Financial Consultant

New Credit Card Technology – Contactless Payments

It can sometimes be hard to know where to look with so many different credit card offers and developments currently on the market. However, one new piece of credit card technology that is definitely worth looking at is the new trend for making contactless payments.

This is an interesting credit card development that has the potential to revolutionise how we pay for goods just as much as Chip and PIN did when it first came into the mainstream. The idea behind contactless payments is exactly as its name suggests – paying for goods using your credit card, without the card ever needing to leave your hand.

Essentially, all you need to do is hold the special chip in your contactless payment card over the card reader. This should register and the payment should then go through. T Read more…

Tags: credit card offers

Thursday, January 26th, 2012 Financial Consultant No Comments

Some Good Economic News, but Will It Last?

In recent weeks, a series of encouraging reports on the United States economy, culminating in the December employment report, has provided tantalizing evidence that the recovery is strengthening. But it’s too early to celebrate.

Both 2010 and 2011 started with good economic news and forecasts of a strong growth rebound but proved to be disappointing. Despite recent signs of strength, most forecasts for 2012 predict that growth will fall short of 2.5 percent, the rate required to absorb anticipated increments to the labor force, and that’s assuming Congress extends the payroll tax cut and unemployment benefits through the year.

Right now, it looks as though the United States economy will continue to recover at a moderate pace in 2012. But there are considerable downside risks that could cause growth to falter.

The central problem remains inadequate aggregate demand – both at home and around the world. The s

Read more…

Wednesday, January 11th, 2012 Financial Consultant No Comments

Congressmen Press Extension of Sales Tax Deduction

A bipartisan group of lawmakers are seeking to make sure an extension of the deduction for state and local sales tax payments is included in the tax extenders package that is expected to come before Congress early next year.

The effort is being led by Rep. Kevin Brady, R-Texas, and Jim McDermott, D-Wash., who are two senior members of the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee. They were joined by 66 other members of Congress from both parties, who sent a letter Friday to Ways and Means Chairman Dave Camp, R-Mich., and ranking Democratic member Sander Levin, D-Mich.

The lawmakers who signed the letter mainly come from seven states without a state individual income tax: Florida, Nevada, South Dakota, Texas, Tennessee, Washington and Wyoming.

Read more…

Tags: Deduction, Sales Tax

Tuesday, January 10th, 2012 Financial Consultant No Comments

Chicken-Fried Generosity: ‘Tis the Seasoning of Giving

Recently, the Credit Karma content team went out to lunch for chicken and waffles in honor of Bethy’s birthday. My order happened to take 15 minutes longer than everyone else’s, so the chicken and waffle baroness behind the counter gave me an extra piece of chicken and an extra waffle. It was pretty much the best thing that ever happened to me.

We are entering the Season of Giving, which is, coincidentally, the Season of Blogging about Giving.

I haven’t been that excited about gifts for the last several years. In part, it’s because once you’re old enough, you’re socially obligated to reciprocate gifts. Therefore, if you get a great gift, you have to find a gift of equivalent price and awesomeness, lest you be considered cheap, ungrateful or thoughtless. For me now, gifts represent an obligation. There’s not

Read more…

Wednesday, December 28th, 2011 Financial Consultant No Comments

The Art of Learning By Josh Waitzkin

Although this is a book by a chess expert, don’t let that fool you. There is some hard hitting advice here that can help you in many different areas of your life. If you are trying to learn more about managing your money and becoming a success, this book is one that definitely deserves a spot on your shelf. It covers, in a nutshell, how we learn and what techniques you can use to start learning more effectively. These same techniques can be carried over to any subject in your life and by following the methods prescribed in this book, you can easily start to achieve anything you put your mind to.

The name of Josh Waitzkin may be familiar to you. His father wrote the book, Searching For Bobby Fisher, and Josh is the chess genius from that book and the resulting movie. As a child, he was able to go up against the best minds in the game, and this book is the story of how he managed to do that. E

Read more…

Sunday, December 18th, 2011 Financial Consultant No Comments