Charger’s performance matches racy look

With menacing looks and an intimidating front grille, the 2015 Dodge Charger SXT Rallye AWD is an exhilarating vehicle to drive.

Scalloped body sides and a chiseled front end with LED fog lights and high-intensity discharge wrap-around headlamps, coupled with seamless racetrack taillights, make it exhilarating to look at, too.

Its style and features make competitors like the Chevy Impala and Ford Taurus seem, well, not as exciting.

All new for 2015, the Dodge Charger is quiet and relatively fuel efficient (18 mpg city/27 highway) as equipped with a robust 300-horsepower, 3.6-liter V6 24-valve engine. The Charger packs plenty of punch even if it doesn't have the optional 6.2-liter 707-horsepower Hellcat supercharged V8 engine — though it's easy to imagine what the Hellcat engine could do in this car.

The Charger's all-wheel-drive system handles both dry and wet roads like a champion and it even excels in snow. The 19-inch polished aluminum wheels and all-season tires keep this car in touch with the road. Other safety features like blind spot and cross path detection, lane departure warning, and advanced braking assistance help ensure safe arrival at your destination.

Dodge redesigned the interior of its Charger for 2015. The cockpit has a clean look with a 7-inch customizable gauge cluster. A new electronic shifter compliments the heated leather-wrapped steering wheel, which has stereo, phone and cruise controls.

The 8.4-inch touchscreen GPS and stereo controller connects with the 552-watt stereo to pump great sound through its 10 Beats speakers located throughout the cabin. The stereo receives satellite, Bluetooth audio, AM/FM and HD radio signals. The Garmin-based GPS maps are simple and easy to read. The voice guidance system is also top-notch. As any $40,580 car should, the Dodge Charger SXT has keyless entry.

Dodge's UConnect system makes it easy to establish a connection with your phone, and the speakerphone performed clearly. SiriusXM's travel link shows current gas prices, weather alerts, sports, and movie information.

Seating is incredibly comfortable in the Charger. The driver and passenger seats are eight-way adjustable with power controls. The Nappa leather sport seats are heated and ventilated, and have metallic leather accents with tungsten-accent stitching.

The cabin is roomy and has plenty of space in both the front and back seats. A power sunroof enhances the roominess. The trunk provides ample storage and has a pass through to the main cabin for oversized items.

The bottom line is that this Dodge will put a charge into any mundane driving task, yielding a thrilling driving experience.

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US job market faces hurdles even with 5.5 pct. unemployment

WASHINGTON — Unemployment in the U.S. has dropped to a seven-year low of 5.5 percent — a level normally considered the mark of a healthy job market. Yet that number isn't as encouraging as it might sound.

While U.S. employers added a solid 295,000 jobs in February, and the jobless rate fell from 5.7 percent, it went down mostly because many people gave up looking for work and were no longer officially counted as unemployed, the government reported Friday. What's more, wage gains remained sluggish.

Those trends suggest that the job market, while improving rapidly, isn't quite as healthy as it looks.

That complicates the Federal Reserve's task of figuring out when the economy has strengthened enough to withstand higher interest rates. The Fed is considering a rate increase as early as June.

With Friday's report, employers have now produced 12 straight monthly job gains above 200,000. It's the longest such stretch since 1994-95.

The U.S. is easily outshining most other major economies. For example, the unemployment rate in the 19 countries that share the euro is 11.2 percent, or twice the U.S. rate.

The robust U.S. job gains appear to have convinced many investors that the Fed will soon raise the short-term interest rate it controls. Investors on Friday sold ultra-safe U.S. Treasurys, a sign that many anticipate a rate increase. The yield on the 10-year Treasury note rose to 2.24 percent from 2.11 percent.

And they dumped stocks. The Dow Jones industrial average plummeted 276 points in afternoon trading.

A 5.5 percent unemployment rate is typically consistent with what economists call "full employment" — when the proportion of unemployed people has fallen so low that employers must raise pay to find enough qualified workers.

Companies then raise prices to pay for the higher wages. And the Fed usually follows suit by raising its benchmark short-term rate to cool growth and ward off inflation.

But the scars of the Great Recession have made the process hazier and more complicated.

"5.5 percent doesn't mean what it once did," said Diane Swonk, chief economist at Mesirow Financial. Full employment "is always a moving target, and it has moved down."

Since the recession ended in June 2009, the percentage of adults working or looking for work has fallen to a 37-year low of 62.8 percent. It has hovered around the mark for most of the past year.

Economists calculate that about half that decline reflects the aging of the population as the baby boom generation retires.

But another factor is that many Americans have become discouraged about their job prospects and have given up looking. Those out of work aren't counted as unemployed unless they are actively looking for jobs.

That has helped artificially lowered the rate since its peak of 10 percent in October 2009.

Many economists also argue the economy can't be near full employment if wages aren't growing. And average hourly earnings rose just 3 cents to $24.78 in February from the previous month.

Megan Greene, chief economist at John Hancock Financial Services, noted that hourly pay fell in February from January in the construction and mining industries. Such figures will outweigh the falling unemployment rate in Fed chair Janet Yellen's mind, she said, and perhaps discourage a rate increase soon.

Yet many other economists expect the Fed will put a rate increase into effect in June or September.

The short-term interest rate is usually at 3 percent or 4 percent when the economy is at full employment. It is now at a record low of zero, and inflation is practically nonexistent.

Tim Hopper, chief economist at TIAA-CREF, said that if unemployment keeps falling and inflation starts to pick up later this year, "the Fed will be behind the curve if they haven't already started raising rates."

Nearly 3.3 million more Americans are earning paychecks than 12 months ago. That has boosted U.S. consumer spending and the broader global economy. Many leading exporters, particularly China, Germany and Japan, depend on Americans' spending for a chunk of their growth.

February's hiring gains were broad-based. Some of the industries with the biggest gains include mostly low-paid work: Hotels and restaurants added 60,000 jobs, retailers 32,000.

But higher-paying fields also added jobs: Professional and business services, which include accountants, engineers and lawyers, gained 51,000, construction 29,000 and financial services 10,000.

Growth slowed in the final three months of last year to an annual rate of 2.2 percent after roaring ahead at nearly 5 percent last spring and summer. But consumer spending rose, a sign demand remains strong.

Dave Long, chief executive of Orangetheory Fitness, said the improving economy has given a boost to his fast-growing exercise studio business. He opened the first location five years ago in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. The company now has nearly 200 sites in the U.S.

"As people have a little extra money ... it opens up their minds to spending a little more on a product like ours," he said.

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3 reasons Apple's watch will _ or won't _ change the game

SAN FRANCISCO — No one can argue that Apple has changed the way people live their lives. The company's iPod, iTunes, iPhone and iPad have shaken up music, phone and computer markets worldwide. Is the Apple Watch going to be able to do the same?

The stakes are big for Apple CEO Tim Cook: the watch is the first brand-new Apple product to be launched without legendary co-founder Steve Jobs. But the market is awash in smartwatches that have gained little traction. Here are three reasons the Apple Watch will finally move the needle in the smartwatch industry — and three reasons it might not.

WHY IT WILL CHANGE THE GAME

MORE FEATURES THAN RIVALS: Along with email, texts and phone calls, Apple says its watch will present news, health readings and other notifications in creative ways that can be read at a glance. It will have a heart rate monitor and accelerometer, and an internal motor that can signal the wearer with a subtle "tap" on the wrist. And Siri and Apple Pay will be built in. Apple is working with outside companies to create more apps; Cook has talked about using the watch as an electronic "key" for hotel doors or even cars.

A POWERFUL BRAND: The world's biggest tech company has a reputation for quality and a direct conduit to customers — it operates more than 400 retail stores around the world. And it has deep pockets to spend on advertising — it is showcasing the watch this month with a sleek, 12-page insert in Vogue and other fashion magazines.

APPLE'S TRACK RECORD: This wouldn't be the first Apple product that revolutionized a market where rivals had struggled to break through. Other companies made digital music players before the iPod, smartphones before the iPhone and even tablets before the iPad. Most of those products failed to catch on until Apple made devices so appealing they set new standards and created new demand, said Forrester Research analyst J.P. Gownder.

OR NOT

WHAT'S THE NEED?: Most smartwatches — including Apple's — only work with a smartphone nearby, so you can't swap one expensive gadget for the other. "What we've seen is that it's not obvious why people would want a smartwatch," says Gownder. A recent Forrester survey found some respondents didn't see a reason to buy one because they already owned a less-expensive fitness band or a full-featured smartphone (although it also found Apple fans ready to buy the new watch).

CONSUMERS NOT EXCITED: You can already buy smartwatches made by giant tech companies like Samsung, Sony or LG, or from a tech startup like Pebble, that track your heart rate, show you email and deliver other online services to your wrist. None of them have really caught on. Only about 5 million smartwatches were sold worldwide last year, according to market researchers at Strategy Analytics. By comparison, Apple sold 74.6 million iPhones in just the last quarter.

PRICE AND OBSOLESCENCE: Many of today's smartwatches sell for $200 or less. Apple plans to sell three models, starting at $349, but Piper Jaffray's Gene Munster predicts the average buyer will pay $550 for a watch and extra, interchangeable bands. Apple's high-fashion "Edition" model, made with 18-karat gold, is expected to cost thousands. While affluent consumers might pay that for a watch they can wear for years, or even hand down to their children, it's a lot of money for something that could become outdated if Apple releases a new model every year or so — as it does with smartphones.

Cook will make his case for the Apple Watch at a press event Monday, where he's expected to show off more features and apps. Expectations are high.

But even the iPhone didn't become a mainstream blockbuster in its first year, notes Creative Strategies analyst Ben Bajarin. Of the Apple Watch, he says, "people need to understand more about what this product is, and what it does, and I think that will evolve over time."

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Off-street parking 
drives sales

The blizzard of 2015 — and the storms that followed — were enough to make most Bostonians rethink their parking situations, and Hub home buyers have plenty of options when it comes to properties with off-street spots for cars.

Those more desirable properties come with premiums, of course, the extra cost of which depends on the neighborhood.

"(Parking) always has a value no matter what the snow situation is," said Janet Deegan, a Realtor at Coldwell Banker in Jamaica Plain. "But it will have higher value right now when we have so much snow on the ground — and probably into the spring market because of the abundance. My guess is it won't go out of people's consciousness for a while."

The MLS Property Information Network lists 250 condos and single-family and multi-family homes for sale in Boston that come with parking — driveways, deeded spaces in alleys, parking lots, garages and rented spaces.

For a Jamaica Plain home worth $300,000 to $400,000, parking can add about $20,000 to the list price, according to Deegan. "If it was garage parking, it would be more valuable than if it was just a parking spot in a driveway," she said.

Many Dorchester homes have off-street parking — most of it outdoors, according to Realtor Craig Galvin, of the Galvin Group, who estimates it can add $25,000-plus to the cost of a property.

Galvin recently sold two similar condos in triple-deckers near Adams Village. A 985-square-foot condo with off-street parking listed at $319,000 and sold for $314,000. A larger 1,050-square-foot condo without parking listed for $315,000 and was put under agreement for $295,000.

"Just like any other area, if you have parking, it makes your life a lot easier," Galvin said.

A loft-style, five-room condo at The Foundry in South Boston – a neighborhood where 44 percent of the condos sold last year offered parking — went on the market this week with deeded, uncovered parking in a gated lot. It was listed for $549,000 on Tuesday morning, and there were 13 showing requests within four hours.

"The parking has been why these have sold so quickly," said Nick Hanneman, an agent with The Hanneman + Gonzales Team at Robert Paul Properties.

Even Boston condos with transferable rented parking — meaning the parking is an extra annual cost — typically have higher median sales prices than condos without rental spots, said David Bates, a broker at William Raveis Real Estate.

"If you can secure a rental spot that you can give to the buyer — even though you may not have the rights to the spot — more often you'll get a better price," he said.

Midtown — the area from Downtown Crossing to Tremont Street — had the highest percentage of condos for sale last year that came with rented, assigned or deeded parking at 82 percent, followed by Dochester at 64 percent, according to a report by Bates. Only 19 percent of Beacon Hill condos had off-street parking.

In the Back Bay, parking always has held a premium, according to Michael Carucci, president of Group Boston Real Estate.

"The situation has only got worse with the closing of the Danker Donahue Garage on Newbury Street, which is being converted to retail space," he said. "It's the convenience of having it. Would you pay $3 million to have your wife drive around the block with a car full of groceries looking for a place to park?"

Carucci who deals in high-end properties, said his clients always are looking for off-street parking.

"In some cases, even if they don't need it, they want it for resale value," he said.

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The Ticker

Largest banks pass 'stress test'

All of the nation's 31 largest banks are adequately fortified to withstand a severe U.S. and global recession and keep lending, the Federal Reserve said yesterday.

Results of the Fed's annual "stress tests" show that as a group, the 31 banks are stronger than at any time since the 2008 financial crisis struck, thanks to a steadily recovering economy. The results build on positive outcomes from last year's stress tests.

Industry analysts say the most critical tests for the industry will come next week. That's when the Fed will announce whether it's approved each bank's request, if one has been made, to raise dividends or repurchase shares.

Mandarin Oriental says hotels hacked

High-end hotel chain Mandarin Oriental said yesterday that the credit card systems at some of its hotels in the U.S. and Europe were hacked.

The company, however, did not say which of its hotels were affected. It also did not give details on the extent of the hack or how many customers reported fraudulent charges on their credit cards as a result.

Mandarin Oriental operates about 30 hotels in cities across the world including Back Bay in Boston, Paris, London, Geneva, New York, Miami, San Francisco, Las Vegas as well as Shanghai, Hong Kong and Macau.

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AG hits defunct parenting biz with $260G penalty

Isis Parenting, the Needham-based prenatal and parenting retailer that abruptly shut down last year — leaving many parents and expectant parents in the lurch — will pay a $260,000 penalty for failing to provide services and refunds to its customers after its abrupt closing.

The settlement reached with state Attorney General Maura Healey's Office provides for refunds to eligible Massachusetts customers who had prepaid for merchandise and services, including classes, and received no refunds, according to documents filed yesterday in Suffolk Superior Court.

Customers can go through a claims office to receive restitution. The attorney general's office urges consumers with questions to contact its consumer hotline at 617-727-8400.

"Massachusetts companies have an obligation to treat customers fairly and deliver on the promises they make," Healey said in a statement. "When Isis Parenting went out of business, it left many new and expecting parents without the prenatal and parenting courses they paid for and were depending on. We are pleased that this settlement will provide restitution to these consumers."

The settlement comes after an investigation of Isis by the attorney general's office after it received numerous complaints from customers of Isis' alleged unfair business practices.

"The commonwealth alleges that while attempting to sell its business operations as a going concern, Isis Parenting marketed and sold goods and services when it knew or should have known it had insufficient reserves to ensure it would be able to provide (them)," the court documents state. "Isis Parenting failed to provide such goods and services or provide refunds."

Isis cancelled all of its ongoing and future classes when it closed, including prenatal education, early parenting groups and child development classes.

Isis Parenting's going-out-of-business sales at its four stores in Boston, Needham, Arlington and Hanover violated state law on termination sales, which requires companies to file a bond, pay a fee and provide advanced notice and an inventory list to the attorney general's office and towns or cities where the business is located, according to the court documents.

The company also violated the state's Consumer Protection Act regarding unfair competition and unfair or deceptive business practices, the court documents state.

The $260,000 penalty will be paid on behalf of Isis by its insurer.

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Apps drive gaming growth

Tens of thousands of video game developers and fans decked out as their favorite characters will descend on the Boston Convention and Exhibition Center tomorrow for the start of a sold-out, three-day convention to celebrate an industry that has seen its audience expand and diversify with the growth of mobile games.

"Games are one of the fastest-moving industries around; wait five minutes and something new and interesting is gaining ground," said Timothy Loew, executive director of the Massachusetts Digital Games Institute, or MassDiGI. "Today, we're seeing more and more spectacular looking mobile games, esports (competitive gaming) are rising and virtual reality is as hot it gets."

To Jon Radoff, founder and CEO of Framingham-based Disruptor Beam, which will be showcasing "Game of Thrones Ascent" and the company's newest game, "Star Trek Timelines," the real innovation in games is happening around ones designed for mobile phones and tablets.

"If you go back a decade, there were tens of millions of gamers; now there's a billion," he said, because rather than having to play at home on a console or a desktop, people today can play virtually anywhere.

Mobile devices also have made it easier to get access to new games such as "Star Trek Timelines," said Elicia Basoli, a spokeswoman for Disruptor Beam.

"Anyone can submit an app to Apple to get it into their App Store or to Google to get it into their Play Store," Basoli said. "So the barriers to making a mobile game available to the public are lower."

And because all of the new players who now have access to those games have different tastes and interests, another trend has developed: a growing diversity in both the people who play games and the people who develop them.

"If you have a staff that includes women, I think it leads to more creativity and comes through in your product," said Basoli, one of 10 women on Disruptor Beam's team of 40.

Other women, such as Kristen Mukai, a producer at Cambridge-based Proletariat, said that outside the companies they work for, sexism still exists in the industry.

"One of the things that happens all the time is if I'm representing Proletariat at an event and talking about more technical details, someone will say, 'Wait, do you actually work for this company?'" Mukai said. "There have been a couple of times when people have interrupted me and told me flat out that I don't know what I'm talking about."

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Jerry Remy’s locations thrive...outside Fenway ’hood

The namesake Boston restaurant of Red Sox Nation president and NESN color analyst Jerry Remy abruptly closed Tuesday — a month before baseball season opens — but other­ locations appear to be thriving.

Jerry Remy's Sports Bar & Grill debuted in the shadow of Fenway Park in March 2010 after a $5 million build-out and later added a large roof deck.

The Fenway location is co-owned by Remy and John O'Rourke. Remy declined comment yesterday, and O'Rourke did not return calls.

The other Remy's restaurants in Boston's Seaport District, at Logan International Airport and in Fall River, have different owners­ and operate under licensing agreements. They remained open yesterday, and all three owners said they're doing well.

"I was just told they closed the (Boston) restaurant and would revamp it for two weeks to modernize," said Anthony Cordeiro, co-owner of Remy's in Fall River.

NESV Real Estate LLC, a sister company of the Red Sox, owns the Boylston Street property where the Fenway Remy's is located and is its landlord.

"Our understanding is that the current operators have ceased operations," Red Sox spokesman Kevin Gregg said, "and we cannot speculate on their plans or future uses of the site."

But the restaurant's website, Facebook and Twitter accounts gave no indication that the restaurant had closed, and the website was still allowing customers to make reservations.

Neither Remy nor O'Rourke were restaurateurs. Their managing partner, John Mascia, had the restaurant experience but left in August.

The eatery, Mascia said, was challenged by a decline in business in the Red Sox off-season. Even veteran chef/restaurateur Michael Schlow failed to make a go of it in the Fenway, where his Barrio Cantina closed in 2014 after replacing his Happy's Bar + Kitchen, which opened in 2012.

August was also when Cordeiro and co-owner Larry Couto took over day-to-day operations of the Fall River Remy's, in which the former Sox second-baseman and O'Rourke still are partners, Cordeiro said.

"Let's just say it was time for us to control our own future," he said. "It's in our building, and we have our vision, and we plan on keeping Jerry Remy's in Fall River."

Jon Cronin, of the Cronin Group LLC, was an original investor in the Fenway Remy's and has 100 percent ownership of the Remy's in the Seaport District, which he says is thriving.

"Business is up 10 percent year-over-year," Cronin said. "Even with this bad winter, we've had great business."

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Charlie Baker prescribes cuts to MassHealth

Gov. Charlie Baker's $38 billion budget plan would slash the budget-busting Medicaid program and cut spending throughout state government, setting up months of wrangling with Democratic lawmakers over who will feel the most pain — and who won't.

"This is the first chess move with the Legislature," said Josh Archambault of the Pioneer Institute, who has studied the growing impact of MassHealth spending on state coffers. "We're going to be talking about this for at least the next two years. Given how MassHealth has been eating up education or cops or transportation spending, there needs to be discussion to get this program on a sustainable path."

The Swampscott Republican needs to plug a pro­jected $1.8 billion budget gap created by growing costs, lagging revenues and what Baker called the "spending problem" he inherited.

To help close it, the governor wants to ax $761 million from MassHealth, the mammoth state Medicaid program, including reviewing the eligibility of more than 1.2 million subscribers, which his budget team estimates will save $210 million. His plan doesn't call for changes to what makes people eligible, but Baker called the program "one of the most generous" in the country, making it ripe for a so-called "re-determination process."

"If we're trying to close the structural deficit over time, it's something we're going to have to focus on," said Eileen McAnneny, president of the Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation, "and I would say not just MassHealth but health care in general."

Baker aides said they also killed all earmarks dear to lawmakers. But most of the plan stuck to broad strokes, and several top lawmakers said they're still reviewing the details.

Both the governor and the House have made addressing MassHealth costs a priority, and like Baker, Speaker Robert A. DeLeo has pledged no new taxes.

The governor said he's already getting some guff from the Legislature, including over his proposal to ditch the state's film tax credit to help bankroll a boost to the state's earned-income tax credit. Law­makers have also slammed his plan to give the embattled MBTA an extra $64 million in state aid before identifying the problems behind the agency's widespread collapse this winter.

"We're going to have a big debate with the Legislature about our priorities," Baker said. "I believe the proposal we made is a reasonable one, given the financial circumstances that we inherited. ... Most people will see some belt-tightening but not wholesale changes in existing services."

But some advocates were already howling, in­cluding trial court officials, who said Baker's proposal could force them to cut 550 staffers and make it hard for courts to stay open. Court officials were seeking $642 million, but Baker gave them $603 million.

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India's central bank cuts key interest rate

NEW DELHI — India's central bank unexpectedly cut a key interest rate by a quarter percentage point, the second such cut this year because of lower inflation.

Wednesday's cut brings the policy repo rate, at which commercial banks can borrow from the Reserve Bank of India, to 7.5 percent.

The Reserve Bank of India made a similar cut in the key rate in January.

Inflation in India has lowered substantially as global oil prices have dropped sharply.

The RBI said in a statement that inflation in January was 5.1 percent, well below the government's upper limit of 8 percent for the month.

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