Funny money: how our cartoonist saw the big personal finance stories on 2011

Howard McWilliam's cartoons cut to the heart of the major stories.

-

Patient Stories Personalize the Budget Cuts and the Impact on Access to Mental Health Care

WALTHAM, Mass. -- Pata Suyemoto's Medicaid D plan has a cap on the money allocated to prescriptions. As a result, Pata, 50, who suffers from treatment resistant depression as well as asthma, must often ...

-

Four Questions for Money Market Fund Shoppers

High money market fund fees can ding low yields. This checklist will help you manage them.

-

Avoid These Financial Horror Stories

Feel the chill in the air? It's time once again for Bankrate's annual house of financial horrors.

-

Obama Uses Stories of Four Women to Urge Lawmakers to Approve Jobs Program

President Barack Obama used the personal stories of four women to make his case for the passage of his jobs plan, urging Congress to move quickly.

-

Money lessons from 5 summer movies

What can you learn about personal finance from "Bad Teacher" and "Cowboys & Aliens."

-

Personal Finance Daily: Is your money manager doing all he can for you?

If you hire a money manager, you’d like to think he or she is going to do you, and your portfolio, some good. That’s not necessarily so. Read that story, plus get the latest debt-limit news — including how to use ETFs to protect yourself against a debt default — all in today’s Personal Finance Daily.

-

How To Find Useful Credit Advice

There is no denying that modern living almost entirely revolves around credit in some way or another. It is at the point now where almost anything you would like to do that involves spending money, you will need to have a credit check done on your name and address. Fail to get a good enough score and chances are whatever you wanted is going to be refused.

-

Lower Your Gas Bill With Credit Cards

The truth is the cost of gas has continued to increase and this trend won't be ending anytime soon. This has left many people looking for ways to reduce the amount they spend on gas every month. Many people may be surprised to learn that one method for reducing the cost of gas is by using credit cards. But it's not about using just any credit card. A gas rebate credit card is what you want to use.

-

Sector Snap: Financial firms follow market down

Share of major financial firms fell with the broader markets on Friday as traders responded to a poor jobs report that offered poor prospects for the economy, and analysts cut earnings targets for several big names.

-