The Benefits of Financial Reform
Here's a scientific concept. It's an oldy, but a goody. Ready? For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. It applies to health care reform as well.
Once again, responsible people are penalized. Spread the wealth baby. lol.
Say goodbye to traditional free checking
As banks feel squeeze from new regulations, say goodbye to the old free checking
FILE - In this Jan. 25, 2009 file photo, a Bank of America branch office is shown in New York. Say goodbye to free checking _ at least at Bank of America, which will start charging for the most basic services, like $8.75 just to talk to a teller. (AP Photo/Mark Lennihan, file)
Pallavi Gogoi, AP Business Writer, On Tuesday October 19, 2010, 9:27 pm EDT
NEW YORK (AP) -- Free checking as we know it is ending.
The days when you could walk into a bank branch and open an account with no charges and no strings attached appear to be over. Now you have to jump through some hoops -- keep a high balance, use direct deposit or swipe your debit card several times a month.
One new account at Bank of America charges $8.95 per month if you want to bank with a teller or get a paper statement.
Almost all of the largest U.S. banks are either already making free checking much more difficult to get or expected to do so soon, with fees on even basic banking services.
It's happening because a raft of new laws enacted in the past year, including the financial overhaul package, have led to an acute shrinking of revenue for the banks. So they are scraping together money however they can.
Bank of America, which does business with half the households in America, announced a dramatic shift Tuesday in how it does business with customers. One key change: Free checking, a mainstay of American banking in recent years, will be nearly unheard of.
"I've seen more regulation in last 30 months than in last 30 years," said Robert Hammer, CEO of RK Hammer, a bank advisory firm. "The bottom line for banks is shifting enormously, swiftly and deeply, and they're not going to sit by twiddling their thumbs. They're going to change."
In the last year, lawmakers in Washington have passed a range of new laws aimed at protecting bank customers from harsh fees, like the $35 charged to some Bank of America customers who overdrafted their account by buying something small like a Starbucks latte.
These and other fees were extremely lucrative. According to financial services firm Sandler O'Neill, they made up 12 percent of Bank of America's revenue. On Tuesday, the bank took a $10.4 billion charge to its third-quarter earnings because the new regulations limit fees the bank can collect when retailers accept debit cards.
Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan acknowledged in a conference call that overdraft fees were generating a lot of income. But the bank was also losing customers who were often taken aback by the high hidden fees.
Checking accounts were being closed at an annual rate of 18 percent, he said, and complaints were at an all-time high.
So Moynihan ended overdraft charges on small debit card transactions. He says the rate of account closings have since dropped 27 percent.
To make up for lost fees, he also started thinking of new products. In August, the bank introduced a new "eBanking" account, where customers were offered a free checking account if they banked online. The catch: If they opt for paper statements, or want access to tellers for basic transactions, they would be charged a monthly fee of $8.95.
"Customers never had free checking accounts," Bank of America spokeswoman Anne Pace said. "They always paid for it in other ways, sometimes with penalty fees."
This summer, Bank of America also started offering "emergency cash" for a $35 fee to customers who went to the ATM for withdrawals that would exceed their bank balance. Moynihan said 50 percent of these customers opted to go ahead with the fee.
"We are now in an era where consumers will be buying products from banks, even if it's a checking account," said Brian Riley, senior research director for bank card practice at consultant TowerGroup. He noted that several banks have started charging $7.50 for paper statements.
"Paper and print costs around $2.25, add postage to that, and if banks are losing income from other avenues, someone has to pay for it," said Riley.
Economic research firm Moebs Services says free checking usage has been steadily rising in recent years before falling this year. Last year 81.5 percent of U.S. banking customers had free checking, but that fell to 72.5 percent this year.
Large banks are also under additional pressure because of curbs from new laws on high-risk trades with complex derivatives. Their trading desks have been large revenue and profit generators for banks in recent years.
Michael Moebs, the founder of Moebs Services, said it is now up to the smaller Main Street banks to see an opening and grab customers from the big banks.
"Free checking could become a mainstay of community banks and credit unions in the future," Moebs said.
Vote Conservative And This May Be What You'll Get.
Tea Party Candidate Thinks People Should Fend for Themselves Against Salmonella Outbreaks
This post first appeared on Washington Monthly.
Over the summer, there was a major egg recall, following at least 1,300 salmonella-related illnesses spanning 22 states over the summer. The Washington Post reported in August that the outbreak highlights the need to fix “the holes in the country’s food safety net.”
That truth was hard to deny, and even harder to ignore. As we learned more about the story, we saw that the salmonella problems stemmed from an uninspected producer in Iowa, with a record of health, safety, labor, and other violations that go back 20 years. The need for better regulations and enforcement has been obvious for decades, but conservative, anti-regulatory lawmakers have consistently put industry profits above public safety.
With this in mind, Zaid Jilani flags a story that’s so astounding, it’s almost hard to believe.
Although there are a diverse set of political beliefs in the United States, there are currently two major political philosophies clashing for control of the American body politic. One, the progressive view, believes in a society where a democratically elected government plays an active role in helping all people achieve the American Dream, no matter who they are. The other, the conservative vision, believes in the on-your-own-society that favors the wealthy, big corporations, and other privileged sectors of society.
GOP House candidate Jesse Kelly, who is running in Arizona’s 8th congressional district, championed this second vision a week ago at a campaign rally hosted by the Pima County Tea Party Patriots. During a question-and-answer period, a voter asked Kelly about the recent salmonella outbreak, which led to recall of more than half a billion eggs.
The voter asked if Kelly, if elected, would he help pass a law that would allow the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and other government agencies to shut down companies that have too many safety violations, such as the companies that allowed millions of eggs that sickened people to be sold to the public. Kelly responded that he doesn’t “believe what we’re lacking right now is more regulations on companies,” complaining that “you could probably spit on the grass and get arrested by the federal government by now.” When the voter followed up by asking, “Who’s protecting us?” Kelly responded, “It’s our job to protect ourselves.” The exasperated voter asked once more, “Am I supposed to go to a chicken farmer and say I’d like you to close down because all of your birds are half dead?” Kelly once more answered, “There’s a new thing that comes along every day. But I know this: Every part of our economy that is regulated by the government doesn’t have fewer disasters, it has more.”
If you’re skeptical a congressional candidate could really be this crazy, all of this was captured on video.
It really never occurred to me that right-wing Republicans would start running on a pro-salmonella platform, but Jesse Kelly and his Tea Party allies have a surprisingly twisted worldview. Kelly seriously seems to believe that laws to enforce food safety are unnecessary, and may ultimately make matters worse. Just let the free market work its magic, and everything will be fine.
It’s hard to overstate how radical this is. A lack of regulation is literally putting Americans who eat food in the hospital with life-threatening illnesses, but instead of wanting to improve safeguards, zealots like Kelly insist the FDA should stand aside and let us fend for ourselves. Usually, when an outbreak occurs, reasonable people notice the need for public safety and reject the anti-government crusade. This congressional candidate — who stands a fairly strong chance of winning — is doubling down. Jesse Kelly actually supports the notion of Americans playing Russian Roulette every time they go to the grocery store.
A few years ago, Rick Perlstein even coined a phrase to capture this ideology: “E. Coli Conservatism.”
I can only assume the vast majority of the country has no idea what they’re about the elect.
Conservative, Liberal or "other"
If you don't know, have a look at this.
http://www.studentnewsdaily.com/othe...beral-beliefs/
Where do you fit? Take the quiz.
http://typology.people-press.org/typology/
I ended up with the typology of an "enterpriser"
