The days of bigger candy bars and mega toilet paper rolls are gone. With record inflation comes “shrinkflation,” the term used when companies give you less product for the same price. Instead of more obviously passing on higher prices to customers in the sticker price, companies sneakily trim product quantities, hoping consumers won’t notice. But…

When President Biden took office, the Black community stood strongly behind him, but things have changed. Just look at the data. A new report from Pew Research shows that the sharpest drop in approval for President Biden is among Black protestants.   In March 2021, shortly after he took office, President Biden’s support among African American protestants…

The Federal Reserve is hiking the federal funds rate multiple times in 2022 in an attempt to depress 40-year-high inflation. The move is meant to reverse easy monetary policies put in place at the start of the pandemic. From March 15, 2020, to March 16, 2022, the Fed’s target interest rate was set to “near…

A week after topping $130 per barrel, oil prices have dropped back down to around $100 per barrel. According to CNBC, West Texas Intermediate crude, the U.S. oil benchmark, peaked at $129.44 per barrel last Monday. Meanwhile, Brent crude, the international benchmark, topped out at $133.15 last Monday. A week later, West Texas Intermediate dropped to $99.76…

A major COVID lockdown in China’s technology hub could cause knots in the supply chain for U.S. companies like Apple and fuel higher inflation. Residents of Shenzhen, just north of Hong Kong, have been told to lock down for at least a week over a COVID outbreak there. The city has reported more than 400…

Russia’s threat of war helped fuel February’s inflation numbers, hitting a new 40-year high of 7.9%. The price spike doesn’t include the surge in gas prices and wheat seen in March since the start of the war, which has economists worried the worst could be yet to come. Energy, food and shelter are the largest…

Pressure has been building on the Biden administration to begin loosening sanctions on Venezuela after President Nicolas Maduro freed two American prisoners and promised to resume negotiations with his opponents. The U.S. engagement comes as Venezuela’s financial lifeline to Russia is fraying under sanctions on Moscow following its bombardment of Ukraine. Venezuela has been under…

Gasoline prices are pushing further north of $4 per gallon as President Joe Biden announced the U.S. will ban all Russian oil imports in retaliation for the country’s invasion of Ukraine. Even before the invasion, inflation, at its highest level in decades, had become the top issue on the minds of voters ahead of elections this…

If you thought that January was as bad as it could get for your stock portfolio, I suggest you prepare yourself. Because it may just be the beginning of a long and painful market correction we’re about to see. I’m not here to tell you how to invest your money or to tell you where…

President Biden didn’t say much in his first State of the Union address. But what he did discuss does not instill much hope for America. Probably the worst State of the Union I’ve seen in my career. There was no natural theme to it. He opened on Ukraine ’cause how could he not? Then he bounced around to various ideas…