By TIM GRANT, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Two decades after his death, Andy Warhol, a larger-than-life artist known for hype and breaking boundaries, might even have been shocked by the recent $71.7 million sale of one of his paintings.

Gasoline prices are soaring, and drivers are feeling the pinch.The national average currently stands at about $3.77 a gallon, which is 39 cents more than one month ago and 67 cents more than this time last year.According to AAA, rising gasoline prices will result in 360,000 fewer Americans traveling over Memorial Day compared with the previous year.

The gold fever that swept through Wall Street in recent months has produced a hot market for coin dealers across the country who trade precious metals with everyday people.

For average investors who are overwhelmed by financial choices and have little time or energy to devote to retirement planning, target date mutual funds, which automatically shift to a more conservative mix of stocks and bonds as investors get older, are an attractive option.

It used to be that an IRA could be funded with only cash, stocks or bonds, but Congress has expanded the rules governing individual retirement accounts to include gold and silver bars and coins.And more investors who are concerned about turbulence in the U.S. and global economies are taking advantage of that option.

Despite their best efforts to save, sacrifice and limit their living expenses, retirees often live out their golden years with a fear of running out of money.Falling interest rates and fierce markets have only inspired more anxiety among senior citizens and near retirees hoping to live off the interest earned by their savings and investment portfolios.

Like infidelity, financial secrets can erode trust and spell doom for spouses or partners who love each other.

Have you made a friendly wager with someone on an athletic event? Did you place a bet in the company office pool for the Super Bowl?If you got lucky and won, you owe part of that money to the Internal Revenue Service.

Best-selling author Robert Kiyosaki believes there is a silver lining in the clouds over the sluggish U.S. economy in the form of silver itself.

Gold was out of sight and out of mind for most investors for more than 20 years while it consistently lost value and was widely considered to be a losing proposition. But recently the precious metal has regained its shine.