Banks are none too happy about how the passage of Dodd-Frank has been crimping their style. So they hired a Wall Street lobbyist, former Congressman Steve Bartlett, to lead the well-funded rearguard action by the ” Financial Services Roundtable” to neuter the laws. And darned if those cocktail parties aren’t working. [More]
government
Treasury Prints Less Money As Credit Card Use Climbs
By 7.8.11
Last year, the Treasury Department didn’t even bother printing any new $10 bills. [More]
Theft Of Pittsburgh's Iron Trash Cans Allegedly An Inside Job
By 5.31.11
After a police investigation, the mystery of where fifty of the city of Pittsburgh’s metal trash cans ran off to has been solved. The culprit wasn’t who Consumerist readers suspected. The cans were installed through a partnership with Lamar Advertising, and the man arrested for trying to recycle them just happens to work for Lamar. [More]
Feds Gave $220 Million In Bailout Bucks To Two Morgan Stanley Wives For Some Reason
By 5.3.11
Rolling Stone’s Matt Taibbi – the guy who famously referred to Goldman Sachs as “a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessly jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money” – has an interesting expose of how the wives of two Morgan Stanley hot shots, though they had no previous financial experience, set up their own investing initiative and got $220 million in bailout funds. [More]
These Sweet Population Maps Make White Flight Look Pretty
By 4.14.11
Here’s a series of really nice-looking maps Datapointed made to visualize the 2000-2010 US Census data released this year. The bluer an area, the more people it gained. The redder an area, the more it lost. In the series of maps across America you’ll see urban centers surrounded by a blossom of red, ringed by a halo of blue. It’s the classic “flight to the suburbs” playing out. But one interesting development is the core of cobalt at the heart of these cities where downtown addresses have become in-demand again. Even beleaguered Detroit, as seen in this graph, is showing glimmers of a comeback in its most central neighbs. [More]
Free Checking Lives On At Smaller And Online Banks
By 3.31.11
Now that free checking is dead at each of the four major retail banks, is there any where you can go to just have a simple checking account without paying a bunch of fees? Yup, look at your smaller local bank or credit union, or think about an online checking account, reports American Banker. Unlike the big banks that have such dominant market presence that they don’t need to compete on price, just who has more ATMs, the scrappier outfits are going to to use free checking as a competitive advantage and a way to get people in the door so they can try to upsell them to other banking products and services. [More]
Bill Introduced To Delay Swipe Fee Reform
By 3.18.11
Bills were introduced in both the House and Senate to delay “swipe fee reform” by at least a year and they call for a study of its potential effects. The new rules, scheduled to take effect July 21, would cap the fee banks can charge merchants for processing debit card fees at 12 cents per transaction. [More]
FAA Orders O2 Masks Removed From Airplane Bathrooms
By 3.11.11
Airlines are removing the emergency oxygen generators from airplane bathrooms by order of FAA directive, reports KPRC. The concern is that someone could go in there, rip the supply out, and rig it into an explosive device. [More]
Is The 30-Year Mortgage On Death Row?
By 3.7.11
Plans are in the works to dismantle Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and that could mean that what many Americans had assumed came fourth after “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness,” the 30-year mortgage, could be on the outs. [More]
10 Ways To Make The TSA Crotch Grabbers Profitable
By 3.7.11
Last week, the the Director of Homeland Security suggested to Congress that the TSA get a cut of airline baggage fees. The fees encourage travelers to carry on their bags, and this in turn leads to more bags that have to be inspected by hand at security checkpoints. Should taxpayers keep picking up the tab, or should airlines give the TSA a piece of the baggage fees? How about neither? What if instead the TSA looked for more creative ways to offset costs and even increase revenue? Here are 10 modest proposals: [More]
TSA Wants To Increase Airport Fees Because You're Not Checking Your Bags
By 3.4.11
To avoid bag check fees, travelers are routinely opting to carry on their bags, but the TSA says that the cost is just getting shifted to tax payers, to the tune of $260 million a year. That’s because the more bags that don’t get checked, the more bags the TSA has to inspect by hand at security checkpoints. Now the TSA is looking to get a cut of some of the checked baggage fees the airlines collect. [More]
Fed Might Rethink Capping Debit Card Swipe Fees
By 2.18.11
The Fed told Congress yesterday that it might rethink the plan to cap debit card swipe fees at 12 cents per swipe. One of the hopes is that merchants would be able to pass on the reduced costs to consumers in the form of lower prices. Lawmakers piled on in the hearing, saying that it would “batter banks still reeling from the 2008 financial crisis.” How banks can both be posting soaring profits and still be “battered” and reeling is an accounting trick way over my head. [More]
Economic Downturn Puts Police Horses Out To Pasture
By 2.16.11
Have you seen a police horse lately? The New York Times reports that mounted patrols are on the decline nationwide, victims to budget cuts despite their popularity with the public and ability to put a cuddly, slightly archaic face on policing. “They are a valuable element to policing. The problem is I just couldn’t afford it,” the police director of Newark, N.J. told the Times. [More]
Send Your Ideas To The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's New Website
By 2.3.11
ConsumerFinance.gov, the newly created Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s new website, is live and in full effect. So is their Twitter, Facebook, Flickr and YouTube. They want your suggestions and ideas so send ’em in! As they announced on their website their central role is “to make markets for consumer financial products and services work for America…The CFPB belongs to the people it serves. If you have suggestions, we want to hear them.” [More]
Elderly Woman Jailed For Throwing Condiments In Library Book Drop
By 2.3.11
There are a number of ways to let an establishment know that you are unhappy with the service that it provides. Do not, however, follow the example of a 75-year-old Idaho woman who deposited ketchup, mayonnaise, maple syrup, and other sticky condiments in her local library’s book drop, destroying books and evading capture. She recently plead guilty to the crime, and will serve one month in jail. [More]
Govt. Unveiling "Superstar" Energy Star Rating
By 2.3.11
The government is updating the Energy Star program and launching a new higher tier of certification called “Superstar,” Marketplace reports. The program currently certifies the top 25% most energy-efficient products in a given category, so the new star might be for the top 5%. Energy Star could certainly use an overhaul; last year the Government Accountability Office found it was able to submit and get certified 15 of 20 phony products, including a gasoline-powered alarm clock. [More]
USDA's New Guidelines Finally Listen To Tyler
By 2.1.11
“If you read the document it really is what I’ve been saying for over 2+ years. The government realized, “What’s the point in recommending all this ultra-healthy Whole Foods type of food if NOBODY listens to us? Let’s just simplify it and listen to Tyler and what he’s been saying for two years: eat less of ANY food you’d like to start off with (and learn about nutrition as you go) and just move around.” – A tongue-in-cheek email about the USDA’s new dietary recommendations from Tyler Weeks who documented his weight-loss journey to less than 200 lbs on 344pounds.com. [More]
Shocking New USDA Recommendations: "Just Eat Less"
By 1.31.11
For the first time ever, the USDA came out and said that in order to combat obesity, you have to eat less. So just eat a single down, okay? [More]
