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401(k) limit could slip
It’s quite likely that the maximum contribution level for retirement accounts will fall next month unless the Internal Revenue Service or Congress chooses to freeze it at the current $16,500.
The level is set by an Internal Revenue Code formula that’s rather complicated but based on the third quarter Consumer Price Index for all urban consumers, the CPI-U, to be released on Oct. 15.
The CPI-U represents the average change in prices over time of goods and services such as food, clothing, shelter and other goods and services purchased by urban consumers.
The CPI-U has risen from the previous year’s figures every year for more than a decade.
For the second quarter this year the CPI-U was 642.8, down 1.2 percent from 650.3 for the same period a year ago.
E-book penance offered
Amazon.com Inc. is offering free books or $30 to Kindle customers whose copies of the George Orwell novels “1984” and “Animal Farm” were deleted from their electronic reading devices in July.
When Amazon erased the books from Kindle, citing a problem with the rights to the books, the company issued refunds to the buyers. But the episode startled many Kindle customers, who didn’t know Amazon had the neo-Orwellian ability to erase content that had already been downloaded to their devices.
Amazon spokesman Drew Herdener said Friday the company now has the proper rights to distribute the Orwell books.
Ford settles pollution suit
The Ford Motor Co. has settled a lawsuit filed by residents of a northern New Jersey town over toxic waste dumped there in the 1960s and ’70s.
The settlement was announced in state Superior Court on Thursday. Details were not released, but The Record of Bergen County reports that residents of Ringwood in northeastern New Jersey will receive about $10 million.
Thousands of tons of paint sludge and other toxic material from Ford’s old Mahwah factory were dumped in Ringwood, and residents sued in 2006 claiming that the waste led to illnesses ranging from skin rashes to cancer, and threatened the Wanaque Reservoir.
Canada gains jobs in month
Canada added a better-than-expected 27,100 jobs in August, one of the biggest gains since the recession began in the country last fall. But according to Statistics Canada, all of the jobs are part-time. The agency said Canada’s unemployment rate edged up to 8.7 percent from 8.6 percent in July, as more Canadians began looking for work. Still, the addition of 27,100 jobs is well above the previous month’s 45,000 job retreat. The result also beat consensus expectations of a 15,000 job loss last month.