Everyday Economics

The case for buying the fancy paint in a bad economy

Sometimes the $80 paintbrush is the budget choice.

You've choked down the last crumbs of a cardboardy health snack because hey, you paid for them and you're not going to waste them. That's the sunk cost fallacy talking, and it has ruined a lot of meals.

Illustrator Sara Barnes has a suggestion: aim the sunk cost fallacy at something more useful. Her tip for sticking with a new hobby is to spend real money on it, because the cheap version is the version you quit. Erik Barnes (no relation) walks through the logic. The good paintbrushes. The pro-taught boxing class. The table saw that doesn't break. Each one sounds like a splurge, but what's more expensive? The nice tool you use all the time, or the crummy tool that never makes it out of the closet?

In a shaky economy, spending more on a hobby sounds like bad advice. Financial experts keep giving it anyway. A hobby you actually do can be cheaper than most of the things you'd spend the money on instead. With a mental health dividend most ETFs can't touch.

Do you have a GOOD picture to share?

Send us your best images, and we may feature them as the image of the day. Be sure to tell us a bit about your pic.

Previous Results

Yesterday we cleared the air. Or, rather, we featured two stories that aim to do so.

How do GOOD readers keep the air clean in their homes? It was a good fight between HEPA filters and just opening the windows, and the latter eked out the win.

• A suspicious number of houseplants (25.0%)

• HEPA purifier, running 24/7 (32.9%)

• Opening windows and hoping (35.5%)

• I do not have one and now I'm worried (6.6%)

GOOD reader Levi Omorgan is an extreme window opener! “I live in New England, but I open my bedroom window every night except when it falls below 20F. Right now it's 49F, and my air filter, humidifier, and heat are off, and my living room and bedroom windows are partially opened." 49F! In Southern California, that would be considered a dangerous cold snap! I envy your frosty courage, Levi.

Research

Scientists want a word about your weekend brunch

We’ve all been so focused on what to eat that we haven’t bothered to consider when we should eat it.

Tomorrow is Saturday, and you might be thinking about sleeping in and eating late. Maybe don't? Science says it can cause a brunch of, sorry, a BUNCH of health problems.

A 2025 study in Communications Medicine followed nearly 3,000 older adults in the UK for decades and found that the ones drifting toward later breakfasts had lower 10-year survival rates. Not catastrophically lower. Just lower enough to notice. As Mark Wales explains, it's all part of a growing field called chrononutrition, which studies how meal timing interacts with your circadian rhythm, metabolism, and sleep.

The question is, how much lower was that survival rate? Because for a drowsy Saturday morning and a bottomless-mimosa brunch, I'd trade a little time.

Culture

Three words are all you need for a happy ending

Words came easily!

As a writer, I don't know if I love this or hate it. There's some amazing creativity and fantastically evocative micro-stories here, but... I love my words! The challenge making the rounds online: write a happy-ending story in exactly three words. The internet obliged.

Erik Barnes rounded up the best, and the tonal range is what gets you. "I am sober" sits next to "DoorDash is here." "It was benign" shares a list with "Pre-ordered Switch 2." Gratitude, recovery, small wins, and extremely normal consumer joy, all stacked in the same three-beat structure.

There's actual neuroscience for why these land so hard on so little real estate, and it's not flattering to my pro-adjective stance. But the best part is just scrolling through them. Every one is somebody's whole interior life, folded down to the size of a postage stamp.

On April 24, 1800, President John Adams signed off on $5,000 to buy "such books as may be necessary for the use of Congress," and with that casually worded line item, the Library of Congress was born. The opening collection was not exactly dazzling. It consisted of 740 books and three maps, all ordered from London and tucked into a single room in the brand-new U.S. Capitol.

Then, in 1814, the British army showed up, set the Capitol on fire, and the whole thing went up in smoke. Enter Thomas Jefferson, retired, cash-strapped, and sitting on one of the largest private libraries in the country. He offered Congress his personal collection of 6,487 volumes for $23,950. Congress bought the lot, and the library got a glow-up that is still paying dividends.

Today, the Library of Congress holds more than 181 million items, making it the largest library in the world. For reference, the Library of Alexandria, the legendary great library of antiquity, is estimated to have held somewhere between 40,000 and 400,000 scrolls before famously meeting its own fiery end. The LOC has roughly a thousand times that.

Despite the name, it isn't really a lending library. Anyone 16 and up can walk in and use it, but books don't leave the building unless you're a member of Congress. The late fees, one imagines, could put a healthy dent in the national debt.

Do you have something GOOD to share?

We’re always on the lookout for uplifting, enlightening, and engaging content to share with readers like you. If you have something you think should be featured in the Daily GOOD, let me know!

Who’s a GOOD boy/girl?

While pet pics aren’t really what we feature in Image of the Day, I’ve received so many wonderful submissions that I couldn’t just let them sit unseen. So every Friday, I’ll be sharing a reader-submitted photo of a favorite pet. Want yours featured? Send it along.

💬 From the group text…

I’m not a train guy; it’s just not my sort of hobby, but majestic videos like this one of UP4014 Big Boy steaming up the Williams Loop, deep in the Plumas National Forest, are making a strong case.

Join the Group Text! Send us your social media gold.