Comparing the Speed of U.S. Interest Rate Hikes

After the latest rate hike on May 3rd, U.S. interest rates have reached levels not seen since 2007. The Federal Reserve has been aggressive with its interest rate hikes as it tries to combat sticky inflation. In fact, rates have risen nearly five percentage points (p.p.) in just 14 months.

In this graphic, we compare both the speed and severity of current interest rate hikes to other periods of monetary tightening over the past 35 years.

The recovery key was designed to make Apple IDs safer. Instead, these victims permanently lost family photos and other precious digital possessions.

By Nicole Nguyen and Joanna Stern. April 19, 2023

Greg Frasca has been locked out of his Apple account since October, and he’ll do just about anything to get back in.

He has offered to fly from Florida to Apple’s California headquarters to prove his identity in person, or write a check for $10,000 to reclaim the account. It holds the only copies of eight years of photos of his young daughters.

This is all because the thieves who stole Mr. Frasca’s iPhone 14 Pro at a bar in Chicago wanted to drain cash from his bank account and prevent him from remotely tracking down the stolen phone. They used his passcode to change the 46-year-old’s Apple ID password. They also enabled a hard-to-find Apple security setting known as the “recovery key.” In doing so, they placed an impenetrable lock on his account.

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A large chunk of the income tax in the U.S. is paid by a small slice of the population.

Now that you’ve paid your income taxes or are about to, let’s look at the big picture: Which of these statements is true about 2022 individual income taxes?

(A) They’ll provide 35% of federal revenue for the year.

(B) Most of the 180 million taxpayers will be lower earners, as about 70% are expected to earn less than $100,000. In aggregate, they will earn nearly 30% of the income of individual U.S. taxpayers and owe about 1.5% of the income taxes.

(C) About one-quarter of filers will earn between $100,000 and $500,000, and they’re expected to have nearly half the aggregate income and owe nearly half of income taxes.

(D) The top earners will owe the most compared with their share of income. A small group — about 900,000 filers earning $1 million or more — will have 16% of income and owe nearly 40% of income taxes.

The answer: All the statements are true except (A). Individual income taxes are expected to provide 54% of federal revenue for 2022, which is more than any other levy and more than many people guess.

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No strategy for tax planning, risk analysis, asset allocation, or short and long-term planning means you have no safeguard against unnecessary risk or its long-term impact.

A true investor puts money in the market with purpose and a big-picture strategy.

You may have speculator leanings if you like get-rich-quick schemes, love hearing tips, want to beat the market, or are emotional over investments.