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GOOD NEWS FOR STAY-AT-HOME SPOUSES: The New York Times reports that the Consumer Financial Protection is finally moving to fix a glaring problem with the 2009 CARD act. The law had the unintended consequence of making it more difficult for couples to obtain credit since banks were now supposed to evaluate applicants as individuals and not take anyone’s total family income into account. From the article:
The requirement was meant, in part, to protect students from getting into trouble with credit card debt, but it also ended up making it difficult for others to get credit cards. The bureau said data from the credit card industry suggested that otherwise creditworthy applicants were being denied cards and that a “significant number” of them might be stay-at-home spouses or partners. (Comments from the industry noted that military spouses were particularly affected.)
Under the revised rule, applicants who are 21 or older can rely on other income, including that of the working spouse or partner, if the applicant has a “reasonable expectation” of access to it. The bureau said it considered more than 300 comments from the public and industry before deciding on the revision.
Our understanding is that if you lived in a community property state then the regulation didn’t affect you, since your spouse’s income already belongs to you and vice versa, but others were not so lucky. We’re not sure how much this affected things in practice, since presumably a lot of people went right on counting their spouses’ income as their own, CARD act notwithstanding. It’s still good to have this cleared up, though.
TEN HIGHEST-PAID COLLEGE MAJORS: The Wall Street Journal has a list of the 10 highest-paid majors. They are:
Petroleum Engineering: $93,500
Computer Engineering: $71,700
Chemical Engineering: $67,600
Computer Science: $64,800
Aerospace/Aeronautical/Astronautical Engineering: $64,400
Mechanical Engineering: $64,000
Electrical/Electronics and Communications Engineering: $63,400
Management Information Systems/Business: $63,100
Engineering Technology: $62,200
Finance: $57,400
A few other interesting tidbits from the article:
Engineering salaries rose, on average, 4% over the previous year to $62,535, but other industries saw larger increases. Those majoring in health sciences will see a 9.4% increase over last year, while business majors’ salaries will rise 7.1%.
The grads seeing the smallest pay bump are humanities and social-science majors, whose starting salaries inched up 1.9%, to $37,058.
In the industry with the most hiring – educational services, which includes teaching and special education, among other professions – employers pay average salaries of $39,992 to the 455,000 new graduates they hire.
The article did not list the lowest-paying majors. This article does–it’s a few years old, but the list probably hasn’t changed that much. They are:
Social Work
Elementary Education
Theology
Music
Spanish
Horticulture
Education
Hospitality and Tourism
Fine Arts
Drama
Lots of money in being a geek these days…
GO NORTH, YOUNG MAN: Speaking of college, apparently there are bargains to be had north of the border:
Here is what it costs for a year of undergraduate tuition at a select group of U.S. and Canadian universities:
• University of Chicago – $45,945
• George Washington – $45,780
• Stanford – $41,250
• McMaster (Hamilton, Ontario) – $20,966
• McGill – $14,561
• University of Winnipeg – $11,115
Why, yes, those bottom three are Canadian. Of course, there are American schools that charge lower tuition as well, but there don’t seem to be any Canadian schools that charge $45K per year. The number of Americans attending school in Canada is increasing:
Six percent of McGill’s student body is American, and the ranks are growing. The number of U.S. students at Canadian colleges rose 50 percent in a decade, and now about 10,000 Americans attend Canadian colleges, according to the Institute for College Access & Success.
We should also note that the drinking age is 19 in most provinces, which can be either a plus or a minus depending on your point of view.
And you should see the cheerleaders at the Winnepeg U. Wow.