Economy

Amid intense partisan sniping, legislation to provide aid for small businesses teetered on the verge of collapse Thursday after Senate Republicans blocked the measure from reaching a final vote. Democrats say the bill is necessary to spur hiring and help the economy emerge from the recession, but Republicans objected to spending increases and said they were prevented from offering amendments. Democrats countered that some of the GOP-sponsored amendments, like a border security provision, have ...

Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis President James Bullard has a flair for the dramatic. He's currently a member of the interest-rate-setting Federal Open Market Committee, so whatever comments he makes about the economy carry special weight. And his writing of a document titled "Seven Faces of the Peril," in which he lays out two possible paths for the U.S. economy, is getting plenty of attention. Down one path, he argues, is the chance that low inflation married with low interest rates may ...

Rep. Charles Rangel, the New York Democrat who has represented Harlem for four decades, will face a rare trial before the House Ethics Committee on 13 charges that he misused his position as the powerful chairman of the House Ways & Means Committee. The trial of Rangel, who was first elected to Congress in 1970, comes after settlement talks to avoid the potentially embarrassing situation for Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a Rangel ally, broke down, according to The New York Times. Pressure is ...

The folks that brought us such iconic ad campaigns as Rosie the Riveter, Smokey the Bear and the Crash Test Dummies are tackling another historic national effort: mortgage modification. The Ad Council is teaming with the Kaplan Thaler Group, a New York advertising agency, to spread the word about the federal Home Affordable Modification Program, or HAMP. Established in 2009 as part of a multipronged effort to resolve the subprime mortgage crisis, HAMP helps qualifying homeowners avoid ...

When U.S. District Court Judge Susan Bolton blocked enforcement of parts of Arizona's controversial immigration statute yesterday, she didn't do much to quell the controversy surrounding the law. But she did try to clarify several key legal issues, and a closer look at her ruling shows what her logic was. A recent CNN/Opinion Research poll shows a majority of Americans support the law, which amounted to Arizona attempting to enforce federal law by requiring the state's law enforcers to ...

The economic recovery is likely to be rocky, according to the latest Beige Book region-by-region report from the U.S. Federal Reserve on Wednesday. Tell us something we don't know. OK, the report suggests we are not headed for another recession. However, thanks to a stagnant housing market, high unemployment, gun-shy businesses and a skittish stock market, the recovery is having trouble gaining speed. The report also confirms that the homebuyer tax credit this spring created a bump in home sales ...

Unbeknown to most consumers, there is a seismic shift coming in the American real estate industry. The Obama Administration is contemplating fundamental changes to the national housing policy. As yet, this is something for various think tanks, government officials, lobbyists, and academics to argue over, but it will come to affect virtually every single American citizen in one way or another. I wrote about this on my blog for the industry insider folks, but wanted to see what you, the ...

It was a mixed-progress week on the labor front as initial jobless claims fell a better-than-expected 11,000 to 457,000, but continuing claims rose 81,000 to 4.57 million. Economists surveyed by Bloomberg had predicted initial jobless claims for the week ending July 24 would total 460,000. The four-week moving average also declined 4,500 to 452,500. Though the initial claims decline looked like good news, the U.S. Labor Department cautioned that the statistic can be especially volatile during ...

Initial jobless claims fell 11,000 to a seasonally adjusted figure of 457,000 in the week ending July 24. The revised figure for the previous week was 468,000. The four-week moving average, a clearer measure of unemployment trends, fell 4,500 to 452,500, the Department of Labor said in a statement. ...

The U.S. Senate Banking Committee voted in favor of the nominations of three candidates for the Federal Reserve Board. The committee voted 17-6 in favor of the nomination of San Francisco Fed President Janet Yellen for vice chairman, 16-7 in favor of Peter Diamond, an MIT economics professor, and 21-2 for Sarah Bloom Raskin, Maryland's commissioner of financial regulation. All the opposition votes came from Republican committee members, Bloomberg News reported. The committee approval puts ...

About 75% of America's large metropolitan areas saw a year-on-year increase in home foreclosure activity in the first half of 2010, according to a new report. RealtyTrac, an online marketplace for foreclosure properties, said 154 out of 206 metropolitan areas with a population of 200,000 or more saw an increase in foreclosure activity. "While we're seeing early signs that foreclosure activity may have peaked in some of the hardest-hit markets, foreclosures continued to rise in ...

Profits at some of the nation's leading regional banks could suffer as the result of a potential credit rating downgrades stemming from the adoption of the Dodd-Frank financial regulation overhaul legislation. Moody's Investors Service (MCO) has disclosed that it's reviewing 10 large regional banks for possible downgrades because it believes "the potential for government support for these banks will be reduced" following adoption of the Dodd-Frank legislation, which was signed into law by ...

When it comes to investment decisions, men still make the lion's share of the choices about whether to invest in stocks, bonds or real estate. But the gap is narrowing, and in 2009, women decided how to allocate about $20 trillion in investments -- about 27% of the world's wealth. That's up by 16% from one year earlier. As more women call the shots on money, they also want their wealth managers to do a better job of meeting their needs, according to a report just released by The Boston ...

The unemployment rate in about three-quarters of the nation's largest metro areas rose last month as nearly 1 million teenagers entered the work force looking for summer jobs. The Labor Department said Wednesday that the unemployment rate rose in 291 of 374 areas in June from May. It fell in 55 areas and was flat in 28. That reverses the trend of the previous three months, when joblessness fell in most metro areas. But the report does not adjust the figures to take into account seasonal trends, ...

Despite the month-to-month increase in home prices, some historical perspective is in order. While prices have gained 5 percent in the last year, they are still only level with housing values of around seven years ago. And the median home size is down to about 1,500 square feet. In fact, the incredible shrinking home is around 15 percent smaller than it was in 2003. But it still costs about the same. That's a pretty big (little) deal. ...