The job of reforming Wall Street is far from finished. The most profitable investments for the big banks continue to be Washington lobbyists chipping away at reform and litigators challenging every major rule in court.
It's a sign of our shadowy times that the latest regulatory "reform" bill hasn't been laughed out of Washington. Same goes for the latest bankers' complaint, this time about being asked to cover their own bets. And if you think it's bad now, wait and see what happens if Romney takes over.
Think "global catastrophe."
While bank-friendly politicians offer insipid legislation, the world economy is still at risk. And it could get worse.
A mid-September sunny day in New York City draws those with the day off to go to the parks and laze along the avenues, walking by the workers on call, cleaning up after tourists, holding together a city that always seems held together by the sweat of its massive workforce and a dose of city pride. Beneath the massive Washington Arch, a woman in a wheelchair, beside other men and women in wheelchairs and other prosthetic devices, holds a sign that says, “Occupy Wheelchairs.” The Occupy Wall Street Disability Caucus is holding an assembly to proclaim its presence at Occupy, Year 2.
As we celebrate Occupy Wall Street’s first birthday, the movement's pivoted from financial regulation to focus on crushing consumer debt. While reforming debt is crucial (particularly student debt), finance remains an imminent threat to the American economy. We shouldn't forget it.
Four years ago today, Lehman Brothers collapsed as Hank Paulson and his colleagues made the fateful decision that free market principles demanded that at least one bank crippled by the deteriorating financial system had to be sacrificed at the altar of moral hazard. These “deciders” had no idea of the firestorm they were igniting. They did not foresee that the financial system that had evolved during 30 years of deregulation (based on specious economic theory and ideology) was so interconnected that it would collapse like a house of cards. Within a few weeks, the U.S.
A new fact sheet from Demos, College on a Credit Card, investigates the relationship between educational expenses and credit card debt, and shows that putting college on credit can be a very bad deal.
Demos conducted a nationwide survey of low- and middle-income households in early 2012. The findings in this brief summarize the relationship between college costs and credit card debt, and its impact on students and their parents.
A new report from the New York Fed suggests that even while the rest of household debt improved since March, driven by decreasing credit card and housing debt, student loans have worsened.
Many Florida families have been paying up to 25 percent of median income for public in-state college costs — out of reach for some middle-class parents who have taken recent pay cuts or lost jobs, according to a new study.
It seems there is little real relief on the horizon.
“If you’re coming out of college with an average number of $20,000 to $25,000 in debt and there’s no job out there, you’ve got a real problem,” said John Quinterno, a researcher who has studied the consequences of student debt.
The days between the Fourth of July and Bastille Day on the 14th are known for fireworks on both sides of the Atlantic. This year, more rockets and firecrackers than usual were going off, but they were inside hearing rooms in the British Parliament and the U.S. Congress. Barclays bank announced that it had been fined more than $450 million by regulators from both countries, and its CEO, Robert E. Diamond Jr., and COO, Jerry del Missier, both resigned. The fines were part of a settlement that granted Barclays immunity from potentially worse punishment for its manipulation of interest rates.
Every day brings more reminders of the terrible unfairness that besets our country, the tragic reversal of fortune experienced by millions who once had good lives and steady jobs, now gone.
An article in the current issue of Rolling Stone chronicles “The Fallen: The Sharp, Sudden Decline of America’s Middle Class” and describes a handful of middle-class men and women made homeless, forced to live out of their cars in church parking lots in Southern California.
Since 2008, working families have done everything they can to get by – changing spending habits, paying down debt, taking on 2nd (or 3rd jobs), digging into savings and retirement funds, and even cutting back on medical care – but they’re still falling behind.
The movement has drawn some support from financial circles. Wallace C. Turbeville, a former Goldman Sachs banker who now is a senior fellow at Demos, a public policy research organization in New York,submitted testimony last month for the Senate Banking Committee in favor of more banking regulation.
In its May 2012 Plastic Safety Net survey, research and advocacy company Demos surveyed 997 low- and middle-income American households that carried credit card debt for three months or more — and looked at how the recession and the Credit CARD Act of 2009 have affected American households.
It’s easy to get in over your head when it comes to credit-card debt, and retirees are no exception.
According to New York-based research group Demos, those 65 and older from low- and middle-income households carried average credit card debt of $9,283 in 2012, the highest debt load of any age group in the survey.
But here's the fact that convinced me older Americans need more help managing their debt than new college grads: The age range of low- and middle-income Americans with the highest credit-card debt today is 65 and older — they owe an average of $9,283. By comparison, 18- to 24-year olds average just $2,982 in credit card debt; those aged 25 to 34 are about $5,156 in the red.
Millions of Americans with damaged credit records are at risk of being unfairly denied job opportunities by companies that use credit histories to screen applicants. Faced with growing public complaints, seven states have rightly limited the use of credit histories by potential employers. Federal, state and local lawmakers who are considering similar legislation are on the right track.