My Score Is So Bad – Why Should I Even Bother To Fix My Credit?
You know what I’m talking about because you’ve said that before. You know your credit score is low, but you shrug it off like there is nothing you can do to fix bad credit anyway. Well, if you think that, chances are, you’re right! There isn’t a lot you can do about it because you’ve given up already. Hey, it’s your life. Do what you want with it! But if hearing that makes you mad, read on.You can get through life with bad credit. You probably rent, and you probably were required to put down a bigger deposit to get the place. You may have a credit card, and if so, your interest rate is probably too high. You only fantasize of buying that new car, but you’ve resigned knowing it just won’t happen. It doesn’t have to be like this. Instead of feeling bad about your financial situation, take control of it one small step at a time.First, start by going online and pulling your own credit report. Each year, from Annual Credit Report, you have the right to run one free credit report from each of the credit bureaus: Experian, Equifax and Transunion. (Actually, that ends up being three free reports. ) I would suggest only running one at first until you have some understanding of how to review a credit report. Please know that running your own credit report will not lower your score if you use this site. And, unfortunately, they will not give you your score unless you choose to pay extra. However, the score can wait too. So which credit bureau should you run then? Experian, Equifax or Transunion? Flip a coin. It doesn’t matter at this point. All that matters is that you’re getting started by looking at a copy of your current credit report.Second, review that report. I know, if you haven’t seen one before or it’s been a long time, it may look foreign to you. Keep looking, and try to decipher where the credit cards are listed, where the other loans are located, where any public records are shown and lastly where the recent inquiries can be found.Third, get out your credit card statement and any loan or mortgage statements that you have.- Double check your current credit card and loan limits.
- Check your current balances. Are they accurately listed?
- Look to see if the credit cards or loans show late payments?
- If you see late payments, we’re you in fact late or is this information incorrect?
- Do you see any credit cards or loans that aren’t even yours?Next, take a look at the inquiries, who has been running your credit lately? Do you know these companies who’ve run your credit? If not, you need to figure out who and why they are. Sometimes, you can see a phone number listed. It couldn’t hurt to give them a call and ask some questions that may jog your memory. Often times your current credit card companies or cell phone carrier will run your credit for special promotion or to check up on you.Then, you may see public records. This section shows judgements, liens, collections and any other matter that has been recorded against you. Medical bill collections are often found in this section. If you don’t have any of these type of items reported on your report, you won’t see this section at all.Reviewing your own credit report really is the first step to fixing bad credit. Now, you know what is there. You still may be confused and understand exactly what everything on your credit report means, but that’s OK. You may see items on your credit report that don’t belong to you, and that is enough to get anyone fired up. You have to dispute those items. Second, if you have a lot of late payments, credit limits are missing or incorrect and you see old public record derogatory items, it will be worth your time, energy and or money to invest in fixing your report. Just cleaning up these items alone should show a significant increase in your score.Chances are since you’ve been avoiding your credit report in the first place, you won’t know how to fix your bad credit by yourself. Even if you did, doing it alone requires a lot of time and follow up. I suggest researching a company that will help you increase your credit score. Look for a company that will help educate you along the way. Look for a credit repair company that doesn’t charge thousands of dollars, but don’t skimp and go with a company that charges under $50 either (they may keep up-charging you for different services or charge for each derogatory item). Check out their rating on the BBB. Do just a little bit of homework.Take the leap with a credit repair company, or start to dispute items yourself from the website at Annual Credit Report (ACR). A credit repair company, most of the time, will dispute items via letter and regular mail. Disputing items yourself though ACR are done online. Personally, I like hitting the bureaus with disputes by mail. Simply because a real person has to open your mail and process that request. We all know humans can make errors, and they are only allowed to work so many hours in the day. If the credit bureaus cannot respond to the dispute within 30 or sometimes 45 days, that item can come off your report. See why I like hitting them with snail mail instead of going through the computer? Chances are you could increase your score simply because someone couldn’t get to your request fast enough. However, any action is better than none.This may seem overwhelming, but you’ll start to understand more and more as you investigate. And, once you have a good credit score, you can call your credit card companies and ask them to reduce your interest rate. You will no longer need to provide landlords with a bigger deposit, and who knows, maybe you’ll find yourself in a position to buy that car. Or better yet, you might find yourself in a position to buy a home. You deserve it. After all, you took action to make a change. A change for the better.
4 Reasons Why You Need Life Insurance in College Itself
Life is full of uncertainties and we can never know what life has planned for tomorrow. And students are no different in that. Even if you are a student that doesn’t mean that you are immune from the unwanted events of life. Life insurance policies protect you and your loved ones against the uncertainty of life. In case of an unfortunate event, the insurance provider helps with a lump sum amount of money helping the family to take care of financial debts and other responsibilities. Losing a child can be a heart-breaking experience for any parent and accumulated cash amount can be very helpful in such situations. Parents or loved ones may utilize this amount to help them to take care of funeral expenses, pending personal or education loans and other essential expenses. In this article, we are going to explain what is the importance of a life insurance for students and the benefits offered by various insurance providers.Life Insurance Options for StudentsInsurance providers are coming up with advantageous life insurance policies for different types of customers and students are no different. Usually, students are more into enjoying their college time than thinking of protection from unfortunate incidents. For once, it may seem irrelevant to the students, but if you go into the details, you will find life insurance is a smart buy. However, most people don’t realize the need in the early stages of their life and hence can’t buy one for them. Such policies are providing the students a useful way to take care of their study and other essential expenses.There are multiple companies offering life insurance plans at affordable rates online. You are just requested to fill an online for the official website of insurance providers or on an insurance portal with multiple providers. Insurance representatives from different companies will reach you with top insurance quotes as per your requirement. They will patiently listen to your queries, explain all the available plan clearly and suggest the most suitable for you. Comparing the different plans for their coverage and benefits, you can choose a plan offering the maximum coverage for the best price. Also, students are considered to have a longer life-expectancy than some older buyer and are expected to live longer. Hence, insurance policies offer a cheaper insurance plan to attract younger buyers. If you are unmarried along with being a student and make you mind buying a life insurance plan, you may qualify some great discount of your insurance plan and get a premium quite cheaper than someone who is married or is working with a firm. Moreover, if you buy a life insurance plan in early stage of life, you can help your parents take a breath if relief as they won’t have to think much about the uncertainty of future.Reasons to buy a life insurance plan for studentsThere are several reasons that may compel a student to a buy a life insurance for themselves. Here are a few of them:The Study LoanThis is one of the major reasons for students to buy a cheap life insurance policy for them. Almost every college student in the United States needs to take care of their educational and other essential expenses such the cost of lodging, food, and transportation themselves. They had to go for an education loan to pay their tuition fees that they will require repaying once the course is completed. There are two types of loans provided to students: Federal Study Loans and Private Study Loans. Federal study loans that are provided by federal Govt. waive off the loans if the insured dies before repaying the debt. But that not the case with private study loans. Generally, private loans are provided with a co-signer and if the insured dies without repaying the full amount, the co-signer will have to repay the balance. In cases, there is no co-signer, the debts are paid by selling a portion of estates named to the insured. Having a right insurance in place can help you avoid such consequences and secure you co-signer as well.Parents with DebtsMost often, when the students graduate, their parents will have their own debts that they might have taken to make the college education possible. The study loan alone will cost $30,000 on average and there are additional debts such as home equity lines of credit, credit card debt, 401(k) loans or mortgage debts that aren’t be waived off upon the death of the borrower. In case they die before repaying the debt, this may create a trouble for the parents who are grieving the loss of their child. Grieving parents may have their own debts and financial responsibilities, and this may add an additional financial burden to them.In such cases, insurance companies provide a lump sum death benefit to the parents that greatly helps to take care of pending financial debts of their deceased child. Hence, it’s always a good idea to buy an insurance in your college only. Just by filling a form on their websites, you can get multiple life insurance quotes online and choose a preferred insurance policy for you as well as your family. If you are in a dilemma, you can get the help experts from different insurance companies that will provide the life insurance policy details for each clearly and help you decide the most suitable insurance plan for you.Expenses of Young Marriage and New ParentsYou may not believe it at first, but a large number of students get married and have kids while there are in college. According to the National Center for Education Statistics, around 20 percent of undergraduate students are married, and more than 25 percent of undergraduate students are taking care of their kids while going to college. Losing a spouse at this age can be disheartening and the pending study loan can put an additional burden on the surviving spouse. Having a life insurance will provide an accumulated cash amount that will help the surviving spouse take care of pending financial debts, funeral expenses and help to raise the kids as well.Care of Older ParentsFor the students, who are youngest in their family or are born in later years will have an older parent by the time they will graduate. They may or may not have a full-time to take care of the family expenses and might be partly or fully dependent on their child as well. If they lose their child at such age, this can be heart-breaking for the parents and the additional burden of paying the pending financial debts may make the things worse. If the students would have a life insurance in place, this would help their parent to repay the financial debts as taking care of other essential expenses.
Recent Health News Articles on Stress
The people in Siolim, India, who are suffering from stress, depression and anxiety, are seldom properly treated. Doctors and nurses assigned in this far flung fishing and farming village focus more on physical ailments. Mostly, they prioritize children suffering from diarrhea, aging people with heart problems, and laborers with cut injuries. In the same way, locals fear to get diagnosed with related mental problems. They are afraid to experience disgrace from family and friends. It resulted to suffering in silence making their misery worse.In 2007, two specialists visited the town. Their main purpose was to identify people with anxiety and stress. Surprisingly, the doctors found themselves preoccupied the whole day and for the whole week. Dr. Anil Umraskar, the person in charge, claimed that a great number of people made up a “sizeable crowd” at the clinic. More and more patients with high level stress, anxiety and depression keep appearing daily.They concluded that most of the Indians with moderate to severe mental illness never go untreated. Research revealed that 80% to 90% of people suffering highest level of anxiety and stress do not get adequate treatment. It was then that Dr. Vikram Patel, psychiatrist of London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, started the Siolim Project. As of today, the clinic has been the forefront to treat the emotional and mental condition of the people in the area. It has expressed its potential to transform the mental health problem in some countries in the developing world.But instead of doctors, the program is training common people to identify symptoms of depression and treat individuals under stressed condition. With India’s population of more than one billion people it will take large sums of money to raise more psychiatrists to deal with depression problems. They have only 4,000 specialists in the whole country. Dr. Greg E. Simon, researcher in Centre for Health Studies in Seattle, commended Dr. Patel’s advocacy. He said “It’s a really interesting, exciting thing he’s doing.”The workers claimed that stress and depression has been as common to that of the wealthy. Poor people in poor countries experience the same emotional turmoil and are no longer viewed anxiety as Western affliction.Most of these poor patients express a wide variety of causes. 29 year old Medha Upadhye, one of the councilors said, “Financial difficulties and interpersonal conflicts are there. But Unemployment and Alcoholism are some of the major problems.”Individuals, who are identified suffering the problem, increase at least 20% in a given year. Experts say that even the remotest and poorest place, severe stress has become a disabling disease similar to malaria. It is theoretically affecting the economic condition of the society. If a farmer is suffering from consistent and constant depression or stress, he cannot get out of bed to work. Most likely, his family will not have food on the table.
The Other Path Reveals to Investors Lucrative Alternatives to Traditional Investments
In The Other Path, Robert J. Klosterman’s follow-up to The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, the author once again offers his astute financial and investment advice. The book’s subtitle, “Illuminating the Path Toward Volatility While Achieving Equity-Type Returns,” is apt, as that is just what Klosterman advocates that investors do to achieve optimal monetary gains with their investment portfolios. Klosterman gets his title from Robert Frost’s famous poem, “The Road Not Taken,” which he quotes at the beginning of The Other Path, a highly interesting book that offers investors insights into a different sort of investment approach than they might be used to, though a very effective one that is designed to aid investors to earn equity-type returns while reducing the volatility that many other investors experience who only try more traditional approaches when it comes to planning their portfolios.Klosterman’s book, The Other Path, is relatively short, coming in at just 60 pages, not counting the Appendices at the conclusion of it, but his approach to investing which he details in it is one which is very informative. The book is sure to interest and be beneficial to anyone who would like to lower his/her investment risks while maximizing his/her potential monetary returns.The very title of Klosterman’s book, The Other Path, alludes to an investment strategy, or road, that most people have traditionally followed, which is investing their money entirely in stocks, bonds and cash. Such an approach is a tried-and-true one that has proven beneficial to many investors, but it has also proven to be a sometimes volatile path for others. Investing in stocks, bonds and cash, Klosterman argues, is an important part of an overall investment strategy, though there are other opportunities for diversifying one’s investments and reducing the volatility many portfolios unfortunately undergo, a volatility which can cause the monetary value of one’s portfolio to experience a disastrous nosedive.Still, the main leg of the milk stool, that is, investing in stocks, bonds and cash, is a vital component in a wise investment strategy, according to Klosterman’s assessment in The Other Path. He calls it the core leg of a metaphorical three-legged milk stool, with each leg in the metaphor referring to a different but complimentary strategy when it comes to investing. If an investor diversifies his/her portfolio and does not solely focus on the main leg of stocks, bonds and cash, but also invests his/her money in nontraditional ways, Klosterman argues, using a series of useful and informative charts and graphs, that one’s portfolio is much less liable to experience a disastrous financial loss and the volatility of one’s portfolio will be reduced.The second of the three legs of the milk stool is “Diversifiers,” and the third leg is “Absolute Returns.” Klosterman argues that “Diversifiers,” or alternative or nontraditional Investments, help reduce the volatility of an overall investment portfolio. Some examples that the author gives of nontraditional investments include real estate, private equity, “developed and emerging international equities,” distressed debt, and managed futures. These sorts of nontraditional investments can reduce volatility by either having a “very low correlation with traditional markets,” as Klosterman writes, or by delivering “consistent returns year after year, with little or no volatility.”The third leg of the milk stool, “Absolute Returns,” is also the name of Chapter Four of The Other Path. Absolute returns are investments, according to Klosterman, which “demonstrate the same qualities of a bond with the assurance of return of principle and consistent payment of interest.” The author writes that they are similar to ten-year treasury bonds but “they are not backed by the full faith and credit of the United States.” Despite this, Klosterman states that aspect of absolute return vehicles can be considered to be an advantage. That is because strategies involving absolute return vehicles, as the author writes, “can invest in sound ideas and not have to fit restrictions that other institutions have.”One example is investing in companies that lend money to small businesses and house flippers. These companies can work fast and close loans faster than banks. These companies have the ability to provide quick access to loans for money to people like real estate developers or house flippers, in comparison to banks.In The Other Path, author Robert J. Klosterman writes about a no-nonsense approach to nontraditional investing and how it can benefit one’s investment portfolio and help reduce volatility. The book also examines and identifies “trouble signs” besides volatility when planning one’s portfolio, like groupthink, market disruptions and inflation. While Klosterman recommends that investors follow the advice of professionals who are experts in planning investment portfolios and have proven track records over at least a decade, The Other Path is an interesting and insightful look at adding nontraditional investments to an individual’s portfolio. Whether investors want and like to plan their investment strategies on their own, or with the advice of professionals, The Other Path is an eye-opening Must Read designed to inform investors of types of alternative investments that can balance out their portfolios and reduce the negative effects of market volatility. It is a book I would highly recommend to anyone who has ever considered expanding their investment portfolios and adding nontraditional investments to them.
Universal Health Care – The Ideal Health Care
There are various theories floating around about health care at the moment. Each and every single one has an ideal attached to it, in which every single individual gets accessible health care whenever they need it at an affordable rate. However, very few of them actually put a plan into action that dictates how the ideal would be achieved. One of those that does is universal health care. It does imply that every person in the world should have access to basic health care, which would raise the health level of the world. Universal health care also refuses to take factors like age, location and status into account. However, it is slightly optimistic considering the third world does not even have access to basic utilities yet.However, the idea of universal health care is backed by several ideas as to how it can be carried out. Universal health care should in fact be administered via a series of insurance policies that are controlled by the government of any given time. In this way, universal health care will give everyone access to health care whenever they need it at very little personal cost, thus ensuring that every single person can actually call a doctor out whenever necessary. Universal health care may also be administered through a series of clinics and other medical establishments to ensure that lower class individuals that cannot afford private health care can just drop by.Universal health care could actually be administered by any number of schemes in effect, but at least there are ideas in place to ensure that it could work if governments in power at the moment changed their policies. The ideal behind universal health care are valid as preventative as well as remedial because it would actually encourage everyone to have regular health checks to ensure that they stay in the best of health. This would include testing g younger people for STIs and monitoring their progress as they grow up via a series of vaccinations against diseases that may cut their lives short. Similarly, under universal health care would actually allow older people to be tested for ailments like diabetes on a regular basis too.Universal health care could provide treatment for every individual, whether they could afford it on paper or not. This would provide great positives for all of humanity and make for a much better world. There is so much more resting on universal health care than just health care alone. If we want a better world, we have to take the chance whenever we can. Universal is one of the chances we should take.
Why “Free Market Competition” Fails in Health Care
In trying to think about the future of health care, thoughtful, intelligent people often ask, “Why can’t we just let the free market operate in health care? That would drive down costs and drive up quality.” They point to the successes of competition in other industries. But their faith is misplaced, for economic reasons that are peculiar to health care.More “free market” competition could definitely improve the future of health care in certain areas. But the problems of the sector as a whole will not yield to “free market” ideas – never will, never can – for reasons that are ineluctable, that derive from the core nature of the market. We might parse them out into three:1. True medical demand is wildly variable, random, and absolute. Some people get cancer, others don’t. Some keel over from a heart attack, get shot, or fall off a cliff, others are in and out of hospitals for years before they die.Aggregate risk varies by socioeconomic class and age – the older you are, the more likely you are to need medical attention; poor and uneducated people are more likely to get diabetes. Individual risk varies somewhat by lifestyle – people who eat better and exercise have lower risk of some diseases; people who sky dive, ski, or hang out in certain bars have higher risk of trauma.But crucially, risk has no relation to ability to pay. A poor person does not suddenly discover an absolute need to buy a new Jaguar, but may well suddenly discover an absolute need for the services of a neurosurgeon, an oncologist, a cancer center, and everything that goes with it. And the need is truly absolute. The demand is literally, “You obtain this or you die.”2. All demand apes this absolute demand. Medicine is a matter of high skill and enormous knowledge. So doctors, by necessity, act as sellers, and agents of other sellers (hospitals, labs, pharmaceutical companies). Buyers must depend on the judgment of sellers as to what is necessary, or even prudent. The phrase “Doctor’s orders” has a peremptory and absolute flavor.For the most part, people do not access health care for fun. Recreational colonoscopies are not big drivers of health care costs. In some cases, such as cosmetic surgery or laser eye corrections, the decision is clearly one the buyer can make. It’s a classic economic decision: “Do I like this enough to pay for it?” But for the most part, people only access health care because they feel they have to. And in most situations, it is difficult for the buyer to differentiate the truly absolute demand (“Do this or you die”) from the optional.Often it is difficult even for the doctor to tell the difference. The doctor may be able truthfully to say, “Get this mitral valve replaced or you will die. Soon.” More often, it’s a judgment call, a matter of probabilities, and a matter of quality of life: “You will likely live longer, and suffer less, if you get a new mitral valve, get a new hip, take this statin.At the same time the doctor, operating both as seller and effectively as agent for the buyer, is often rewarded for selling more (directly through fees and indirectly through ownership of labs and other services), and is not only not rewarded, but actually punished, for doing less (through the loss of business, the threat of malpractice suits, and punishment for insufficiently justifying coding).So the seller is agent for the buyer, the seller is rewarded for doing more and punished for doing less, and neither the buyer nor the seller can easily tell the difference between what is really necessary and what is optional.This is especially true because the consequences of the decision are so often separated from the decision. “Eat your broccoli” may actually be a life-or-death demand; maybe you need to eat more vegetables to avoid a heart attack. But you’re not going to die tonight because you pushed the broccoli around the plate and then hid it under the bread.So, because it is complex and difficult, and because its consequences are often not immediate and obvious, the buy decision is effectively transferred to the seller. We depend on the seller (the doctor) to tell us what we need. Whether we buy or not usually depends almost solely on whether we trust the doctor and believe what the doctor says.3. The benefit of medical capacity accrues even to those who do not use it. Imagine a society with no police. Having police benefits you even if you never are the victim of a crime. You benefit from that new bridge even if you never drive over it, because it eases the traffic jams on the roads you do travel, because your customers and employees and co-workers use it, and because development in the whole region benefits from the new bridge.This is the infrastructure argument. Every part of health care, from ambulances and emergency room capacity to public health education to mass vaccinations to cutting-edge medical research, benefits the society as a whole, even those who do not use that particular piece. This is true even of those who do not realize that they benefit from it, even of those who deny that they benefit from it. They benefit from having a healthier work force, from keeping epidemics in check, from the increased development that accrues to a region that has good medical capacity – even from the reduction in medical costs brought about by some medical spending, as when a good diabetes program keeps people from having to use the Emergency Room.All three of these core factors show why health care is not responsive to classic economic supply-and-demand theory, and why the “free market” is not a satisfactory economic model for health care, even if you are otherwise a believer in it.Answers for the future of health care?The answer to the first problem, the variability and absolute nature of risk, is clearly to spread the risk over all who share it, even if it is invisible to them. If you drive a car, you must have car insurance, and your gas taxes contribute to maintaining the infrastructure of roads and bridges; if you own a home, you must have fire insurance, and your property taxes pay for the fire department. Because of your ownership and use of these things, you not only must insure yourself against loss, you also must pay part of the infrastructure costs that your use of them occasions. Similarly, all owners and operators of human bodies need to insure against problems that may accrue to their own body, and pay some of the infrastructure costs that their use of that body occasions. However the insurance is structured and paid for, somehow everyone who has a body needs to be insured for it – the cost of the risk must be spread across the population.Skipping to the third problem, the infrastructure argument, its answer is somewhat similar: To the extent to which health care capacity is infrastructure, like police, fire, ports, highways, and public education, the costs are properly assigned to the society as a whole; they are the type of costs that we normally assign to government, and pay for through taxes, rather than per transaction. In every developed country, including the United States, health care gets large subsidies from government, because it is seen as an infrastructure capacity.That leaves the second problem, the way in which all demand apes the absolute nature of true demand in health care (“Get this or die”). The answer to this problem is more nuanced, because it is not possible to stop depending on the judgment of physicians. Medical judgment is, in the end, why we have doctors at all. But we can demand that doctors apply not just their own judgment in the moment, but the research and judgment of their profession. This is the argument for evidence-based medicine and comparative effectiveness research. If a knee surgeon wishes to argue that you should have your arthritic knee replaced when, according to the judgment of the profession as a whole, the better answer in your situation is a cortisone shot and gentle daily yoga, the surgeon should have to justify somehow, even if just for the record, why your case is different and special. The physician’s capacity to make a buy decision on your behalf must be restrained at least by the profession’s medical judgment. If the best minds in the profession, publishing in the peer-reviewed literature, have come to the conclusion that a particular procedure is ineffective, unwarranted, or even dangerous, it is reasonable for insurers, public or private, to follow that best medical judgment and stop paying for it.These three core factors – the absolute and variable nature of health care demand, the complexity of medicine, and the infrastructure-like nature of health care capacity – are all endemic to health care and cannot be separated from it. And all three dictate that health care cannot work as a classic economic response to market demands. Failure to acknowledge these three core factors and structure health care payments around them account for much of the current market’s inability to deliver value. Paying “fee for service,” when the doctor is both the seller and acting as agent for the buyer, and when the doctor is punished for doing less, is a prescription for always doing more, whether “more” delivers more value or not. Paying “fee for service,” unrestrained by any way to make classic value judgments, means that hospitals and medical centers respond to competition by adding capacity and offering more services, whether or not those services are really needed or add value.For all these reasons, it is vastly more complex to structure a health care market rationally, in a way that delivers real value, than it is to structure any other sector, and simply fostering “free market” competition will not solve the problem.