Poverty Rises, Will Rise Further
The recession seems to have taken a toll on the rich and poor alike, but the rich can usually afford housing. The nation’s poverty rate climbed to 13.2%, up from 12.5% in 2007. That…
Economy
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Newest first · Page 381Beige Book Looks More Gray
The DJIA has rolled over a bit since the release of the latest Beige Book from the Federal Reserve, yet the market is still higher. Ditto for the S&P. The Fed’s Beige Book is…
Consumer Spending: No One Has A Dime
The Federal Reserve issued its monthly Consumer Credit report for July. Consumer credit fell almost $22 billion to $2.74 trillion. The figure has been dropping fairly steadily since the middle of last year. The…
US Hiring To Remain Weak
Hiring in the US may not be recovering, at least not soon, to the extent that it will help the economy in the fourth quarter. New data from Manpower shows a labor market in America…
The New National Employment Anxiety: The Myth Of The Jobless Recovery
The press and a number of economists believe that GDP will improve at the end of this year and that the improvement will accelerate into 2010 and 2011. Unemployment improvements will lag, but that…
G-20 Wants To Hogtie Major Banks
The finance ministers of the G-20 nations blame most of the collapse of the credit system and a portion of the failure of the global economy on the world’s largest banks. Whether that is…
Biden’s Stimulus Speech: A Context Check
by Christopher Flavelle and Amanda Michel, ProPublica – September 3, 2009 Vice President Joe Biden marked the 200-day point of the stimulus package today with a speech at the Brookings Institution, where he spent…
IMF: More Concern About The Recovery
What was being described by many economists just a few weeks ago as a robust recovery has become hardly any recovery at all. Economist Joseph Stiglitz recently said that improvement in global GDP may not…
Fear And Loathing In The Unemployment Line
The minutes of the FOMC on August 11th and 12th were released today. The Fed did everything it could just short of saying that the recession is officially over. One of the critical notations…
ISM Showing Some National Growth
The August manufacturing data from the Institute for Supply Management is actually positive and above that 50.0 threshold for growth versus contraction. It is easy to point to some exceptions here, but this is…
Chicago Purchasing Managers Showing Some Growth
The reading for Chicago Purchasing Managers for August is now back in positive territory. The adjusted August figure is 50.0 vs. 43.4 in July. A reading above 50.0 is growth, a reading under 50…
Tax Avoidance And The 2011 GDP Dip
UK investment banks are preparing to pay many of their big earners at the beginning of 2010 to avoid an income tax on April 5. The Times points out that this may reinforce notions…
A Cynical View Of Bernanke’s Reappointment
The number of reasons for President Obama to reappoint Ben Bernanke as Fed chairman greatly outnumber the reasons for letting him go and putting someone like Larry Summers in his place. Bernanke is viewed…
No Increase For Social Security Recipients
The millions of Americans who get social security will not see their payments rise next year and probably not the year after. The cost of living increases that have been in place for thirty…
White House Deficit Estimate To $9 Trillion From $7.1 Trillion
The Administration quickly and fairly quietly raised its budget deficit forecast for the next ten years to $9 trillion from $7.1 trillion, an astonishing 27% increase. The new estimate is much closer to the…