Find a Payday Loan Near You!

Is the nation's economic stimulus package working? It's hard to tell.

The idea of the Economic Stimulus Act of 2008 passed by Congress you may remember is that the Internal Revenue Service gives taxpayers money and they spend it on stuff — iPhones, Guitar Heroes and vacations. That helps the economy get back on track.

So how much do you get? It's $600 if you're single, $1,200 if you're a married couple and another $300 for each eligible child under 17.

Nice.



But, again, is it working?

According to the National Retail Federation it is. The trade group says retail industry sales for May jumped 3.8 percent unadjusted over last year and 0.9 percent seasonally adjusted month-to-month. And, these numbers don't include automobile sales, gas stations and restaurants, so you can't blame soaring gas prices.

According to the NRF, many consumers are focused on groceries and other necessary items while others did splurge. Sales at electronic and appliance stores increased 0.7 percent seasonally adjusted month-to-month and a solid 4.4 percent unadjusted year-over-year. Clothing and clothing accessory stores sales increased 0.5 percent seasonally adjusted from April and 2.4 percent unadjusted from last May.

It may be less scientific, but if you pick up a daily newspaper in cities across the country you'll find story after story about people who are using their stimulus checks to pay bills, to reduce credit card debt and to buy gas or food.

And, there's another indicator that may be even more telling even if it's more difficult to verify.

An informal poll of some people in the payday lending business shows a 10 percent decline from April 24 through May 15 this year as opposed to the same time frame in 2007.

Payday or cash advance loans are considered an economic life-preserver for many people with sub prime credit ratings or those recovering from mortgage foreclosures or other money problems.

A payday advance is a small short-term loan without collateral usually repaid on the borrower's next payday.

Typically, a customer uses a payday loan to cover small, unexpected, expenses between paydays to avoid expensive fees on bounced checks, penalties on late bill payments, overdraft charges and other less desirable short-term credit options.

Industry analysts estimate that more than 22,000 payday advance locations across the United States extend about $40 billion in short-term credit to millions of middle-class households that experience cash-flow shortfalls between paydays.

Sites like PayDayFinder.com allow people to find nearby brick-and-mortar locations so they can comparison shop for the best payday loan rates.

Whether or not you chose to pay bills with it, go on a spending spree or save your stimulus check, you should know when to expect it. The chart below explains.

Checks
If the last two digits of your Social Security number are:	Your check should be in the mail by:
00 – 09	May 16
10 – 18	May 23
19 – 25	May 30
26 – 38	June 6
39 – 51	June 13
52 – 63	June 20
64 – 75	June 27
76 – 87	July 4
88 – 99	July 11

With gas and food prices spiraling higher, more middleclass American are coming up short between paychecks.

Many are turning to payday loans to bridge the gap. A payday advance is a small short-term loan without collateral. It's repaid on the borrower's next payday.

Typically, a customer uses a payday loan to cover small, unexpected, expenses between paydays. The money is often used to avoid expensive fees on bounced checks, penalties on late bill payments, overdraft charges and other less desirable short-term credit options.

Industry analysts estimate that more than 22,000 payday advance locations across the United States extend about $40 billion in short-term credit to millions of people.

A new report by the Center for Financial Service Innovation — a non-profit affiliate of ShoreBank Corp. that facilitates financial services industry efforts to serve underbanked consumers — says payday lending is going mainstream.

Credit unions and banks are beginning to recognize the need for payday loans and the size of this underserved market.

Several individual credit unions, the report says, have begun to offer cash advance loans. These offerings acknowledge the growth of payday loans and aim to give credit union members a valuable service.

According to the report, one of the largest credit unions in the nation, the North Carolina State Employees' Credit Union, now offers salary advance loans. This cash advance features a savings component with 5 percent of the advance placed into a credit union cash account as collateral.

Dating back to 2001, the North Carolina cash advance loan program has served nearly 100,000 members with loans totaling more than $1 billion.

The Savings Bank of Wakefield, Mass., has a small-dollar loan product it offers as a payday loan alternative — and makes it available to non-customers as well as current customers. These are closed-end, simple interest loans ranging from $300 to $1,000. They are available at an 18 percent APR interest rate, the same as their unsecured overdraft line of credit. Repayment terms range from 18 months for a $300 to $500 principal to 36 months for a $501 to $1,000 principal. A credit report is processed for all applications.

Wells Fargo and U.S. Bank now offer cash advance loans. Both charge borrowers $2 per $20 advanced, equivalent to an APR of 120 percent. Wells Fargo's Direct Deposit Advance service allows account holders who receive a monthly direct deposit exceeding $100 to access the advance line of credit through an ATM.

In offering small-dollar loans to non-customers, banks and credit unions hope to gain access to new client prospects

It used to be that home schooling was a rarity. No more.

According to a Harris Interactive Poll of 2,435 U.S. adults surveyed online, one-third of Americans know someone who is home schooling a child.

Eight percent of the households who reported having children who were old enough to attend school said that their child had been home schooled at some point. Here are some of the study's findings:

• U.S. adults that say their main reasons for home schooling their children are dissatisfaction with academic instruction (65 percent), to provide religious or moral instruction (60 percent) and concern about safety at school or on the bus (53 percent).
• Forty percent of Republicans report knowing someone who home schools their child; Democrats report 29 percent.
• More Republicans (69 percent) than Democrats (56 percent) cite religious or moral instruction and student behavior problems (Republicans 50 percent, Democrats 43 percent) as the main reasons behind home schooling.
• Democrats were more likely than Republicans to cite schools being too crowded to provide individual attention (44 percent vs. 35 percent) and educating special needs children (42 percent vs. 33 percent) as the main reasons for home schooling.
• Twenty-five percent of adults rate home schooling as excellent or very good as compared to 17 percent who rate public schools this highly for elementary education; secondary education was rated 23 percent vs. 14 percent respectively.
As economic factors like skyrocketing gas prices put increasing pressures on businesses and families, home schooling, like telecommuting, may see more growth in 2008

A startling new report from The Commonwealth Fund, "Gaps in Health Insurance: An All-American Problem," reports that one in five working age adults is paying off medical debt, that nearly 60 percent of uninsured adults skip medication because they can't afford it, and many are ending up in emergency rooms and require hospitalization.

Forty one percent (that's two out of five) working-age Americans whose incomes are between $20,000 and $40,000 were uninsured for at least a portion of the past year. Working families constitute the vast majority of the uninsured. There was an estimated 48 million working-age Americans uninsured during the year—67 percent of that number was families in which at least one person was working full time. Here are some other findings:

• More than 44 percent of all working-age adults with medical debt reported that it was $2,000 or more.
• More than 82 percent of uninsured adults had been without insurance for one year or more.
• Sixty-three percent were solo business owners or working for firms with fewer than 100 employees.
• 51 percent of uninsured adults reported medical debt or bill problems. Of those, nearly half (49 percent) used up all their savings to pay their bill, and two of five were unable to pay for basic necessities.
• Just 41 percent of uninsured adults had a regular doctor or other health-care professional compared with 86 percent of insured adults.
With soaring food prices and gasoline averaging well above $4 a gallon, more and more people are likely to find they can't afford health insurance.