Financial related news.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Janet Yellen’s Federal Reserve has demonstrated one of the core tenets of central banking: On the Fed panel that sets interest rates, some votes are more equal than others. The panel — the Federal Open Market Committee — voted Wednesday to keep rates unchanged, something it’s done for six straight meetings. What [...]
WASHINGTON (AP) — Modest income growth for most Americans, strikes by fast-food workers, and the rapid growth of low-paying jobs at the same time middle-income work shrinks have combined to make the minimum wage a top economic issue for the 2016 campaign. Millions could benefit: Raising the federal minimum wage from $7.25 an hour to [...]
WASHINGTON (AP) — In much of the U.S., families spend more on child care for two kids than on housing. And if you’re a woman, it’s likely you earn less than your male colleagues even though one in four households with kids relies on mom as the sole or primary breadwinner. That’s according to the [...]
DETROIT (AP) — Kelly Dahle remembers leaving work one day several years ago at the same time as the CEO of her company. When they arrived at her car, he was startled. “Great car! But why do you need a BMW?” he asked. Dahle didn’t respond — “I wanted to keep my job,” she says [...]
WASHINGTON — The world’s key central banks have worked themselves into contortions to try to rev up economic growth, raise inflation and coax consumers and businesses to borrow and spend more. They’ve pumped trillions into financial systems and driven interest rates about as low as they can go — even below zero in Europe and [...]
New research from the Employee Benefit Research Institute outlines what it calls “leakage,” preretirement reductions in defined contribution savings plans such as 401(k)s. To highlight its work on the issue, the institute devoted part of its 78th policy forum that took place earlier this year to the topics of retirement challenges and reforms and reducing [...]
Gone are the days when a basic savings account was a practical means of socking away some cash. Interest rates well below 1 percent promise minuscule returns and the typical big bank savings account serves as little more than a reserve to cover the odd overdraft. There are relative exceptions but there exists barely any [...]
People are always wondering about the best way to handle their money — whether to invest, how to save, and the varying specifics of different institutions. One popular way of gaining interest on your money is through a certificate of deposit, or CD. A CD is a time deposit account where savers give the bank [...]
Just as Mastercard, the world’s second-largest credit card company, reported last week that 80 percent of its U.S. consumer credit cards have chips, researchers have found that hackers could continue to counterfeit credit cards by making the chip security feature seem nonexistent. It’s because of the magnetic strip, the United Press International report outlined. Credit [...]
As parents prepare their rising freshmen for life at college, many are leaving out a crucial piece of information: how to build credit. The college years are the best time to begin the process. After graduation, adults with no credit history have a harder time renting apartments, obtaining car loans or, eventually, mortgages. Nowadays, getting [...]