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Ask HN: What's the most valuable thing you can learn in an hour?

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Re: Ask HN: What's the most valuable thing you can learn in an hour?

#451

Post by truculent »

joshspankit wrote: post #439
learnstats2 wrote: post #410

On the contrary, it has taken me years to unlearn compound interest. When you start with relatively little, compound interest is relatively very unhelpful - it compounds wealth and benefits people who have started with something more than you. Twice as good at nothing is still nothing.

As much as I dislike seemingly knee-jerk contrary statements against “known-good” knowledge, I feel that there is an important point here: aggressively attempting to compound interest is a poor use of time when you only have, say, hundreds of dollars. Better to focus on compound interest “in the background” while optimizing for growing capital or income-generating skills.

So, essentially: compound interest is something wealthy people are good at because it's useful when you are wealthy. Not because learning about compund interest will make you rich?

Re: Ask HN: What's the most valuable thing you can learn in an hour?

#452

Post by Daub »

dougweltman wrote: post #440

Learn how to use Google Search effectively. It's a "language" we use every day. Mastering its few features can make any search so much more effective and precise: https://support.google.com/websearch/answer/2466433

Completely agree. I teach web search to my first year students as a valuable life skill.

Re: Ask HN: What's the most valuable thing you can learn in an hour?

#453

Post by ihodes »

jbverschoor wrote: post #434
RobertRoberts wrote: post #176

How to cook for yourself, really, really good food. I no longer crave restaurant food, and all of the really important things I learned about cooking take just the time to read it, hear about it and then try it. All without any special hardware. A few examples: 1. Cooking jasmine rice: rinse it first, 1 c. water to 1 c. rice ratio. Bring to boil, turn down heat to lowest setting. Leave lid /the entire time/. Fluff th…

3. Don't store eggs in the fridge, and don't frikking wash them!

This depends on how the eggs are processed prior to you purchasing them, so beware. Cf. https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2014/09/11/336330502/wh...

Re: Ask HN: What's the most valuable thing you can learn in an hour?

#455

Post by greyhair »

galfarragem wrote: post #267
unlinked_dll wrote: post #28

How to properly wrap cables. A/V and cable techs are super anal about this and it takes just a few minutes to learn, it will change your life. Cables should never be coiled in the same direction. It creates kinks when unwound and make it extremely likely for knots to form (ever leave your headphones in your pocket?). If a cable isn't being installed permanently it should be "wrapped" using a technique called "over-un…

I learnt this while working in trades. Working with trades people or handymans will teach you a lot of practical skills that are useful in daily life.

Thirded. I worked as a farm hand on a nearby dairy farm through high school, then six years as a mechanic before going to college. As a farm hand, you learn early how to arc weld, or cut steel with an acetylene torch, along simple carpentry and plumbing, as well as mechanical maintenance on equipment. It isn't all just feeding and milking cows. You also learn to deal with shit. Literally tons of it.

Re: Ask HN: What's the most valuable thing you can learn in an hour?

#457

Post by VLM »

vast wrote: post #46
citilife wrote: post #32

Learn how to read quarterly earnings (and other financial documents). It's amazing how simply it is to see if a company is making money / losing money and how that'll impact your view of the world. For instance, Uber as it is today, is going out of or dramatically changing its business. Might not see that from all the hype, might not see it from all the user, but the terms sheet doesn't quarterly earnings doesn't lie…

And how to learn it?

Hilariously, I think most Gen-Xers learned from playing Railroad Tycoon computer game where the detailed score sheet is the three sheet financials. For a short period of time in the late 80s there were plenty of 12 year olds who understood quite a bit about financial statements and what they imply about how a game/business is being run.

I don't know the modern equivalent that motivates a game player to learn to read financials.

Obviously you can/could/do play RRT "just one more turn" all night long until 4am every day just like the Civilization series of games, although actually learning how the numbers interact with each other and in-game behavior probably took one hour spread out over time. None of the concepts are terribly complicated once you memorize the definitions and important ratios.

Honestly you could get a basic start at reading financials, if provided with experienced tutoring, in an hour of clock time while playing RRT.

It was kinda ridiculous half a decade later in high school taking econ class and seeing the dry and boring way they tried to teach reading financials. You could replace an entire multi week unit of the class with perhaps three class periods of playing RRT.

Re: Ask HN: What's the most valuable thing you can learn in an hour?

#458

Post by Kye »

joshspankit wrote: post #439
learnstats2 wrote: post #410

On the contrary, it has taken me years to unlearn compound interest. When you start with relatively little, compound interest is relatively very unhelpful - it compounds wealth and benefits people who have started with something more than you. Twice as good at nothing is still nothing.

As much as I dislike seemingly knee-jerk contrary statements against “known-good” knowledge, I feel that there is an important point here: aggressively attempting to compound interest is a poor use of time when you only have, say, hundreds of dollars. Better to focus on compound interest “in the background” while optimizing for growing capital or income-generating skills.

This is so true. I invested what little money I had to spare in music. Everything I made with it went back in. The return is more than I would have gotten from interest or things like stocks and bonds.

~2% is great if you're doing okay financially and have a good career. It's useless if you have any marketable skill that would benefit from spending what you can spare on tools or services. A pair of good mixing headphones in 2017 paid for itself by 2018. It would have only been an extra $2 in a savings account. That investment paid for a MIDI controller that came with Ableton Live Lite. That helped pay for an upgrade to Suite during a sale less than a year later.

All the money I spent on the controller and Suite upgrade would amount to barely $30 a year in savings interest. That's not going to help me with the tiny but still greater income built on those investments.

Re: Ask HN: What's the most valuable thing you can learn in an hour?

#459

Post by greyhair »

koliber wrote: post #338

Understanding compound interest thoroughly. Compound interest is probably the most powerful "force" governing out lives. It is crucial when borrowing money, especially for longer terms. It is crucial when saving and investing. It is crucial in self-development, where a tiny 5% improvement in some area of your life per year can mean that you are twice as good at something in 15 years. It is important when evaluating a…

Also learn about opportunity cost when spending and saving. It is tied to compound interest in many ways, but also deals with addressing wants vs. needs, and also scoring your wants.

Re: Ask HN: What's the most valuable thing you can learn in an hour?

#460

Post by VLM »

Learn very basic weightlifting, like how to design sets (12 or so light reps to warm up, aim to run out of energy around 8 reps for "production" sets, do about 3 production sets a couple minutes of rest in between). With only an hour, limit to relatively safe machines (LOL at learning olympic squats correctly and safely in only an hour of coaching).

If you need motivation for why human bodies need to lift, "The Barbell Prescription: Strength Training for Life After Forty"

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