It’s been a busy couple of weeks as my son had a significant surgery on his leg last week. Caring for him afterwards has been a round-the-clock job. I hope to be able to jump back into writing a little more in the coming weeks, although we have our big move looming as well. I’ll do my best to keep up with my one post a week minimum and add in a few bonus articles when I can. In the meantime, I did manage to find some good thought-provoking articles from around the web this June. Enjoy!

1. In an article published in the Washington Post, Barry Ritholtz of The Big Picture blog shared 7 Life Lessons from the Very Wealthy. This one is well worth a few minutes of your time.

2. What If 8% Is Really 0%? This is the question posed in an article posted at Advisor Analyst. It reviews the thoughts of Mebane Faber on the realities faced (or not being faced) by large pension funds. They are underfunded even if they do achieve the 8% annual returns they need, which is highly unlikely. This is another great read.

3. Josh Brown of The Reformed Broker writes about Bloggers as the Conscience of Wall Street. As much as many of us (myself included) decry crony capitalism and unfair financial practices, there are many financial blogger/practitioners out there (Josh included) who do their best to give the rest of us a peek behind the curtain. I, for one, am very grateful that they take the time to do so.

4. Every so often I discover a blog that I wish I had found earlier. Frances Coppola writes about finance and many other topics out of the UK from the perspective of an ex-banker. Check out her post on The Hole in the Fence, and while you’re at it, explore some of the other great articles at Coppola Comment. This blog proves that you can miss out on some great writing if you get hung up on rankings that depend on mindless keywords and meritless link-counting rather than thoughtful commentary.

5. Thoughtful commentary doesn’t always have to be very wordy. Sometimes a picture really is worth a thousand words. Thanks to Joe Taxpayer for sharing a cartoon about our Sisyphean Economy. For those who are a little rusty on Greek Mythology, Sisyphus was the king who was punished by being compelled to roll a huge boulder up a hill only to watch it fall to the bottom again. He was condemned to repeat this pointless task for eternity. Hmmmm.

6. While we’re on the topic of insurmountable debt, you might want to take a look at Jim Yih’s post on How Much Debt Is Too Much? over at his Retire Happy Blog.

7. The Financial Post had an interesting article on Canada Missing Out on Commodity Boom. Apparently, our GDP doesn’t get the same boost when the bulk of commodity demand is coming out of emerging markets rather than the U.S.. Interesting.

8. Kevin from Invest It Wisely offered up 3 Reasons Why I Squirrel Away My Money. These are some great reasons to save and the cute picture of the squirrel is a bonus!

9. Sustainable Personal Finance shared some savings specifics on How Menu Planning Saves Time and Money. I can vouch for that!

10. Cullen Roche at Pragmatic Capitalism shared a video of Randall Wray talking about Why the Crisis Is Not Over. I would concur with his views about “how the banking crisis is far from over, why the bailouts solved nothing, why the US economy remains at great risk of another crisis and why no real economic change (and recovery) will likely occur until after another crisis occurs.”

I hope everyone is enjoying a wonderful Canada Day. For kicks, you might want to check out my post from last year on A Dozen Good Reasons to Move to Canada. Have a great weekend!

As always, your comments are welcome.