Author: Reporter

The head count of every U.S. resident in 2020 helped guide the distribution of $2.8 trillion in annual federal spending, underscoring the importance of participating in the once-a-decade census, according to a new report released in June by the U.S. Census Bureau. There were 353 federal assistance programs that used the Census Bureau data in 2021 to steer the allocation of the federal funding, up from 316 programs accounting for $1.5 trillion in 2017 when a similar study was conducted, according to the report. The federal funding is distributed to state and local governments, nonprofits, businesses and households. In...

Check fraud is back in a big way, fueled by a rise in organized crime that is forcing small businesses and individuals to take additional safety measures or to avoid sending checks through the mail altogether. Banks issued roughly 680,000 reports of check fraud to the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, also known as FinCEN, last year. That is up from 350,000 reports in 2021. Meanwhile the U.S. Postal Inspection Service reported roughly 300,000 complaints of mail theft in 2021, more than double the prior year’s total. Early in the pandemic, government relief checks became an attractive target for criminals....

U.S. cigarette smoking dropped to another all-time low last year, with 1 in 9 adults saying they were current smokers, according to government survey data released in late April. Meanwhile, electronic cigarette use rose, to about 1 in 17 adults. The preliminary findings from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are based on survey responses from more than 27,000 adults. Cigarette smoking is a risk factor for lung cancer, heart disease and stroke, and it’s long been considered the leading cause of preventable death. In the mid-1960s, 42% of U.S. adults were smokers. The rate has been gradually...