Focus on Personal Finance » (3rd Edition)

Dr. Jack Kapoor is a Professor of Business and Economics in the Business and Services Division. Dr. Kapoor has taught Business and Economics at College of DuPage since 1969. He received his B.A. and M.S. from San Francisco State College and his Ed.D. from Northern Illinois University. Professor Kapoor was recently awarded the Business and Services Division's Outstanding Professor Award for 1999-2000.

Dr. Kapoor is known internationally as a co-author of several textbooks including BUSINESS: A PRACTICAL APPROACH (Rand McNally), BUSINESS (Houghton Mifflin), and the forthcoming SMALL BUSINESS MANAGEMENT (Richard D. Irwin/McGraw-Hill).

Les Dlabay teaches in the Department of Economics and Business at Lake Forest College, Lake Forest, Illinois. Over the past 25 years, he has taught more than 30 different courses in high school, community college, university, adult education, and teacher preparation programs. Dr. Dlabay has developed a wide variety of textbook materials, student activity guides, instructor manuals, testing programs, audio-visual materials, and software packages in the areas of Personal Finance, Consumer Economics, and International Business.

Dr. Dlabay has served as a consultant to corporations, educational institutions, and government agencies. He has presented more than 140 workshops and seminars in over 20 states to encourage teachers to actively involve students in the learning process with video presentations, newsletters, interviews, and Internet research activities.

Focus on Personal Finance is a brief, 14-chapter book, covering the critical topics in Personal Finance courses. This 4-color, paperback text is designed and written to appeal to a range of ages, life situations, and levels of financial literacy.

A unique aspect of this text is its active approach. This text will not only get your students thinking about their current situation and financial goals, but also to put these in writing to use as a guide and revise over the course of their lives. The more a student involves themselves in the assessments, exercises and worksheets provided, the more they will discover about their current habits and how to improve them for greater financial freedom.

Students have many different financial goals, but none are more important than having a basic understanding of financial issues and peace of mind with regard to their decisions. The ultimate goal of Focus on Personal Finance is to get students to this point as a first step to achieving the many financial goals they have set for themselves.

Chapter 1 Personal Financial Planning in Action

Chapter 2 Money Management Skills

Chapter 3 Taxes in Your Financial Plan

Chapter 4 Savings and Payment Services

Chapter 5 Consumer Credit: Advantages, Disadvantages, Sources, and Costs

Chapter 6 Consumer Purchasing Strategies and Wise Buying of Motor Vehicles

Chapter 7 Selecting and Financing Housing

Chapter 8 Home and Automobile Insurance

Chapter 9 Health and Disability Income Insurance

Chapter 10 Financial Planning with Life Insurance

Chapter 11 Investing Basics and Evaluating Bonds

Chapter 12 Investing in Stocks

Chapter 13 Investing in Mutual Funds

Chapter 14 Retirement and Estate Planning

Appendix A Developing a Career Search Strategy

Appendix B Consumer Agencies and Organizations

Appendix C Daily Spending Diary

Index