The Federal Reserve numbers on the Discount Rate (overnight bank loan rates) can be found here . Banks pay customers less than this rate because they have to service the account where as an overnight loan is just one transaction that can be taken care of by one or two people in a short period of time. If you look in the early 80's when interest rates were so high, you will find it was worth it for the banks to pay 5% because they had to pay far more to the Federal Reserve for overnight money, You can get more interest for your money if you can tie up over $10,000 in a long term CD, but most people don't have that much money laying around. For the average person, Credit Unions are a good option but they have the disadvantage that sometimes you are unable to do some of the electronic transfers or you are unable to find a local office.

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the whole Idea of credit unions is that they are local. Yes they are a bit more simplistic than a bank but they are keeping your money local so it benefits the people it serves not some CEO in an Ivory tower in Manhattan

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In a rich man's house there is no place to spit but his face.
Diogenes Of Sinope

I don't object to the idea of credit unions and would love to go to one, but they are not very local to me and I travel to locations where my credit union has no coverage. I am paying extra at the bank because they offer a few services I am unable to get elsewhere. Also, Wells Fargo is not located in Manhattan but they did make some of the mistakes that they did in Manhattan but not all of them. I also agree that they are just as greedy as the ones located in Manhattan. As good as my credit rating is, they bumped the interest rates on my credit card. What's funny about this is a few years ago I ask them to lower the interest rate, rase the limit and drop the service fee. They did all three in a 5 minute phone call with no questions ask. Since then, I payed off the house loan to them and have put away more savings and now they want to charge me more interest if I run a balance. That's why I don't intend to let them see a penny of interest.

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My CU has visa debit cards so locations dont matter

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In a rich man's house there is no place to spit but his face.
Diogenes Of Sinope

I don't object to the idea of credit unions and would love to go to one, but they are not very local to me and I travel to locations where my credit union has no coverage. I am paying extra at the bank because they offer a few services I am unable to get elsewhere. Also, Wells Fargo is not located in Manhattan but they did make some of the mistakes that they did in Manhattan but not all of them. I also agree that they are just as greedy as the ones located in Manhattan. As good as my credit rating is, they bumped the interest rates on my credit card. What's funny about this is a few years ago I ask them to lower the interest rate, rase the limit and drop the service fee. They did all three in a 5 minute phone call with no questions ask. Since then, I payed off the house loan to them and have put away more savings and now they want to charge me more interest if I run a balance. That's why I don't intend to let them see a penny of interest.

Locations? You realize that the only ATM's without fees are at credit unions. It doesn't have to be your home one. As to deposits, that is what direct deposit is for. As to the rest, try internet banking. These days you can transfer between banks, not just accounts.

As to services, yes, you may need one of the high fee banks for a business/merchant account.

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I go to places where the internet is not available. My roommate's credit union will not take a transfer from a bank. The credit union I can join put it's nearest ATM machine 5 miles away from me where as my bank is within walking distance. The nearest credit unit branch is close to 10 miles away. I am sure credit unions are a good thing for many people, but they just don't work well for me. About the only thing I am forgoing by using a bank is that my interest rates are low. For me the solution is when I start getting to much money in the bank, I will move it to a place where the interest rates are better.

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I tr to never use atm's I purchase a small item at a store and get cash back. The CU doesnt chanrge extra for it and I get my money.

BTW ATM fees piss me off. charging between $1 and $3 for access to my own money when the act of using the atm is nothing more than a 10 cent electronic call from one computer to another.

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In a rich man's house there is no place to spit but his face.
Diogenes Of Sinope

I only use the bank ATM machines and pay for small items with cash. Large items can be cash, credit card or check but I never use my ATM card for purchases. I tend to have $200 to $400 in cash on hand so I don't have to make mad dashes for a ATM machine. Banks don't earn service fees off me. If it looks like they will, I find a way to avoid them.

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200-400 huh you wouldnt happen to have your daily routes written down with all the areas that are free of cameras... ummm never mind : )

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In a rich man's house there is no place to spit but his face.
Diogenes Of Sinope

I run around with a crowd that would shoot you if you tried and would have the guns to do it with. I don't recommend you try it. On the other hand, I don't always have it on me. While I don't want to lose it and I never have, it is the amount I could lose and not feel to bad about it. It is also what I feel would get me out of most jams without using plastic or checks. Yes, I have seen times when the network was down and you couldn't use plastic. That said, I only hit the ATM machine once every 3 or 4 months. I told you that I live like I am poor.

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I go to places where the internet is not available. My roommate's credit union will not take a transfer from a bank. The credit union I can join put it's nearest ATM machine 5 miles away from me where as my bank is within walking distance. The nearest credit unit branch is close to 10 miles away. I am sure credit unions are a good thing for many people, but they just don't work well for me. About the only thing I am forgoing by using a bank is that my interest rates are low. For me the solution is when I start getting to much money in the bank, I will move it to a place where the interest rates are better.

They may not be the only place in town.
http://www.creditunion.coop/cu_locator/quickfind.php

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"It's not free. ... Someone's going to have to pay for it and you bet it's going to be the taxpayer." --Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT) on the "public option"

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) unveiled an $894 billion health care takeover bill Thursday; the Congressional Budget Office puts the cost at $1.055 trillion. The bill, a combination of three separate committee bills, should be light reading for our nation's lawmakers, though -- it weighs in at a scant 1,990 pounds, er, pages.

when I calculated this out I found that the cost is abot $3000 a year which currently I pay 1/3 or so and the business I work for pays teh remainder. So basically I would have the same insurance as I had before. I want everyone to have at least what I have so lets do this. screw the numbers. We've thrown ourselves into Iraq without taking into account nor caring about the cost. It's about time we did something to level the playing field with the rest of the world on healthcare. American companies need this. We Need this.

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In a rich man's house there is no place to spit but his face.
Diogenes Of Sinope

when I calculated this out I found that the cost is abot $3000 a year which currently I pay 1/3 or so and the business I work for pays teh remainder. So basically I would have the same insurance as I had before. I want everyone to have at least what I have so lets do this. screw the numbers. We've thrown ourselves into Iraq without taking into account nor caring about the cost. It's about time we did something to level the playing field with the rest of the world on healthcare. American companies need this. We Need this.

We need this bill because we went into Iraq?

American companies will be forced to provide insurance or pay a fine, explain how that will make them more competitive with countries like Mexico or China.

"It's not free. ... Someone's going to have to pay for it and you bet it's going to be the taxpayer." --Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT) on the "public option"

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) unveiled an $894 billion health care takeover bill Thursday; the Congressional Budget Office puts the cost at $1.055 trillion. The bill, a combination of three separate committee bills, should be light reading for our nation's lawmakers, though -- it weighs in at a scant 1,990 pounds, er, pages.

There is a big difference between doing something and doing the right thing. Yes we do need to fix healthcare but how about undoing the mistakes of the past first instead of throwing a large amount of money at something thats broke already. Throwing money and a problem tends to be a very costly way to fix a problem and it's not government money, it's your money. If correctly done, health care cost could be cut in half without changing the level of care you receive or cutting doctors pay. That alone could reduce the number of uninsured making the problem much easer to deal with.
Some states have already done Tort reform and have seen a large reduction in the cost of healthcare. Other changes need to be done on a federal level because they deal with things like selling insurance across state lines.
The current healthcare bill is nothing but payback for electing the democrats to office and in the long run will punish the haves to benefit the have nots. You will need to figure out where you belong, but the haves will end up including the middle class which is most of the population. Forget about this soak the rich stuff because it never works unless you impose communism. To make the jobs that employ people, you must have the rich to provide money. Take away their money and you take away your own job.

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Where is the constitutional authority for a federal mandate that individuals must buy health insurance?

Sen. Ben Nelson, a Democrat in red-state Nebraska, pleaded the Fifth: "Well, you know, uh, uh, I don't know that I'm a constitutional scholar, so, I, I'm not going to be able to answer that question."

Sen. Daniel Akaka (D-HI) likewise dodged the question, saying, "I'm not aware of [any constitutional authority], let me put it that way. But what we're trying to do is to provide for people who have needs and that's where the accessibility comes in, and one of the goals that we're trying to present here is to make it accessible." Right. "Provide" for them by mandating they do something under penalty of massive fines and/or imprisonment -- that's leftist "compassion" for you.

Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA) answered, "The United States Congress passed laws regarding Medicare and Medicaid that became de facto mandatory programs. States all the time require people to have driver's licenses. I think that this is a bit of a spurious argument that's being made by some folks." Uh, states require licenses only for the privilege of driving.

Sen. Jack Reed (D-RI), a member of the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee -- one of two committees that wrote and approved health care legislation -- pointed to precedent as justification: "Let me see. I would have to check the specific sections, so I'll have to get back to you on the specific section, but it is not unusual that the Congress has required individuals to do things, like sign up for the draft, uh, uh, and do many other things too, which I don't think are explicitly contained [in the Constitution]. It gives Congress a right to raise an army, but it doesn't say you can take people and draft them, uh, but since that was something necessary for the functioning of the government over the past several years, the practice on the books, it's been recognized, the authority to do that." So because Congress has acted unconstitutionally before, they can do it again now? Our guess is he understands health care about as well as he comprehends the Constitution.

as stated before ITS NOT UNCONSTITUTIONAL. just becasue you say it doesnt make it so. just keep calling the sky red and we'll know how well you comprehend whats being done

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In a rich man's house there is no place to spit but his face.
Diogenes Of Sinope

as stated before ITS NOT UNCONSTITUTIONAL. just becasue you say it doesnt make it so. just keep calling the sky red and we'll know how well you comprehend whats being done

It is constitutional to require me to purchase something I do not want? lol you must be thinking of China...

More on the unconstitutionality of mandated health insurance:

Mandatory Insurance Is Unconstitutional
Why an individual mandate could be struck down by the courts.

By DAVID B. RIVKIN JR. AND LEE A. CASEY
Federal legislation requiring that every American have health insurance is part of all the major health-care reform plans now being considered in Washington. Such a mandate, however, would expand the federal government’s authority over individual Americans to an unprecedented degree. It is also profoundly unconstitutional.



An individual mandate has been a hardy perennial of health-care reform proposals since HillaryCare in the early 1990s. President Barack Obama defended its merits before Congress last week, claiming that uninsured people still use medical services and impose the costs on everyone else. But the reality is far different. Certainly some uninsured use emergency rooms in lieu of primary care physicians, but the majority are young people who forgo insurance precisely because they do not expect to need much medical care. When they do, these uninsured pay full freight, often at premium rates, thereby actually subsidizing insured Americans.

The mandate's real justifications are far more cynical and political. Making healthy young adults pay billions of dollars in premiums into the national health-care market is the only way to fund universal coverage without raising substantial new taxes. In effect, this mandate would be one more giant, cross-generational subsidy—imposed on generations who are already stuck with the bill for the federal government's prior spending sprees.

Chad Crowe
.Politically, of course, the mandate is essential to winning insurance industry support for the legislation and acceptance of heavy federal regulations. Millions of new customers will be driven into insurance-company arms. Moreover, without the mandate, the entire thrust of the new regulatory scheme—requiring insurance companies to cover pre-existing conditions and to accept standardized premiums—would produce dysfunctional consequences. It would make little sense for anyone, young or old, to buy insurance before he actually got sick. Such a socialization of costs also happens to be an essential step toward the single payer, national health system, still stridently supported by large parts of the president's base.

The elephant in the room is the Constitution. As every civics class once taught, the federal government is a government of limited, enumerated powers, with the states retaining broad regulatory authority. As James Madison explained in the Federalist Papers: "[I]n the first place it is to be remembered that the general government is not to be charged with the whole power of making and administering laws. Its jurisdiction is limited to certain enumerated objects." Congress, in other words, cannot regulate simply because it sees a problem to be fixed. Federal law must be grounded in one of the specific grants of authority found in the Constitution.

These are mostly found in Article I, Section 8, which among other things gives Congress the power to tax, borrow and spend money, raise and support armies, declare war, establish post offices and regulate commerce. It is the authority to regulate foreign and interstate commerce that—in one way or another—supports most of the elaborate federal regulatory system. If the federal government has any right to reform, revise or remake the American health-care system, it must be found in this all-important provision. This is especially true of any mandate that every American obtain health-care insurance or face a penalty.

The Supreme Court construes the commerce power broadly. In the most recent Commerce Clause case, Gonzales v. Raich (2005) , the court ruled that Congress can even regulate the cultivation of marijuana for personal use so long as there is a rational basis to believe that such "activities, taken in the aggregate, substantially affect interstate commerce."

But there are important limits. In United States v. Lopez (1995), for example, the Court invalidated the Gun Free School Zones Act because that law made it a crime simply to possess a gun near a school. It did not "regulate any economic activity and did not contain any requirement that the possession of a gun have any connection to past interstate activity or a predictable impact on future commercial activity." Of course, a health-care mandate would not regulate any "activity," such as employment or growing pot in the bathroom, at all. Simply being an American would trigger it.

Health-care backers understand this and—like Lewis Carroll's Red Queen insisting that some hills are valleys—have framed the mandate as a "tax" rather than a regulation. Under Sen. Max Baucus's (D., Mont.) most recent plan, people who do not maintain health insurance for themselves and their families would be forced to pay an "excise tax" of up to $1,500 per year—roughly comparable to the cost of insurance coverage under the new plan.

But Congress cannot so simply avoid the constitutional limits on its power. Taxation can favor one industry or course of action over another, but a "tax" that falls exclusively on anyone who is uninsured is a penalty beyond Congress's authority. If the rule were otherwise, Congress could evade all constitutional limits by "taxing" anyone who doesn't follow an order of any kind—whether to obtain health-care insurance, or to join a health club, or exercise regularly, or even eat your vegetables.

This type of congressional trickery is bad for our democracy and has implications far beyond the health-care debate. The Constitution's Framers divided power between the federal government and states—just as they did among the three federal branches of government—for a reason. They viewed these structural limitations on governmental power as the most reliable means of protecting individual liberty—more important even than the Bill of Rights.

Yet if that imperative is insufficient to prompt reconsideration of the mandate (and the approach to reform it supports), then the inevitable judicial challenges should. Since the 1930s, the Supreme Court has been reluctant to invalidate "regulatory" taxes. However, a tax that is so clearly a penalty for failing to comply with requirements otherwise beyond Congress's constitutional power will present the question whether there are any limits on Congress's power to regulate individual Americans. The Supreme Court has never accepted such a proposition, and it is unlikely to accept it now, even in an area as important as health care.

Again?!? declaring something unconstitutional doesnt make it so. FOr example

The color yellow is unconstitutional. My saying it doesnt make it so. Heck we've been paying for medicare for our adult lives and nobody is screaming blood murder and unconstitutionality about it. Its a benefit. I'm willing to be that they'd even allow you to opt out. I know you can opt out of SSN and medicare. However in doing so you'll not ever receive one SSN check or unemployment insurance or any form of public aid. Opt out its your right to screw yourself over. I for one look forward to not having to worry about preexisiting crapola if I change my job. I also like the Idea that the preventative medicine that this insurance will provide will actually make the ER a more efficient place since they wont deal with the common cold any more and will actually deal with EMERGENCIES.

Lets also take a look at what currently happens. The uninsured individual waits until they are on deaths door before seeking help. Always on the assumption that they'll get over their illness. their one stop is the Emergency room. The Emergency room is the most expensive place to seek aid for illness. Since the individual doesnt have insurance it's likely the Hospital will eat the cost of the visit and the gov't gets to pick up the bill. Hmmmm Hmmmmm Who pays taxes to pay for gov't expenses.... Hmmmm WHo is that Oh yeah!!! its you and me. So instead of screwing around with non payments we are actually looking at getting a sick person with gov't insurance into a doctor at an office before it costs $$$ and is easily treated. This reduces the cost of health care for everyone. I can see how the staff of an ER would shrink since they wouldnt have to deal with every knee scrape that comes along. And I can also see how Physician offices would get to bulk up to meet the need of additional clients. Hardly a tragedy here. Just a stable managable Health care system.

Heck I worked at a low cost local Non emergency Dr office in Rockford Illinois about 10 years ago. they made a huge dent in Emergency room visits and increased the availablility of affordable healthcare for the under served. The system works you just have to let it work

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In a rich man's house there is no place to spit but his face.
Diogenes Of Sinope