Save & Invest

"my Social Security," is a new online service that provides individuals quick access to their personal Social Security information. The site enables working individuals to obtain their earnings record and see estimates of future retirement, disability, and survivor benefits. It also enables people, who already receive Social Security benefits to get a benefit verification letter, check benefit payment information, change their address or phone number, and start or change direct deposit information online. Check it out!

This edition of FDIC Consumer News focuses on small businesses. They are crucial to the U.S. economy and they're very important to the entrepreneurs who put their own money and long hours into operating and growing a company. If you're a small business owner – or you want to be – read our tips on ways to handle your business' finances, including getting loans, paying for everyday expenses, understanding your rights and responsibilities, and guarding against fraud.

Use savings bonds to plan for your financial future.

Traditional economic theory posits that people make decisions by maximizing a utility function in which all of the relevant constraints and preferences are included and weighed appropriately. Behavioral economists and decision-making researchers, however, are interested in how people make decisions in the face of incomplete information, limited cognitive resources, and decision biases.

This article provides an overview of the literature on best practices for retirement savings plan design and financial education in the workplace. Without a successful plan design, financial education will not be effective and even a well-structured plan can fail to achieve retirement savings goals without financial education. The main components of a retirement savings program that employers must consider include options for enrollment, investment choices, employer matching of contributions, and distributions over the working career and at retirement.

Minority groups, particularly Hispanics and Blacks, are less likely to use formal financial advice compared to their White counterparts and have lower levels of financial literacy on average. This gap in literacy may have important implications for savings, investing, and retirement planning. To better reach these groups and improve financial literacy, the literature recommends making access to financial education easier, targeting the education to the population, and delivering it through preferred methods.

The practice of spreading money among different investments to reduce risk is known as diversification. By picking the right group of investments, you may be able to limit your losses and reduce the fluctuations of investment returns without sacrificing too much potential gain. To learn more about this investment strategy, read the SEC’s online materials on diversification.

Increased policy and academic attention has been placed on promoting retirement savings early in the life course. This study investigates the extent to which retirement savings behavior among young persons, a population for which retirement savings is important but typically low, differs by marital status. We draw national survey data on young adult households (ages 22 – 35; N = 3,894) from the U.S. Federal Reserve Board’s Survey of Consumer Finances (SCF). Results reveal considerable differences by marital status.

How the CFPB serves the unique challenges and financial education needs of military service members facing deployment, change of duty stations, and emergencies.

We are with you at every step of the way. From start to finish, we can help you make informed financial decisions about paying for college.