Provides the latest RSS feeds for Personal Finance News. For more headlines on Breaking, National, Business, Finance, Sports and World News, visit our home page Charlotte Star.com http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/cat/300e4fa8e5e292cd/ en-us Sat, 18 May 2013 23:29:46 -0400 Sat, 18 May 2013 23:29:46 -0400 30 It's been a tough couple of seasons for the cruise ship industry. First, the Costa Concordia, a 3,800-passenger ship operated by a unit of Carnival Corp., ran aground off the coast of Italy in January 2012. Thirty-two people were killed, while images of the abandoned ship, lying incongruously on its side. beside a picturesque beach town, flashed around the ... http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214607643/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd Sat, 18 May 2013 20:00:56 -0400 http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214607643/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd Simon Read is Personal Finance Editor at The Independent. He edits the Saturday Your Money section as well as writing for the news and business pages of the Independent and i ... http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214608126/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd Sat, 18 May 2013 19:50:59 -0400 http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214608126/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd "Obviously, cash is king," said personal finance blogger Joseph Audette, a personal finance writer/blogger for NerdWallet. But students, especially high school graduates juggling their own finances for the first time, can quickly blow through a lot of cash, he notes. Instead?"Get a gift card from the university's student bookstore. It's a little more thought than writing ... http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214605929/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd Sat, 18 May 2013 17:36:14 -0400 http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214605929/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd When teaching older children and teenagers about personal finance, experience is key. Here are six real-life experiences that can get them on the right financial ... http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214605804/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd Sat, 18 May 2013 16:25:53 -0400 http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214605804/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd appears to think that databases are overused. "Instead of a database, I just serialize my data to JSON, saving and loading it to disk when necessary," he writes . "All the data management is made on the program itself, which is faster AND easier than using SQL queries." What is missing here? Why should a developer use a database when saving data to a disk might work just as ... http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214604106/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd Sat, 18 May 2013 13:20:47 -0400 http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214604106/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd It was treeplanting that triggered environmentalist Nikki Heck's epiphany: working in industry was the best way to make a difference."I got frustrated being the person putting the trees in the ground," says Heck, 33, an environmental adviser with the electric utility company AltaLink. "I wanted to be the person making the decision about how the land was managed in the first ... http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214602841/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd Sat, 18 May 2013 11:30:33 -0400 http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214602841/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd President Barack Obama speaks to reporters in the White House briefing room in Washington, Friday, March 1, 2013, following after meeting with congressional leaders regarding the automatic spending cuts. (AP Photo/Charles ... http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214602842/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd Sat, 18 May 2013 11:29:16 -0400 http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214602842/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd They say the best defense is a good offense. That could be the case in sector ETFs amid signs investors are rotating from defensive, dividend-paying sectors into aggressive, , cyclical ... http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214602202/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd Sat, 18 May 2013 10:31:05 -0400 http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214602202/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd Nissan's GT-R was among the first, if not the first, of the supersport cyborgs, cars with multimode, fully algorithm-based handling, and powertrain and dynamics control pumped through a fantastically dialed-in all-wheel-drive ... http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214601786/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd Sat, 18 May 2013 10:23:00 -0400 http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214601786/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd Credit unions come in all stripes and colors.Currently, there are 7,200 credit unions in the U.S., according to the Credit Union National Association. And not all of them are just community-related. Your church, university or even your military branch may offer its own credit union with sweet deals and special perks, such as a no-minimum checking account that also pays interest.And that's on ... http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214601661/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd Sat, 18 May 2013 09:31:26 -0400 http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214601661/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd Prepaid debit cards often are pitched as a cheaper alternative to checking accounts. After paying billions of dollars' worth of checking fees over the years, that's a pitch consumers are finding increasingly appealing, says Tom Feltner, director of financial services at the Consumer Federation of America."It's an area where we've seen exponential growth over the last 10 ... http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214601660/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd Sat, 18 May 2013 09:31:25 -0400 http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214601660/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd Americans between the ages of 61 and 70 are withdrawing money from their IRAs in amounts that are larger, both in absolute dollar amounts and as a percentage of their IRA account balance, than those taken by older households, according to a new report from the Employee Benefit Research ... http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214600663/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd Sat, 18 May 2013 07:34:42 -0400 http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214600663/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd Absurd? Check. Irresistible? Double check. From Autoweek.com, here are some things you should know about the Lamborghini Egoista concept, which has made quite a splash since its debut as part of Lamborghini's 50th anniversary ... http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214600662/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd Sat, 18 May 2013 07:34:42 -0400 http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214600662/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd Champions League qualification with 11 wins in 15 matches, and are looking to maintain the winning momentum and their top spot in the points tally.Mumbai have one of the strongest batting line-ups in the league. They have the likes of a fit-again Sachin Tendulkar, Dinesh Karthik, skipper Rohit Sharma and Kieron Pollard. However, given the situation, Mumbai may want to rest some of their key ... http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214597091/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd Sat, 18 May 2013 00:57:36 -0400 http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214597091/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd $1.46 billion. The world's biggest online social network has also kept growing to 1.1 billion users. Some 665 million people check in every day to share photos, comment on news articles and play games. Millions of people around the world who don't own a computer use Facebook, in Malawi, Malaysia and Martinique. And much has changed at Facebook in a year. The company's executives ... http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214596763/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd Fri, 17 May 2013 23:40:17 -0400 http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214596763/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd Simon Read is Personal Finance Editor at The Independent. He edits the Saturday Your Money section as well as writing for the news and business pages of the Independent and i ... http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214596764/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd Fri, 17 May 2013 23:37:10 -0400 http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214596764/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd Ten years ago, Breck Morrison and his wife, Marci Russo, moved from their home in Los Osos, Calif., to a tiny beach town on the east coast of Australia. They secured long-term retirement visas, allowing them to continue working while also enjoying a new life in Queensland. Ms. Russo is working as a teaching assistant. And after realizing that living in a small town required them to "make our ... http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214593708/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd Fri, 17 May 2013 19:18:43 -0400 http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214593708/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd NEW YORK A research report by the Pew Charitable Trusts says younger baby boomers and Generation Xers face an uncertain retirement because of reduced savings, high levels of debt and losses during the Great Recession. The study found that members of Generation X, who are now between 38 and 47 years old, lost almost half their wealth between 2007 and 2010. Young baby boomers, who are between 48 ... http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214591624/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd Fri, 17 May 2013 18:02:58 -0400 http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214591624/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd Study after study, including two released this week, suggest that a 65-year-old couple retiring this year need to have somewhere between $220,000 and $293,000 set aside now just to pay for ordinary health-related expenses over the course of 20 years of ... http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214591440/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd Fri, 17 May 2013 17:15:52 -0400 http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214591440/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd But Jeffrey Rosenberg, the chief investment strategist for fixed income at BlackRock, says investors should be worried about something entirely different. Disinflation remains the dominant global theme--and investors should react accordingly, according to his ... http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214591441/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd Fri, 17 May 2013 17:15:51 -0400 http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214591441/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd Question: I have a question about government pension offset. What spousal benefits is someone entitled to if they were a teacher who will receive a pension in retirement and didn't pay into the Social Security program while working? ... http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214591442/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd Fri, 17 May 2013 17:15:51 -0400 http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214591442/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd More than one-third of state and local government employees are postponing when they retire, according to a survey. The annual survey, "State and Local Government Workforce: 2013 Trends," from the Center for State and Local Government Excellence and the International Public Management Association for Human Resources, asked supervisors what changes their retirement-eligible employees had ... http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214591443/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd Fri, 17 May 2013 17:15:50 -0400 http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214591443/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd Robert Powell is a MarketWatch Retirement columnist. He has been a journalist covering personal finance issues for more than 20 years. Follow him on Twitter ... http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214591444/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd Fri, 17 May 2013 17:15:50 -0400 http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214591444/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd Facing stiff competition and tepid demand, Google Wallet has not made a big splash in the world of mobile payments. Find out why experts say young Americans may help revive its fortunes, in today's Personal Finance ... http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214591445/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd Fri, 17 May 2013 17:01:30 -0400 http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214591445/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd The HTC First smart phone -- also known as the Facebook phone because it comes with Facebook Home installed -- has been in the news because AT&T dropped the price to 99 cents just a month after the phone debuted. And now there are reports that it likely will be discontinued. Considering that most new smart phones cost $200 and up when you agree to a two-year contract with a service provider ... http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214591446/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd Fri, 17 May 2013 16:59:19 -0400 http://www.charlottestar.com/index.php/sid/214591446/scat/300e4fa8e5e292cd