I'm 38 and just rolled $120,000 into an IRA. I'm trying to decide whether I should invest it on my own or pay an investment firm a fee to do it for me. I'm inexperienced, so I really don't even know what information I should factor into this decision. Any suggestions? -- Trevor S.
A federal watchdog took a bite out of military hospitals this month, warning it is impossible to tell if some doctors are licensed, properly trained and evaluated in their specialties.
When a health insurance claim denial lands in the mailbox, do you figure the hassle of going to battle isn't worth it? Think again.
Over the last three years, the number of contraband cell phones seized in federal prisons and minimum-security facilities has quadrupled, according to a report issued by the General Accountability Office.
Nobody likes having to pay more in taxes. And it's true that the country is on track to spend more than it can afford.
Thousands of contractors who got stimulus money to do such things as build roads and provide social services owe more than $750 million in back taxes, a federal investigation has found.
Undercover government investigators were able to get into major U.S. seaports -- at one point driving a vehicle containing a simulated explosive -- by flashing counterfeit or fraudulently obtained port "credentials" to security officials -- raising serious questions about a program that has issued the cards to more than 1.6 million people, Congress disclosed Tuesday.
In making the case for why lawmakers need to tackle the long-term debt, President Obama chose the one projection that brings home the point better than any other.
AT&T will acquire T-Mobile USA from telecommunications company Deutsche Telekom for an estimated $39 billion in cash and stock, the companies said in a joint release Sunday.
You can wave bye-bye to $4 billion in government spending.
The U.S. government could save tens of billions of dollars a year by streamlining a bloated federal bureaucracy, according to a report Tuesday from the Government Accountability Office.
Is this any way to run a government?
The countdown to a possible government shutdown is on.
It cost more than $193 million for the Pentagon to implement the policy of removing gays and lesbians from military service over six years, a study says.
Those who clamor for more "limited government" rarely define what they mean. But assuming nothing changes over the next decade, Americans could be left with a de facto limited government -- limited in what it will be able to do.
Some court-appointed guardians for incapacitated seniors are not screened before they're appointed, and many are not monitored by the courts after they've taken over the affairs of their charges, resulting in hundreds of allegations of abuse, a federal probe found.
Congress has sent President Barack Obama a bill that that will significantly increase the number of lawmakers notified about the administration's most secret intelligence activities.
The corporate glass ceiling has been cracked, but the number of women breaking through it is largely stagnant, according to a government report released Tuesday.
I am a product of the "The Black Church." It shaped me into who I am today: a Christian pastor aware of God's amazing grace and love.
The public and private sector are not doing enough to share information that could help prevent a catastrophic cyberattack on the nation's critical infrastructure, according to a report by the General Accountability Office released on Monday.
Mike DiGiacomo graduated with a graphics design degree from Gibbs College, owing more than $30,000 in federal student loans and tens of thousands of dollars in private student loans -- a sum he's finding almost impossible to pay off with his $31,000-a-year job at a FedEx Office store in a Boston, Massachusetts, suburb.
updated: Wed Aug 04 2010 20:01:00
A government investigation finds some colleges deceive students with dishonest recruiting. CNN's Lisa Sylvester reports.
Flight delays decreased 6 percent from 2007 to 2009, largely because airlines put fewer planes in the sky because of the recession, according to a study by the Government Accountability Office.
Staff members at eight Head Start centers manipulated income information given to them by undercover applicants so that the applicants would get benefits they were not qualified for, according to a Government Accountability Office report being released Tuesday.
The Better Business Bureau is out with a new warning: beware of some debt settlement companies.
On the face of it, a reverse mortgage sounds like a no-lose deal for older homeowners. A lender gives you what amounts to a cash advance on your home equity -- no minimum income or credit score required. And you don't have to pay it back until you move or die, when the proceeds from the house sale typically will be used to close out the loan. But in fact, reverse mortgages have some serious drawbacks. Here's what you need to know.
While hundreds of thousands of disability claims lay backlogged at the Department of Veterans Affairs, thousands of technology employees at the department received $24 million in bonuses, a new report says.
A contrite head of the Federal Protective Service took the blame Wednesday for security lapses that allowed covert investigators to sneak bomb components into 10 federal government buildings.
updated: Wed Jul 08 2009 20:01:00
Government investigators successfully snuck bomb components past guards into federal buildings. Brian Todd reports.
The two federal agencies most responsible for stemming the flow of firearms to Mexico agreed Tuesday to improve cooperation after they were sharply criticized by a congressional report for lack of coordination.
Congressional auditors have uncovered widespread abuse of techniques used to restrain or discipline special-education students in U.S. schools, with some deaths linked to the practices, a top congressman says.
Marjorye Heeney knew something was wrong when she saw a bulging cloud of black dust darken the sky.
A better recipe for disaster hardly seems possible: Allow politicians to take billions of dollars of your money and dole it out to other politicians, who then give it to other government administrators. All of whom ask you to trust that the funds will be spent wisely.
With a bailout bill floating through Congress, America's automakers are hoping for a lifeline from Uncle Sam that could help them hold on until the summer.
A new Government Accountability Office report on voting system testing finds that the Election Assistance Commission has not notified election officials across the country about electronic voting machine failures.
The Pentagon will reopen bidding Wednesday for one of the largest contracts in military history, Sen. Richard Shelby, Republican of Alabama, said in a statement on his Web site.
The U.S. has five-star rankings for restaurants and hotels. So why not five-star rankings for nursing homes?
The Department of Homeland Security unveiled measures Monday aimed at easing the aggravation associated with air travel, including new screening machines, clearer standards for identification, and a new effort to keep travelers from falsely being identified as potential terrorists.
Terri Lovin and her husband, Harold, may have had the world's most expensive pizza ... at $117 a pie. No, it's not gourmet dining. A cashier charged the couple twice for the $22.50 pizza.
Sensitive and stolen U.S. military items are being sold on eBay and Craigslist, according to a report by the Government Accountability Office.
When you fork over $36 billion, it stands to reason that you should know exactly what you're paying for.
The federal agency charged with safeguarding nuclear reactors has underestimated the potential for terrorists to attack small research reactors on college campuses as well as the potential impact of such attacks, congressional investigators said in a report released Tuesday.
The nation's three nuclear weapons laboratories have had almost 60 serious accidents or near misses in the past seven years, according to a report released Wednesday by the Government Accountability Office.
Government watchdogs have found that thousands of people who shouldn't have been admitted to the United States were mistakenly allowed in last year because of security lapses at legal border crossings.
Question: I'm 30 years old and invest regularly in my 401(k). So far, my account has been doing well, but I wonder whether that might change when retiring baby boomers stop making investment contributions and begin taking money out of their retirement accounts. Are we in for a bump down the road when the boomers retire? - Jason, Salt Lake City, Utah
The cable television industry has launched a $200 million advertising campaign to assure customers they will still be able to watch their favorite programs after the transition to digital broadcasting.
The Homeland Security Department has failed to meet even half of its performance expectations in the four years it has been in existence, congressional auditors concluded
Juggling work, family, friends and community may seem sometimes like an impossible task. A flexible work schedule may be one solution to a better work-life balance.
Employees at the Seattle office of the U.S. Government Accountability Office know that they have to put in 80 hours of work every two weeks.
Employees at the Seattle office of the U.S. Government Accountability Office know that they have to put in 80 hours of work every two weeks. But they can configure those hours pretty much how they'd like, with the exception of the one day a week their managers require all employees to be at the office at the same time.
Gasoline prices hit an all time high of $3.227 a gallon just before the Memorial Day holiday, and once again, Congress has taken the easy way out. Instead of doing anything substantive about the United States' unquenchable thirst for gasoline, it has gone searching for phony villains - and found them in the personage of mysterious "price gougers."
It's tough enough to save for retirement without having to worry about hidden fees in your 401(k).
Americans are drowning in credit card debt - over $5,000 on average. And credit card companies aren't helping the situation.
Late fees and penalty interest rates continue to charge higher, according to a recent report from the Government Accountability Office.
They carried fake IDs and used phony names. But the ne'er-do-wells -- actually plain-clothed government investigators -- were able to get into the United States anyway.
The Department of Veterans Affairs has not done enough to protect its data in the four years since it was first warned of problems, according to a report from the Government Accountability Office.
THE BOILING DEBATE over the economics of immigration may give you an eerie sense of déjà vu, and no wonder: Its superheated rhetoric recalls the polarized and exaggerated arguments over open trade ...
The boiling debate over the economics of immigration may give you an eerie sense of déjà vu, and no wonder: Its superheated rhetoric recalls the polarized and exaggerated arguments over open trade and globalization in the 1990s.
Did you pay too much in taxes last year? Millions of Americans did last year, according to a government report.
In a post-9/11 world where immigration processes are governed by security concerns, seeking visas for business travel ventures can be a bureaucratic nightmare.
Congressman Michael Oxley says something stinks in the title-insurance industry. The chairman of the Financial Services Committee is calling for an investigation into the companies that sell insurance to insure the legal transfer of ownership from sellers to buyers.
Coin collectors can look forward to a new series of gold-colored dollar coins depicting portraits of former presidents, according to a report published Friday.
More details about the abuse of soldiers from misleading and overpriced insurance ploys will be reported by a government auditor next week, according to people who have seen the report.
NEW YORK (CNN/Money) - Many states have been hiking cigarette taxes for years, claiming that they discourage smoking and contribute much-needed tax revenues to state coffers.
The Pentagon has come a long way from its '80s splurges on $435 hammers, but it still has a ways to go, according to a recent report by the General Accountability Office. For the 26 programs the GA...
Like lemmings rushing into the fjords, Congress cannot seem to resist a leap into the dollar-coin money pit.
Here are some of the key provisions of the intelligence reform bill that finally made it through Congress Tuesday:
The latest corporate tax bill--passed by Congress in early October and stuffed with $137 billion in tax breaks--will bring the business community's share of the national tax burden to its lowest le...
Buying a home brings all kinds of joys -- the satisfaction of not paying a landlord, the pleasure of having your own space -- and best of all, the tax deduction.
Saddam Hussein's regime made billions of dollars more than originally estimated from the United Nations' Oil for Food program and smuggling, the General Accounting Office said Thursday.
Uncle Sam may begin playing repo man when it comes to Americans donating their old cars to charity.
John Kerry can relate. The Democratic senator from Massachusetts is also a former small business man who ran his own bakery at Boston's Faneuil Hall Market. So when the following tale was told at a...
For more than two years, Ed Yardeni, Deutsche Bank's chief economist, has been Wall Street's biggest Y2K agitator. His forecast--that Y2K had a 70% chance of causing a global recession this year--a...
With all the lurid tales coming out of Washington, D.C. these days, a bit of good news got scant attention earlier this year: The Clinton Administration is reportedly considering raising $2.5 billi...
If after reading the previous story you feel emboldened to finance your next big-ticket purchase, your thoughts may turn to a pretty alluring lender: yourself. After all, it's likely that your 401(...
There may be no such thing as a free lunch, but our U.S. senators get pretty close to it. According to a recent audit by the General Accounting Office, last year the Senate dining facilities lost a...
In December, MONEY reported on an alarming trend: bankers charging so-called convenience fees of 50 to $2 to other banks' customers who withdraw money from their ATMs. Since our article, even more ...
As chairman of the Senate Finance Subcommittee on Deficits, Debt Management and Long-Term Economic Growth, Sen. Bill Bradley (D-N.J.) plans to make retirement savings a top priority in the 104th Co...
CRACKDOWN ON ROGUE BROKERS Two reports setting the stage for stiff legislation are due June 24. Rep. John Dingell (D-Mich.), chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, has ordered the Sec...
BY NOW, you must have heard that there is another crisis brewing of savings and loan-like proportions, this one in the nation's private pension system. Thousands of corporate plans do not have enou...
Recessions hurt everyone. But for the jobless, the past recession's sting was especially acute: A smaller percentage received unemployment benefits than in most previous recessions. The General Acc...
HAPPY WITH your broker? Probably. The market has been good to most investors over the past 11 years, and odds are you're dealing with a well-trained and ethical professional who takes his job serio...
After a recent study by the General Accounting Office (GAO) showed that Social Security's toll-free hotline is less than a ringing success -- the GAO's calls went unanswered 56% of the time -- MONE...
While traditional fee-for-service plans sometimes give doctors an incentive to prescribe more treatment than is necessary, many managed-care plans actually have an incentive to undertreat you -- si...
A sharp rise in tax-deductible home-equity and second-mortgage loans has contributed to a dramatic decline in the equity that Americans hold in their homes, as the charts above show. Indeed, the eq...
IS AN S&L-SIZE DISASTER brewing among America's commercial banks? With banks already failing at the highest rate since the Great Depression, both the Congressional Budget Office and the General Acc...
The Treasury Department, which last summer put a $73 billion pricetag on the S&L disaster, has increased its estimate to between $90 billion and $130 billion. Over the same period, the General Acco...
New York Senator Daniel Moynihan's proposal to cut Social Security taxes provides an unpleasant reminder of the enormous bite that they take out of your paycheck: up to $3,924.45 this year if you e...
TIRED OF worrying about America's budget deficit? Now you can start worrying about the vast sums that are not on the budget. Uncle Sam's off-budget guarantees will climb from $2.1 trillion in 1980 ...
Are the top pension cops at the U.S. Department of Labor the modern-day equivalents of Paul Revere or of Chicken Little? The answer, which is still unclear, could determine whether all the 51 milli...
With Medicare's new catastrophic coverage picking up more of the health-care tab for older Americans, you might think that medigap insurance -- the private policies that pay the portion of costs th...
One of these days a Congressman will stand in the well of the House and utter the truth about sweatshops, but no way does this person figure to come from the tenth district of New York. The tenth, ...
What's the world's most expensive credit card? According to Congressman Joseph DioGuardi, a Republican from Westchester County, New York, it's the card by which Representatives electronically regis...
Congressmen more familiar with yeas and nays than with puts and calls are getting a ''crash'' course in the arcana of Black Monday. Their primer: the President's Brady Commission report. Among othe...
Forget for a moment the issue of Social Security's future solvency. Today the agency is facing a challenge over the accuracy of its records -- which ultimately determines whether you will get all t...
Few government programs have proved as benighted as the federal operation to enrich uranium for use as nuclear fuel in generating electricity. The effort has cost taxpayers billions and given them ...
In which the present writer continues for some reason to propound long-winded interrogatories, the answers to which everybody knows, or if not we are in even bigger trouble than previously postulat...
The United States is swimming in milk, and the Department of Agriculture wants to mop it up. In a sweeping offensive against overproduction, the department will spend $1.8 billion to help nearly 14...
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