Dear Readers,
Thanks to those of you who have made the 8 Weeks to Vibrant Health no-cost teleseminar series such a resounding success. For those of you who haven’t joined us yet, it’s never too late. The next session is this Thursday night, March 5, with replays on Friday and Saturday. Register now. The 8-part series will continue through May with loads of information from Dr. Hyla Cass and me.
I’m on my way to Anaheim, California this week for thre natural products Expo West. This huge show is a gold mine of new products, innovative ideas for healthier, greener living and ideas and a wonderful opportunity to connect with people who share my passions for health and preserving the planet. Look for my blog posts on Expo in the coming weeks. If you haven’t already subscribed to the RSS feed for my blog, you’ll find it on my home page.
In the meantime, despite the bitter cold this week, spring will soon be with us. I actually had a solitary daffodil blooming in mid-February. There is hope!
Be well,
Kathleen
Credit Card Defaults: The Next Banking Crisis
I have a stellar credit rating, over 770, never had a late pay, etc. You can imagine how stunned I was when I received a letter from one of my credit card companies telling me that my current interest rate (8.99%) was being raised to 29%! Of course, I do have the option to
“opt-out,” pay off my current balance (which is zero) at the current interest rate and then have the card cancelled.
This is happening everywhere, to people with stellar credit ratings and to those who have been a little shaky. Who isn’t a little shaky in these trying times?
It’s obvious that the banks are worried that people will default on their credit cards, so to prevent that, they are raising the interest rates to the roof. This is exactly the kind of wrong-headedness and moronic thought processes that got the banks into the sub-prime mortgage crisis and which will precipitate the next crisis of massive credit card defaults.
Imagine you have a credit card with a $10,000 balance at 8.99%. You’re paying $100 a month and making slow headway. The bankrate.com calculator says you’ll crawl out from under that debt in seven years.
Now imagine your most wonderful, most loving and understanding credit card company suddenly raises your rates to the stratosphere. You may or may not be given an “opt-in” offer to have your credit shut down, freeze your current interest rate and have your account closed when the balance is paid.
At 29% interest, you’ll never pay off your debt at the rate of $100 a month because your payments will not even cover the interest. In order to make any headway, your payments will be raised to at least $250 a month. At that rate, it will take you nearly 12 years to erase the debt.
For argument’s sake, let’s continue with the imaginary scenario that you have just been given notice that you are being laid off.
Your top priorities are (and should be) to keep your car, so you can travel to a new job, and your home. Other priorities are obviously food, utilities and medical insurance. Where do those already unaffordable $250 a month credit card payments fall? You’re right: At the bottom of the list.
Your thinking process goes something like this: You need a car to get a new job and that has to the the most important thing in your life. If you default on your credit card, your credit will be in the toilet for seven years, but you’ll still have the necessities of life: car, house, food, etc.
What choice do you think you (and most people) will make? You’ll grit your teeth, default on your credit cards and let your credit rating suffer.
It’s not pretty, but these hard economic choices are being made every day all over the country.
What does this mean for the credit card companies and the big banks that own them?
It doesn’t take an MBA from Wharton to figure out that the $25 trillion we collectively owe in credit card debt is going to drag down the fearful and greedy banks that are forcing so many to make the difficult decision to default.
And it doesn’t take a crystal ball to see the banks once again crying for a government bailout.
And should we give to them?
NO WAY!
The banks are precipitating this situation. They started 15 years ago when they started shoving credit cards at us and encouraging us to spend more and more and more. Now they are bringing this festering boil to a head by raising interest rates to impossible levels.
What should you do if you’ve gotten one of these letters? Accept the opt-in, which will freeze your rates at their current level. Keep your payments current and take the minor hit you’ll have on your credit rating when the account is closed when you have a zero balance. (By the way, you can’t make any new charges on the card if you accept the opt-in.)
What should the government do to stop the next bank crisis before it hits? Congress should immediately pass legislation regulating credit card interest rates for all banks receiving federal bailout money. Retroactive rate increases for customers who are current on their accounts should be prohibited. Higher interest rates on new purchases should be regulated at reasonable levels, say at 15% or less.
Contact your senator and representative today and tell them the banks have to reined in again before they cause a second crisis which could be the killing blow to our economy.
This is usury, pure and simple. Worse yet, these panicked interest rate hikes are certain to become a self-fulfilling prophecy which will ensure more bank failures.
Fight Wrinkles Naturally
Over the years, I’ve noticed those little wrinkles at the corners of my eyes and around my mouth.
I can rationalize those eye crinkles as laugh lines, and they honestly don’t bother me too much.
But the wrinkles around my mouth are something else. I hate them. I think of the as smokers’ wrinkles. But I’ve never smoked. It’s not fair, but they’ve started. I decided to nip them in the bud.
I found a few things that help. I’ll tell you there is no magic answer. But here as some methods that have worked for me:
* Omega-3 fatty acids: We all need them and fish oil is great for heart and joint health. It’s also great for skin health. Be sure you get a good products. I particularly like PharmaOmega’s ultra-purified fish oil products because I can feel the difference in my energy levels when I’m taking them. They also have no fishy smell or belchback, a real plus for me since I really dislike the taste of fish. I also like krill oil products because the tiny crustaceans are harvested in unpolluted deep cold waters and they have a good source of the antioxidant astaxanthin.
* Vitamin C: This ubiquitous nutrient should be in your regular vitamin regimen for a number of reasons, not the least of which is increased skin health. That’s because vitamin C helps your body re-build its stores of collagen, the fibers that kinds together the connective tissues of your body, including the underlayers of your skin. Studies show that people who eat a diet low in vitamin C have significantly more wrinkling, so an orange a day . . keeps your skin smooth. Most of the studies used ascorbic acid, just one of the elements of the complex vitamin C molecule. While ascorbic acid is cheap and available everywhere, I prefer to get my vitamin C from food and from supplements formulated from vine-ripened fruits grown in mineral-rich soil. I’ve taken a whole food vitamin C product produced by Innate for a couple of years now and I’m haopy with its many benefits, including skin plumping.
* Emu oil: My first two recommendations are for internal remedies for wrinkles. But if you want a quick fix followed by a longer term solution, you can’t go wrong with ultra-rich emu oil is one of the best kept anti-aging secrets in the world because it helps plump up skin, reduce wrinkles and reduce the inflammation that causes puffy eyes and eye bags. Dremu is one of my favorite brands because of the variety of products that address a multitude of sins. There’s Deception, a smoothing cream that provides instant results by filing in those fine lines. Its secret is tiny nanoprisms that refract the light to eliminate the visible shadow created by a wrinkle. Deception is a great quick fix while you’re working on the longer term solution with Dremu oil, a thick luxurious oil you apply at night that also relieves itching and even softens calloused feet.
Having youthful skin isn’t all that difficult. Try one of these remedies. Better yet, try them all. Not only will your skin show remarkable changes, that glowing skin will truly reflect your inner health.
Getting a Tax Refund? That’s Bad News!
If you’re getting a tax refund this year, you’ve made an interest-free loan to the government. You’ve let Uncle Sam have your money free of charge for as long as a year.
Now, I don’t know about you, but I’m most definitely not in the loan business, and I’m especially not interested in loaning money to the government.
Yes, I know that many people use their tax refunds as some sort of enforced savings account, but there are far better ways you can do that which will actually earn you interest.
Here’s how you can do better than giving your money to Uncle Sam:
Say you’re getting a $1,000 refund. That’s free money, right? No! It ‘s your money and it has been in the hands of the government, not your hands for months now.
That’s $19.23 a week that could have been working for you.
If you’re getting a refund, I strongly advise you to visit your human resources rdepartment and ask for your withholding to be adjusted to reflect that amount.
With your $1,000 overpayment, that means you’d reduce your withholding by $19.23 a week, if you’re paid weekly. If you’re paid every two weeks, reduce your withholding by $38.46 per pay period and if you’re paid twice a month, reduce it by $41.67 a month.
But, you say, you don’t trust yourself to actually save that extra money in your paycheck. Don’t use Uncle Sam as a savings bank that pays no interest.
Instead set up an automatic deduction that puts that amount straight from your payroll deposit into a savings account or a brokerage account for a Roth IRA. I’ll be writing more about Roth IRAs next week, but, in a nutshell, these are excellent ways to save money and to see your money grow tax-free over the years and serving you well when you retire.
Right now, online banks are paying just under 2% on savings accounts, although that figure has been much higher in the past and will be again.
If that seems paltry, consider this: That $1,000 a year you’ve been loaning the government could turn into more than $41,000 if you’ve got 30 years until retirement at just 2% interest. I know you can do even better than that.
So, this April 15, celebrate the fact that you’ve given Uncle Sam exactly what he’s due and not a penny more!
Sneaky Sugars
Note: This post was written by Dr. Scott Olson, a naturopath extraordinaire, whose book, Sugarettes, is packed with eye-opening information about the dangers of sugar. I’m hoping to be able to give you more guests post form Dr. Olson and other experts. ~Kathleen
Sugar can be sneaky. You might think that you know when you are eating sugar; after all, sugar tastes sweet. But the moment you start reading labels, you begin to realize how many foods you eat have sugar in them. Food manufactures also have a bad habit of changing the name of sugar in order to confuse you into not knowing that you are eating sugar.
Sugar has well-known addictive qualities; this is the reason why it is added to crackers, coffee, peanut butter, salad dressing, sauces, salsa and just about every other food you eat.
Labels Can Be Confusing
If you take a peek at a label, it may not be that clear to you that the food you are buying contains sugar. One of the best ways figure out if there is a sugar in the food is to look out for the “ose” ending. Many sugars have an “ose” ending, such as: glucose, fructose, maltose and others. It is not a guarantee that you are looking at a sugar when you see the “ose” ending, but most likely so.
The Many Names of Sugar
Sugar is sugar no matter what the name and here are some of the other names for common sugar additives:
• Beet sugar
• Brown sugar
• Cane sugar
• Concentrated grape juice
• Confectioner’s sugar
• Corn sweeteners
• Corn syrup
• Crystallized cane juice
• Dextrin
• Dextrose
• Evaporated cane juice
• Fructose
• Fruit juice concentrate
• Galactose
• Glucose
• High-fructose corn syrup
• HFCS
• Honey
• Invert sugar
• Lactose
• Malt
• Maltodextrin
• Maltose
• Mannitol
• Maple syrup
• Molasses
• Powdered sugar
• Raw sugar
• Sorbitol
• Sorghum
• Sucrose
• Table sugar
• Turbinado sugar
• White sugar
• Xylitol
Other Hidden Sugars
If you are trying to find the sneakiest sugars of them all, you have to look beyond the list above. The sneakiest sugars are the foods that act like sugar. These foods, such as breads, cracker, chips, bagels and even potatoes, act just like sugar in your body. If you are looking to make the plunge into a sugar-free diet because you understand how bad sugars are for your health, then you should also remember to include the foods that act like sugar.
Any step that you might take to remove sugars from your diet is a step towards better health. This guide to the sneaky sugars should help you along your way.
