Making money
My identity was stolen in 2013, and it took
me years to undo the damage, said Drew
Armstrong in Bloomberg Businessweek. A
man named Marlen Manukyan somehow got
access to my name and Social Security num-
ber and “went from bank to bank over three
days in August that year setting up accounts
at TD Bank, Bank of America, and Wells
Fargo.” When he sold an RV over Craigslist
for $39,960 and never delivered the vehicle,
the police caught on. Still, for the next six
years, I would get interrogated and searched
anytime I tried to board a plane. My credit
rating was destroyed; I was denied a new
credit card and struggled to get a mortgage. Since then, “breach
after breach has exposed the vulnerability of the systems that
guard the private information we casually hand over,” repeating
my nightmare for others. “In fairness to thieves, we’ve made this
very easy.” So much data has been exposed that there is probably
“an undersupply of willing criminals.” But it should be harder to
get a new credit card than to log in to Gmail.It’s time to do away with the Social Security number, said Patrick
Lucas Austin in Time. It was created to track social benefits,
and up until the 1970s, the card actually said “not for identifica-
tion.” But the single identifier became convenient when compa-
nies began handling information with computers. Now “it’s alittle like having a Facebook password that
we can’t change even if we know somebody
else has it.” Better methods of identification
include biometrics, such as thumbprints
or iris scanners, said James Wellemeyer in
MarketWatch .com. One company is even
working on technology that can identify
you by your heartbeat. “But not everyone
may want to give their heartbeat to their
bank, and for good reason.” The best
alternative might be “real-time” personal
information: A bank could ask for the last
number you called on your phone or the
last purchase you made— information that
is harder to steal because it’s constantly changing.It’s important to stay vigilant, said David Murphy in Lifehacker
.com. The website HaveIBeenPwned.com “will let you know if,
or when, your email address is involved in a hack” if you sign
up for their notifications. The easiest thing to do? Sign up for
credit monitoring, said Melanie Lockert in BusinessInsider.com.
It’s free on sites such as CreditKarma.com, and “last year, it
actually helped me stop an insurance identity theft with a simple
alert.” After an alert notified me that a credit card account at
Old Navy had been opened in my name, I was able to call the
issuer and cancel the card before the identity thief could make
any charges.Security: Staying safe from identity theft
BUSINESS 33
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Cards used to say ‘not for identification.’Big Pharma’s profitable philanthropy
“Half of America’s 20 largest charities are af-
filiated with pharmaceutical companies” that
fund copayments on prescriptions for drugs
that they manufacture, said The Economist.
The drug companies set up the charities to
defray the costs of copayments on expensive
drugs, but this has “the fortunate consequence
of making their customers price-insensitive.”
The charity run by AbbVie is the third larg-
est in the country, while Bristol-Myers Squibb
runs the fourth largest. In total, 13 companies
spent $7.4 billion on these programs in 2016.
Having copayments gives patients incentive to
stick with the companies’ drugs instead of opt-
ing for cheaper generics—ultimately helping
the drugmakers’ bottom line. The companies
can then deduct up to twice the cost of their
donations from pretax profits.Doing your own tune-up
Do-it-yourself auto repair shops are pop-
ping up across the U.S., said Steve Friess in
The New York Times. One typical location,
My Mechanics Place in Detroit, supplies the
bay, the lift, and some tools for $25 an hour.
For a simple task like an oil change or tire
realignment, the DIY garage could save you
“60 to 80 percent on the repair costs.” The
concept isn’t entirely new—oil companiesused to lease garage stalls and lifts in the
1970s for “customers to do their own work.”
As cars grew more durable, the practice died
out. However, some “garage entrepreneurs
saw the escalating cost of auto repairs and
the reputation of some dishonest mechanics
as an opportunity for a renaissance.” The
only requirement is that you know what
you’re doing.More trouble at beleaguered G.E.
General Electric’s shares plummeted after a
whistleblower accused the company of fraud,
said Thomas Gryta and Mark Maremont in
The Wall Street Journal. Harry Markopolos
is best known as the “accounting expert who
raised red flags about Bernie Madoff’s Ponzi
scheme” years before it became public. Last
week, he published a 170-page research re-
port alleging that “the struggling conglomer-
ate has masked the depth of its problems.”
Markopolos says G.E.’s troubled long term–
care insurance business faces $30 billion in
claims over the next two decades. The report
says G.E. has lied about the severity of the
liability and needs to boost its insurance re-
serves substantially more than the $15 billion
it already announced in 2018. The company
denies the accusations. Once beloved by the
markets, G.E. now trades at a 10-year low.What the experts say
Homes for Our
Troops ( hfotusa
.org) was
founded in
2004 to give
severely
injured Iraq
and Afghanistan
war veterans
newly built homes
adapted to their physi-
cal needs. HFOT designs four-bedroom,
two-bath homes that have lowered coun-
tertops, wider hallways, shelves that can
pull down, automatic doors, and roll-in
showers. With these donated homes,
veterans can find physical and financial
stability, live independently, and rebuild
their lives. Having their homes paid for
gives them a chance to concentrate on
building career, family, and savings.
Sixty-nine percent of these veterans
pursue a degree or trade certification.
Veterans who own an HFOT home are
67 percent more likely to have a job; the
employment rate is a full 300 percent
higher for their spouse or caregiver.
HFOT has built 282 homes nationwide.Charity of the week
Each charity we feature has earned a
four-star overall rating from Charity
Navigator, which rates not-for-profit
organizations on the strength of their
finances, their governance practices,
and the transparency of their operations.
Four stars is the group’s highest rating.