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Latest Articles: Economy
Obamanomic Report: Jobless Rise in 20 States as Workers Still Laid Off
Post Date: 2011-01-25 13:55:28 by Happy Quanzaa
1 Comments
The unemployment rate rose in 20 states last month as employers in most states shed jobs. The Labor Department says the unemployment rate rose in 20 states and fell in 15. It was unchanged in another 15 states. That's nearly the same as in November, when the rate rose in 21 states, fell in 15 and was the same in 14. The report is evidence that the job market is barely improving even as the economy grows. Most economists expect hiring to pick up this year, although the unemployment rate will likely remain high. Employers in most states didn't add any net new jobs last month. The number of jobs on employer payrolls fell in 35 states in December, the department said. Only 15 states ...
Economists see more hiring on the way
Post Date: 2011-01-24 08:25:36 by go65
8 Comments
NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- In another sign of a strengthening economy, U.S. companies say they are planning to hire more workers, and expect economic growth to pick up in the first months of 2011, according to a survey released Monday. The National Association for Business Economics said the hiring outlook for the next six months is at a 12-year high. "The number of firms expressing positive hiring plans is at a level not seen in over a decade -- a sign of improving labor-market dynamics," Shawn DuBravac of the Consumer Electronics Association said in a statement. Forty-two percent of companies surveyed said they expect to hire more workers in the next six months, a 13% increase ...
How the financial elite have dismantled the American middle class
Post Date: 2011-01-23 18:51:08 by Godwinson
7 Comments
How the financial elite have dismantled the American middle class – top 1 percent share of wealth at levels not seen since the Great Depression. Goldman Sachs offering average bonuses of $430,000 while a record 43,200,000 Americans receive food stamps. Posted by mybudget360 The U.S. economy is now operating like a finely tuned engine bent on dismantling the middle class and protecting the tiny elites in our nation that have learned to manipulate both political parties to their financial benefit. This did not occur over night but started in the 1970s when the U.S. government and investment banks juiced up the nation with deficit and debt spending. A single family cannot go into debt ...
Healthcare Reality Check [Full Thread]
Post Date: 2011-01-23 14:48:24 by jwpegler
52 Comments
The GOP House has voted to overturn the huge mess known as Obamacare. We'll see if it passes the Senate. Regardless, President Obama is not going to sign. So, the GOP is already starting work on replacing Obamacare with their own ideas. What should the GOP propose? There are two countries that can guide us. Switzerland undoubtedly has the best healthcare system in Europe. Singapore has the best healthcare system in the world. Switzerland spends about 10.8% of GDP on healthcare. Singapore spends less than 4%. Healthcare expenditures in the U.S. have ballooned to a whopping 16.5% of GDP. Neither Switzerland or Singapore have "socialist" or "single payer" systems ...
Supreme Leader's Spendulus III or IV (or whatever # we're up to now) : This time it's going to work
Post Date: 2011-01-22 15:05:58 by Happy Quanzaa
1 Comments
Will reject GOP budget-cut demands President Barack Obama will call for new government spending on infrastructure, education and research in his State of the Union address Tuesday, sharpening his response to Republicans in Congress... Read Full Story
Obama's Ex-OMB Director: America must brace itself for turbulence
Post Date: 2011-01-21 07:19:42 by Happy Quanzaa
2 Comments
America is experiencing the hard slog of recovering from the financial crisis. Prospects have turned more positive over the past two months. But a year ago growth was picking up too – and then it stalled, at about the same time Greece’s fiscal problems infected the global economy. The question now is whether a home-grown fiscal crisis could derail this year’s rebound. Some analysts have reached dramatic conclusions, suggesting the near-certainty of hundreds of billions of dollars in government defaults within the US over the next 12 months. Such predictions will undoubtedly turn out to be substantially overblown. Yet the rejection of one extreme is not the affirmation of the ...
Laissez-Faire Capitalism Has Failed: The financial crisis lays bare the weakness of the Anglo-Saxon model
Post Date: 2011-01-20 16:13:23 by Godwinson
14 Comments
Doctor Doom Laissez-Faire Capitalism Has Failed Nouriel Roubini, 02.19.09, 12:01 AM EST The financial crisis lays bare the weakness of the Anglo-Saxon model. It is now clear that this is the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression and the worst economic crisis in the last 60 years. While we are already in a severe and protracted U-shaped recession (the deluded hope of a short and shallow V-shaped contraction has evaporated), there is now a rising risk that this crisis will turn into an uglier, multiyear, L-shaped, Japanese-style stag-deflation (a deadly combination of stagnation, recession and deflation). < snip > It is clear that the Anglo-Saxon model of supervision ...
Electrolux layoffs begin as Webster City plant begins shut down
Post Date: 2011-01-20 13:29:50 by Happy Quanzaa
0 Comments
WEBSTER CITY, Iowa (AP) — The layoffs have begun at the Electrolux plant in Webster City as the plant begins the process of closing down by this spring. United Autoworkers Local 442 Vice President Jerry Kloberdanz says the company posted the first stage of layoffs on Jan. 7. Kloberdanz says there are about 500 people working at the plant. Electrolux, which makes washing machines and dryers, announced in 2009, that it will close the Webster City plant by the end of March. The Messenger in Fort Dodge is reporting that the company began building a presence in Mexico several years ago in anticipation of moving production there. Kloberdanz says the long-range plan is to retain about 75 ...
Economy forces closure of Whitehall Company
Post Date: 2011-01-20 13:25:10 by Happy Quanzaa
0 Comments
WHITEHALL, Wis. -- Illinois-based Milk Specialties Global says they are closing their Whitehall, WI plant at the end of the month. Company President Eddie Wells tells News 8 the decision to close the plant was an economic one. He says employees are in the plant right now packing up equipment, and they should be finished by the end of January. Milk Specialties creates proteins for sports nutrition and weight loss as well as animal nutrition. OSHA fined the company $535,000 in May of 2010 for safety violations. Wells says the decision to close the plant had nothing to do with the fine. Wells says the employees have done a fabulous job for the company and he hopes that someday they will be ...
Imation to close plant in Okla, cutting 115 jobs
Post Date: 2011-01-20 12:57:10 by Happy Quanzaa
1 Comments
WEATHERFORD, Okla. (AP) - Imation Corp. says it is closing its magnetic tape coating plant in Weatherford by April 2011. The company says that about 115 jobs will be cut, mostly in manufacturing operations. Imation says it will maintain its research, development and engineering facility at its Oakdale, Minn., headquarters. Imation President and CEO Mark Lucas says in a statement that the decision to close the Oklahoma facility "is a difficult but necessary step" as the company tries to improve its operating efficiency and optimize its magnetic tape business. He says the company will provide "financial assistance and outplacement support" to employees who will lose ...
Reynolds closing Pa. food packaging plant
Post Date: 2011-01-20 12:50:36 by Happy Quanzaa
0 Comments
LAKE FOREST, ILL. (Jan. 19, 1 p.m. ET) -- Reynolds Group Holdings Ltd. will close its Reynolds Food Packaging plant in Grove City, Pa. “We’re doing some consolidation. These operations will be consolidated in other facilities, specifically New York and Illinois,” company spokesman Matthew Gonring said in a Jan.19 telephone interview. He said 145 employees, represented by the United Steelworkers union, and the company are in negotiations over workers’ possible futures within the Reynolds companies. Gonring did not give a timeline for the plant closure. He said products produced at the plant include plastic, aluminum and paper products. Reynolds Group of Auckland, New ...
UPDATE: Sony To Close NJ CD Manufacturing Plant~response to continuing U.S. obamanomic malaise
Post Date: 2011-01-20 12:48:28 by Happy Quanzaa
1 Comments
NEW YORK (Dow Jones)--Sony Corp. (SNE) said Tuesday that it is closing a compact disc manufacturing plant in Pitman, N.J., resulting in about 300 layoffs. The plant's operations will be moved to another Sony-owned manufacturing plant in Terre Haute, Ind., which makes DVD and Blu-ray discs, according to Lisa Gephardt, a spokeswoman for the company. The closing, scheduled for March 18, will mark the end of Sony DADC, the largest employer in Pitman--a town of just over two square miles with a population less than 10,000. The factory began operations in 1960 as a manufacturer for Columbia Records. Pitman Mayor Michael Batten, a Republican, said the plant closing would deal a painful blow ...
Boeing cutting 900 jobs at California plant
Post Date: 2011-01-20 12:35:14 by Happy Quanzaa
5 Comments
Boeing cutting 900 jobs at California plant, citing declining orders for C-17 cargo planes LONG BEACH, Calif. (AP) - Dwindling domestic demand for C-17 cargo planes will force Boeing Co. to slash 1,100 jobs at its U.S. plants, most of them in Long Beach where the aerospace giant has cut 13,000 jobs since the 1990s, the company said Thursday. The 900 jobs in Long Beach and 200 jobs at plants in Mesa, Ariz., Macon, Ga., and St. Louis will be cut by the end of next year. The cuts include accountants, midlevel management, engineering, research and assembly line workers. Affected workers will receive 60-day notices beginning Friday, with layoffs staggered monthly through 2012. Boeing said it ...
Police Bust 'Hillbilly Heroin' Ring In Murfreesboro
Post Date: 2010-12-29 11:34:06 by Ferret Mike
3 Comments
MURFREESBORO, Tenn. - Murfreesboro police have arrested three people in connection with a prescription drug ring specializing in what street dealers call "hillbilly heroin." Joseph Freels along with father and son, Horace and Kenneth Laster, have been charged with prescription fraud. The three men are accused of stealing a prescription pad from a doctor's office and forging more than one hundred prescriptions for thousands of roxicodone pills over the past year. The Lasters both have a history of public service. Horace is a retired Metro firefighter. His son Kenneth worked at one time for the La Vergne Fire Department. "This is the largest prescription drug fraud case ...
Outsourcing by U.S. firms add to unemployment woes [created 1 million jobs here v. 1.4 million abroad]
Post Date: 2010-12-29 11:00:21 by Ferret Mike
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Continued job outsourcing by U.S. companies in order to cut costs and maximize profits may be keeping the U.S. unemployment rate at a high 9.8 percent. For the most part, U.S. firms are doing fine during the economic recovery. Just 4 percent of the top 500 U.S. corporations did not generate profits in 2010 while the stock market is nearing its highest level since the financial crisis began two years ago. Yet, this modest success has not trimmed down joblessness. U.S. companies are hiring, just not on U.S. soil. Many businesses are hiring overseas as they expand their operations there. According to Washington-based think tank Economic Policy Institute, U.S. companies have created 1.4 million ...
Alaska records second-highest gasoline prices in the nation
Post Date: 2010-12-29 10:49:29 by Skip Intro
3 Comments
UNUSUAL: National tab most ever for the holiday season at $3. The Anchorage average was $3.39 a gallon Monday, compared with $3.36 a month ago and $3.28 a year ago, AAA reported. Nationally, pump prices topped $3 for the first time ever at Christmas, according to AAA, Wright Express and Oil Price Information Service. The average pump price was $3.01 at the end of last week. That's 14 cents more than a month ago and 43 cents higher than a year ago. The national average continued to go up and was $3.04 per gallon as of Monday. Pump prices traditionally have dropped after the peak summer driving season and into the winter, because fewer people are on the road. This year, however, ...
Top Senate Democrats Defect on Tax Vote
Post Date: 2010-12-04 14:44:46 by jwpegler
1 Comments
Two votes: Extend current tax rates for families making less than $250,000. Voting no: Russ Feingold, Joe Manchin, Ben Nelson, Jim Webb, and Joe Lieberman. Extend current tax rates for families making less than $1,000,000. Voting no: Russ Feingold, Joe Lieberman, Dick Durbin, Tom Harkin, and Jay Rockefeller.
The Stench of US Economic Decay: Russia and China Dump the US Dollar
Post Date: 2010-11-29 17:54:55 by Capitalist Eric
2 Comments
On Thanksgiving eve the English language China Daily and People’s Daily Online reported that Russia and China have concluded an agreement to abandon the use of the US dollar in their bilateral trade and to use their own currencies in its place. The Russians and Chinese said that they had taken this step in order to insulate their economies from the risks that have undermined their confidence in the US dollar as a world reserve currency. As China has a large and growing supply of dollars from trade surpluses with which to conduct trade, China is signaling that she prefers Russian rubles and Brazilian reals to more US dollars. This is big news, especially for the news dead Thanksgiving ...
Next Debt Crisis May Start in Washington
Post Date: 2010-11-26 10:01:05 by jwpegler
1 Comments
The US needs to take urgent action to cut its debt in order to prevent the next financial crisis, which may start in Washington, Sheila Bair, chair of the Federal Deposits Insurance Corp. (FDIC) wrote in an editorial in the Washington Post. AP FDIC Chairman Sheila Bair says the US needs austerity plan. The federal debt has doubled over the past seven years, to almost $14 trillion, and the growth is a result of both the financial crisis and the government's "unwillingness over many years to make the hard choices necessary to rein in our long-term structural deficit," Bair wrote. Retiring baby boomers will impact government spending heavily and this year, combined spending ...
More on Radical Tax Reform
Post Date: 2010-11-11 15:56:06 by jwpegler
2 Comments
The idea of simplifying the tax code by lowering tax rates and eliminating deductions is not a new one. In the 1970s, an economics professor from Canada (Art Laffer) demonstrated that there are two rates that will produce the same revenue. A tax rate of 0% will produce the same revenue of a tax rate of 104% or higher, namely ZERO revenue. However, a 10% rate and a 90% are not inequivalent. Imagine a skewed bell curve. A 10% rate might produce the same revenue as 80% or 90% or 95% or some other high rate. It depends on a lot of things. Reducing rates can produce higher revenue by stimulating economic activity, but it depends on where the rate is in the context of the condition of the ...
Obama Deficit Commission Proposes Surprising Tax Rate Reduction
Post Date: 2010-11-11 15:07:38 by jwpegler
0 Comments
Yesterday, Obama's Deficit Commission leaked some of their proposed recommendations. The Deficit Commission is bi-partisan group created by President Obama to come up with recommendations on how on to reduce (and presumably eliminate) deficit spending over the next decade. The commission's members were appointed by the President as well as the Democrat and Republican leaders in the House and Senate. Some of the GOP's rising stars, including Congressman Paul Ryan and Senator Tom Coburn, are members of the commission. The draft proposal calls for cutting $4 trillion from the projected deficits over the next 10 years. Nancy Pelosi, Congressman Rick Weiner, and many others on the ...
Paul Volcker: US Fed's spending to have little impact on recovery
Post Date: 2010-11-05 15:51:44 by jwpegler
1 Comments
The Federal Reserve's move to pump hundreds of billions of dollars into the US economy will have relatively little effect in supporting the recovery, former Fed chairman Paul Volcker said. "I don't think that (support) will be very large," Volcker, who now chairs President Barack Obama's economic recovery advisory board, on Friday told a press conference in the South Korean capital. "That doesn't say there won't be any. "It (the Fed) certainly hopes there will be some but I don't think that action alone will make a very dramatic difference." The Fed announced Wednesday it would pour an additional 600 billion dollars into the economy ...
Scary New Wage Data [Full Thread]
Post Date: 2010-10-28 00:38:05 by lucysmom
46 Comments
Every 34th wage earner in America in 2008 went all of 2009 without earning a single dollar, new data from the Social Security Administration show. Total wages, median wages, and average wages all declined, but at the very top, salaries grew more than fivefold. ... The number of Americans making $50 million or more, the top income category in the data, fell from 131 in 2008 to 74 last year. But that’s only part of the story. The average wage in this top category increased from $91.2 million in 2008 to an astonishing $518.8 million in 2009. That’s nearly $10 million in weekly pay! You read that right. In the Great Recession year of 2009 (officially just the first half of the ...
A Lost Decade for Jobs
Post Date: 2010-10-26 11:56:38 by lucysmom
7 Comments
Between May 1999 and May 2009, employment in the private sector sector only rose by 1.1%, by far the lowest 10-year increase in the post-depression period. It’s impossible to overstate how bad this is. Basically speaking, the private sector job machine has almost completely stalled over the past ten years. ... Without a decade of growing government support from rising health and education spending and soaring budget deficits, the labor market would have been flat on its back. Click for Full Text!
Government job cuts ravage California
Post Date: 2010-10-26 00:05:02 by lucysmom
11 Comments
Weighed down by a struggling economy, government agencies in California shed 37,300 workers last month — more jobs than were lost in the private sector — as cities and counties made their biggest payroll cutbacks since at least 1990. What's more, analysts see more job cuts ahead as California faces an estimated $10-billion shortfall in the state budget that the next governor must address. Cities and counties, meanwhile, are still struggling with tepid sales and property tax revenue. "Local governments are adopting austerity measures," said Jerry Nickelsburg, an economist with the UCLA Anderson Forecast. "They don't have confidence that they're going to ...
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