Stephen Brobeck High Quotations

If consumers started to shift money, however, ... from an interest checking or a traditional savings account into even a bank CD or from a bank to a credit union. That would place market pressure on the banks to raise those interest checking rates and those traditional savings rates. They (banks) do not feel as if consumers are demanding higher rates.

On some small accounts, the fees are so high and the interest is so low that the savings dwindle rather than accumulate.

The bottom line for consumers is potentially billions of dollars a year in additional charges, fees, and higher interest rates and lower yields on savings.

We project for all households in the Northeast, oil and heat bills will be 35 percent higher than last year and that for households in the Midwest, gas bills will be 50 percent higher. Low and moderate income households will be clobbered by these oil and gas price hikes.