In what has become an annual ritual, the CEOs of the major US banks appeared in front of Congress on Wednesday to sell themselves as shepherds of a helpful industry at a time of financial and economic distress for many Americans.
Democrats called JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America, Wells Fargo and Citigroup to Washington to talk about pocketbook issues as households contend with the highest inflation since the early 1980s and the midterm election looms just weeks away.
“While COVID is behind us, the economic challenges we are now facing are no less daunting,” said Citigroup CEO Jane Fraser, in remarks prepared for the hearing. The hearing broke for recess just before the Federal Reserve announced a 3/4-point hike to its benchmark interest rate as the central bank tries to contain inflation.
While billed as a hearing on everyday finances, the CEOs have been peppered with political questions with Washington in the midst of an election year.
One hot button issue has been the issue of gun store sales. Earlier this month the major payment networks — Visa, Mastercard and American Express — said they would start categorizing gun store sales as a separate merchant code. It’s a decision gun control advocates have pushed for, potentially to help catch surges of gun sales ahead of a mass shooting. --->READ MORE HERE
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| Photo: Brandon Bell/Getty Images |
Middle-income households in 2022 have seen inflation eat into a greater share of their incomes compared with low- and high-income households, according to a report released Thursday by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office.
The report’s analysis considered an average basket of goods and services purchased by households in each fifth of the income distribution in 2019, before large shifts in consumption patterns during the Covid-19 pandemic. It found that households in the second, middle and fourth income quintiles have seen the share of their income—derived from labor, business and other nongovernmental sources—that would purchase that basket increase in 2022. Meanwhile, households in the lowest and highest quintiles have seen their share of their income that would purchase the basket fall this year.
The dynamic reflects prices that grew faster than middle households’ incomes this year, the report found. Households in the lowest- and highest-income quintiles have seen incomes grow faster than prices. --->READ MORE HEREFollow links below to related stories:
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WSJ: Another Inflation Stress: Rising Costs of Senior-Living Homes Strain Families
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