Outside On The Street: Why Restaurant Wine Is A Ripoff

By SIMON CONSTABLE

Wine connoisseur Mark Oldman explains how to make the best use of your money when buying wine at dinner.

WSJ: Is Longevity Insurance Too Risky?

By SIMON CONSTABLE

The chance of a guaranteed lifetime income in old age seems like something risk-averse people would jump at.

Yet many of them are shunning a product—a type of annuity known as longevity insurance—designed to provide just that.

The problem, a recent study found, may stem from the need to make a large single payment to buy the insurance when people don’t know how long they are going to live. Such insurance typically starts paying a fixed monthly sum to beneficiaries when they reach age 80 or 85. But the payments stop when the policyholder dies. Read more here.

Outside On The Street: What Are The Biggest Wine Investing Mistakes

By SIMON CONSTABLE


What Are the Biggest Wine Investing Mistakes? from Constable Confidential on Vimeo.

Photo by Klara Kulikova on Unsplash

Outside On The Street: What Is The 2 AM Principle?

By SIMON CONSTABLE

Jon Levy explains why it's sometimes better to stay up late and have a special experience. He is the author of The 2 AM Principle, and explains his ideas in this video.

U.S. News: 5 Reasons to Bet on a Consumer Rebound

By SIMON CONSTABLE

Is it time to bet on a consumer rebound? Historically, it's never been wise for investors to underestimate the willingness of Americans to spend.

But so far in this recovery we haven't reached the "spending-like-drunken-sailors" stage. 

The good news is that we may soon see the beginnings of a splurge, because although the economic recovery has been limp these past few years, there seems to be an important turning point. Read more here.

Forbes Video: How Restaurant Wine Is A Rip-off

By SIMON CONSTABLE

There are ways to get better value for money when you order wine at dinner. Sure, you already know that the restaurant has to mark up the price it charges you — there are lots of people who need to be paid.

But there are ways you could easily do better or worse, if only you knew what code words to use, or to avoid. For instance, which phrase is better: good value, or good price?

Plus there are actions you can take, which might seem subtle, but actually communicate directly with the sommelier in a way that they are unlikely to miss.

To find out what you need to know, I asked Mark Oldman, author of ‘How to Drink Like a Billionaire,‘ who explains the intricacies of restaurant wine in this video.

Photo by Maksym Kaharlytskyi on Unsplash

Forbes Video: Is The Fed Politicized?

By SIMON CONSTABLE

The Federal Reserve prides itself on being independent. The idea is that the policy makers of the Federal Open Market Committee should make decisions to further the twin goals of stable prices and full employment. And they should do so without regard to what the different political parties want. That's the idea anyway.

The question on the mind of many is whether those very important policy makers are actually now being swayed. After all, Fed Chair Janet Yellen get grilled with some frequency in Congress, and there are powers that stand to make a ton of money if they could persuade the country's central bank to move interest rates in one direction or another.

Charlie Bilello, Director of Research at Pension Partners addresses the question in this video. Curiously enough, Bilello and I are about two blocks away from the New York Fed as we film this interview.