By Jeff Lundy I know a couple friends who model their retirement outcomes. Recently, I asked them what growth rate they assumed for investments. Interestingly, we all used a similar rate: 4%. That seems appropriately conservative, and by setting it low you bake in all kinds of uncertainties (taxes...

In the fall of 2012, I remember my mother telling me about an article that said data scientists are the new, sexy profession. The moment stuck with me because nobody wants to hear their parents utter the word, “sexy”. Unbeknownst to me at the time, this Harvard Business Review...

Merriam-Webster defines a generalist as one whose skills, interests, or habits are varied or unspecialized. Having varied and unspecialized skills seems like an undesirable trait for job applicants. Recruiters are expected to find candidates with specific skill sets based on a defined job description. Meanwhile, candidates are expected to...

As we approach the one year anniversary on my current digitization project at work, I look back to see what can be learned from the experience. Project SWIFT was aimed at providing information about our global manufacturing plants to the product developers earlier in the development process. The output...

Date: September, 2017 “Who gave you this information?” Joe, the employee With a hint of fear and confusion in the tone of his voice, my colleague, Joe, came up to me and asked, “Who gave you this information?”. The information that Joe collects is difficult to obtain, relies heavily...

In late 2017, I started looking at different online masters programs with a heavy focus on quantitative skills. This included statistics, data science, analytics, economics, and various MBA programs. Unfortunately, many of the top programs, such as Carnegie Mellon’s Business Analytics or Berkeley’s Data Science program, had crazy price...

If you are new to investing, the number of retirement account options that you can deposit money into can be overwhelming. You see articles about brokerage accounts, 401Ks, and IRAs. Meanwhile, your friend keeps talking about how much money he made on Nikola, the next Tesla. Anyone can get...

The Beginning In the fall of 2008, I had my first real exposure to a formal business education. I was enrolled in an accounting course during my senior year of high school. I was interested in accounting because of my natural affinity with numbers and the constant advice from...

By Jeff Lundy There are many books about the early history of science.  There are even several histories of statistics.  Yet, I’ve not seen a social history exclusively devoted to data; even though, without data, statistics could not even exist. In this blog post, I’m going to argue that...

What are Target Date Funds? Target date funds are an investment vehicle that provide broad diversification while incrementally decreasing exposure to riskier assets (e.g. stocks) and increasing exposure to safer assets (e.g. bonds) as each fund’s target retirement date approaches. For example, if you invest in a 2060 Target...