Its only taken a couple of years but it looks like we are finally going to take a few small measures to protect consumers over the benefit of large financial institutions. I for one, doubt that we’ll ever be able to make any laws with teeth until and unless we change the ability of special interest groups and lobbyists from influencing our law makers via cash. That said, let’s take a look at the highlights of the bill.
Consumer Help
1. Your free credit report comes with an actual score this time!
2. Debit card swipe fees will be limited to save you some cash.
3. A consumer agency inside the Federal Reserve is being created to stop unfair practices in consumer loans.
4. Protection from lenders and yourself – no more unverified income loans.
5. The unemployed will get some mortgage help.
6. Tougher rules on those who sell Fixed-equity annuities
Breaking the Banks
1. New 10-member council to keep an eye out for major problems in the system.
2. The ability to break up big banks that threaten the system.
3. Greater checks on the Fed
4. “Skin in the Game” – if a bank sell a mortgage back security, you have to keep some of them to ensure you aren’t selling junk.
5. The banks have to pay for the bill! 19 Billion
Other Important Measures
1. Derivative regulation and forcing open derivative trading
2. Spinning off Swaps
3. Independent credit ratings – separate the ratings agencies and the firms needing ratings.
A great article from Cleveland NPR discusses how grads are changing their approach and goals to respond to a tough job market.
“After graduating from Case Western Reserve University in May, 22-year-old Duwain Pinder moved back home to Reynoldsburg, Ohio, a suburb of Columbus.
His mom, Dora, quickly put him to work, dealing with one of the effects the recession has had on their family: The local school district is in financial trouble, and last year’s failed school levy meant the end of bus service for its high school students.
So Pinder has been the family chauffeur — shuttling his sister to and from school each day. He’s also been doing errands around the house and catching up with friends and family.”
This question just came up at lunch with my friend Mike. Buddy Guy, the musician, came on Sirius radio channel 74. And Mike said this is Eric Clapton’s favorite guitarist. I thought – shouldn’t Eric Clapton be Eric Clapton’s favorite guitarist?
Are you your favorite at what you do? I’m probably not my favorite web publisher, but I like what we write about, or else we wouldn’t write about.
I think the point is two-fold. First, we should always strive to be better at what we do. To achieve a higher level of excellence in whatever interests you. Second, that there will always be someone, no matter what level of success you achieve, that inspires you to be better.
Posted on : 12-05-2010 | By : Ben Levy | In : In The News
BNet writes about 7 Proven Ways to Steal Winning Ideas which is a great way to get started in a line of business where the market has already been established.
I don’t know about you, but dropping call after call on AT&T is starting to wear on me. Perhaps it’s time to join the masses and join the wave of android adopters instead of the iPhone.
I guess when the primary revenue driver is a dying medium going radical is a good idea: Playboy goes 3-D.
Is it really possible for a single person to crush so many? Well that’s the latest word on the stock market free fall from last week.
Of course my mother and father were in favor of me pursuing an MBA. It can provide insurance. It gives you another qualification that might help you stand out from the crowd. You will learn many, many things about business. I never heard the question answered in quite the way it was answered today at The Business Insider by Steve Blank. His approach was about determining where you think you want to work in your life: in a start-up environment or in established businesses?
My MBA helped me get the first job in the industry where I have since spent my career – all within boot strapped start-ups or those that were funded by angel investors. Nonetheless, I appreciate his approach. A quote from the article below.
Why Yes I Am an Entrepreneur I could see I was having an effect when he blurted out, “You know my happiest times in these startups were when we were a small team figuring out the business model. The chaos and camaraderie gave me an adrenalin rush and incredible satisfaction. While I’m really good at managing the process, this phase of the company feels like a job. I’ve been bouncing some ideas about a company with some fellow employees who feel the same way. Maybe I do want to do startups as a career.”
Posted on : 03-05-2010 | By : Ben Levy | In : In The News
The scale of this disaster cannot be overstated. It will be as far reaching as anything we’ve encountered in this country outside of a war, in my opinion. President Obama has said it’s “a massive and potentially unprecedented environmental disaster.” Think about it for a few minutes and you begin to realize that this isn’t just BP losing money, or gas prices rising, or the loss of life on the rig, or polluting the environment. Though each of those things is important to recognize.
Do you like shrimp? Be prepared to pay a lot more for it. Roughly half of the nation’s shrimp is harvested in the Gulf. Fishermen across the states that border the Gulf are losing their livelihood for years. Clean up from disasters this large take years, and fish will be covered in oil which means reproduction problems in addition to widespread death of animals. I live in Baltimore, Maryland. Maryland Blue Crabs have been a staple; a local custom for years. People come from all over and eat our crabs. The dirty secret is that for years we’ve been importing the majority of our crabs from fishermen in Louisiana. Crab season begins in May. And just at the onset of the season, a ban is now in effect in the Gulf – no fishing allowed. That means that restaurants in Baltimore could be affected by the Gulf oil spill.
I’ve read reports on the Business Insider that the current rate of gushing oil is like losing an Exxon Valdez every three days. Let that sink in for a minute. We are still cleaning up after that mess.
Think about tourism in the Gulf. Swimming in the Gulf might be prohibited.
Some expect the oil to get into the gulf stream and head up the east coast.
Below is a map of where the spill is today and where its expected to get to by the end of today.
Posted on : 23-04-2010 | By : Ben Levy | In : Free Stuff
Earlier this week I was at my desk trying to get things done. My computer kept freezing. I did the restart thing – no help. I’m pretty careful about what I download to my PC but still it was slow. This computer is about 4 years old now. So not terribly old, but probably due for a tune up. I’ve also added RAM about a year ago.
So I’m frustrated and decide to look up “PC Speed Test”. Which turned up some free software that measures computer performance. It said I had some issues in the registry and a few other places. For $29.95 this software was able to fix my problems. Ever the cheapo that I am I looked at download.com for “PC Registry Clean Up”. I trust download.com because its owned by CNET.com – the Consumer Reports for digital products. The offered up a host of “sponsored solutions” which I’m not interested in because sponsored usually equals fee. I found Advanced System Care. Downloaded it. Ran the scan and the repair. It’s been smooth sailing ever since.
Posted on : 30-03-2010 | By : Ben Levy | In : In The News
Fast Company was asked to test drive the new Chevrolet Volt on a rainy New York City afternoon. Watch the video and try to hear the car—it’s virtually silent.
Millions of people who are living off of unemployment benefits are in for a rude awakening.
While the Democrats were busy celebrating their healthcare victory, apparently too busy to even notice anything else that was going on, “a Republican slipped into the chamber to move a bill that would extend soon-to-expire enhanced unemployment benefits—paid for with $10 billion in unused funds from the stimulus bill,” reports the Huffington Post.
The Democrats want to extend unemployment using money not committed to the stimulus.
The Republicans want to extend benefits with stimulus money so we don’t have to spend any more money on top of the billions we’re already spending.
The Democrats claim that the Republicans are retaliating for passing health care. The Republicans claim that the Democrats are simply spending too much money. The unemployed are going to lose their benefits.
And Congress has left the building.
Congress has adjourned for their two-week “spring break” without coming to an agreement on the unemployment benefits extension. Even though they have made assurances that any bill, once passed, will take effect retroactively, it’s still going to hurt millions of people that are missing those checks and disrupt every single state unemployment agency. On “April 5 laid-off workers will lose their eligibility for extra ‘tiers’ of Emergency Unemployment Compensation, which provides up to 53 weeks of federally-funded unemployment checks on top of state-funded benefits. Newly unemployed workers will also lose their eligibility for subsidized COBRA health insurance,” states the Huffington Post.
Meanwhile, on Wall Street, JP Morgan Chase released a report stating that these unemployment extensions are actually contributing to the unemployment rate—that because people have benefits they aren’t looking for jobs. Interesting theory, yet if you take the total number of jobs lost and the number of new jobs created, those numbers won’t quite match up. Add in all of the young adults graduating and entering the workforce with older Americans are staying in their jobs instead of retiring… and you might find that there simply aren’t enough jobs for all of the people.
Also, JP Morgan Chase people have jobs. They work for JP Morgan Chase.
As Judy Conti, lobbyist for the National Employment Law Project, stated in the Huffington Post, “It’s absolute hooey.”
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