Jobs Numbers Go from Bad to Worse. Is It Time for a New Stimulus Package?
There was bad news in May’s jobs report, and then there was worse news. See the full story at our companion business blog The Curious Capitalist.
Articles from Contributor
The Dismal Jobs Number: Time for New Stimulus?
There goes the recovery.
In May, the number of people employed in America rose by just 54,000. In addition, the unemployment rate rose for the second month in a row to 9.1%. Worse, the time it’s taking unemployed people to find a job rose to a new high of 39.7 weeks, or nearly 10 months. There was bad news in May’s jobs report, and then …
America’s Hottest Investment: Farmland
This is usually a slow time of the year for farm sales. It’s past prime planting season. Yet, Sam Kain, Des Moines area manager for land sales at Farmers National, is busy. He has 3 auctions this week. Most of the 30 or so bidders who show up will be farmers. But an increasing number of people buying land these days have no intention …
Why House Prices are Double Dipping
Welcome back to the sour economy.
It didn’t take long after the Memorial Day break to get the latest signs that the recovery remains in the gutter. The housing market has been looking like it was headed for a double dip for some time. On Tuesday, we got confirmation that it happened. According to the S&P/Case-Shilller housing index, …
Did Lobbying Cause the Financial Crisis?
The HBO docu-drama Too Big To Fail and the book by Adam Ross Sorkin by the same title are billed as the defining history of the financial crisis. But it may be time to rewrite history again.
Recently, there has been some griping about financial lobbying because it seems the big banks are attempting to roll back every regulatory change …
Bailout Wonder: How the Government Turned a Profit on AIG
Remember the basket case that was AIG. The giant insurance company became known for everything that was wrong with Wall Street: unchecked risk-taking; complicated, unregulated derivatives; and, most importantly, huge, unearned bonuses.The cover of TIME carried the headline “AIG = WMD.” In order to save the company the government had to …
Is the Home Foreclosure Crisis Ending?
Foreclosures have been holding back the housing market for some time. It’s one of the reasons housing prices have continued to sag, long after many predicted a rebound. But recently there has been some news that seems to suggest a light at the end of the housing bust tunnel. The number of completed foreclosures has been dropping …
Is Goldman Sachs Doomed?
These are the last days of Goldman Sachs.
On Friday, the Wall Street Journal reported that Goldman is preparing to be hit with subpoenas soon from U.S. prosecutors looking into the firm’s mortgage operations. How big was the news? Not very. Dealbook, the New York Times blog about all things Wall Street, didn’t even cover it. And that …
NY AG Investigation: Why Haven’t Wall Streeters Gone to Jail?
In August 2006, Nichols Smith, an investment banker at now-defunct Bear Stearns e-mailed a colleague, Keith Lind, who was busy selling the firm’s mortgage bond deals to clients. Smith was supposed to be the manager supervising these deals, and the e-mail was to tell Lind what he thought of the latest deal Lind was trying to pitch to …
Jobs Miscount: How Flawed is the Nation’s Most Watched Economic Indicator
Last October, when the government released its monthly tally of how many people had jobs, there was a collective groan. The September report, which came out the first Friday in October, said the number of employed people in the U.S. had dropped by 95,000, worse than the 57,000 job drop the month before. After looking like we had …
A Surprising Jobs Recovery: American Manufacturing is Back
Post Updated: 1:30, Monday, May 16.
The jobs rebound came early at the Case I-H farm equipment factory in Grand Island, Neb. Last September, when many companies were still cutting employees, Bill Baasch, the manager at the Grand Island plant, which manufactures combines – the large vehicles that harvest grain crops – was hiring. In …
Foreclosures: Are Bank Regulators Messing Up the Housing Recovery?
Foreclosures are down. Time to celebrate? Not really. Realtytrac, which monitors foreclosures, says the number of people losing their homes is dropping not because people are having fewer financial problems but because banks are taking longer to process foreclosures. And that’s not because they are modifying loans and helping people stay …