| Volume 142 Number 77 |
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The People’s Lawyer’s Tip of the Day
Are you thinking about joining a multi-level marketing business to earn extra money? Before investing your hard-earned cash, make sure you’re not dealing with a pyramid scheme – a scam that can cost you dearly. Click here for more.
Social Security checks will only increase by 1.6 percent next year
Social Security recipients will see their monthly benefits grow by 1.6 percent in 2020 to reflect the change in the official inflation rate. The Social Security Administration said the increase will be made starting in the January 2020 payments to nearly 63 million Americans. An increase in payments made to more than 8 million Social Security Supplemental Income (SSI) beneficiaries will begin on December 31, 2019. The annual cost of living increase is based on the Consumer Price Index (CPI), as determined by the Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics. However, the CPI is not always an accurate reflection of the costs most affecting consumers. Click here for more.
Your Money
Owning a home is a major milestone many Americans expect to achieve in their lifetime. It's not simply about having the ability to stay in one place for years – it's also about taking advantage of the incentives to homeownership, including the financial security to make a major investment and see it grow over time. While buying a house for the first time may be intimidating, no homeowner started the process feeling confident every step of the way. Here's what first-time homebuyers need to know. Click here for more.
For the Lawyers
Supreme Court sends TCPA dispute back to Sixth Circuit. The U.S. Supreme Court ordered the Sixth Circuit to revisit its split decision that faxes seeking contact information verification qualify as advertisements under junk fax rules, in light of an earlier high court ruling on the validity of federal agencies' interpretation of federal law. The high court vacated a panel decision from November that revived a putative TCPA class action against health care information technology provider Enclarity Inc. and its parent company. The Supreme Court then remanded the dispute to the appellate court for further consideration in light of its June decision in PDR Network v. Carlton & Harris Chiropractic. The Supreme Court offered no further explanation of its decision. In the PDR Network case, the Supreme Court sidestepped the question of whether district courts are required under the Hobbs Act to defer to agency orders such as the Federal Communications Commission's numerous interpretations of the TCPA. Instead, the justices sent the dispute back to the Fourth Circuit to consider a pair of key questions that hadn't been properly addressed: whether the challenged FCC order was a legislative or interpretive rule and whether PDR Network had been afforded an adequate opportunity to challenge the order. Enclarity Inc. et al. v. Matthew N. Fulton, case number 18-1258, in the Supreme Court of the United States. Click here for more.