In 2014, a woman wrote to Consumer Reports with a problem. She said her husband was able to get health insurance at his job for $130 a month, which was about 4% of their monthly income. However, adding her to his plan would have raised the cost to $415 a month, more than 12% of their income. Was there anything they could do, she asked?Sadly, the answer was no. In theory, the Affordable Care Act (ACA) — better known as Obamacare — is supposed to guarantee all workers access to a health care plan they can afford. Unfortunately, the IRS has interpreted the law to mean that workers are only … [Read more...]
Amy Livingston
How to Stop Living Paycheck to Paycheck
According to a 2017 CareerBuilder survey, 78% of all workers say they live paycheck to paycheck. It's not just low-wage workers who have this problem, either. Nearly 1 out of 10 workers making $100,000 or more say they always or usually live paycheck to paycheck, and 59% of them are in debt.Living paycheck to paycheck is like being stuck in a hamster wheel; no matter how fast you run, you can never get ahead. Every penny you make goes toward paying the bills, and a major unexpected expense can completely derail your budget, sending you scrambling for the credit cards and driving you deeper … [Read more...]
4 Fears That Cost You Money and How to Overcome Them
Everyone, from powerful world leaders to babies in their cribs, is afraid of something. Fear is a normal human response to danger — and most of the time, it's a useful one. It can lead you to steer clear of threats, like a wild animal or the edge of a cliff. It can even protect you from financial dangers, like excessively risky investments.However, sometimes fear works against you. When fear gets out of control, it can lead you to shy away from things that aren't dangerous and could even be helpful. Because fear is a primal emotion, it can overpower your reason and lead you to make unwise … [Read more...]
How to Lock or Freeze Your Credit and Why You Should Do It
In September 2017, hackers broke into the servers of the credit bureau Equifax, gaining access to the personal information of roughly 143 million Americans. In the wake of this attack, many financial experts urged consumers to freeze their credit reports to prevent identity theft. By doing this, they could completely stop any attempt to open new credit accounts in their name.Over the course of the month, searches for "credit freeze" on Google quadrupled. Within six months, research from Fundera revealed that nearly one in five Americans had frozen their credit after the attack. Younger … [Read more...]
What Do Rising Interest Rates Mean for You? – Effects & How to Prepare
For much of the past decade, interest rates have been at historic lows. Interest rates set by most lenders tend to go up and down based on the federal funds target rate, or the rate at which banks can borrow from other banks, which is set by the Federal Reserve. This rate has ranged from around 1% to over 19% over the decades, but in the wake of the 2008 recession, it dropped to nearly zero and stayed there for five years. This made borrowing money cheap, encouraging consumers and businesses to spend - but it also discouraged saving, because the interest on bank accounts was so low.Since … [Read more...]
Should You Pay for a Credit Monitoring Service? – Best Options
In 2017, the credit bureau Equifax announced that hackers had broken into its servers and gained access to the personal information of roughly 143 million people, putting them at risk of identity theft. In the wake of the attack, Equifax offered all U.S. victims a free year of credit monitoring through its new TrustedID Premier service. At the same time, searches on Google showed a surge of interest in other paid credit monitoring and identity protection services. These services comforted panicky consumers with the promise to catch signs of identity theft right away — or even stop it before it … [Read more...]
How to Get Cheap Concert, Event & Musical Tickets
Tickets for concerts, shows, and other events can be outrageously expensive. Here's a quick sampling of prices I recently found on Ticketmaster:A Jay-Z and Beyoncé show at MetLife Stadium in New Jersey: $54 to $380 per ticket An International Champions Cup soccer game, also at MetLife Stadium: $41 to $194 per ticket A Friday night performance of the Broadway musical "Wicked": $109 to $159 per ticketPaying high prices like these is probably not an option for anyone on a tight entertainment budget. Fortunately, you don't have to. With a bit of work, a bit of patience, and a few … [Read more...]
How to Use 0% Balance Transfer Credit Cards Responsibly
After years of hovering at close to zero, interest rates are on the rise. The Federal Reserve raised rates three times in 2017 and twice more in early 2018, with more increases likely. That's good news for savers, but bad news for anyone who's carrying credit card debt. Most credit cards have a variable interest rate, so as the federal fund rate creeps upward, so will the cost of carrying a credit card balance.However, for some people, there's a way of getting out of paying these higher rates, at least temporarily. If you're lucky enough to get an offer for a zero-interest balance … [Read more...]
How to Deal with a Lying Spouse – Financial Infidelity in Marriage
Julia has a secret credit card that she hides from her husband, Carlos. Whenever she goes out for a little retail therapy, she uses that card and has the bill sent to her office. That way, she doesn't have to listen to any lectures from him about how much she's spending. She figures what he doesn't know can't hurt him.She's wrong.Keeping money secrets from your partner, like Julia's secret shopping, is called financial infidelity. And according to experts, it can cause just as much harm in a marriage as cheating on your spouse. When lies about money come to light — as they tend to do … [Read more...]
What to Do If Your Wallet or Purse Is Lost or Stolen
One day I was walking down the street minding my own business when a kid ran toward me and grabbed my purse off my shoulder. I tried to hold on to it, but he shoved me off and jumped into a waiting car, which took off down the street.As I turned around and walked empty-handed toward the police station, there were two thoughts uppermost in my mind. The first was the license number of the car, which I kept repeating to myself because I had no way of writing it down. The other was what a huge hassle that one moment of inattention was about to cause me.I'm one of those people who keeps her … [Read more...]
Labor Unions in the United States – How They Work, Pros & Cons
When you read news stories about the middle class in America, you often see terms such as "squeezed" or "declining." As a 2017 study by the National Bureau of Economic Research points out, average lifetime earnings for U.S. workers have been stagnant for decades, even as the cost of a middle-class lifestyle has risen sharply.Politicians on both sides of the aisle deplore this trend, blaming it on everything from tax policy to immigration. But there's one piece of the picture that they tend to overlook: the decline of labor unions.According to the Center for American Progress (CAP), a … [Read more...]
