Getting even a tentative handle on the multi-trillion dollar federal budget is no easy matter. Still, as the debate surrounding U.S. spending, taxes and the looming debt ceiling continues, it's worth asking: Exactly how does America spend all that cash, and what do the choices being debated really mean?
The Tea Party-led Republican Party has already won the battle to cut this year's federal budget, and it has announced a plan to dismantle Medicare. Is a proposal to cut Social Security payments next?
Republicans pushing for spending cuts in the 2011 federal budget may be ready to shut the government down to get their way. But is anyone ready to do what it would take to really make a dent in the federal budget: raise taxes on the rich and close corporate tax loopholes?
More than half of American workers have less than $25,000 saved for retirement, but having too little set aside is just one of many ways you can sabotage your later years. We examine some oft-made financial planning traps -- and the safe paths around them.
Amid high unemployment rates and rising health-care costs, a smaller proportion of Americans -- less than 45% -- are getting health insurance from their employers, according to a recent Gallup survey.
Whistleblowing firm Ven-A-Care has recovered $2 billion for taxpayers by suing drug companies that overcharge the government and create windfalls for participating pharmacies. It also has made $380 million for itself. What's the problem with that?
In his State of the Union address, President Obama didn't shy away from tackling the ongoing questions about the health care reform law head on. And though he opened with a joke, he made it clear that while he's serious about repairing any flaws in the law, repeal is not an option.
Americans' opinions on the divisive topic are all over the map. A new poll shows more than half of Americans now oppose the law, compared to only 41% who support it. Yet 62% -- including 38% of Republicans -- actually disapprove of defunding or changing parts of the law.
Led by the health insurance reform law, a flurry of drug and food recalls, key medical breakthroughs and plenty of layoffs and lawsuits, 2010 proved to be an exciting -- if not always positive -- year. Here's our rundown of the biggest health care stories.
An survey of 11 industrialized nations finds adults in the U.S. are by far the most likely to go without health care or skip filling a prescription because of costs, due to a high-cost health care system that lags behind those of other modern countries.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released data that found that almost half of all Americans took at least one prescription drug per month in 2008, up from 43.5% a decade ago.
A record one in six Americans is on Medicaid, the government's health program for the poor. And Medicaid is just one of several government anti-poverty programs that have seen large increases in caseloads -- and costs.
