About the Author
Beth Tallman
Beth Tallman entered the working world armed with an M.B.A. in finance and thoroughly enjoyed her first career working in manufacturing and telecommunications, including a stint overseas. She took advantage of an involuntary separation to try teaching high school math, something she had always dreamed of doing. When fate stepped in once again, Beth jumped on the opportunity to combine her passion for numbers, money, and education to develop curriculum and teach personal finance at Oberlin College. Beth now spends her time writing on personal finance and financial education, conducting student workshops, and developing finance curricula and educational content. She is also the Treasurer of Ohio Jump$tart Coalition for Personal Financial Literacy.
Reading List for November 20-22
Financial Literacy
Survey data suggest a pre-pandemic gap in financial knowledge of women that is especially concerning as they are disproportionately impacted by the pandemic’s financial strain. (Phys.org)
Economics
The IMF director warns that the coronavirus could disrupt any global recovery during a meeting with G20. (APNews)
Initial unemployment claims back on the upswing last week for the first time in 35 weeks. (AP News) Here is Morning Brew’s summary of the...
EconExtra: Does GDP Truly Reflect an Economy's Strength?
EconExtra is a series of posts that go beyond the textbook, relating current events and recent developments in economics to content standards, and providing resource suggestions to help you incorporate the current events into your lessons.
The Issue:
GDP headlines do not seem to mesh with the underlying health of the US Economy. We visited the recovery earlier this fall in GDP in the EconExtra “The Alphabet Soup of Economic Recoveries,” covering the prospects for a...
Reading List for November 13-15
Investment
Retirement account balances on the rise, as are 401k “Millionaires.” (Yahoo Finance)
The pandemic seemed to be driving the market this week: soaring when promising vaccine results were announces, then fell back as case numbers continue to spike. (Yahoo Finance)
It is going to be a big year for consumer tech IPOs. (CNBC) Instacart is one of many companies planning an IPO in coming months. (Fox Business)
Economics
Unemployment claims moving in the right direction,...
EconExtra: Friedman’s “The Social Responsibility of Business” Turns 50
EconExtra is a series of posts that go beyond the textbook, relating current events and recent developments in economics to content standards, and providing resource suggestions to help you incorporate the current events into your lessons.
The Issue
Milton Friedman, the father of “free-market” or libertarian economics, published his groundbreaking essay, “The Social Responsibility of Business” in September 1970. His basic argument was that corporate...
Reading List for November 6-8
Investing
Doesn’t seem like the stock market cared about the outcome of the election, just that it was over as markets look like they will have their best week since April. (CNBC)
Who owns the stock market? Read results of new research from the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center. (Irrelevant Investor)
Should bitcoin have a place in mainstream portfolios? The thinking on this seems to be evolving. (Seeking Alpha)
Speaking of Bitcoin: Bitcoin value driven up as the US Government...
Reading List for October 30-Nov 1
Hope you all have a happy and safe Halloween!
Financial Literacy
Ally is “leaning into gamification” to attack the financial literacy gap, beginning with “Animal Crossing.” (PRNewswire)
Economics
Yahoo Finance provides a wrap-up of this week’s economic data releases.
* Consumer spending increases 1.4% in September
* Personal income rebounds 0.9%; savings rate dips to 14.3%
* Core PCE price index rises 0.2%; up 1.5% year-on-year
GDP rebounded in...
Econ Extra: Measuring Employment and Unemployment
EconExtra is a series of posts that go beyond the textbook, relating current events and recent developments in economics to content standards, and providing resource suggestions to help you incorporate the current events into your lessons.
#1 The Issue
Employment and unemployment statistics are regular headline news these days. (CEE Content Standard 8) Most people have a very limited knowledge of how each one is calculated—who is counted and who is not. (Except for the weekly...
Reading List for October 23-25
Financial Health
PRNewswire reports on an extensive three-part survey by Lending Tree and Stash to look at the financial health of people during the Covid-19 crisis. Here are the key findings:
Due to the economic impact of the COVID-19 crisis, 1 in 4 people expect to retire later than anticipated. That's especially true for those who make less than $35,000 (34%) and Gen Xers (29%), as well as Latino (30%) and Black consumers (28%).
People of color are facing heavy financial...
EconExtra: What do WWII and the Covid-19 Pandemic have in common?
EconExtra is a series of posts that go beyond the textbook, relating current events and recent developments in economics to content standards, and providing resource suggestions to help you incorporate the current events into your lessons.
#1 Present the Issue
What do World War II and the Covid-19 Pandemic have in common? They both have driven US debt to over 100% of GDP.
Here are the headlines and key takeaways about this year’s record-breaking budget deficit announced last...
Reading List for October 16-18
By Beth Tallman
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Oct 16, 2020
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Current Events, Economics, Investing, Paying for College, Budgeting, Insurance, Retirement
Economics
Retail sales up 1.9% in September. (CNBC)
The unexpectedly big gain in spending comes after months of historically high savings as consumers retrenched due to the Covid-19 scare. The personal savings rate peaked at 33.6% in April and remained at 14.1% in August, the highest pre-pandemic rate since June 1975.
(Ed Yardeni) took a closer look at the recovery by sector of the economy in his blog post dated October 9.
First-time unemployment claims of 898,000 back on the rise this...
EconExtra: Pandemic Wreaking Havoc on State Budgets
EconExtra is a series of posts that go beyond the textbook, relating current events and recent developments in economics to content standards, and providing resource suggestions to help you incorporate the current events into your lessons.
The Issue/ Huge State Revenue Shortfalls
The Tax Foundation summed up the situation back in April. The situation was dire enough to drive a $150 billion allocation to state and local governments as part of the CARES act referred to below. ...
Reading List for October 9-11
Economy
Jobless claims over 800,000 last week. (Yahoo Finance) (Graph below)
“Last hired, first fired? Employment losses across age groups.” It is not a pretty picture for young workers. (FRED)
If you ever wanted to live in NY, it hasn’t been this cheap to rent an apartment in Manhattan since 2013! (Bloomberg)
On the other hand, Denver is a hot real estate market. (CNBC)
Investing
On one hand: Warren Buffet values dividends. (USA Today)
And on the other hand: Investor...
EconExtra: Three Reasons to Update your Monetary Policy Material
EconExtra is a series of posts that go beyond the textbook, relating current events and recent developments in economics to content standards, and providing resource suggestions to help you incorporate the current events into your lessons.
Issue/Event
There are three reasons to check your lessons on Monetary Policy (CEE Content Standard 10):
Policy has changed over the last ten years
The Fed’s long-term strategy around its dual mandate has changed slightly
The Fed is...
Reading List for October 2-4
Economics
How the pandemic is hurting working mothers disproportionately. (Knowledge@Wharton)
Weekly jobless claims came in at 837,000 last week. Over 25 million are still collecting benefits, and household income declined last month by 2.7%.(AP NEWS)
September employment report: 661,000 jobs added and 7.9% unemployment---definitely slowing, and these numbers don’t reflect upcoming layoffs at American, United, Goldman Sachs, Disney, etc. and business closures expected in...
EconExtra: The Alphabet Soup of Economic Recoveries
EconExtra will be a series of posts that go beyond the textbook, relating current events and recent developments in economics to content standards, and providing resource suggestions to help you incorporate the current events into your lessons.
Issue/Event
Recessions happen for a wide variety of reasons. There is variation expected in the course of business cycles*, but not all countries experience them regularly. It took the current global Covid-19 Pandemic to break...
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