Category: Cost of Living
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DOJ’s proposed Pinnacle settlement would bar use of rivals’ private rent data
The Justice Department has filed a proposed consent decree that would bar Pinnacle Property Management Services, one of the largest apartment managers in the United States, from using rent-pricing software fed by competitors’ private data. The September 4, 2026 filing in federal court in North Carolina would also stop Pinnacle from sharing sensitive rent information…
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Utilities and data centers covering 263 million Americans pledged not to pass costs to households
No federal rule requires the operator of a data center to pay for the power plant built to serve it. What exists instead is a signature page. The Ratepayer Protection Pledge, published by the White House, now carries commitments from organizations the page says cover 263 million Americans, three-quarters of the population, and roughly 80…
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Michigan raised a gas utility’s low-income credit from $40 to $58
A monthly credit that had sat at $40 for income-eligible DTE Gas Co. customers is now $58. The Michigan Public Service Commission set the higher figure deliberately, pegging it at approximately 70 percent of the utility’s proposed average monthly bill rather than picking a round number. For a household inside the program, the change is…
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Xcel gas customers in Colorado pay $5.16 more a month from October 6
Natural gas rates for Xcel Energy’s residential customers in Colorado rise 8.6 percent on October 6, which works out to $5.16 a month, or about $62 across twelve months. The Colorado Public Utilities Commission reached its final decision in the case on September 4, roughly six weeks before most Colorado furnaces begin running in earnest.…
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Colorado cut the share of income a low-income household pays for power from 6 percent to 2.5 percent
Colorado’s utility regulator still publishes a page explaining that its Percentage of Income Payment Plan holds an income-qualified household’s electric and gas bills to no more than 6 percent of that household’s income. For customers of the state’s largest utility, the number is now 2.5 percent. The Colorado Public Utilities Commission made that reduction on…
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Colorado seniors qualify for a new $20 monthly credit on an electric bill
A rate decision that adds roughly $5.00 a month to the average residential electric bill in Colorado also created a benefit running the other direction for older households. As part of its final decision in Xcel Energy’s electric rate case, the Colorado Public Utilities Commission ordered a dedicated discount program paying a $20 monthly bill…
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Eggs rose 2.9 percent in August while lettuce fell 6.2 percent
The grocery bill looked flat in August, at least on the receipt’s bottom line. But two of the most ordinary items in the cart moved in opposite directions and by a lot: eggs got noticeably more expensive while lettuce got noticeably cheaper, extending a slide that started the month before. The Bureau of Labor Statistics…
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Ohio drivers paid 26 cents a gallon more in a single week
Gasoline prices move every week across the country, but the size of last week’s move in Ohio stood out from the rest of the map. The U.S. Energy Information Administration’s latest survey shows Ohio’s average price for a gallon of regular gasoline climbing 26 cents in just seven days, a jump sharp enough to outpace…
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The food stamp market basket cannot be re-priced upward again before October 2027
Every October, food stamp benefits move by a set formula tied to inflation. What most households never see is the separate, much bigger lever sitting behind that formula — the government’s own periodic re-costing of what a healthy diet actually requires — and a 2025 law has now welded that lever shut for two more…
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A food stamp error under $57 does not count against a state at all
Not every wrong food stamp payment shows up in the numbers the federal government uses to judge a state. Buried in a footnote of USDA’s own fiscal year 2025 accuracy report is a dollar line: if a case reviewer finds an error smaller than that amount, it is excluded from the state’s official payment error…