Ways To Money

The key to receiving a retention bonus is to speak with the right department at the credit card issuer. When customers first indicate a desire to close their account, most representatives will transfer them to a specific department called retentions. Alternatively, customers themselves can simply request to be transferred to that department. Once a cardholder is speaking with a retentions representative, it is fairly easy to negotiate some type bonus in return for renewing his or her credit card.

For example, many banks will present their reward card holders with a standard retention offer of several thousand points or miles. In other instances, customers may be offered bonus points or cash back over a period of time. Although customers may not be able to make a counter offer, they can still indicate that the retention offer is insufficient, in the hopes of receiving a larger, subsequent proposal. In some situations, retentions representatives will offer customers alternative products that address concerns such as high annual fees or insufficient rewards. In this situation, a customer’s balance can be transferred to this new product.

Once cardholders feel that they have received the bank’s best offer, they may still decide to cancel their account. By

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With the price of gold hanging in the upper stratosphere, investors are falling back in love with bullion.

The U.S. Mint reports that it already sold 115,000 ounces of gold in the first few weeks of this year alone.

And while Investment U’s Chief Investment Strategist Alexander Green maintains that gold will continue to slump through 2012, he does acknowledge that investors should hold around 5% of their assets in precious metals.

But choosing the wrong gold bullion coins can be a costly mistake. So it’s vital to own the right coin for your own personal investment goals.

In general, most people buy gold coins for three reasons: for investment, as collectibles and as a safe-haven. For each of these reasons, there are some gold coin options that are better than others. And in today’s article, I’ve outlined some of the best coin options available today for each reason to own gold.

Best Gold Coins for Investment

The best gold coins for investment are government-minted bullion coins with low premiums and high liquidity. On this stage, the American Gold Eagle is the model.

The U.S. Gold Eagle is th

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New York – President Obama’ reelection prospects hang in large part on how the economy is doing by Election Day, and perhaps the most obvious yardstick - and the one Americans care most about - is the unemployment rate.

This is hardly lost on Mr. Obama. “The most important thing we need to do is get more Americans back to work,” he said in his Saturday radio address, in which he also previewed a White House forum on Jan. 11 that will feature business leaders who have opted to bring outsourced jobs back to the US.

Though the unemployment rate dipped in December – from 8.7 percent to 8.5 percent – it remains uncomfortably high for an incumbent president seeking reelection. When Obama took office in January 2009 unemployment stood at 7.8 percent, and Republicans will have a heavy cudgel with which to pound him if the jobless rate is worse almost four years later than it was then.

Commenting Friday on the latest unemployment figures, Republican House Speaker John Boehner laid down a marker of sorts: “Today marks the 35th consecutive month of unemployment above 8 percent, and too many Americans continue to struggle to find their next job.”

So, could the unemployment rate sink below 8 percent by Election Day?

It’s possible but not likely, say some leading economists

It all depends on whether the economy can create jobs at the rate of about 268,000 a month between now and November, says Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s Economy.com, in an interview. T

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Every credit card issuer has its niche. For American Express, their specialties have always been travel and business, two areas which they compliment by offering best of breed customer service. While no travel rewards business card can eclipse Amex’s vaunted Business Platinum card, the American Express Business Gold Rewards card offers many of the same benefits at a fraction of the cost. However, if one looks past the annual fee on the Platinum card and delves into the benefits, it often makes sense to bite the bullet and opt for the higher fee Platinum card.

The American Express Business Gold card is a charge card, not a credit card. Account holders are thus required to pay their balances in full each month in order to avoid delinquency. A pay over time option may be offered after approval, but this is limited to high dollar purchases and often comes with a higher than average interest rate. Consequently, businesses that tend to carry balances from month to month should avoid this card and instead go with a standard business credit card to insure against problems that might arise from carrying a charge card.

As a rewards credit card, each dollar spent on the Business Gold card earns a single American Express Membership Rewards point. D

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[Editor's Note: We originally published David Fessler's assessment on the viability of solar power back on October 28. We felt this is an especially relevant topic today on the news this week that Warren Buffett-owned MidAmerican Energy bought a 550-megawatt solar farm from First Solar (Nasdaq: FSLR).

According to Greg Abel, chief executive of MidAmerican Energy, "This project also demonstrates that solar energy is a commercially viable technology without the support of governmental loan guarantees and reflects the type of solar and other renewable generation that MidAmerican will continue to seek to add to its unregulated portfolio."]

Wednesday was a beautiful, warm, sunny day here in Northeastern Pennsylvania. We haven’t had a frost yet, and the farmer who leases my fields just mowed his alfalfa… for the fifth time this year. He’s never been able to get a fifth cut in the 25 years I’ve lived here.

My electrician was taking advantage of the good weather. He’s modifying my electrical service to accommodate the photovoltaic (PV) solar panel array. It should be installed in a week or two.

The system I’m putting in will cover about half of my electricity usage. I’m hoping through conservation and the eventual use of LED lighting that it’ll cover even more. Once it’s insta

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