I did an appearance on the Real News Network, a web TV operation currently based out of Toronto but planning a move to D.C. to take on the “industrial-military complex” in person. Part one is now online. (I could embed it here, but it’s pretty long.) The other guest was Jim Stanford, chief economist with the Canadian Auto Workers union. …
How bad does the recession get?
I’ve got a piece up on TIME.com about the current race-to-the-bottom in GDP projections. It begins:
Just how far and how fast will the economy drop this quarter? There’s lately been a race to the bottom among forecasters, with the economists at Goldman Sachs leading the way. Early in the week, they put out a report saying that -3.5%
…
Geithner gets Treasury
NBC is reporting that, in one of the least surprising choices of recent days, Barack Obama is going to tap Tim Geithner as Treasury Secretary. Former Treasury chief Larry Summers had been the subject of the most discussion in recent weeks, mainly because he’s said so many entertaining things through the years, but the actual betting was …
New column: Don’t call it bankruptcy
I’ve got a new column online and in the issue of TIME with a tongue depressor (and a tongue) on the cover. It begins:
The phenomenon we now know as Chapter 11 bankruptcy was born during the financial panics that regularly pummeled the U.S. economy in the 1800s. Railroads had emerged as the country’s first large industrial corporations,
…
Mark Cuban not so ha ha ha
I’ve been getting a steady stream of traffic over the past couple of days to a post I wrote in May 2007 titled Ha ha ha Mark Cuban ha ha ha. It was about the Warriors’ glorious upset of Cuban’s Mavs in the NBA playoffs that year. The people landing there now all presumably want to read about Cuban’s insider trading mess, and I feel bad …
Next time they should probably carpool
So the Detroit bailout will have to wait, at least until December. Nancy Pelosi said it was because lawmakers wanted to see a plan for how GM, Chrysler and Ford would spend the money. Then there was that other reason:
[W]hatever support they found sagged when it became known that each of them had flown into Washington aboard
…
My book needs a subtitle. Can you help?
So, as reported, I turned the book manuscript in Monday. Now I need a subtitle. There are those who think I need a title. I disagree, but I’ll get to that. The title of the book is The Myth of the Rational Market. The current subtitle, which is left over from the days that the people at Collins were thinking our best shot was to market …
Who needs a bonus? In fact, who needs pay?
Goldman Sachs’ top executives recently made the news for refusing to take bonuses this year. Hear that? It’s the sound of me clapping really slowly. Bravo, fellows. Bravo. Your stock is down 60% this year, and your firm is expected to announce its first quarterly loss as a public company in December. But you’re going to bite your lips
…
Why isn’t American industry agitating for universal health care?
Long-time reader and Australian-TV-personality-on-the-rise Marcus has a question:
Given the whole debate about the US auto industry and the fact that one of their massive ongoing costs is health care, why the hell isn’t corporate America out there campaigning 24/7 for universal, state funded health care?
Surely one of the reasons that
…
Are the Detroit Three wrapped around Ron’s Gettelfinger?
So I watched the auto companies’ CEOs ask Congress for money. In fact, I watched almost all four hours of Tuesday’s beg-a-thon before the Senate Banking Committee. I didn’t blog about it because I was frantically struggling to tease a magazine column out of it. Now that’s done, and I want to share one thing I learned: The car CEOs and …
Free money? Sure, what could be wrong with that?
My colleague Sean Gregory has a piece up on Time.com about a Toyota advertisement for zero-percent financing that’s annoying the heck out of sports fans. Apparently, the song “Saved by Zero” stops being catchy if you hear it at every commercial break.
I get that automakers are desperate for people to come buy cars, but zero-percent …
Holiday party tips for dummies
Honestly. We’re grown-ups here. Aren’t we? So how come every year around this time, I get a barrage of tips from experts about how to conduct ourselves at the annual holiday party? The answer is that despite exterior appearances, we all still act like tweens when given the opportunity. So the following nine tips come from Barbara …