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Tech billionaires are pouring millions into California politics
Tech billionaires are directing millions of dollars into California’s state and local elections, with ballot measures, gubernatorial campaigns, and city races increasingly becoming high-stakes contests between concentrated wealth and organized labor, according to recent reporting and campaign-finance filings. The fight centers on a proposed one-time 5% wealth tax on billionaires, but the money flows far...
Read MoreMarkets and Business
Markets and Macro
Tech billionaires are pouring millions into California politics
Tech billionaires are directing millions of dollars into California’s state and local elections, with ballot measures, gubernatorial campaigns, and city races increasingly becoming high-stakes contests between concentrated wealth and organized labor, according to recent reporting and campaign-finance filings. The fight centers on a proposed one-time 5% wealth tax on billionaires, but the money flows far...
Markets and Macro
Experts warned tariffs would jump 13% so why is inflation just 2.4%?
The January 2026 Consumer Price Index landed at 2.4% year-over-year, a number that has prompted fresh questions about how quickly tariffs show up in consumer prices. Modeling from early 2025 had projected that a sweeping reciprocal tariff policy could push the U.S. effective tariff rate up by 13 percentage points, the steepest jump since 1937,...
Markets and Macro
3 high-yield dividend ETFs set to crush the market in 2026
Three high-yield dividend ETFs built on quality U.S. payers and backed by transparent regulatory filings are drawing fresh attention from income-focused investors heading into 2026. With many active managers struggling to consistently outperform their benchmarks over time, the case for low-cost, dividend-focused index funds remains compelling. I see the iShares Core High Dividend ETF (HDV),...
Markets and Macro
Jim Cramer says GM’s CEO absolutely nailed this crucial call
Jim Cramer, the outspoken CNBC host, recently praised General Motors CEO Mary Barra for what he called an absolutely nailed call on the automaker’s direction. The praise arrived alongside GM’s release of its 2025 financial results and 2026 forward guidance, a package that paired strong operating performance with aggressive shareholder returns. What makes the moment...
Corporate Wins/Losses
‘Wuthering Heights’ hauls in $34.8M, Emerald Fennell’s best opening yet
Emerald Fennell’s adaptation of “Wuthering Heights” stormed into theaters over Presidents Day weekend, collecting $34.8 million across its three-day North American opening and claiming the No. 1 spot at the box office. The result marks Fennell’s strongest debut as a director, outpacing her previous work and signaling that literary adaptations driven by a singular creative...
Corporate Wins/Losses
Inside Disney’s ruthless choice between lawsuits and $1B AI deals
The Walt Disney Company is simultaneously suing one AI company for generating its characters without permission and signing a deal with another AI company to do exactly that, on Disney’s terms. This split strategy reveals a calculated approach to artificial intelligence that treats litigation and licensing as two sides of the same coin. The tension...
Banking and Rules
Banking and Rules
9 powerful tricks to protect your debit card in public places
Debit card fraud pulled from unsuspecting consumers at ATMs, gas pumps, and checkout terminals continues to grow, with reported losses…
Fees and Policy Changes
Diners furious as $100+ restaurant bill explodes with hidden 20% fee
A growing number of diners are discovering that the price listed on a restaurant menu is not the price they…
Loans
Banning immigrants from SBA loans is killing the American dream
Starting March 1, 2026, the Small Business Administration will require all loan applicants to be U.S. citizens, effectively shutting out…
retirement and benefits
Social Security
Social Security in 2026: 5 basic bills your check won’t cover
Social Security checks got a little bigger in January 2026, but for millions of retirees the raise is already spoken for. The 2.8% cost-of-living adjustment adds roughly $56 a month to the average retirement benefit, a gain that sounds helpful until you stack it against the bills that keep climbing faster. I want to walk...
Retirement Planning
Average retiree owes IRS $4,300 a year: 7 ways to cut that tax hit
Households headed by someone 65 or older spend an average of $4,343 a year on federal income taxes, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ 2023 Consumer Expenditure Survey. That figure reflects the combined tax burden from pensions, Social Security, required minimum distributions, and investment income, and it represents real cash that could otherwise cover...
Social Security
Social Security after 2033: what your future benefits may really look like
The Social Security system is not going bankrupt, but the checks retirees receive could shrink meaningfully within the next decade. The 2025 Trustees Report projects that the Old-Age and Survivors Insurance trust fund will run dry in 2033, and after that point, incoming payroll taxes would cover only a fraction of promised benefits. For tens...
Social Security
How much the typical upper-class retiree gets from Social Security at 83?
Social Security pays the average retired worker $2,071 per month, but that figure obscures a wide range of outcomes. For someone who spent decades earning at or near the taxable maximum and delayed claiming benefits, the monthly check at age 83 can be roughly double the national average. Understanding how the program treats high earners...
Retirement Planning
Average 401(k) balance in your 60s for 2026: see where you rank
Your 60s are the final stretch before retirement, and how your 401(k) stacks up against others in your age group can shape decisions about when to stop working, how aggressively to save, and whether catch-up contributions are worth the squeeze. For 2026, new IRS contribution limits give workers in their early 60s an unusually large...
Social Security
The hidden 2026 tax that will slash your Social Security checks
Millions of retirees will open their Social Security statements in 2026 and find less money than they expected, not because benefits were cut on paper, but because a series of automatic deductions will quietly shrink what actually hits their bank accounts. The combination of a sharply higher Medicare Part B premium, aggressive overpayment recovery rules,...
Retirement Planning
New retirement law unlocks 401(k) emergency cash, so why is no one using it?
SECURE 2.0 gave millions of American workers two new ways to pull emergency cash from their retirement plans without the usual 10 percent early-withdrawal penalty. One option lets participants take up to $1,000 a year for urgent personal expenses. The other creates a sidecar savings account attached to a 401(k) with a $2,500 cap and...
Retirement Planning
Major 401(k) shakeup in 2026 with a tax twist that could hit key investors
The Internal Revenue Service announced on November 13, 2025, in Washington that the standard 401(k) contribution ceiling will rise to $24,500 for 2026, while IRA limits climb to $7,500. But the bigger story is not the higher caps. A new mandatory Roth requirement for catch-up contributions will force higher-earning workers over 50 to pay taxes...
Retirement Planning
9 charming Southern cities where you can retire on $1,900 or less a month
Retiring on a single Social Security check sounds like a stretch, but a handful of Southern cities make the math surprisingly workable. The estimated average monthly retirement benefit for January 2026 sits around $1,900, and in the right ZIP code, that figure can cover rent, groceries, healthcare premiums, and still leave a small cushion. I...
Retirement and Benefits
3 cheapest US cities where retirement healthcare will not break you
Retirement planning often collapses into a single anxiety: will healthcare costs consume the budget before anything else gets a chance? For retirees willing to relocate, a handful of smaller U.S. metros offer a rare combination of low rents and below-average medical expenses that can stretch fixed incomes far beyond what coastal or Sun Belt hotspots...
Social Security
Will Social Security actually run out of money and what happens to your check?
The 2025 Social Security Trustees Report, released today, projects that the combined Old-Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance trust funds will run dry by 2034, one year sooner than last year’s estimate. That does not mean checks stop arriving. It means the program would shift from paying what retirees were promised to paying only what incoming...
Retirement Planning
Want $75,000 a year in retirement? Here’s the nest egg you really need
Reaching $75,000 in annual retirement income sounds like a clean, comfortable number. But the gap between that target and what most retirees actually spend, earn from Social Security, and need from savings is wider than many planning tools suggest. Federal data on benefits and household spending points to a more grounded way to size a...
Social Security
Social Security is running out of cash and a $trillions debt is coming, economist warns
Social Security’s financial clock just accelerated. The 2025 Trustees Report, released today, projects that the combined Old-Age and Survivors Insurance and Disability Insurance trust funds will run dry by 2034, one year earlier than the previous estimate. With reserves still measured in the trillions but an unfunded obligation now exceeding $25 trillion in present value,...
Medicare
The 10 best Medicare Advantage plans right now, ranked by members
Medicare Advantage enrollment now covers more than half of all Medicare-eligible Americans, and the plans they choose can be influenced by quality scores that include what members report about their experience. The federal government’s Star Ratings system blends clinical performance with enrollee-reported measures and is one widely used way to compare Medicare Advantage contracts. Because...
Retirement Planning
How to navigate the new 401(k) rule hitting your retirement this year?
New federal regulations are about to reshape how millions of Americans save for retirement through their 401(k) plans, and the changes will hit higher earners hardest. The Treasury Department and IRS have finalized rules under the SECURE 2.0 Act that force certain workers to route their catch-up contributions into after-tax Roth accounts, while a separate...
Social Security
How $50 can cost you $500 with the brutal Social Security ‘income cliff’?
A retiree earning just $50 more than a federal income threshold can lose hundreds of dollars in annual Social Security benefits, not because of a gradual tax but because of rigid bracket cutoffs that punish small earnings bumps with outsized financial penalties. The mechanism behind this problem sits at the intersection of Medicare premium surcharges...