It's Your Money Archive

By Jerry Stewart In a recent speech to Congress, our leading U.S. economist, Alan Greenspan, said that our present U.S. economy is a "conundrum". You say, "What!" A conundrum. In simple words, a conundrum is a puzzle or a riddle with seemingly no solution – or at least one hard to figure out. And I agree. Many times its very hard to figure out just what’s going on in our economy.

By Jerry Stewart In my report last week I raised the question, "Are credit cards our friend or our foe?" With their ever climbing interest rates and their absolutely ridiculous late charges and special service charges, I believe it’s quite clear – credit cards are not our friends. And to reinforce my own thinking on this matter of credit cards, interestingly enough, two separate examples came up this week.

By Jerry Stewart Isn’t it both strange and bizarre how names or ideas get started when they really don’t make sense. For example, the answering machine. Why do we call it that? It doesn’t give us any answers. And just where did the original idea ever come to be that when you die, you have to pay tax. Think about it. If you earn money, it’s a taxable event. If you sell property and make any profit, it’s a taxable event. And, if you’re hit be a Mack truck, it’s a taxable event.

By Jerry Stewart Believe it or not, it’s already May, and Memorial Day, the official start of summer vacation is just a few weeks away. So, if you’re busy planning your summer vacation I thought I’d give you a heads up regarding saving money on your trip.

By Jerry Stewart I don’t know where the saying came from, "There’s something rotten in Denmark," But I do know this, "There’s something rotten right here in America." And it has to do with our gas prices. Today I bought a gallon of gasoline for over $2.50 a gallon, the highest in our state, and I live only a few miles from an oil refinery.

By Jerry Stewart ust last week Congress passed new legislation regarding the current state of bankruptcies here in America. During those congressional debates it was mentioned that last year alone, over 1.5 million Americans declared bankruptcy. That figure is staggering, and the purpose of this new legislation is to make it harder for a person to declare bankruptcy and just walk away from 10’s of 1,000’s of unpaid dollars in debt.