November 7, 2013

Healthcare Credits Reach Middle Class

Individuals earning nearly $46,000 a year and families of four earning $94,000 may be eligible for federal tax credits under the new health care law.

Tax credits are the mechanism by which the federal government caps how much people pay for health insurance premiums, which are set by the private market. The premium caps are based on how much someone earns, relative to the federal government’s definition of poverty.

Here’s an example of how premiums are calculated for, say, young, single workers who earn between $17,236 and $22,980 per year, which is between one-and-one-half and two times the poverty level. The premiums, which range from 4 percent to 6.3 percent of their income, start at about $57 a month for those at the low end of this income range and up to $121 at the high end.

In the following charts, Squared Away converted into dollars the income and premiums that the Henry J. Kaiser Foundation, in its brief on the healthcare law, has expressed as percentages of the U.S. poverty thresholds: …Learn More

October 24, 2013

Oldest Americans Are Lucky Generation

Americans in their 70s and 80s have earned more and are wealthier than the baby boom generation – for the simple reason they were born at the right moment in history.

It was easier for members of this older generation to get ahead, because they came of age in the aftermath of World War II, when economic and demographic trends were strongly working in their favor, contends new research by William Emmons and Bryan Noeth of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. The emergence of a modern social safety net and the rise of unions may’ve also contributed to their relative prosperity, they said.

Baby boomers born after about 1950 do not seem to have the same income and wealth over their working and retired lives that their parents have enjoyed, even after the research takes into account numerous things that determine an individual’s prosperity, such as their level of education. If the current trend continues, these younger boomers just won’t be as lucky.

Birth year “comes up as a significant variable in terms of influencing income and wealth,” Emmons, a senior policy adviser, said about the study, which analyzed decades of U.S. data on household finances. …Learn More

October 22, 2013

Food Stamps Need Rises in Good Times

Enrollment in the federal food stamp program, known as SNAP – for Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program – has more than doubled over the past decade to 47 million.

What’s remarkable is that for the first time the number of Americans receiving food stamps increased even in a period when the economy was growing. During the 2003-2007 expansion, the SNAP case load, in a break with historic trends, rose 24 percent.

One explanation is the change in the longstanding correlation between the unemployment rate and poverty, according to research findings by economists Matt Rutledge and April Yanyuan Wu of the Center for Retirement Research, which were presented at the Retirement Research Consortium meeting in August.

Poverty used to fall in tandem with the jobless rate, reducing the need for food stamps. But the researchers found that the mid-2000s expansion was different: poverty did not decline as the economy grew.

In the recovery that has followed the Great Recession, the number of people receiving food stamps continued to rise, according to federal data.

The assumption has always been that a stronger labor market will reduce the need for food stamps. But this new trend suggests rising employment might no longer be enough. Reducing the food stamp rolls may require a broader recovery or initiatives to reduce poverty and provide more jobs for the marginally employed.

Full disclosure: The research cited in this post was funded by a grant from the U.S. Social Security Administration (SSA) through the Retirement Research Consortium, which also funds this blog. The opinions and conclusions expressed do not represent the opinions or policy of SSA or any agency of the federal government.Learn More

October 17, 2013

Video: Mutual Funds or Designer Shoes?

Prithi Gowda’s animated video was one of two winners in a competition among New York University film school students and alums to produce a video that would turn young adults on to mutual funds. The winners were awarded a trip to Monaco to premier their work.

The filmmaker practices what she preaches in this short animation, “Frenemies.” Gowda’s freelance work as a website designer and videographer for Wall Street firms has allowed her to build up “a nice, comfortable savings.” Investing, she said, has given her the freedom to start her own company, 21^st Street Projects in Manhattan.

“I just feel strongly the world could be a much better place if people really understood how to deal with their finances,” Gowda said.Learn More

October 15, 2013

U.S. Families: Not Poor But Feeling Poor

New research shows the share of Americans who lack enough ready cash on hand for emergencies shot up in the aftermath of the Great Recession.

These families do not have access to the liquid assets – cash or funds in their checking or savings account – to cover emergencies like layoffs, health crises, or even car repairs, according to an analysis of federal data by Caroline Ratcliffe of the Urban Institute, who presented the finding to the Congressional Savings and Ownership Caucus in late September.

Ratcliffe’s measure of financial fragility was families who did not have enough liquid assets to subsist at federal poverty levels for three months. That amounts to $2,873 for a single person, $4,883 for a family of three, and $5,888 for a family of four.

By this measure, 37 percent of families in the middle income group – earning $35,600 to $57,900 a year – in 2010 were financially fragile – up sharply from 28 percent in 2007, a year before the Great Recession began. No income group was spared by the downturn: in most cases, the share of families at risk increased between 9 percentage points and 13 percentage points.

Ratcliffe said that financial problems can cascade if cash-poor families resort to high-cost loans or credit cards to pay their bills, and building wealth becomes extremely difficult.

“A shortage of liquid assets can lead to cycles of debt when financial emergencies arise,” creating “further financial instability,” she said.Learn More

August 15, 2013

Students Tell Their Tales of Debt

Click on each of the four photographs above to hear from the students, Kathleen Buckingham, Preston Davis, Michael McCormack, and Kelly McGowan.

Nastasia Peteuil, who paid very little for her college education in France, was shocked by how much students in this country are borrowing and by the crushing financial pressures this creates.

While taking graduate journalism courses at the University of Massachusetts in Amherst last spring, she persuaded four classmates to narrate their personal stories, which she documented on film in four short profiles.

What makes Peteuil’s profiles so powerful is that they convey, in real time, how these young adults begin to realize what their debt will mean to their lives and career choices.

Squared Away has written about the financial consequences of college loans after graduation – on buying one’s first house, on retirement, and even on graduates’ love lives.

But, as Peteuil has dramatized, the consequences begin prior to graduation day.Learn More

August 1, 2013

Student Debt May Slow Home Buying

First-time buyers are currently responsible for about 29 percent of all U.S. house sales, down from historical levels of 40 percent, according to the National Association of Realtors. The share of young adults who own a house has also declined sharply.

There’s debate about whether buying a house is a good financial move. But the waning of this coming-of-age ritual is a significant change in behavior for young adults in this country.

One culprit may be student debt, which is becoming more prevalent – 43 percent of young adults have some, compared with 25 percent a decade ago. The average borrower’s balance has also doubled in the past decade, to more than $20,000 in 2012.

Researchers at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York believe these unprecedented student debt levels may be dampening house purchases by first-time buyers. Student loans cause individuals to do poorly under two of the primary tests by Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae that lenders use to approve standard home loans. …Learn More