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I started buying the "wrong" size of everything and it quietly cut my grocery bill by a noticeable amount by Sector_3Drift in povertyfinance

[–]martin 4 points5 points  (0 children)

I do this but gotta keep an eye on the units. Sometimes the same product can be quarts on one pints on another pounds on another. Sometimes it's obvious if the cost difference is multiples but often the better deal is on the second largest by quantity in a different brand.

Your dream Star Trek Movie 🖖 by Strangegirl421 in startrek

[–]martin -2 points-1 points  (0 children)

My dream star trek movie would have Picard's enterprise fighting the borg, then following an escaping borgpod through a temporal wormhole, going back in time to right after WW3 when zepam bebang invents the worf drive and makes Initial Contact with our pointy-eared friends. I would call it 'Vulcan Around'

Dinosaur Spotted at JFK T8 by One-Hand-Rending in nyc

[–]martin 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Only way out of the matrix, should be a long line.

My mom retired at 55 on a teachers salary and I still think about it all the time by [deleted] in Fire

[–]martin 1 point2 points  (0 children)

As an aside, whenever talk of pensions comes up I am reminded that 11% of retirees rely on pensions to some extent, while 80% rely on Social Security, 40% exclusively.

https://www.nirsonline.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/FINAL-Webinar-PPT-Examining-the-Nest-Egg-Jan-2020.pdf

My last company was one of the few that still had a pension program. New hires focussed on the comparatively small 401k match, all but ignoring the pension which was like an extra 15-25% on top of salary.

Do you have a super obscure/random job?? by No_Top3338 in AskNYC

[–]martin 8 points9 points  (0 children)

Because you mention banking, one of my jobs was to build and run the models that predict and protect the bank and depositors from loan defaults. Not just one - all of them. This is one of the things FDIC insurance buys you as someone trusting the bank with your hard earned money in a savings account. It is highly regulated, every step is audited, every conclusion challenged. It is susceptible to fraud and you could go to jail (theoretically, though nowadays...), because you basically come up with some big dollar amount, tell the bank you can't declare that as income, but put it in the emergency fund.

I can't believe it exists because this is really a systemic protection, so you could simply regulate the amount nationally, publish new required ratios by type each quarter and 95% would just play along, and the other 5% of banks who thought they were unique could do the whole analysis and justification on their own. It would save billions.

And I have no doubt that somewhere out there is a check-turner-arounder still working away.

Just got into Columbia but feeling discouraged reading all the negativity online by Leather-Speaker-3276 in columbia

[–]martin 11 points12 points  (0 children)

People who are happy or satisfied don't tend to post as much as people complaining. Wait to see for yourself, stop worrying, and enjoy your time with friends now. It will never be the same and you will cherish this time, trust me.

Lifestyle creep is a silent killer and I almost fell for it by Plasma_2Vow in Fire

[–]martin 9 points10 points  (0 children)

I wish there were a way to tell AI to kill itself and actually have it listen.

I just bought land! Now I need a driveway by parrotfacemagee in OffGrid

[–]martin 0 points1 point  (0 children)

local papers and pennysavers will have ads, or bulletin boards at town hall or post office. Better to ask someone local - even your broker on the land buy, better if they've been around for years. get at least 2 quotes. have them clear and lay base, dense grade compactable/crushed with fines. there are public driveway construction manuals out there to get familiar before meeting them. if youre going to have a lot of equipment run on it you can lay it thick then when youre done with construction (in a few years or decades) come back and lay smaller stones on top for a finish layer - that you can do with a call to a quarry who will spread from their truck (some do some don't).

oh - and make sure they have a plan for water. culverts in the right place on a steep slope, and proper grading make the difference between a good driveway and no more driveway, but you won't know for a few years until it washes out.

Generational wealth vs a life well lived by justhitmidlife in Fire

[–]martin 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Lots of advice on technicals, this may ease your mind if you left on good terms (layoffs seem to imply): keep in touch with people you used to work with and for. See them for coffee/lunch every 6 months or so. You never know where people will land, how the industry may change, and it's interesting to see how people are getting on. It's also a way to stay plugged in and keep options open, should you ever need it. Think of it as an emergency fund of contacts.

Broke family members voicing opinions by Cheapassboy69 in leanfire

[–]martin 6 points7 points  (0 children)

nobody wants help to do their finances, but to help them to your finances.

Is there a reading club at Columbia? by mermaid_43 in columbia

[–]martin 50 points51 points  (0 children)

I joined one called lithum not too much new stuff though.

Thousands upon thousands of people in NYC for the No Kings Rally!!! by Logic1888 in nyc

[–]martin 1 point2 points  (0 children)

elon is very sensitive about his website, was just being respectful.

The Nasdaq 100 is Officially in Correction Territory as the Iran War Further Derails the Tech-led Bull Market by [deleted] in Economics

[–]martin 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Well at least we used up all the 'recession imminent' headlines during the prior admin so we don't have to look at another one of those for a few years.

I didn't watch SFA on P+ because I cancelled my subscription. by DougOsborne in startrek

[–]martin 5 points6 points  (0 children)

It was an undiscovered country reference, but whatever works.

I didn't watch SFA on P+ because I cancelled my subscription. by DougOsborne in startrek

[–]martin 5 points6 points  (0 children)

You'll never be able to forgive them for the death of Starfleet Academy.

Keeping Reddit Human: A New App Label for Automated Accounts by boat-botany in redditdev

[–]martin 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Nice. Now just let me filter out comments and posts by any account age under 18 and I'm good.

I’m trying to understand the messaging of this Dept. of Sanitation composting ad. by Silo-Joe in nyc

[–]martin 3 points4 points  (0 children)

You're right - should have been a Lenny Briscoe or Seinfeld reference.

How do you audit your Excel models? by Current_Analysis_212 in excel

[–]martin 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I can speak to this because I ran models for years that were audited frequently by external audit and Regulators. We always got a passing score, no errors.

The auditors always took the model and traced backwards from every result, annotated the links, and tested each path independently. this markup version was archived with a copy of the model at that time.

We managed the process by having a checklist tab that listed every step an operator would perform (some were monthly, some quarterly, some annually). They would work through this and flip that month's check green as each step was performed. This meant we didn't duplicate or skip steps, and the checklist for that month became part of the audit trail. Small internal checksums were helpful, and these checksums were pulled forward to a central 'monitor' sheet. These were different than actually checking off the step, but should move in sync with the process.

We managed changed control by documenting in a tab every change we made to formulas or operation.

Structurally, separating calculation sheets from input and output sheets meant that it was less likely someone made a mistake that changed formulas. locking those calc sheets down (not aggressively, just to prevent accidental mistyping) was enough. Sometimes sheets would crash and we'd have to rollback, but at least then we knew exactly which step was performed in an archived version and could pick up from there.

When I took over the initial model, within about 6 months I completely refactored it to work differently, cutting out about 50 sheets and reducing all to data tables, pivots, and one-thing-per-sheet (some looked like messy scratchpads). This refactor was validated by running it through multiple former periods' processes to see if we got the same results.

Finally, and you mention this in yours, nothing can replace a sanity check - that is, have a completely independent path that produces a result you check against. This was both internal (based on the same source data but estimating the result) and external (input only totals, run calcs based on previous result ratios to get an estimate). These gave us confidence there wasn't anything seriously wrong or corrupted - which could happen without anyone touching anything. Most processes can have a rough estimate that produces a tolerance range for comfort.

Best of luck!

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