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Here's a quick question about your retirement savings: When was the last time you checked the fees on your 401(k)?
If you're like most Americans, chances are you're not sure what exactly your plan is charging you. Even though employers are now required to disclose more information about 401(k) fees, only about half of workers said they actually noticed the data, while just 14 percent made changes after reviewing the information, according to a 2013 study from the Employee Benefit Research Institute.
At a Senate hearing today, retired Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens will testify about the rise of dark money and the impact of what he’s called the “grossly incorrect” decision in McCutcheon v FEC.
Today’s New York Times leads with some news that maybe, just maybe, ‘too big to fail’ for major Wall Street banks could become a thing of the past. Prosecutors are nearing criminal charges against Credit Suisse and BNP Paribas (while of course taking very, very careful baby steps to make sure that these criminal penalties would not have drastic impacts). The crimes of these banks? In BNP Paribas’ case, it’s processing transactions involving Sudan and Iran.
There’s been alarm raised recently over the decline in college enrollment over the past two years. Some have even gone so far as to argue that this decline is the result of masses of young people realizing that college “isn’t worth it”, even though the college wage premium—the gap between the average wages of college grads and those with less education—
One of the greatest things about a market economy is that all sorts of people can get to the top -- in contrast to, say, feudalism where the only people at the top are those who were born there. And while I spend plenty of time bemoaning the decline of upward mobility and how privilege is increasingly inherited in America, the fact remains that there are still elements of a robust meritocracy here.
It’s the end of April—and probably safe to say the Kwasi Enin thing is played out. I’m going to be “that guy” who annoyingly resurrects a topic long after everyone else in the convo has buried it. While Kwasi’s specific headline may have had a one-week expiration date, the American media manufactures these frenzies every so often.
President Obama has spent a lot of time in Asia talking about the Trans-Pacific Partnership, the big trade deal that negotiators have been working on for a few years. But all that energy is probably for naught, at least for the time being, since the TPP isn't going anywhere in Congress anytime soon. I could say more about the TPP, but I'll spare you, since most people don't share my fascination with global trade.
No less a capitalist than Henry Ford believed in paying his workforce enough so that the men who built his cars could buy his cars too. At McDonald’s, employees are encouraged to apply for food stamps if they aren’t making enough to eat.