During periods of unemployment, colleges generally see a surge of people who are either going back to school in order to retool for a different career, or who are attempting to wisely spend their time in gaining more education in order to better themselves.  What has changed over the years, however, is the nature of the education that is being afforded these return students.  We are required by the rise of on-line degree mills disguised as universities to ask questions about higher education—no longer are all bachelor’s degrees equal, and even a master’s degree is meaningless if it isn’t earned through graduate level work.

Perhaps we could chalk degrees from these institutions up to a kind of educational con game making students think that the MBA they’ve earned in less than a year will earn them entrance into a high paying profession.  In reality, however, the damage done by these degree mills amounts to more than just a personal tragedy for the student who believes they’ve received an education, it is a national problem.  Because much of the motivation to return to school during periods of economic downturn is related to federal grants, these return students are going back to school on the taxpayer dime.  While we may endorse paying for the retraining of someone’s obsolete or substandard skills in order to help them better fit the nation’s workforce, if, instead, we are paying for these students to receive substandard education or training for careers in an already flooded market, then we, as a nation, are quite simply throwing our money away.

The Federal Housing Administration will be the next financial disaster to fall on the shoulders of American taxpayers.  Created in 1934 to help low income and first time buyers get housing loans, the agency was designed to guarantee a relatively small percentage of mortgages, for instance, two percent in 2005.  Since its inception, FHA’s budget and operational infrastructure have followed this low-ratio model, and have been designed to absorb losses without having to ask for money or help from the Federal Government.  However, the GAO is now projecting taxpayer funded subsidies for the FHA of half a billion dollars over the next three years, if no changes are made to the agency’s program.

With the housing and credit markets in dire straights, private lenders are asking for better credit scores and higher down payments.  This means fewer people are able to qualify for conventional loans.  According to the website for Housing and Urban Development (the parent organization for the FHA), the FHA’s restrictions on the kinds of loans it will guarantee are more lenient relative to conventional loans, and as such, the FHA is being called into service more and more frequently in this particular economic climate.  Up by over 1200 percent since 2005, the FHA is now expected to back one quarter of all new U.S. mortgages.

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has responded to the lack of transparency in product endorsements on Internet forums and blogs by amending the guidelines it requires advertisers to follow.  Under new rules which will go into effect on December 1st of this year, bloggers will have to disclose any material relationship they have with their advertisers when offering reviews. In other words, if they receive money or products for free when they write reviews, they will have to disclose that information to their readers, or face a fine of up to $11,000.

These new guidelines promote transparency between advertisers and endorsers, which will make the Internet a more trustworthy source of relevant and neutral information.  Given the scope of the online world, it is necessary to curb the activities of scammers and hucksters and to promote a public forum where a reader can trust the material they see. The FTC’s new guidelines are a step in that direction.

My clutter is costing me money. I figured this out a few days ago when, struck by the mad desire to clean my apartment, I found not one, not two, but three unopened packages of swim diapers. At about $8 apiece, that’s $24 wasted dollars.

Enough was enough. So far I’ve decluttered my office, the nursery, and half of my bedroom, and as a result I’ve taken 11 tall kitchen garbage bags worth of stuff to my local Goodwill. (Yes, I could have had a garage sale, but I wanted this stuff out of my place pronto.)

In light of the imminent prospect of network neutrality rules being voted on by the FCC, AT&T has announced that it will allow Internet calling services to be placed and received over its wireless network.  The FCC’s proposed rules will likely affect the validity of exclusive relationships, like the one that exists between AT&T and Apple’s iPhone, and will ensure that broadband providers don’t abuse their power over Internet access in order to favor their own services or harm competitors.

The result of allowing products like Google Voice and Skype over wireless phone networks should be similar to the effect that Voice Over IP (VOIP) has had on land-line phone services.  As we all know, once people began to use their computers to make phone calls at significantly reduced rates or even for free, traditional phone companies were forced to significantly reduce the rates they charged for phone calls.  Then, they covered their lost revenue by developing new products and  introducing new services.

Certain economic factors, like unemployment and credit card default rates are intertwined.  So it’s absolutely natural that in an economic climate where experts are predicting a ten plus percent unemployment rate before the end of the year, credit card companies will have to change the way they do business in order to remain safe and profitable.  As we all know, most issuers have been doing this by raising interest rates on both new and existing customers.

Wells Fargo has recently joined its peers in announcing that it too will raise the rates on the credit cards it offers.  According to Kevin Rhein, group head of card services at Wells Fargo, “this is something we’ve been contemplating for quite a period of time… We had just reached the point that we don’t think we can offer credit cards at the current pricing and keep credit flowing.”  Rhein’s announcement is interesting because it seems to suggest that Wells Fargo waited as long as it could before instituting these new rates.  He states that the impetus for this change was the bank’s recognition that the flow of credit was actually in danger, which is another way of saying that the profitability of Wells Fargo’s credit card department was at risk.  This, and the fact that the rate hikes are not scheduled to go into effect until November 30, one day before Congress’ new suggested enactment date for the CARD Act, suggests that Wells Fargo really has waited until the last minute before raising rates.

Last year around holiday-time, we heard a lot about layaway: “It’s coming back!” “Helloooo, 1980s, your purchase-plan just called.” In particular, Kmart earned buzz with its layaway program last year, and now offers layaway items on Sears’ purchases as well.

But is layaway really a big deal?

Recently, Bank of America announced that it would stop raising interest rates on the credit cards of its existing customer base.  This news comes ahead of the February 22nd deadline mandated in the Credit CARD Act, and is certainly a step in the right direction.  However, there is an issue that hasn’t been raised that would put this announcement into better perspective.  How much of Bank of America’s existing credit card portfolio does this news really affect?

Even after the bank has already re-priced millions of credit card customers into higher interest rates, the national media seems to be treating BofA’s announcement as a sign that the North Carolina-based bank is falling in line with the spirit of consumer rights—that it has ended the practice of raising rates in the midst of this credit crunch.  Unfortunately, it is not at all clear what this announcement actually implies given that the media has toed the company line, and has not asked the necessary questions to put this announcement into perspective.

Fair business practices and consumer rights in the credit card industry are being regulated by six different entities depending on the classification of the card issuer.  This fragmented system exists despite the fact that the rules regarding business practices and consumer rights laws are the same for all credit card issuers.

Imagine you discover a burglar in your house and call the police.  They arrive to make an arrest, but when they show up, they do nothing.  They tell you you’ve called the wrong police.  The police officers that arrived at your home only deal with criminals whose last name start with Q through S and this guy’s last name starts with a B.  Moreover, the officers who are in your home tell you they won’t call the officers who deal with bad guys with last names beginning in B because they’re in competition with each other.  Too bad too, because the guys who showed up are really good at prosecuting burglars but the guys you should have called are a little behind the times in that capacity.  And of course, because of the competition, the two different police departments don’t share information.

The latest version of the health care legislation has weakened the requirement that all Americans must have health insurance. Coupled with the inability under the proposed law for health insurance companies to deny coverage to people for poor health, this concession would mean that Americans could purchase insurance at any time and therefore would have little or no motivation to get health insurance while still healthy.

What Washington has failed to account for is that the very idea of insurance is based on the idea of spreading the costs between people who file a claim and those who do not. The cost of premiums is kept down precisely because some people will not die within the span of a term life insurance policy, or will not have a car accident, in the case of an auto insurance policy.

A while back we wrote a piece describing the basic problems with Bullish opinions currently circulating about the end of the recession.  In that article, we showed the various continued symptoms of our nation’s economic problems and the signs that we are still in a very real recession, even if abstract economic terminology currently suggests otherwise.  Recently, I came across the following graph in an article by Henry Blodget, and I think that it shows further evidence that the stock market is already overvalued and the bulls are wrong about their predictions.

Last week, banking powerhouse JP Morgan Chase launched a charge card for small businesses. This is the first charge card to be offered by any major Visa/MasterCard issuer, as American Express locked up that marketplace a long time ago.

The new charge card is called Ink Bold, and, as with any charge card, monthly balances must be paid in full each billing period. Ink Bold most closely resembles the Gold Card from American Express OPEN. Let’s compare some typical features:

As we all know, the competitiveness of U.S. companies is measured by their ability to innovate and also by their operating costs.  Operating costs can come in the forms of labor and overhead, but they are also the result of less tangible forces like those produced by a nation’s laws, regulatory bureaucracies and taxes.  As a nation, we need to recognize that we are unlikely to meet competitive equality with China or India as far as labor costs are concerned.  Instead, we should focus our attention on reducing the other elements that contribute to the cost of doing business in the United States.  A large part of that can be traced to complying with the various regulatory bodies.

The insurance industry, which is regulated at the state level rather than the federal level, provides a prime example of how over-regulation can significantly increase the operating costs of a business.  If insurance were regulated at the federal level, the number of regulatory bodies would be reduced from 50 to 1.  This would allow insurance providers to both lower their cost structure and more easily compete on a national level.  Moreover, a single regulatory body for the U.S. insurance industry would monitor the industry more efficiently than would 50 such bodies working independently of one another.  The reduced bureaucracy, the increased efficiency in regulation and the resultant increase in market competition would pass savings on to American consumers.

If you or someone you buy for is planning to dress in costume for Halloween, you can save big money by taking care of those needs right now instead of a couple of days prior to October 31st.

For the younger set, Toys “R” Us/Babies “R” Us lets you save $10 on purchases of $30 or more if you’re a new “Bill Me Later” customer, subject to credit approval.

Recently, we’ve printed a number of articles concerning the need for Congress to change the way they do business and the overall difficulty of putting such changes into effect.  The current laws concerning politicians and the disclosure of funds raised by lobbyists is a perfect example of just what happens when Congress decides to police its own excesses.

First, some explanation.  Lobbyists want the ear of politicians so that they can convince them to vote their way on some issue.  How do they convince politicians that their side is in the right?  Strong rhetoric?  Sound argument?  No.  They use money and campaign contributions.  They, essentially, attempt to buy votes.