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The following is the latest post in my “Reader Profiles” series. Each post in this series details the financial situation and challenges of an FMF reader. The purpose of this series is to help us all identify with people like us (in similar situations — not all will be, of course, but eventually Im sure you will find someone like you here), get to know the frequent commenters on the site, and hear some financial wisdom/challenges from people other than me.

If youre interested in contributing to this series, then drop me an email. The series seems to be very popular with readers and I need a steady stream of new ones to keep it going.

Next in the series is FMF reader TB. She answered my questions (in red below) as follows:

Please tell us a bit about yourself.

I am a 27 year old mother of two (10 and 7), married to a police officer for 8 years.

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This week I’m beginning a series about the great men and women – often unknown – who shaped the modern investment landscape.

Why should you care about these individuals, especially since many of them are dead? Because Sir Francis Bacon was right: Knowledge is power. This is especially true in the financial markets. And, as you’re about to learn, the type of knowledge you accumulate is likely to be a primary determinant of your success as an investor.

So let’s kick things off today with a man whose name is legendary on Wall Street:

Charles Dow.

Dow is a significant figure in the annals of financial history for two reasons. He created the first financial bible, The Wall Street Journal, and the first market barometer, the Dow Jones Industrial Average. In doing

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Welcome to our week-long series on crushing your credit card debt. In this first of five articles, we look at the most important part of tackling credit card debtstop going into more debt

Without a doubt, the hardest part of getting out of credit card debt is avoiding new debt.

Our society has grown so accustomed to using credit cards that we use them without even thinking about it. The charges pile up each month to the point where we cant afford to pay off our cards in full. As our debt rises, we become even more dependent on credit cards just to get to the next paycheck.

To break this cycle, well have change many of our behaviors, attitudes and expectations. And the first step is to understand how we got into credit card debt in the first place. The changes will be significant, so let’s get started.

Not everyone sinks into credit card debt the same way. F

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Saving account numbers will soon be portable in India. Finance ministry is working on this from some time and soon you will be able to change your banks without changing your Bank account number. Saving account number portability will be almost similar to porting your mobile number to different network carrier.

A lot of people do not change their banks because there is a lot of headache involved in the procedures. If you change your Bank from ICICI to HDFC, it means you have to change the account numbers at different places (for ex SIP ECS). Also you will have to close the ICICI account and open a new account in HDFC which means repeating the procedure all over again. These tasks stop people from taking action of moving from one bank to another. However with saving account number portability, you will be able to change your Bank account from bank A to bank B with less paper-work.

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With health care costs increasing every year, an entrepreneur reader emailed me to ask about the Health Spending Account (HSA).  The HSA is basically a registered account with a CCPC that allows an employee of that company to receive tax free health benefits.  In addition to the tax free benefit to employees, the company funds the HSA with pre-tax dollars, which means there is 0% tax paid overall on the health benefit.

What are the Benefits

A funded HSA can be used by employees, their spouses and their dependents towards medical or dental expenses.  It can be used in conjunction with health insurance to cover the deductible or as a stand alone benefit.  Putting my employee hat on, I can see this as a real perk, especially since it’s a tax free benefit, in other words, free money!  In addition, if the health insurance plan is on the lighter side (ie. no orthode

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College Park, MD – The economy added 200,000 jobs in December, and the unemployment rate fell to 8.5 percent. Going forward unemployment is not likely to fall much further and may rise again.

Fourth quarter growth was exceptionally strong as the global economy recovered from first half disruptions such as the earthquake in Japan, but going forward economists expect growth to slow to about 2 percent.

Job growth in the range of 130,000 should be expected to accommodate labor force growth but not much lower the unemployment rate. That is hardly a pace that will restore economic health, or validate President Obama’s heavy intervention in the economy and industrial policies in the upcoming Presidential campaign.

The unemployment rate would be higher but for the fact that many unemployed professionals have established home-based businesses that really don’t provide full time employment but do take workers off the unemployment rolls. 

Also, many adults have quit looking for work altogether, and the adult labor force participation rate remains depressed. In D

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