[BrokeAssMillionaire]

You should take advantage with business to earn the mileages. My friend is spending over 100k-300k each year so he always get free tickets for his family of 4 to VN every year and free hotel too. Every card to cancel, you lose 5 pts credit score   Mine credit score usually over 850 so it's pretty good. I think as long as you have over 700 is fine when it comes to mortgage and loan. Usually, it takes a year to recover the lose points as long as you don't have any late payment. Most are stay within their airline, you can't use it for others. I couldn't remember exactly since policy may change that they used to allow to convert points from one to others as long as it the same chase company but it wasn't worth to do. Southwest is most for Southwest airline and as United. Majority of airlines have their own visa so you need to apply for each of them.

If you plan to get a mortgage/loan next year then don't cancel because they would run credit report where they can see everything. However, cancel 1 card is fine. Don't cancel more than 5 cards    Yeah I used to cancel more than 4. Remember, good credit score only helps one part of mortgage/load processing, it's also relate to 20% down payment and income in order to get low rate.   

 Mastermind? I think everyone would do the same as me. Think about it, what if you have managed your asset over 20-40 years and have confident to continue to keep it growing, then why would you let someone else to control it? By this time, you're getting old and don't have more time to earn more if someone loses it all.    Whatever you do, make sure to have plan A and B in case something is not right.

Your cousin is partially correct. However, it's depend on which position. I had gone over 10 cities for interview and finally got 1 out of 10 interview. Your cousin may refuse to go to other cities because of family or other reasons. As far as I know, Transportation Engineer, Computer Programming, Databases, and Research Analyst are easy to get Gov. jobs since there are many available. Accounting may be a little bit hard to get in because too many people are in this major. There are a few tricks to get in that I have seen before where they apply for technician position then after a year of probation, then they can apply for engineer, IT, and accounting (these are the internal and lateral transfer positions) which it's based on their major. Most people at lower positions are moving after 2-3 years so usually they don't care over qualify since they encourage everyone to move around every 2 years.  Relative/friends referral is around 10% since everyone has to take exam and going through HR screening before getting interview. I have over 10 relatives and family are working for the Gov. after they got lay off from private.   it didn't look hard for them after a few interviews. If they listened to me over 20 ago, they would be better to retire at 55 1/2, now they have to work until 62 as a new policy. 

Majority of the North may be VC   However, those were end up in Hong Kong probably from the North because that the nearest location to escape. Southern usually ended up in Indonesia, Philippine, Thailand, and Malaysia.