Everybody’s working for the weekend. But it’s only Wednesday. Here are some need-to-know numbers to end your day.
Over at the Washington Post, former Treasury Secretary Lawrence H. Summers makes an interesting argument: Kill the $100 bill. The reason? Summers points to studies that find that high-denomination bills lead to spikes in illicit activity. That’s because the bills make it easier to transport large amounts of money without taking up a huge amount of space or weighing a great amount.
Here’s another number to think about: 53 million. By some estimates, that’s how many people can’t get a traditional credit score. But a new kind of loan could get more consumers banking. LexisNexis Risk Solutions utilizes a tool that looks at alternative data on consumers, like how long they been at their address or if they went to college. With an untapped market potential customers, banks are taking interest.
And if your neighbor happens to win the lottery, it might be a good time to move. A recent study by the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia found a slight uptick in bankruptcies in neighborhoods surrounding lottery winners. The theory is that as one house accumulates new signs of wealth — fancier cars, bigger toys — those who live around them will feel pressure to keep pace. As the Wall Street Journal writes, researchers were even able to quantify the effect: in areas surrounding a big winner, a 2.4 percent rise in bankruptcy filings was found for every $1,000 increase in lottery winnings.
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