The Best Links this Week: Finding money, dropping out of college, and your tax dollars at work

Mike Dang  |  04:29 PM, Friday, May 7, 2010

LOST MONEY, FOUND MONEY
Don't freak out if you lose your wallet. They turn up more often than you think. Since 2007, Jon Mooallem has been collecting "long-lost wallet" stories, starting with the wallet of a Union soldier, lost at the Battle of Gettysburg (1863), returned to his descendants in Minnesota (May, 2007). After setting up a Google alert for "wallet found," Return of the Wallet stories poured into his inbox. Here are his findings, which are quite different than David Sedaris' personal study of found money. Here's a tip: If you find Oprah's money, she secretly wants it back. [Slate, MPR, Tumblr]

TO GREENMARKET, TO GREENMARKET
Freshly picked food tastes better, which is why many of us — restaurant chefs especially — pay the relatively higher prices commanded at greenmarkets. This video profile of New York berry farmer Rick Bishop shows why the food costs more: Bishop's farm builds different soil for different crops to grow the best quality produce possible, and his Tristar strawberries grow sweeter in the cold mountain climate. This week, the video won a James Beard Foundation Award (the Oscars of food), and our stomachs as well. [Serious Eats]

COLLEGE? WE DON'T NEED NO STINKING COLLEGE
Bill Gates dropped out of Harvard. Steve Jobs didn't make it through his first year at Reed. Mark Zuckerberg? Another Harvard defector. Which raises the question: do aspiring entrepreneurs need a $140,000 degree? Heck no, says Caterina Fake, co-founder of Flickr (and, full disclosure, a distinguished Vassar alum). In a riveting post about why entrepreneurs should drop out of college, Fake argues that industry knowledge is self-taught and can't be gained in a dorm room. Of course, you could always do both. [Caterina, INC.]

AMERICA'S BUDGET
Like you, the U.S. government budgets and spends. Okay, not quite like you, unless you are also spending billions on fighter jets, bank bailouts and a new national health care overhaul. Where does all the money go? Graphic designer Jess Bachman spent two months researching and creating this gorgeous poster of President Obama's proposed 2011 budget. We like the animation, but a hard copy would look great next to your framed poster of the Constitution. [Death & Taxes: 2011]

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