| 3/31/2009: | World Bank Predicts Sharply Slower Growth. The new Global Economic Prospects update notes that global growth is expected to contract by 1.7 percent this year. This would be the first decline in world output since World War II. GDP is projected to decline by 3 percent in OECD countries and by 2 percent in other high-income economies. World Bank. | |
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| 3/26/2009: | The Quiet Coup. The crash has laid bare many unpleasant truths about the United States. One of the most alarming, says a former chief economist of the International Monetary Fund, is that the finance industry has effectively captured our government -- a state of affairs that more typically describes emerging markets, and is at the center of many emerging-market crises. If the IMF's staff could speak freely about the U.S., it would tell us what it tells all countries in this situation: recovery will fail unless we break the financial oligarchy that is blocking essential reform. And if we are to prevent a true depression, we're running out of time. Atlantic. | |
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| 3/24/2009: | Geithner Plan Will Rob US Taxpayers: Stiglitz. The U.S. government plan to rid banks of toxic assets will rob American taxpayers by exposing them to too much risk and is unlikely to work as long as the economy remains weak, Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz said on Tuesday. CNBC. | |
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| 3/24/2009: | China calls for new reserve currency. "This is a clear sign that China, as the largest holder of US dollar financial assets, is concerned about the potential inflationary risk of the US Federal Reserve printing money," said Qu Hongbin, chief China economist for HSBC. FT. | |
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| 3/23/2009: | Cuomo Says Most Huge A.I.G. Bonuses Were Returned. Attorney General Andrew M. Cuomo of New York announced late Monday afternoon that 9 of the top 10 bonus recipients at the American International Group had given back their bonuses. NYT. | |
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| 3/23/2009: | Bank of America's Bernstein Says Sell Bank Stocks After Rally. Removing devalued loans and securities from banks' balance sheets is a short-term solution that will delay the problem's ultimate solution, which is bank takeovers, Bernstein said. The government won't be able to inflate the prices banks receive for selling bad assets indefinitely, he added. Bloomberg. | |
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| 3/23/2009: | Seize their Porsches and throw them in jail! How can the real world get through to these people that they are not success stories, winners, masters of the universe but failures, losers, impresarios of misery? Why should banking be singled out, to be rewarded differently from every other form of human endeavour? Max Hastings. | |
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| 3/23/2009: | Revolution in the Air. Might we might be seeing the first real rumblings of class warfare -- the genuine article, not the Republican talking-point -- in this country? Felix Salmon. | |
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| 3/23/2009: | Sweden Says No to Saving Saab. The Swedish government has responded to Saab's desperate financial situation by saying, essentially, tough luck. Or, as the enterprise minister, Maud Olofsson, put it recently, "The Swedish state is not prepared to own car factories." NYT. | |
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| 3/23/2009: | Geithner: My Plan for Bad Bank Assets. The financial system as a whole is still working against recovery. Many banks, still burdened by bad lending decisions, are holding back on providing credit. Market prices for many assets held by financial institutions -- so-called legacy assets -- are either uncertain or depressed. With these pressures at work on bank balance sheets, credit remains a scarce commodity, and credit that is available carries a high cost for borrowers. WSJ. | |
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| 3/22/2009: | Obama says risks still haunt U.S. financial system. The U.S. financial system still faces risks requiring government intervention to avoid a more destructive recession, President Barack Obama said, before a critical week of fleshing out and selling his recovery plan. Reuters. | |
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| 3/22/2009: | Kroft to Obama: Are you punch-drunk? The interview is Obama's most detailed explanation yet of his view of the world economic crisis, and he makes clear that he's afraid the nation hasn’t seen the worst of it -- even invoking the possibility of a 'depression' if a series of financial institutions collapse all at once. Politico. | |
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| 3/22/2009: | The Geithner Plan FAQ. The Geithner Plan is a trillion-dollar operation by which the U.S. acts as the world's largest hedge fund investor, committing its money to funds to buy up risky and distressed but probably fundamentally undervalued assets and, as patient capital, holding them either until maturity or until markets recover so that risk discounts are normal and it can sell them off--in either case at an immense profit. Brad DeLong. | |
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| 3/22/2009: | Has a 'Katrina Moment' Arrived? It would be foolish to dismiss as hyperbole the stark warning delivered by Paulette Altmaier of Cupertino, Calif., in a letter to the editor published by The Times last week: "President Obama may not realize it yet, but his Katrina moment has arrived." Frank Rich. | |
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| 3/22/2009: | More on the bank plan. Early on in this crisis, it was possible to argue that it was mainly a panic. But at this point, that's an indefensible position. Banks and other highly leveraged institutions collectively made a huge bet that the normal rules for house prices and sustainable levels of consumer debt no longer applied; they were wrong. Time for a Swedish solution. Paul Krugman. | |
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| 3/21/2009: | Despair over financial policy. The Obama administration is now completely wedded to the idea that there's nothing fundamentally wrong with the financial system -- that what we're facing is the equivalent of a run on an essentially sound bank. Paul Krugman. | |
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| 3/20/2009: | The Great Recession versus the Great Depression. At first, the current recession didn't hit industrial production all that hard. But the pace accelerated dramatically last fall, so that at this point we're sort of experiencing half a Great Depression. That's pretty bad. Paul Krugman. | |
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| 3/20/2009: | Off With the Bankers. The argument that A.I.G.'s traders are the people that we must depend on to save the United States economy is as weak and self-serving as it was in Thailand, Korea or Indonesia. A.I.G. is essentially advocating survival of the weakest. Thankfully, the American people are not buying it. NYT. | |
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| 3/19/2009: | It's the turn of the unsecured creditors now. Why are the unsecured creditors of banks and quasi-banks like AIG deemed too precious to take a hit or a haircut since Lehman Brothers went down? From the point of view of fairness they ought to have their heads on the block. It was they who funded the excessive leverage and risk-taking of banks and shadow banks. Maverecon. | |
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| 3/18/2009: | Dodd Admits to Loophole. Senate Banking Committe Chairman Chris Dodd admitted to CNN that he was responsible for the loophole in the economic stimulus package that allowed firms like AIG receiving bailout funds to pay bonuses. Political Wire. | |
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| 3/18/2009: | Will Britain go bankrupt? Apparently, British house prices could fall by as much as a further 55%. Oh, and there's a real risk that the country could go bust on top as well. MoneyWeek. | |
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| 3/18/2009: | A bit more to worry about. Foreign demand for long-term Treasuries has disappeared over the last few months. Brad Setser. | |
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| 3/18/2009: | AIG Chief Asks Execs to Return Part of Disputed Bonus Pay. The head of AIG appeared on Capitol Hill amid a furor over the company's bonus pay and told lawmakers that he's called on workers to return part of the payments. NewsHour/PBS. | |
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| 3/18/2009: | Federal Reserve to Buy $1.2T in Bonds, Mortgage-Backed Securities. The central bank will increase its purchases of mortgage-backed securities by $750 billion, on top of a previously announced $500 billion. It also will double its purchases of debt in Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to $200 billion. Those steps are intended to lower mortgage rates. The announcement of the previous purchases pushed mortgage rates down a full percentage point. Washington Post. | |
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| 3/17/2009: | Bush: Obama 'Deserves My Silence' The former president refuses to criticize his successor in his speech to the Calgary Chamber of Commerce in Canada Tuesday. "I'm not going to spend my time criticizing him. There are plenty of critics in the arena." Speech was his first since leaving office in January. Mark Halperin. | |
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| 3/17/2009: | Obama, Congress knew about AIG bonuses for months. For months, the Obama administration and members of Congress have known that insurance giant AIG was getting ready to pay huge bonuses while living off government bailouts. It wasn't until the money was flowing and news was trickling out to the public that official Washington rose up in anger and vowed to yank the money back. AP. | |
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| 3/16/2009: | Grassley on AIG execs: Quit or suicide. Sen. Charles Grassley is so angry over AIG bonuses that he says the executives should resign or kill themselves. Politico. | |
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| 3/16/2009: | Consumer Mood Index Hits Highest Mark Since September. Gallup's Consumer Mood Index rose sharply over the last week, to -90 for March 13-15. This is up from -120 a week ago and is the most positive the Index has been since mid-September 2008. Gallup. | |
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| 3/16/2009: | Citigroup CEO awarded $10.8 million. Citigroup Inc awarded Chief Executive Vikram Pandit $10.82 million of compensation in 2008, a year when the government propped up the bank with $45 billion of capital. Reuters. | |
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| 3/16/2009: | Bank CEO calls Geithner's Plan Asinine. Wells Fargo's CEO Richard Kovacevich has some harsh words about Geithner's stress test. "It's Asinine" Says Wells' CEO. Henry Blodget seems to agree. Mish's. | |
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| 3/16/2009: | A Continent Adrift. There's no government in a position to take responsibility for the European economy as a whole. What Europe has, instead, are national governments, each of which is reluctant to run up large debts to finance a stimulus that will convey many if not most of its benefits to voters in other countries. Paul Krugman. | |
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| 3/15/2009: | White House says economy is sound despite 'mess' The economy is fundamentally sound despite the temporary "mess" it's in, the White House said Sunday in the kind of upbeat assessment that Barack Obama had mocked as a presidential candidate. AP. | |
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| 3/14/2009: | World mints report soaring demand for gold coins. Mints around the world say demand for gold coins has risen sharply as interest in the precious metal soars on the back of financial instability and concerns over the inflation outlook. Reuters. | |
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| 3/13/2009: | A White House Seized By The Animal Spirits. The greatest fear in Washington's corridors of power now is that we collectively lose our minds again, becoming irrationally pessimistic just as we were all irrationally optimistic a few years ago. The policy responses are after all as much about restoring confidence in sustained economic growth as they are about restoring economic growth. Time.com Swampland. | |
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| 3/13/2009: | The bad news hidden in the good news. The US January trade deficit fell to $36 billion. That is as low as it has been in a long time. The petroleum deficit (seasonally adjusted) fell to $14.7 billion -- $4 billion less than in December 2008 and $20 billion less than January 2008. So where is the bad news? Brad Setser. | |
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| 3/13/2009: | Asian Markets Surge on China, Japan Stimulus. Asian markets surged Friday at the prospect of fresh stimulus measures in China and Japan. Major indexes close 3-5% up. Mark Halperin. | |
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| 3/13/2009: | Obama: Economic crisis 'not as bad as we think' "A smidgen of good news and suddenly everything is doing great. A little bit of bad news and ooohh , we're down on the dumps," Obama said. "And I am obviously an object of this constantly varying assessment. I am the object in chief of this varying assessment." AP. | |
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| 3/12/2009: | 4-day school week gains momentum amid recession. With the nation's school districts strapped for cash, more are considering a schedule that delights students and makes working parents cringe: Class only four days a week. AP. | |
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| 3/12/2009: | Who is afraid of a banking stress test? As promised, federal officials revealed more details on Wednesday of how regulators intend to conduct "stress tests" to determine the financial health of the nation's biggest banks. But anyone expecting "bold" or "swift" action, to borrow a couple of words that we've been hearing a lot about from President Obama lately, is likely to be disappointed. Salon: How the World. | |
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| 3/12/2009: | U.S. commuter trains need repairs, money. U.S. commuter trains are in bad shape and, even though more money is flowing into public transportation, they are not receiving enough funding to make needed upgrades, the nation's transportation secretary told Congress on Thursday. Reuters. | |
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| 3/12/2009: | German industry declines at an annualised rate of over 50% If this decline continues until the summer – and there are no indications why it should not – it means that Germany will have lost half of manufacturing output. Eurointelligence. | |
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| 3/12/2009: | Judge OKs injunction to freeze Stanford assets. A federal judge on Thursday granted a request from the Securities and Exchange Commission for a preliminary injunction to freeze the assets of Texan financier Allen Stanford and three of his companies that are accused of running a massive Ponzi scheme by U.S. regulators. Reuters. | |
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| 3/12/2009: | New jobless claims rise more than expected. The government says the number of Americans filing initial claims for jobless benefits rose last week while the total jobless benefit rolls reached a new record. AP. | |
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| 3/12/2009: | Obama Wants Global Financial Plan. Trying to smooth out disagreements between American and European policy makers about how to address the economic crisis, President Obama called on foreign governments on Wednesday to increase their domestic spending to stimulate their economies and asked for greater coordination of regulatory oversight. NYT. | |
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| 3/12/2009: | Hersh: 'Executive assassination ring' reported directly to Cheney. Investigative reporter Seymour Hersh dropped a bombshell on Tuesday when he told an audience at the University of Minnesota that the military was running an "executive assassination ring" throughout the Bush years which reported directly to former Vice President Dick Cheney. Raw Story. | |
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| 3/12/2009: | Obama, Geithner get low grades from economists: WSJ survey. U.S. President Barack Obama and Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner received failing grades for their efforts to revive the world's largest economy, according to participants in the latest Wall Street Journal forecasting survey. Reuters. | |
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| 3/11/2009: | Cuomo Says Merrill Deceived Congress on Bonuses. Andrew M. Cuomo, the attorney general of New York, claimed Merrill Lynch was misleading Congress over its plans to award billions of dollars in bonuses last December. NYT. | |
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| 3/11/2009: | Democrats in Congress Fear Recovery May Take Too Long. Democratic House members say they have less time to wait for signs of economic recovery than President Barack Obama, a conflict of timing that lawmakers say has become increasingly evident in their dealings with the White House. CQ. | |
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| 3/11/2009: | Freddie Mac seeks $30.8B in US aid after 4Q loss. Freddie Mac said Wednesday it will ask the government for nearly $31 billion in additional aid after posting a gargantuan loss of more than $50 billion last year as the U.S. housing market worsened. AP. | |
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| 3/11/2009: | Chu to OPEC: Cutting production will harm economy. Energy Secretary Steven Chu said Wednesday that if OPEC cuts production and adds to oil price volatility, it could severely hamper any global economic recovery. AP. | |
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| 3/9/2009: | Creeping fear of bank nationalization. The blogosphere is starting to realize how difficult it would be for the government to "take over" the largest banks, even if those banks are insolvent by various measures. Marginal Revolution. | |
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| 3/9/2009: | Geithner bucks up House Dem spirits. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner told the House Democratic Caucus that the Obama administration's efforts to get the economy going will work. "It will take some time," Geithner said Monday, according to a Democratic source. "It will take some patience. We will work with you. But it will work." The Hill. | |
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| 3/9/2009: | McCain, still center stage in U.S., battles big spending. "If it sounds like I'm angry it's because I am," McCain roared on the Senate floor. But after plenty of fiery debate, the bill was expected to win final congressional approval in the Senate on Tuesday and go to Obama to sign into law. Reuters. | |
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| 3/9/2009: | Ford workers approve UAW contract changes. Unionized workers at Ford Motor Co. have approved contract changes that include freezing wages and cutting benefits in a move aimed at helping the automaker remain competitive. AP. | |
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| 3/9/2009: | Congress to go to work on union organizing bill. Legislation that would make it easier for workers to unionize will be introduced on Tuesday in the U.S. Congress, escalating a battle between Democratic lawmakers and corporate America. Reuters. | |
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| 3/9/2009: | Sen. Specter: Nation on 'brink of a depression' "Our economic problems are enormously serious â€" more serious than is publicly disclosed. And I think we're on the brink of a depression," he told reporters at the state Capitol. USA Today. | |
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| 3/9/2009: | Japan reconsidered. I’m not the only person to notice this: Japan doesn’t look so bad these days. Paul Krugman. | |
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| 3/8/2009: | David Brooks: "That is just insane" "A lot of Republicans up in Capitol Hill right now are calling for a spending freeze in a middle of a recession/depression. That is insane. But they are thinking the way they thought in 1982, if we can only think that way again, that is just insane." Washington Monthly. | |
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| 3/8/2009: | The Next Hit: Quick Defaults. Many borrowers are defaulting as quickly as they take out the loans. In the past year alone, the number of borrowers who failed to make more than a single payment before defaulting on FHA-backed mortgages has nearly tripled, far outpacing the agency's overall growth in new loans, according to a Washington Post analysis of federal data. Washington Post. | |
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| 3/8/2009: | David Brooks: Spending Freeze is "Insane" David Brooks on ABC's "This Week" shows he has the guts to go where the MSM dares not tread and observes that whatever you may think of the Obama administration's plans, the main alternative coming from the dominant conservative wing of the GOP would be laughable were it not so dangerous. Yglesias. | |
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| 3/8/2009: | The Slightest Glimmer. In light of the week's terrible economic news we asked Simon Johnson, a professor at MIT's Sloan School of Management, a Senior Fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, and co-founder of Baseline Scenario, if there were any reasons, any at all, to feel hopeful. New Republic. | |
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| 3/8/2009: | Anti-nationalization arguments. The current system, of implicit maybe-kinda guarantees on bank liabilities â€" call it wink-wink-nudge-nudge-say-no-more banking policy â€" is failing badly. Paul Krugman. | |
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| 3/8/2009: | Obama nominates 3 to key Treasury Department posts. The White House on Sunday said Obama is nominating David S. Cohen to be assistant secretary in dealing with terrorist financing; Alan B. Krueger for assistant secretary for economic policy; and Kim N. Wallace as assistant secretary for legislative affairs. AP. | |
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| 3/8/2009: | Obama will use spring summit to bring Cuba in from the cold. US companies are queuing up as the president moves to ease restrictions on travel and trade, raising hopes of warmer relations and an end to the embargo. Guardian. | |
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| 3/7/2009: | A.I.G., Where Taxpayers' Dollars Go to Die. Derivatives are a black hole at the big insurer, and the government keeps tossing in money. NYT. | |
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| 3/7/2009: | Obama brings grim job figures to Ohio. Obama traveled to Ohio to highlight a tiny bit of good news: 25 jobs saved by the stimulus plan. Politico. | |
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| 3/7/2009: | Bernanke: Fed will use all tools at its disposal. Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke said on Saturday the U.S. central bank would use all of its tools to stabilize financial markets and pull the economy out of recession. Reuters. | |
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| 3/7/2009: | Clinton: Obama to visit Turkey. President Obama plans to visit Turkey in about a month, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Saturday. Turkey is a secular country and predominantly Muslim. It is a NATO member and has been a longtime ally of the United States. It is one of the few Muslim countries to have full diplomatic relations with Israel and has long been the Jewish state's closest military and economic partner in the region. CNN. | |
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| 3/7/2009: | In hard times, executions become question of cost. After decades of moral arguments reaching biblical proportions, after long, twisted journeys to the nation's highest court and back, the death penalty may be abandoned by several states for a reason having nothing to do with right or wrong. AP. | |
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| 3/7/2009: | One-sided debate. According to the invaluable Media Matters, the idea that the Obama stimulus plan might be too small -- a view held by many well-known economists -- basically went unreported on broadcast news during the stimulus debate. Paul Krugman. | |
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| 3/6/2009: | Job Losses Hint at Vast Remaking of U.S. Economy. With unemployment at 8.1 percent, some economists believe that a wrenching restructuring is under way. NYT. | |
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| 3/6/2009: | U.S. regulators close Freedom Bank of Georgia. U.S. regulators closed Freedom Bank of Georgia bank on Friday, the 17th U.S. bank to fail this year as the struggling economy and falling home prices take their toll on financial institutions. Reuters. | |
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| 3/6/2009: | Silicon Valley unemployment rate jumps to 'frightening' 9.4 percent. The hair-raising report had Silicon Valley Leadership Group Chief Executive Carl Guardino worried that worse was to come: "If the January unemployment numbers resemble a horror movie, then I fear the sequels that will be released in February and March, as they will probably be even more frightening," he said. Mercury News. | |
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| 3/6/2009: | For McCain, a Dual Role, Center Stage. Senator John McCain, alternately his old coalition-building dealmaker and the gloves-off bruiser from the campaign, is rewriting the part of presidential loser. NYT. | |
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| 3/6/2009: | The Beat: Let Limbaugh Hate, Let Kennedy Have the Last Laugh. Richard Nixon, when asked his opinion of an up-and-coming Texan named George Herbert Walker Bush, famously replied with casual disinterest, observing that Bush was alright as ambitious young pols went. Then, Nixon lit up at the thought of Bush's wife, Barbara. "Now," he declared, gleefully, "there's a woman who knows how to hate." The Nation. | |
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| 2/28/2009: | Limbaugh calls on conservatives to take back nation. Rush Limbaugh brought a cheering crowd to its feet several times Saturday in Washington as he called on fellow conservatives to take back the country in the keynote speech at the Conservative Political Action Conference. CNN. | |
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| 2/28/2009: | Op-Ed Columnist: The Ecstasy and the Agony. The president's speech to Congress, brilliant as it was, could still be undermined by unchecked populist rage. Frank Rich. | |
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| 2/28/2009: | GOP presidential movie: '2012: The sequel' Republicans have a script for 2012. Just listen to Newt Gingrich, speaking before the crowd at the Conservative Political Action Conference, which is an annual gathering of conservatives from across the country. CNN. | |
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| 2/28/2009: | Obama Calls His Budget Needed Change. Saying he would defend his plan, President Obama cast himself as a populist crusader willing to do battle with special interests. NYT. | |
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| 2/10/2009: | Geithner Revamps Rescue Plan, but Details Prove Scarce. The Treasury Department outlined an overhaul of the financial rescue plan Tuesday as the stimulus bill moved forward. Economists and analysts react to the developments. NewsHour/PBS. | |
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| 2/7/2009: | Senate reaches tentative stimulus deal. On a day when new unemployment statistics showed that 11.6 million Americans are out of work, Senate Democratic leaders announced they had struck a compromise to advance an economic stimulus bill. USA Today. | |
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| 2/7/2009: | Franken waiting, says he's ready to join Senate. Al Franken said Friday he's frustrated but not bitter that a lawsuit by Norm Coleman is keeping him out of the U.S. Senate. Franken, a Democrat, left little doubt in an interview today that he considers himself the winner of the race. MPR. | |
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| 2/6/2009: | Obama to visit Indiana, Florida to push stimulus. President Barack Obama plans to participate in town hall-style meetings next week in two cities that have struggled amid the crumbling economy. AP. | |
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| 2/6/2009: | 598,000 Jobs Lost in January; Rate Hits 7.6% The United States lost almost 600,000 jobs last month and the unemployment rate rose to 7.6 percent, its highest level in more than 16 years, the Labor Department said Friday. NYT. | |
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| 2/6/2009: | Synchronised depression. The OECD have just released their latest leading indicators. Amid mounting optimism of investors that the global economy is bottoming, these data suggest no such thing is occurring. Indeed they are catastrophically weak. FT Alphaville. | |
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| 2/6/2009: | A Great Depression for industry. These are numbers nobody has seen before. German industrial orders have fallen by 27% yoy in December, by 6.9% during the month. German industry, like Japan’s industry, is in virtual free-fall. Investment goods, the heart of German manufacturing industry, were down almost 30% yoy. FT Deutschland says on its front page that economists are now invoking the Great Depression, and they are fearing mass layoffs by the summer unless the economic cycle is turning by mid-year. Eurointelligence. | |
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| 2/6/2009: | US downturn looks to be getting worse. Unfortunately, the fall in US industrial production is approaching the worst falls in the post-World War 2 data set. Some recessions in the past produced a sharper initial fall. But in an average post-World War 2 recession, the economy would be recovering by now -- not getting worse. If things don’t improve, the current fall may match the biggest fall in the post war data. Brad Setser. | |
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| 2/6/2009: | Toyota sees first annual net loss since 1950. Toyota sank into the red for the October-December quarter and acknowledged Friday it was heading for its first annual net loss since 1950 because of plunging global automobile sales and the strong yen. AP. | |
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| 2/6/2009: | Krugman. Washington has lost any sense of the reality that we may well be falling into an economic abyss, and that if we do, it will be very hard to get out again. NYT. | |
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| 1/30/2009: | Sack Odierno, Send A Message. Now that President Obama in in the Oval Office, Odierno is still suggesting publicly that Obama's campaign promise of a 16 month withdrawal - one that would be in advance of the SOFA requirements and has been endorsed by primeminister Maliki of Iraq - isn't Obama administration policy because he's the Deciderer, not Obama. Crooks and Liars. | |
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| 1/12/2009: | Ideas for Obama. If Mr. Obama drops the 'jump-start' metaphor, if he accepts the reality that we need a multi-year program rather than a short burst of activity, he can create a lot more jobs through government investment, even in the near term. Paul Krugman. | |
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| 12/23/2008: | Bubble blindness. The big mystery is the failure to see the housing bubble. The data screamed "bubble," even in real time. And there was no excuse for believing that such things don't happen in efficient markets, not with the dead body of the dot-com bubble still warm. Paul Krugman. | |
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| 12/22/2008: | With most ballot challenges settled, Franken leads by 48. With most ballot challenges settled, Democrat Al Franken holds a 48-vote lead over Republican Sen. Norm Coleman in the U.S. Senate recount, according to a Star Tribune analysis of a draft report from the Secretary of State's office. Star-Tribune. | |
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| 12/22/2008: | Life Without Bubbles. It may take a lot longer than many people think before the U.S. economy is ready to live without bubbles. And until then, the economy is going to need a lot of government help. Krugman. | |
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| 12/22/2008: | Toyota sees first oper loss, "unprecedented" crisis. Toyota Motor Corp forecast a first-ever annual operating loss, blaming a relentless sales slide and a crippling rise in the yen in what it said was an emergency unprecedented in its 70-year history. Reuters. | |
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| 12/21/2008: | Gasoline prices fall to lowest since February 2004. The average price for a gallon of gasoline in the United States fell 5 percent from two weeks earlier, hitting its lowest level since February 2004, according to the nationwide Lundberg survey released on Sunday. Reuters. | |
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| 12/21/2008: | Gasoline prices fall to lowest since February 2004. The average price for a gallon of gasoline in the United States fell 5 percent from two weeks earlier, hitting its lowest level since February 2004, according to the nationwide Lundberg survey released on Sunday. Reuters. | |
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| 12/21/2008: | California in fiscal emergency, governor eyes layoffs. California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger declared a fiscal emergency on Friday to call lawmakers into another special session to tackle the state's weakening finances, and separately ordered state officials to prepare to furlough and lay off employees to cut costs. Reuters. | |
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| 12/21/2008: | Who Wants to Kick a Millionaire? There are more black boxes still to be pried open, whether at private outfits like Madoff’s or at publicly traded companies like General Electric, parent of the opaque GE Capital Corporation, the financial services unit that has been the single biggest contributor to the G.E. bottom line in recent years. But have we yet learned anything? Incredibly enough, as we careen into 2009, the very government operation tasked with repairing the damage caused by Wall Street’s black boxes is itself a black box of secrecy and impenetrability. Frank Rich. | |
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| 12/21/2008: | Lexington: Jumping the gun. Mr Obama repeatedly insists that America only has "one president at a time". But since election day that "one president" seems to have been the junior senator from Illinois rather than the former governor of Texas. The Economist. | |
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