• tiaa-cref - help with teacher retirements
• vanguard.com - move your retirement money
• annualcreditreport.com - get your free credit report
• craigslist.org - free online classifieds
• kijiji.com - online classifieds
• squaretrade.com - eBay partner

We say all the time how great people are who become teachers. These individuals work overtime to teach our children and very often get little in return. But teachers have been taken advantage of for as long as Clark can remember, especially when they retire. First of all teachers don’t have access to the same retirement plans that other workers are. Instead they are forced into 403b plans, which are inferior in nature to 401k plans. Even worse, they’re offered very few choices and most of them are horrible annuity plans. In the worst cases, teacher’s unions are handling the retirement plans and are taking kickbacks for putting teachers in a certain annuity. In New York, for example, the New York State United Teachers union gets a $3 million kickback to put teachers in these plans. If you’re a teacher, you need to know about this and take action. You can transfer your money tax free to two low-cost companies. The companies with the lowest costs are TIAA-Cref and Vanguard. TIAA-Cref is cheaper than Vanguard, but both are much better choices than any kind of annuity your union is pushing on you. If you have friends who are teachers, please let them know. For the full story, click here.

Over the years, Clark has taken issue on the air with people who try to “sell” others on the idea that they don’t have to pay income taxes. Every time it happened, Clark got more complaints from people who believed it. Just because some presenter in a hotel ballroom tells you that income taxes are voluntary doesn’t mean it’s true. If you get involved you can get in serious trouble and maybe go to jail. It happened to one woman that Clark has mentioned on the air named Lynn Meredith. She has made millions of dollars selling her kits on avoiding income tax. She was very flamboyant about it, shamelessly driving around in a Mercedes convertible. Well, now she’s going to be riding in a prison bus. Meredith was sentenced to more than 10 years for defrauding the IRS and failing to file her income taxes. She’s one of many people making money off your willingness to believe that you don’t have to pay. So, when someone starts telling you about laws you don’t have to follow and then offers you a solution that involves paying them for a solution, run the other way!

Are we capable of changing how we drive because of the price of gas? There were many surveys done about people changing their driving patterns because of the price of gasoline. But a new report from USA Today states that gasoline demand is up from a year ago. It’s the strongest year over year increase in many months and it’s the sixth consecutive week that the demand for gas has gone up. So, how do we address the issue of how much oil we’re using? We make ourselves weaker as a country when we’re dependent on foreign sources for oil. And it hurts us in the wallet individually. So, the next time you’re ready to buy a new car, consider one that gets better fuel economy – maybe a hybrid or LEV. One thing you don’t want to do is dump a car prematurely because it gets bad gas. The cost of the car itself will far outweigh the savings you’ll make on gas. Now, if you’re ready to buy a new car because yours is dying, then it’s time.

The Wall Street Journal has been doing a series of stories about a movement in the health insurance business that should be music to the ears of individuals. The industry has decided that its greatest profits will no longer come from giant corporations, but from individuals and small businesses. Many of the small companies are following Kaiser Permanente, one of the largest HMOs, into the individual health coverage market. The problem right now is that insurers are cherry picking people they want to cover. This move is a good one, but there should be a way to cover all people. The state of New York requires that everyone get insurance, but it doesn’t pinpoint plans for people depending on their health and age. Clark thinks that is too extreme. Kaiser, on the other hand, puts people into you’re in a certain category based on age. Every five years, people move into a higher risk category and the cost goes up. Clark thinks this is the way to go. It doesn’t solve the problem of lack of insurance for everyone out there. But it ensures that once people are in, they’re in.

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In other health news, Costco is now experimenting with providing insurance in Southern California. It’s a pilot program for self-employed people and students, and it’s designed to be 20 percent cheaper than traditional insurance for entrepreneurs. So, good things are starting to stir, but we need some ground rules for insurance companies that are cherry picking its members.

How do you pay for things these days? Most people use either a debit card, a credit card, cash and some people still use checks. But a new way of paying is on the horizon. Paying with your fingerprint or thumbprint is growing like gangbusters. It was developed by a company known as “BioPay,” and it allows stores to verify that someone is really who they say they are. It’s popping up in supermarkets and convenience stores. People in Germany are even accessing their bank accounts with a fingerprint. The Washington Post reports that supermarkets in South Carolina are experimenting with this program. It’s already going on in 80 supermarkets in Georgia and South Carolina. Clark is fine with the idea of using these systems as long as it's voluntary.

eBay is starting to get hurt a lot by its FREE rival classified site, Craig’s List. So, what did the company do? It bought the company. Craig’s List, the popular local classified site, has grown so much in popularity that the concept is spreading all over the world. KnightRidder, the newspaper chain, is making its advertising free online because it was getting crushed by Craig’s List. eBay has also started a free advertising site outside the U.S. known as kajiji.com. With these free local sites, there is no protection against fraud or other crimes. But prospective buyers can check out goods before they buy because everything is local. We’ll see how all of these pan out.