businesses, financiers, and landlords. Most have also provided some support for workers; yet without breaks on debt, rent, and bills, much of this has ended up in the pockets of the wealthy too.

These are only the indirect channels through which capitalist states support the global billionaire class. Oxfam identified in 2015 that a third of billionaire wealth comes directly from crony connections to the state or monopolies. Whether through outsourcing, subsidies, or privatization, state policy has created many billionaires over the years — as should be clear from the fact that state-capitalist China created the most new billionaires this year.

It is not an exaggeration to say that the dramatic increase in the wealth of those at the very top of society would have been impossible without the direct intervention of capitalist states all over the world. Those who attempt to justify the extraordinary levels of inequality on the basis that they are the natural result of the operation of the free market would do well to remember this.

But so would those on the Left who see state intervention as the answer to all of capitalism’s problems. More often than not, capitalist states undertake policy in the interests of capital. This is not because states are mere instruments of the ruling class; it is because the balance of power between capital and labor has shifted decisively in favor of the former in recent years, which has influenced the class struggle taking place within state institutions.

It may be possible to imagine a world in which public power is used to support the interests of labor over capital, but there is no way this can be achieved without class struggle within and — crucially — outside of the capitalist state."

- Grace Blakeley, from "Corporate Welfare Props Up the Billionaire Class." Jacobin, 13 June 2021.

[firereblogger]

Super small discord server if anyone wants to share the progress they’ve made, ask questions, or give advice!

[firereblogger]

What is something you wish people would realise is worth spending money on?

Themselves! So many people rather invest in material items, stock or real estate BEFORE investing in themselves.

By this I mean investing in therapy, reiki, a doctor or spiritual healer, books, educational resources, a gym membership or personal trainer, healthy food options, etc.

YOU are your biggest asset so always work on you first, and everything you desire will follow.

[firereblogger]

Do more of what makes you happy

[firereblogger]

I reblog this, and qualify it slightly. Too much video game time is a waste, too much Netflix can be a waste of time. 

But some of those things are great for relaxing. Relaxing is an important part of your life and if you take time to relax you can be more productive later. 

[firereblogger]

I'm pretty sure I'm going to stop renaming this blog now

It's less important now that side blogs can reblog, but I can't believe I didn't think of the name FireReBlogger as the reblogging version of FireBlogger

So I've renamed firebloggermain to firereblogger!

[firereblogger]

“Money frees you from doing things you dislike. Since I dislike doing nearly everything, money is handy.”

— Groucho Marx

[firereblogger]

If you're lazy like me and track your expenses as a percent of your income you can also easily compare what you're spending to various recommendations.

Struggling to save money? This post is for you!

Here’s a simple easy tip that’ll help you save money money, in your business or personal life CONSISTENTLY:

When saving money, focus on saving a percentage of your income not a fixed amount.

It’s no surprise that saving money is hard, really hard. Let’s say for instance, your 2021 goal is to save $3k/month. But what happens during those months when sales are slow or a major expense comes up and you’re not able to save as much as you thought you could?

You still need to be able to pay your bills and take care of yourself so saving that much money during a slow month may make you feel uneasy.

You might say, “no problem, I’ll just skip this month and save double ($6k) next month. WRONG!🤥 This method almost never works.

This just leads to inconsistent budgeting and a poor savings plan. An easy solution for this is to simply save a percentage of your income.

For instance, if you focus on saving 10-20% of your income, you no longer feel the need to stretch your money to make ends meet. So regardless if you made $500 or $5,000 that month, you’ll save money and feel good doing it. This method is much easier to commit to than trying to save a fixed amount.

What’s your number #1 question when it comes to saving & budgeting? 🦋

[firereblogger]

Stimulus Checks

The Senate recently passed Biden's stimulus bill, which means that many people will hopefully start getting checks or deposits in the next couple of weeks. Of course, since the Senate changed some details the House will need to vote on the bill again, but it's expected to pass on party lines. Then Biden will sign it, and the IRS will start sending out the money!

Here are some high level details about the bill:

Individuals with $75,000 AGI (adjusted gross income) or less per year or married couples with $150,000 AGI per year will receive the full $1,400 check per person. Then an additional $1,400 per dependent in the household.

The unemployed benefits will also be increased through early September 2021 by about $300 /week. And hopefully that time frame will allow most of the population to be vaccinated.

The Child Tax Credit is now $3,000 a year per child between the ages of 6 and 17 and $3,600 for kids under the age of 6.

And the first $10,2000 of benefits are actually tax-free income for households with annual incomes below $150,000!

My partner has been thinking about donating his check since he’s lucky enough to not need the money, I’m not sure if I’ll follow suit or not since my income is unfortunately lower. And my expenses are higher. But I am still lucky enough to have enough to provide for myself. 

With the falling stock market prices it could also be an ideal time to invest more heavily in my IRA, as opposed to spreading the remaining $5,000 over the course of the year. We’ll see if the checks come out before the market prices start to rise again. 

If you’re also managing without the stimulus check, it could be an excellent opportunity to start investing, or to give your accounts an extra boost. 

[firereblogger]

Common Money Mistakes

Disposing of disposable income. As you move into the corporate world, or your trade, or even get a promotion at your current job you may start seeing more money coming into your account. Bigger paychecks, better benefits, maybe even bonuses. You’ll probably also start seeing some bigger temptations. When I first started getting a decent paycheck my temptation was to go to the mall and shop at stores like JCPenney’s or Torrid. Now, I spent my entire life buying clothes at second hand stores a couple shirts and pairs of jeans a year. So Torrid’s nice business clothes? That was fancy. I went, I found a brand they carried that I liked quite a bit and I bought several shirts and a few pairs of pants, a blazer with some blouses Maybe spent a couple hundred over a few months, now it would not be exaggerating to say that’s about how much I had spent on clothes my entire life. ($10-15 annual budget 6th grade onwards). And at first it was nice, I was so happy to have made it to the point where I could go out and buy myself a nice shirt. And you know what, that was nice. But it didn’t make me happy in the long-term. After two or three months I stopped going – because sure now I had some nice shirts and business clothes, but I never really wore them. Instead, I started buying Gildan brand shirts online from shops like blankapparel. They’re $2-3 heavy cotton shirts that last forever and are really nice quality. All that disposal income I had been disposing of on clothes was rerouted to high-yield savings accounts instead.

Spending too much on housing. Now, I’m a sucker for an apartment with a washer and dryer in the unit. When I bought my duplex literally what I was most excited about was the fact that there was a washer and dryer. I’m not kidding the first night I drove up an hour from my apartment just to do half a load of laundry. So I can absolutely understand wanting to spend extra on a location with a washer and dryer – but the question is how much extra in my area a washer and dryer can increase rent by ~$100/month if not more. The rule I’ve heard several times is to spend less than 30% of your income on your housing, however that percent is greatly dependent on the cost of living. My rule of thumb – get the cheapest livable place you can find with as many roommates as you can stand. I spent years wishing I had a washer and dryer and instead spent years saving that extra $100 a month (well $50 since I had at least one roommate). So my advice is to find somewhere that’s close enough to your job/school that you can still get there with heating/cooling/no pests and to start saving money from there. Of course, if having an really nice apartment, or having privacy with no roommates is important to you take that into consideration. Just make sure you are considering the future value of that extra rent money instead of just the present value.

Debt. Emergency funds are important, and everyone should have something even if it’s not the 3 – 6 months salary that’s often recommended. Honestly, even an emergency $100 could be very important to have. Some people will use credit cards as their emergency fund, this should be your absolute last resort. Credit cards have very high interest rates, which means that any expenses paid for on a card will grow at an alarmingly fast rate. Say you have a sudden $500 expense, and you have a 24% APY credit card. That means that you will need to pay an additional 2% of interest every month. But because that 2% of interest is compounding it’s not the same as adding $10 every month, instead it’s adding $10 of principal. Which means that your next 2% interest add is 510 * 1.02 rather than 500 * 1.02. Let’s say in this scenario that you make a payment of $15 a month towards your $500 debt. It will take you 56 months to pay down the balance, and you will end up paying over $332 in interest. Making your total cost closer to $832.It will take almost two years before your $15 payment goes more towards principal than interest! Now imagine spending that $500 on a new phone, or pair of shoes, or some other non-essential non-emergency. It’s a bad idea.

Not saving for Retirement. Now this whole blog is geared towards early retirement, but that’s not everyone’s cup of tea. Maybe you like your job. Maybe you don’t mind your job and prefer living at a certain income level rather than trying to save every penny for retirement. Maybe you’re early in your career and don’t feel like you make enough to save for early retirement. You should still be saving for retirement. The greatest asset we have is time, and investing earlier even if it’s in small amounts, gives it time to grow. A $1,000 invested when you’re 25 can grow to be double what $1,000 invested when you’re 35 would. Even if it’s only a few dollars a week start investing early, brokerage platforms like Robinhood have very low minimums and you can invest in funds or ETFs on it.

If you invest, don’t be conservative. I had this problem when I first started investing. I let an older finance manager invest my first $3,000 with the understanding that it would be a retirement account. HE PUT IT ALL I N BONDS???? Okay, I’m young, I should be focused on growth with most if not all of my funds in stock. They’re higher risk, but if I’m planning on holding them for 20-30 years that risk is greatly mitigated. I lost over a year of growth before I realized that the retirement fund he had put my money in was intended for people in the 50s to 60s that already had a decent amount of value and now needed lower risk and lower growth investment vehicles. Since I moved my portfolio out of bonds and into stocks it has nearly doubled, the red line is when I realized my mistake and switched my funds into a stock portfolio.

Go big or Go Home!

[firereblogger]

https://www.ted.com/talks/estelle_gibson_the_true_cost_of_financial_dependence/transcript?language=en

Women: don’t ever give up financial independence because when you no longer have financial independence you lack any independence

[firereblogger]

I’ve had an interesting series of events related to working remotely recently. 

I recently moved about an hour away from my office, a month after Covid so I haven’t had to make the extended commute since my office started doing WFM the week before I moved. Which was a problem because I was planning on going to a law school five minutes away from my office.

Then that school went bankrupt a month before the semester??? So I switched to a hybrid online in person program (that’s pure online because of Covid). 

So now, nearly a year later I have switched from going to work and school in person in a city center to working and going to school 100% remote an hour away. And I’ve got to say, I love it. I have saved so much money and time now that I’m not commuting. 

Ideally I’d be able to continue this for the next four years and continue to save $50 / week on gas and ~ 10 hours of commuting time a week. If I had it longer I’d love to move somewhere cheaper (with better internet) unfortunately WFM is coming to an end in July. 

Unfortunately, having remote employees in other states can cause tax issues for corporations, and in other countries can cause even bigger issues as they need to create incorporated subsidiaries in the country to even get the authority to pay the employee’s salary / country’s taxes. So while WFM is possible, being able to move far is not. (Unless I went and got a new job).

Had that not been the case I would love to move to a cheaper state or even overseas, have a lower cost of living, and adjust my sleep schedule so I go to work at the time of day I want to (rather than needing to get up at 6 or 7am).

The good news is my remote school will mostly continue for the next four years! Once Covid ends I will have to travel to the school’s campus twice a semester for a week each - which will be expensive and stretch vacation time but oh well. 

Now that I’ve rambled, I’m curious what life would look like for you @thewalletwitch ?

What would your life look like if you could work/study remotely for the rest of your life?

[firereblogger]

How Being Transgender Can Challenge Your Financial Future

Photo by Micheile Henderson on Unsplash

Being transgender is pretty difficult. There are a lot of ways this can affect your life, and well being, physically, mentally, and financially. This last category is one that is often neglected, and yet is of the utmost importance. Being prepared for how your identity will affect your future finances can help you weather the storm just that much better. Here are a few issues that I have identified based on research and personal experience.

1. Depending on your family and support system, you could lose much needed financial support after you come out.

I hate to start off on such a crappy note, but it needs to be said. This is still a reality for a lot of transgender and genderqueer folks, especially younger people. If your finances are not your own, or you are otherwise beholden to someone who may object to your identity (i.e. living with your conservative parents), you need to plan how you will support yourself after you come out. Of course, I hope and pray that everyone will have a great support system, and will be fully accepted by their community after they have the courage to come out. But the sad reality is, that is just not going to be the case for some people. If you feel like there is a chance that you will lose much needed support after coming out, you should do your best to plan your future before coming out. Get a job, any job that will have you and works with your schedule. Save as much money as humanly possible. On top of that, you can start DoorDashing if you are old enough, or you could take a longer approach and start a blog or other business that could eventually become a source of income.

If someone is paying for your schooling, you need to consider how coming out will affect this, as well. If there is a risk of losing your support you either need to save enough to support yourself, hold off on coming out until you have an income that can support you (which I hate to recommend, but could make sense for some situations), or just accept that you may have to take a break from school to save some money. You could do like I did, take a break from college until you are 24 and your parents are no longer legally required to be a factor in paying for your education.

2. If you feel it necessary to medically transition, this opens up a whole can of worms. You will need regular medical care for the rest of your life, surgery (or surgeries), and time off from work to recover from each surgery.

If you are in the US, you may be familiar with the dismal state in which we find our current healthcare and insurance systems. I am currently insured under my mother’s plan through her work, but I don’t use it. It is very hard to find a doctor in my area that accepts the insurance. Even if I wanted to, I would still have to pay a copay that is way out of my price range. My mother, who makes well over six figures annually, complains about how high the copays are with this plan, that she chose. But she chose the cheapest monthly plan, and only insures me because she feels she has to as I am not yet 26 years old. Suffice it to say, I feel like I don’t have health insurance, because I can’t afford the insurance I have. It is for this reason alone that I have yet to pursue medical transition. I have had to chose between legal transition and medical transition, and I have chosen to save for the legal costs first.

3. You should be planning for the fees associated with legally transitioning.

I plan on doing a whole article on this topic alone, because it is that important. The legal transition process can be arcane and opaque depending on the state in which you currently reside and the state in which you were born. Personally, I currently live in California, which is primarily concerned with getting paid. If you have the money, and fill out the forms correctly, you can legally transition tomorrow. It will take awhile to process the paperwork, but it really is that simple to begin with. If you were born in California you could have your birth certificate updated during this process, but if you were not, like me, things get a little more complicated. Unfortunately, I was born in Virginia. This means that in order to change my name, and gender on my birth certificate I will have to submit a court order from California that demonstrates this change. This just adds one more thing to the laundry list of other documents that need to be changed, some of which can cost money to replace depending on where you live.

4. You may feel that you need to build a secondary income stream, at least part time.

I always recommend a secondary income source. It is just foolish to rely entirely on one job at a time to support all of your financial well being. In this day and age, this kind of thinking just isn’t possible, for anyone. But those people who find themselves anywhere outside the gender binary may feel that they need to build some way to bring in money outside of their day job because they may struggle to find or keep a day job at all. Historically, members of the trans community have resorted to illegal means of making money i.e. certain kinds of sex work, just to survive, and unfortunately, this continues in a lot places to this day. While you may not find yourself resorting to sex work, you may still struggle to find and keep a job because up until June of 2020 it was perfectly legal on the federal level in the US to fire, demote, refuse to hire, or otherwise discriminate against someone who identified as transgender. There were some states of the union that extended legal protections to the trans community before 2020, but there were plenty more that didn’t. Local sentiments about the trans community and awareness of this change in labor laws will take even longer to get up to speed with the times. You may feel unsafe in your workplace, even if no material punishment befalls you. You may be subject to insidious forms of harassment, such as deadnaming, misgendering, and being made the butt of inappropriate jokes. This kind of harassment is difficult to stop, especially if you end up in a workplace where management is ill informed on trans specific types of harassment. A secondary income stream could provide a small cushion while you leave this type of workplace and find a new, more understanding one. If you didn’t have a little something on the side, you may be forced to stay in this trauma inducing workplace, which is something I hope no one has to endure.

5. Family planning can get complicated, and thus, expensive.

Any family planning option that is outside of the standard heterosexual manner is automatically expensive because it enters the realm of the medical; anyone who has suffered from infertility can attest to this. If you find yourself wanting children of your own, you have a few options depending on your sex at birth. If you were born male, you will have to find someone to donate an egg, and someone to birth the baby. If you have a willing, and healthy friend this option can be relatively close to the heterosexual, cisgender experience. But many people find that they have to find and purchase a set of eggs from a donor, and then have them incubated and placed via IVF into a surrogate. This is an incredibly expensive process, so much so that it oftentimes prohibits people who would otherwise be wonderful parents from having biological children.

If you were assigned female at birth, things become a bit more complicated, and can depend entirely on your comfort with your own biology. I personally will never have biological children, for a variety of reasons. Chief among these is I have no desire to be pregnant, or birth children. My fiancee did for a very long time, and we decided that should we pursue biological children they would be entirely hers. But even if we did, sperm is not cheap, and not at all guaranteed to work. It is perfectly normal for a heterosexual, cisgender couple to find that it takes them close to a year to successfully conceive. This means that you could feasibly spend over $800 per month, for 12 months before pursuing other means such as IVF. A typical round of IVF could cost upwards of $10,000. Even if you have a kind friend that agrees to donate some sperm, you still have to have a contract drawn up to facilitate this transaction, adding legal fees to this process.

6. Your financial priorities change overall.

Finance first piqued my interest during a time in my life when I had no money. When I say no money, I mean no money, and no way of making money on my own. No computer, intermittent access to a working mobile phone, no job prospects, nothing. I found myself in a position of powerlessness, and decided that once I had money I never wanted to be broke again. A lot of people who find themselves on the margins of society find that money is never far out of mind. It is just our reality. It would behoove everyone, but especially those for which society has little or no tolerance, to figure out how to effectively manage money. But from what I have seen cis and hetero people who take an interest in money management, finance, and business more broadly tend to approach these tools as a means of creating wealth, whereas people who find themselves marginalized tend to see money as means of attaining that ever elusive sense of material safety. It is a small but, important distinction. Things such as food, transportation, and reliable and safe housing are extremely important goals for which genderqueer people can spend their entire lives striving. These experiences of material deprivation scar you, and reshuffle your priorities, usually with safety and stability right at the top. This can prevent someone from taking material risks the way that cis/hetero people can. Risks such as buying a house, seeking education beyond the minimum legally required by one’s profession, and starting a family can seem too expensive for people who have different ideas of what is “the worst that could happen”. These same people may not necessarily have family that is able to lend them money, or other material support. A supportive community is the key to stability in almost every sense, and up until very recently, most of this country seemed hell bent on denying access to a supportive community to genderqueer individuals.

Wrapping it all up

Taken together, all of this paints a bleak portrait of the financial possibilities afforded trans people. But this portrait is an incomplete one, for centuries trans, genderqueer, and other marginalized communities have found methods to survive and sometimes thrive. I am always curious about methods that trans and genderqueer people use to create financial stability in their lives. If you have a good tip, a coping strategy, or proven method that you have used to find material stability in your life, I want to hear about it! Comment below; I am always curious about the wide range of human experience!

[firereblogger]

[firereblogger]

An add on to reducing living costs, don’t just look at your own country (especially if you’re from the US). There are so many countries out there that have lower costs of living and better standards of life than the US.

Countries like Portugal or Bali have good cost of living to quality of life ratios. And non-US counties often have the benefit of better healthcare. 

Can I Retire Early Without Multiple Streams of Income?

The short answer: yes. The long answer: yes, but you should read the fine print first.

Anyone who has ever looked up what the F.I.R.E movement is has likely read all the hype about having multiple streams of income. People in the financial independence retire early community strongly encourage those who aspire towards early retirement to have at least two sources of income (during their careers and after they retire). Without creating multiple streams of income, the early retiree’s strategy boils down to two simple steps:

1. Invest as much money as you can as early as you can

2. Reduce your living expenses

Most working adults hope to retire one day. The conventional retirement wisdom is that you should invest enough money from your salary to eventually live off of your investments alone. Early retirees have adjusted this strategy to leave the workforce early by investing an above average amount of their salary and learning to live on less. The ambitious will aim to save about 25 times their household’s annual spending by investing in passive stock funds. Most will try to have $1 to $2 million in their portfolio to meet that goal. Some early retirees will calculate the total number they need to be even lower.

For example, a single 35-year-old could retire early after they reached $500,000 in cash investments. They determined that their $500,000 investment portfolio was enough to retire on based on that portfolio yielding an annual return of 6% ($30,000/year). To be on the safe side, they plan to live on $24,000/year. It’s a modest sum but it enables the 35-year-old to live comfortably in a place with a low cost of living.

This is doable. Living off modest investments alone works just fine for some people. Plenty of early retirees are happy enough to be free of the chains of their job that this method is well worth the effort and sacrifice. Despite this viable strategy, there are good reasons that the aspiring early retiree is encouraged to have multiple streams of income. Even those aiming for $1 to $2 million should be aware of some of the hurdles of relying on one source of income during their career and after they retire.

Retiring on a signal source of income can be risky.

A well thought out investment portfolio can sustain your early retirement as long as everything goes according to plan. Life never goes according to plan. In case of a market downturn or an emergency that exceeds the means of an emergency fund, you could lose a large chunk of your investments. Even those with well-funded, low-risk portfolios can be susceptible to the unexpected.

This is why those in the F.I.R.E community encourage people to start a business, invest in real estate, do affiliate marketing, and anything besides just relying on cash investments. The more sources of income you have the more it enables you to have a secure retirement by keeping money coming in should one line of income fail.

You can only invest your salary.

During the saving phase, only having one source of income through an employer limits the amount of money you are able to invest in the first place. If your employer determines that you are worth $50,000/year, you will only be paid $50,000/year.  You can increase your income by pursuing promotions, bonuses, and changing jobs, but ultimately it’s the employer who decides how much you make.

Of course, if someone makes a six-figure income it will be easier to save but most people do not make such plush salaries. The median individual salary in the United States was $49,764 in 2020. You have more control over how much you make when you start creating other sources of income and that money will keep flowing after you retire too.

Reducing living costs is easier said than done.

Reducing your living expenses allows you to save more money and to live on less in retirement. The less you need saved = the earlier you can retire. Frugality is a smart habit to adopt for anyone but there are certain lifestyles that may not be compatible with a sparing way of living.

If you enjoy living in an expensive city, travelling, or have a pricey hobby, you may not enjoy your life to the fullest if you can’t afford those things in retirement. It’s important that someone who wants to retire early be honest with themselves about the realties of living on less. You should seriously consider how much you need to fund your lifestyle in retirement and your investment income alone may not cut it.

However you reach retirement is excellent. Everyone deserves to retire! Just make sure to come up with a strategy that works for you if you want to get there early.

[firereblogger]

Link to the Fire Blogger Blog!