Personal Finance Daily: The first step in making money and what it takes to become a 401(k) millionaire

Happy Monday, MarketWatchers! Here are the top personal finance stories of the day.

Personal Finance Mega Millions jackpot tops half a billion dollars, so what time is the drawing?

There hasn’t been a Mega Millions jackpot winner since May.

We are all living under constant surveillance

An Uber and Lyft driver in St. Louis secretly recorded his passengers and posted the videos online.

4 reasons NOT to buy a $493 million Mega Millions ticket

Why you should avoid lottery fever—and it has nothing to do with the near-impossible odds.

This is what it really takes to become a 401(k) millionaire

The numbers make it seem like it shouldn’t be that hard to save at least $1 million by retirement age. But everything looks easier on paper than in real life.

This 18-year-old’s hacking side hustle has earned him $100,000 — and it’s legal

More companies are offering ‘bug bounties’ for enterprising hackers.

The first step in making money: You have to really want it

A change in attitude is needed. And then work harder than you ever have before, says Jared Dillian.

How your loved ones can cash in on the 0% tax rate on long-term capital gains

If your own income is too high to benefit, your children, grandchildren and other loved ones can still take advantage.

130,000 veterans are about to get a hefty tax refund

Veterans face unique financial challenges—here’s what they might want to do with the money.

People are taking out personal loans to pay for their vacations

You can pay for your vacation in installments. But should you?

The government has no idea how many gig workers there are—why that’s a problem

It’s tough to measure something when no one can agree on what’s actually being measured.

Elsewhere on MarketWatch How tariffs and trade-war talk may have inflated U.S. economy (GDP) in the spring

Go figure: The threat of an all-out trade war with China probably gave a jolt of adrenaline to an already jacked-up U.S. economy in the spring.

The ‘significant damage’ a U.S.-China trade war could do to the global economy — in one chart

Stock-market investors continue to play down the risks escalating trade tensions pose. But economists are beginning to pencil in an ever steeper hit to growth in China, the U.S. and the world.

Trump should thank his lucky stars that the Fed won’t listen to him

President Donald Trump complains that the Fed is raising interest rates, but he should realize that the slow-and-steady course is the best way to avoid a recession right before the next election, writes Caroline Baum.

GDP seen ballooning above 4%, but air might be already leaking out of economy

The economy hit the gas pedal in the spring and may ripped off one of the fastest growth spurts since the U.S. exited the Great Recession nine years ago. Great news, all right, but it won’t mean much without a few encores.

Existing-home sales slide for third-straight month in June, touch 5-month low as housing sputters

With not enough supply to meet demand, the housing market is running out of steam, as evidenced in the National Association of Realtors’ June sales figures.

Chicago Fed national economic indicator helped by factory-sector snapback

A measure of the U.S. economy from the Chicago Federal Reserve rebounded aggressively in June after a sharp downward revision to May’s already weak performance.

There are millions of Americans like that guy who walked 20 miles to work

We have a transportation problem, and CEOs giving away their cars won’t fix it.

How immigrants can make the economy — and the nation — stronger

The U.S. economy relies on the contributions of immigrants, so we must create a more inclusionary vision of nationalism, argues Jason Furman.

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