Dollars and Sense

While many analysts predict that holiday shopping will remain on the conservative side yet this year, a new survey suggests that more people intend to give the gift of giving to none other than themselves.

Earlier this week, the investment ratings firm Morningstar released their annual list of the year’s best 529 college-savings plans.

In an attempt to go toe-to-toe with retail giant Amazon, Best Buy has announced plans to implement a new price-matching system to combat the ever-growing trend of online shopping.

Recipients of Social Security benefits will see a slightly less than 2 percent cost-of-living increase next year, according to an estimate by the American Institute for Economic Research.

The dream of many college graduates—to earn a good-enough starting salary to pay off student loans without being rendered homeless or forced into starvation—comes easier or harder depending on where they graduate. With that in mind, which American colleges offer the worst possible opportunity for a earning a decent entry-level salary, and which offer the best?

In an attempt to be a forethought on the shopping lists of parents this holiday season, Toys R Us has announced plans to match the prices of their competition. The company’s new “price-match guarantee” will be extended to all products from Toys R Us and Babies R Us retail outlets.

These days more credit card customers are paying their bills on time than they have over the course of the last decade. A report released earlier today by the American Bankers Association indicates that delinquencies on credit cards are currently at an 11-year low, with only 2.93 percent of credit accounts reported past due by 30 days or more. These figures come in substantially under the 3.91 per

For recent college graduates, the economic downturn and very, very slow recovery of the past few years have been brutal. But things may be looking up. According to the Job Outlook 2013 survey, employers are on track to hire 13 percent more graduates from the class of 2013 than they did for those who walked away with their degrees in 2012.