Archive for the ‘money’ Category

2009 Senior Savings Get a Boost from Congress

Monday, January 5th, 2009

Senior citizens across the country got good news in December when reports out of Washington stated that Congress suspended the law that requires those 70 ½ or older to withdraw funds from their retirement plans in 2009, even if they don’t need the money. Traditionally, senior citizens have had to ...

Wall Street on the Up and Up

Friday, January 2nd, 2009

Good news coming from Wall Street today, as the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 258 points, or 2.9%, to close above 9,000 for the first time since November. Standard & Poor’s 500 index gained 3.2%, and the Nasdaq composite rose 3.5%. Numbers have been rising since this past Wednesday but experts ...

Milking the Declining Price of Dairy Products

Friday, January 2nd, 2009

Like the auto industry in Detroit, America’s dairy industry is also taking a huge hit that’s sure to affect your grocery shopping budget. The New York Times’ Andrew Martin reports: "In a warehouse that [Roger Van Groningen’s] company runs here, 8 to 20 trucks pull up every day to unload milk ...

Bigger ’09 Paychecks Under Obama’s ‘Make Work Pay’ Tax Plan

Wednesday, December 31st, 2008

Americans making less than $75,000 annually should expect to see a slightly larger paycheck every two weeks when Barack Obama takes the presidential office on January 20. While he was once believed to be re-thinking the plan he touted during the election, the President-elect is in fact expected to implement ...

NASDAQ’s Tech Driven Trading Model Outsmarts the Competition

Tuesday, December 30th, 2008

Financially, 2008 was a year defined by the plummeting stock market, but Forbes Magazine still thought that no company was more impressive over the four quarters than market mogul NASDAQ OMX. The financial magazine’s Daniel Fisher praised the New York-headquartered company for adapting to recently introduced methods of new business ...

Drop in Holiday Spending Spells More Trouble for Retailers in ‘09

Monday, December 29th, 2008

Described by industry analysts as one of the worst holiday season sales periods on record, December’s retail sales figures plummeted 4% from last year’s numbers. Retailers are finally coming to grips with the fact that the American public has gone into a full-on savings mode that wasn’t the norm in ...

Christmas Comes Early for the Auto Industry

Friday, December 19th, 2008

The debate of whether to bail out the auto industry seems to be coming to a close. President Bush announced this morning that he intends to enact a rescue plan for General Motors and Chrysler LLC that will make $13.4 billion in federal loans available to the two struggling automotive ...

New York Enacts Digital Retail Tax – Is Your State Next?

Wednesday, December 17th, 2008

In New York this week, Governor David Patterson announced the state would begin charging a digital retail tax for online purchases. The tax will go into action along with similar plans from Paterson to raise taxes on movie tickets, soft drinks, sweets and snacks, and luxury clothing items among other ...

Wall Street Investor Bernard Madoff Confesses to Running Pyramid Scheme

Tuesday, December 16th, 2008

Longtime Wall Street investor Bernard Madoff confessed last week to running a years-long Ponzi scheme that’s believed to have swindled up to $50 billion in investments from more than thirty high profile individuals and organizations. The New York City based Madoff first told his children that he was deeply involved ...

Federal Reserve To Cut Interest Rates to Historic Low

Tuesday, December 16th, 2008

The Federal Reserve decided this afternoon to cut a key short-term interest rate to historic lows, making things clear that it will “employ all available tools” in its effort to save the country from its current economic crisis. The Fed announced that it would pull back its target for the federal ...