The Pew Charitable Trusts

Don't Worry About Today's Retirees - but Gen X Is In Trouble

It turns out that Americans in their sixties today have it better than any generation before them, but the generations behind them face a much less prosperous retirement.

Is Prepaid the Future of Plastic? Fee-Hungry Banks Hope So

There's a new wave of plastic filling the middle ground between credit cards and debit cards: refillable cards -- or prepaid cards -- that act like a hybrid of both. They're an attractive option for consumers -- and a convenient way for banks to sidestep recent consumer protection laws.

Prepaid Cards Are 'Risky' and Loaded with Fees, Pew Study Finds

Reloadable prepaid cards, which work like debit cards without a bank account, have been growing in popularity. But prepaid cards are riskier than you'd realize, and most come with between 7 and 15 fees - many of which aren't disclosed - reveals a new study from a nonpartisan think tank.

Senators Take Aim at Bank Accounts' Fine Print

Practically nobody ever reads the disclosures that came with a bank account, and that's no surprise -- they average 111 pages long. That's way too much fine print, say Sens. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) and Jack Reed (D-R.I.), who are calling on banks to cut those disclosures down to just one easy-to-comprehend page.

Older Workers Hit Hardest by Long Term Joblessness

How many Americans have been out of work for more than a year? Around 4.4 million -- about the same as the population of Louisiana. And a disproportionate percentage of those long-term unemployed workers are 55 and older.

More Southerners Are Off the Banking Grid

More people in Southeast don't have bank accounts than in any other part of the country. Mississippi leads the country with more than 16% of households using cash-and-carry for all their transactions. That's a situation that can keep families from climbing the ladder of success.