Finance Globe

In this week’s State of the Union address, President Barack Obama recommended the minimum wage be incrementally increased to $9.00 per hour and be tied to the inflation rate after that. Having the Federal minimum wage indexed to inflation would help make sure that employees are paid a wage that keeps up with increased cost of living. All workers can benefit from increased minimum wage. Generally, other wages move up when the Federal minimum wage goes...

If you find an erroneous charge on your credit card or bank statement, you have the right to dispute it with your credit or debit card issuer, as long as you do it within 60 days. There’s no charge for you to dispute and you can even avoid paying interest on disputed credit card charges while the issue is being investigated. Banks, however, have to spend time investigating the dispute, contacting the merchant, deciding if the...

American Tax Relief, a company who purported to reduce consumer’s tax debt, has been ordered to pay more than $15 million to the FTC for deceiving consumers. As their name implies, American Tax Relief sold tax debt relief services to consumers. The FTC filed charges against the company for making false claims about significant reductions in previous customers’ tax debts and also for falsely telling consumers they qualified for programs that would lower their tax debt....

The U.S. Postal Service announced on Wednesday its plans to drop Saturday letter delivery to street addresses beginning in August. The move is expected to save the financially ailing agency an estimated $2 billion per year. “The Postal Service is advancing an important new approach to delivery that reflects the strong growth of our package business and responds to the financial realities resulting from America’s changing mailing habits,” said Patrick R. Donahoe, Postmaster General and CEO....

We know that paying bills on time is one of the most important aspects of being financially responsible. If you pay late, you’ll get charged a late fee, you risk having your services terminated (no one wants to be in the dark!), and your credit could be impacted. While payment history is generally the most important factor influencing your credit score, it’s not the only thing that matters. In fact, you could pay on time every...

It’s widely known that the FICO score is the score most used by creditors and lenders to approve your credit card, loan, or application. There are possibly hundreds of credit scores out there, so when you check your credit score, especially if you get a free credit score, chances are you’re not getting the FICO score. While, you want to see a credit score nearest to the one a lender’s going to see, it’s not the...

People who expect to get a tax refund this year have probably already started daydreaming and planning on what they’ll do with the extra money. Last year, the average tax refund was around $3,000. While you may be tempted to use the money on a vacation, shopping spree, new furniture, or electronics, there may be a better way to spend your tax refund – on your credit card debt. The average credit card debt per borrower...

Though the tax filing season is open for most taxpayers - whether they are filing electronically or on paper - on January 30th, the Internal Revenue Service will not be ready to accept returns claiming education credits until mid-February, the agency reported on Monday. Those affected by the delay are taxpayers filing form 8863, Education Credits, used to claim two higher education credits -- the American Opportunity Tax Credit and the Lifetime Learning Credit. Typically through...

Young people may never pay off their credit card debt. That’s the hypothesis that experts and reporters have made based on a recent study by an Ohio State economics professor. The study found that the younger generation of borrowers, those born between 1980 and 1984, has $5,500 more in credit card debt than their parents’ generation and $8,000 more in credit card debt than their grandparents’ generation. And worse, this particular generation of borrowers is taking...

In the past few years, prepaid cards, sometimes called prepaid debit cards, has risen in popularity. These cards are often advertised as a credit or checking account alternative for people with bad credit or no credit. However, these cards aren’t necessarily what they seem to be. Prepaid cards aren’t credit cards. While prepaid cards look almost just like credit cards and you swipe them the same way you’d swipe a credit card, the cards aren’t credit...