Help The Middle ClassNews and Information For The Heart Of America
Money Errors To Avoid (Shine)
Everyone makes mistakes, or so my mother tells me. But when it comes to making mistakes with your money, it can cost you.
Avoid expensive mishaps by being in the know, particularly when it comes to your credit score, home loan and rainy day fund:
Ignoring Your Credit Score
Your credit score has never been as important as [...]
States Ready to ‘Tighten Belts’ In 2010 (USA Today)
States across the nation begin the year facing grim budget shortfalls that could mean a repeat of the service cuts, layoffs or furloughs and higher fees imposed in 2009, a USA TODAY survey shows.
States passed fiscal 2010 general-fund budgets totaling $627.9 billion, 5.4% less than a year earlier, says a study released last month by [...]
How to Fix Your Finances in 2010 (Wall Street Journal)
Still mulling over your New Year’s financial resolutions?
David Laibson, a Harvard University economics professor, has one for you—one that many of us may wish we’d made last year.
“Promise that you’ll never try to time the market again,” he suggests, a not-too-subtle gibe at the many investors who sold their stock in the depths of the [...]
STOP FUNDING BIG BANKS; COMMUNITY BANKS NEED YOUR SUPPORT: MOVEYOURMONEY.INFO
JUST BEFORE CHRISTMAS, a few friends were having dinner wondering what personal actions they could take to help limit the power of the big banks and create a more sane, stable financial system. How, they wondered, could they help end the era of Too Big To Fail? The financier at the table recommended that everyone [...]
Robert Reich/Opinion: The Year Wall Street Bounced Back and Main Street Got Shafted (Huffington Post)
In September 2008, as the worst of the financial crisis engulfed Wall Street, George W. Bush issued a warning: “This sucker could go down.” Around the same time, as Congress hashed out a bailout bill, New Hampshire Sen. Judd Gregg, the leading Republican negotiator of the bill, warned that “if we do not do this, [...]
Saving Money, Pinching Pennies – Teenagers Get It (New York Times)
After a year of observing their parents pinch pennies and fret about the economy, the nation’s teenagers may be coming to grips with reality.
Sales are down sharply in recent months at nearly every major retail chain catering to teenagers, and interviews with teenagers suggest that the reasons go beyond their own difficulty finding part-time jobs.
“I [...]
Investors Say ‘Bye-Bye’ To Money Funds In Droves (USA Today)
Investors are yanking money out of money funds and moving to bond funds — but some are just cashing out.
Investors pulled a net $490 billion from money funds this year through October, according to the Investment Company Institute, the funds’ trade group. A record-shattering $313 billion went to bond funds. And $1.9 billion fled stock [...]
For Stocks, The ’00s Worst Decade Ever (Wall Street Journal)
The U.S. stock market is wrapping up what is likely to be its worst decade ever.
In nearly 200 years of recorded stock-market history, no calendar decade has seen such a dismal performance as the 2000s.
Investors would have been better off investing in pretty much anything else, from bonds to gold or even just stuffing money [...]
Obama Implores Bankers To Help Out (USA Today)
President Obama said today that taxpayers provided “extraordinary assistance” last year to save bankers from the financial crisis, and “now that they’re back on their feet, we expect an extraordinary commitment from them to rebuild our economy.”
After urging bank executives at a White House meeting to provide more loans to potential employers, Obama said, “I’m [...]
Obama’s Big Sellout: His Economic Team Is Packed With Wall Street Insiders (Rolling Stone)
Barack Obama ran for president as a man of the people, standing up to Wall Street as the global economy melted down in that fateful fall of 2008. He pushed a tax plan to soak the rich, ripped NAFTA for hurting the middle class and tore into John McCain for supporting a bankruptcy bill that [...]
