By Robert L. Cain My old friend John Clark drove a Toyota Camry. Nothing unusual about that except that John owned one of the biggest real estate companies in Portland, Oregon, and could have paid cash for just about any car he wanted. But John saw no reason to buy a Mercedes, BMW, or Lincoln […]

Kelvin Lyles had been busy. When police raided his home in Atlanta in December 2015, they found “information for over 300 synthetic identities, fake driver’s licenses, a fake social security card, and numerous credit cards held in the names of individuals other than Lyles,” reported the US Attorney’s office. Police said that “Lyles attempted $435,862.10 […]

If you shop at an Amazon bookstore, don’t bother bringing cash. They can’t accept it. Likewise at clothing retailers such as Bonobos, Indochino, Everlane and Reformation.  Then there are Drybar hair styling, The Bar Method fitness studios, and United and Delta airlines. None of them accepts cash, either.  It’s a growing trend to force people […]

Credit card issuers and other lenders are desperate.  Their profits have stagnated.  Credit card debt has reached the same level as in 2008, about $1 trillion.  That means, asTed Rossman of creditcards.com says, the lending market is saturated.  Where to get more business?   The lenders came up with an idea and pushed it on […]

By Robert L. Cain   School’s not for everyone, but hope is.  Hope can overtake someone’s memory of school experience as he or she thinks about wanting to get ahead and the education or training it will take to do it. Stuck in a dead end job, the only hope for something better is more […]

Years ago I worked with a man in his early 20s  who drank nightly, and not just a little.  Every morning, when he managed to actually show up to work, he was so hung over that he could barely function.  He had continually bloodshot eyes, when you could see them, and he reminded me of […]

“They are taking on debt that they can’t repay. A drop in savings and rise in delinquencies means you can’t support the (overall) spending,” said Stephen Gallagher, economist at Societe Generale.  Any dramatic increase in prices, such as gas or the results of higher tariffs could result in “a rather dramatic scaling back of consumption.” […]

Charlotte was born in 2012, a healthy, happy girl with responsible parents who immediately found a pediatrician to ensure that Charlotte would continue to be healthy and happy.  When her  proud new parents went to their new pediatrician’s office, they dutifully filled out paperwork including Charlotte’s newly issued Social Security Number.  That was their big […]

The cellophane from the newly minted bachelor’s degree diploma was barely in the recycling bin when his career was permanently crippled.   Joe graduated at the wrong time, 2008.  The Great Recession ran from 2007 to 2009 and put Joe and his fellow graduates in a career hole that they might never escape from.   They […]

Credit Karma calls them “Credit Fumbles.”  In fact they liked the term so much they trademarked it.  They define it as “phenomenon where young adults, new to credit and many without financial education, make largely avoidable financial mistakes.”  They hired a survey company find out just how prevalent Credit Fumbles are.  They discovered that of […]