I was thinking the other day about how my lifestyle would change if I moved to a place like New York City.

Moving from Texas to Colorado was relatively easy, from a “budget restructuring” standpoint, because while Colorado is more expensive than Texas, they’re still on the same planet, metaphorically speaking. To be annoyingly specific, Dallas is a 101.6 on the Best Places cost of living index, and Fort Collins is a 118.3.

So yeah, it’s more, but it’s not astronomically more. It was simple to migrate my Dallas lifestyle to Colorado and adjust in a few areas (more money toward rent, less toward eating out, etc.).

But as I thought about other places I’d like to live someday (like New York City), it felt like we were leaving Earth and taking a SpaceX rocketship to Jupiter.

My rent hike from Dallas to Fort Collins had more to do with the fact that we went from a 2BR apartment to a 3BR home, but also—sadly—that the cost of living index for Dallas housing specifically (a component of the overall index) is 92.9 and Fort Collins housing is—are you ready for this?—168.1. That’s 80% higher.

Our rent went from $1,741 in Dallas to $3,000 in Fort Collins—a 72% increase.

But the cost of housing index in New York City? Forget 92.9 and 168.1. Try on “294” for size.

When I was thinking about a hypothetical New York City budget, I felt like none of my standard “regular-ass place to live” ground rules made sense anymore. It got me reflecting more broadly on whether or not our typical “best practices” ground rules are the most efficient way to create budgets in the first place.

I remember getting my first salary. The #1 question I had?

“How much of this should I save?”

Followed closely by, “What’s a reasonable amount to spend on rent?”

Then, “How much ‘car’ can I afford?”

I wanted a neat framework to layer on top of the one factor I knew for certain: my income. More precisely, I wanted someone to prescribe for me a realistic amount to spend, save, and invest each month.

What if there’s a better way to plan in the long term for these types of things?

Keep reading.

Highlighting the best personal finance content I've consumed in the last week.

• Podcast: How the Creator of the 4% Rule Applied it for His Clients (and His Own Retirement). I love interviews with Bill Bengen, because he basically discovered retirement math. This one was especially cool: He noted that he found having Small Cap exposure in your portfolio increased your safe withdrawal rate from 4% to 4.5%. I love Small Cap funds ever since I read Paul Merriman's book We're Talking Millions, so that was an encouraging factoid.
• Book: Just Keep Buying by Nick Maggiulli. My friend Nick sent me a copy of his new book, and his use of data to illustrate his philosophy is *chef’s kiss.* If you’re a sheepish new investor, I highly recommend. It’s available for preorder now.

Ugh, I know—how annoying is that title? Nobody has a Magic 8 ball to predict what’ll happen in the future, but I have a slight issue with the idea that the only index fund you’ll ever need is the Total Stock Market.

And based on the funds I see constantly discussed on #PersonalFinanceInstagram, that’s one of the favorites by a long shot.

Most of the recommendations are, for the most part, S&P 500 or Total Stock Market index funds, which are Large Cap funds.

Large Cap funds are popular for new investors (new = started in the last few years, like me) because the S&P 500 has absolutely ripped for the last decade or so—and when I say “ripped,” I mean trounced pretty much every other popular index.

I think there’s a bit of selection bias happening on the aforementioned personal finance Instagram, though, because most new investors are the same ones creating content on the platform. There’s not a great historical representation and it concerns me that we’re going to #influence a new wave of investors to be way overexposed to the popular Large Cap Crew at the expense of other indices.

So what's a new investor to do?

Keep reading.

This week on the Money with Katie Show, we hear from Anna Hulett, an industrial organizational psychologist (think a female Adam Grant), about the state of work in the United States, and why there’s a small legion of millennials obsessed with financial independence and retiring early.

Is financial independence the sign of…a problem? What should we make of this?

We examine data from other places like Scandinavian countries where employment rates are higher, people are happier (and more productive; the GDP per capita is 11% higher than in the US), and—ironically—the taxes and social safety nets are extreme.

Listen now.