QoD: How many states do not have state income taxes?
Did you know that most people have to file tax returns for BOTH federal AND state income taxes? Listed below are 7 states that do not (as of 1/10/2020) have state income taxes.
Answer: 7: Alaska, Florida, Nevada, South Dakota, Texas, Washington, and Wyoming
Find the top tax rate for your state here:
Note: Tennessee and New Hampshire tax investment income.
Questions:
How does your state's tax rate compare to other neighboring states?
Do you think that states that...
QoD: Walmart vs. Amazon: Which has been the better performing stock over the past five years?
Answer: AMAZON by a long shot!
Reviewing the chart, how much would your $100 investment five years ago have grown if you had invested in...
Amazon?
Walmart?
The overall stock market (S&P 500)?
Would you have been better off choosing between these 2 companies or just buying the overall stock market through an index fund?
Why do you think that Amazon has performed so much better than Walmart? (Hint: Do you think that online ecommerce is growing faster than “bricks and...
QoD [UPDATED]: Excluding home loans, what are the three largest debts for American consumers?
Answer:
Student loan - $1.5 trillion
Auto loan - $1.32 trillion
Credit Card - $0.85 trillion
Questions:
Which type of credit has grown the fastest from 2004-2019? Why do you think this is the case?
Using the chart, estimate the growth rate (in trillions of dollars) between 2004-19 for student loans, auto loans and credit cards.
What impact did the Great Recession (2008-09) have on debt levels? Do you think people tend to borrow more or less when a recession occurs? ...
QoD: What percent of Americans got a raise in 2019?
Answer: About 50%
Marketplace audio (1:27):
Questions:
According to the audio, the last decade was the first that didn't have a __________________.
What was the average pay increase across all workers?
While 1/2 of workers may not have received a pay increase, what are other ways that companies may have helped their employees other than raising their pay?
What can you do as a worker to increase the chances that you get a pay increase?
Here's the ready-to-go slides for this...
QoD: You're new to credit and you don't pay your credit card bill for months. It gets sent to a collections agency. How much will your credit score decline?
Answer: 224 points (from 599 to 375)
Explanation: Your score sank 224 points. A credit card in collections means your credit score is now in the high-300s.
Questions:
Why do you think not paying your credit card bill for months has such a big impact on someone who is new to credit?
What do you think are the reasons that people can’t pay their credit card bills? Identify at least 3 reasons.
What are strategies you can come up with to make sure that you are always in a...
Question of the Day: Indicate if stock was among the best or worst performing over the past decade: Kraft/Heinz, Netflix, Under Armour, Ulta Beauty.
With a new decade upon us, let's look back at the 2010s to see which stocks were on the best and worst performing lists.
Answer:
Kraft/Heinz: Worst (58% price decline)
Netflix: Best (+3787% price increase)
Under Armour: Worst (60% price decline)
Ulta Beauty: Best (+1206% price increase)
Questions:
Why do you think that Netflix and Ulta Beauty have done so well as stocks over the past decade?
Why do you think that Kraft Heinz and Under Armour have performed so poorly?
What...
QoD: Every 12 months that a car loan is extended costs an owner about __________ in extra finance charges.
Answer: $1,000
Questions:
Which would you prefer: a 4 year car loan with $400/monthly payment or a 6 year loan with $300/monthly payment? Why?
Why do you think that most car buyers focus on the monthly payment instead of the overall interest cost when they take out an auto loan?
Complete these sentences:
The longer the term of an auto loan, the higher/lower (circle one) the interest cost (assuming it's not a 0% APR loan).
The longer/shorter (circle one) the term of an auto...
QoD: What are the top New Year's Resolutions for 2020?
Questions:
Do you think that making New Year's resolutions are a good idea? Explain.
How would you categorize the items that typically show up on a list of popular resolutions?
Do you have any New Year's resolutions? If so, what are they? If not, why not?
What are some strategies that you can use to make resolutions stick? Have you had success with these in the past?
Here's the ready-to-go slides for this Question of the Day that you can use in your classroom.
Behind the numbers...
Credit Card QoD: How much does the average household with credit card debt pay in interest cost annually?
Holiday shopping can sometimes mean credit card debt, so this question takes a look at the annual interest cost a family pays when they carry a balance on their credit card.
Answer: $1,505
Methodology: Average household credit card debt of $8,707 (WalletHub analysis) multiplied by an average credit card interest rate of 17.30% (creditcards.com)
Questions:
Why do you think that so many Americans have credit card debt, meaning they don’t pay the full balance on their credit card...
Best of 2019...Most Popular NGPF Resources
By Tim Ranzetta
|
Jan 02, 2020
|
Activities, Question of the Day, FinCap Friday, Podcasts, Interactive
We've been posting "Best of 2019 Lists" over the holiday period. In case you missed them, here are links to the posts that list the most popular NGPF resources in each of these categories. Here's to hoping you find some gems here that you can use when classes start up again. Envelopes please...
Question of the Day
Arcade Games and Interactive Library
Product Releases [summary of all of the new NGPF resources developed in 2019]
Unit Pages
FinCap Fridays
Podcasts
-----------------
Thank you to...
Best of 2019..NGPF's Questions of the Day
By Tim Ranzetta
|
Dec 25, 2019
|
Question of the Day, Behavioral Finance, Budgeting, Credit Cards, Credit Scores, Current Events, Investing, New Products
If you receive our daily blog updates, you know that we produce a Question of the Day every Mon-Thursday during the school year..which amounts to about 160 questions. Here are the 10 questions that garnered the most pageviews in 2019. See how many you can answer correctly:
What's the average credit score needed to rent an apartment?
What percent of people age 75 and older are still working?
What percent of U.S. millionaires are professional athletes?
What percent of 18-34 year olds are...
QoD: What percent of Americans would be "ok" receiving a regifted gift?
Did you know the Thursday before Christmas is National Regifting Day? Who knew?
Answer: 83%
Questions:
Do you think it's ok to regift a gift that you have been given? Why or why not?
Would you be ok if someone regifted a gift to you?
What do you think is the strongest argument in favor of regifting?
While 83% say they would be ok receiving a regifted gift, only about 34% admit to having given a regifted gift. Why do you think there is such a gap between these two stats? ...
Updated QoD: How much do you need to earn to be considered middle class?
Answer: Between $41,498 to $123,874
Note: Pew Research methodology assumes middle class = 67% to 200% of median household income
Click on the map below to see what your state's median income details are:
Questions:
Why do you think these figures vary so much state by state?
Can you suggest other ways to measure the middle class other than by income?
Do you think the size of the middle class has changed over time? Why or why not?
Do you think that people earning the same income can...
Updated QoD: What percentage of students who started college in 2013 graduated within 6 years?
Answer: 60%
Here's the earlier QoD blog post that had data for the 2012 cohort. Slides have been updated to reflect up-to-date information.
Questions:
Which school type has the lowest graduation rates? Which school type has the highest graduation rates?
What might explain these large differences in graduation rates?
What has been the trend in graduation rates over the last 3-4 years for the public and private non-profit colleges?
What do you think are the leading reasons that...
Question of the Day: _____ out of 3 Americans are limiting their spending each month
|
Dec 15, 2019
|
Behavioral Finance, Question of the Day, Budgeting, Podcasts, Purchase Decisions
Answer: 2 out of 3 (66%)
Here are the reasons they gave for limiting spending:
Questions:
Have you ever felt like you needed to limit your spending? Why?
What do you think are the main reasons your peers would give for following a budget or limiting their spending?
What do you think is a better saving strategy?
Wait until the end of the month and save what’s left over
Set aside your saving at the beginning of the month and spend whatever is left over after saving
Do you...
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