Economy

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Obama’s Claims About Auto Jobs Conflict with Some Government Data

CNS News

President Barack Obama and administration officials have boasted about how their policies have revived the U.S. auto industry, pointing to the successful initial public stock offering by General Motors on Nov. 18.

However, some of the touted job growth could be questionable based upon a government report last summer that says the rapid pace of dealership closings put “tens of thousands” of workers in immediate jeopardy.

Further, the auto plan lacked "any explicit cost savings to the manufacturers" according to the report by the Special Inspector General for the Troubled Asset Relief Program (SIGTARP) from July.

European banks took big slice of Fed aid

Financial Times.com

Foreign banks were among the biggest beneficiaries of the $3,300bn in emergency credit provided by the Federal Reserve during the crisis, according to new data on the extraordinary efforts of the US authorities to save the global financial system.

The revelation of the scale of overseas lenders’ borrowing underlines the global nature of the turmoil and the crucial role of the Fed as the lender of last resort for the world’s banking sector.

However, news that banks such as Barclays of the UK, Switzerland’s UBS and Dexia of Belgium borrowed billions of dollars at favourable terms from US authorities may further anger critics already enraged about the Fed’s rescue of Wall Street.

“We’re talking about huge sums of money going to bail out large foreign banks,” said Bernie Sanders, the independent senator from Vermont. “Has the Federal Reserve of the United States become the central bank of the world?”

Incoming House Commerce Chairman Opposes Fed Buying $600 Billion in Govt Debt

CNS News

Rep. Joe Barton (R-Tex.), slated to be chairman of the House Energy & Commerce Committee in the next Congress, said he opposes the Federal Reserve’s plan to purchase $600-billion in federal government debt (through Treasury bonds), but does not know if Congress can do anything to stop the Fed. He also said he is not prepared to call for the Fed chairman’s resignation over the issue.

The Federal Reserve announced last week that it would purchase the longer-term Treasury securities over the next seven months as a means to keep interest rates as low as possible and provide banks with more currency reserves that they can then loan to customers to ostensibly stimulate economic growth.

U.S. Debt Proposal Would Cut Social Security, Taxes, Medicare

Bloomberg.com

A presidential commission’s leaders proposed a $3.8 trillion deficit-cutting plan that would cut Social Security and Medicare, reduce income-tax rates and eliminate tax breaks including the mortgage-interest deduction.

The co-chairmen of the panel appointed by President Barack Obama suggested reducing Social Security spending by raising the retirement age to 68 in about 2050 and 69 in about 2075. The plan also would slow the rate at which benefits grow. The savings would come between 2012 and 2020.

“This country’s out of money and we better start thinking,” said co-chairman Erskine Bowles. Without “tough choices,” he said, “we’re on the most predictable path toward an economic crisis that I can imagine.”

Business Looks to Republicans to Block Rules, Taxes

Bloomberg.com

The Republican victories in Congress mean U.S. companies from Goldman Sachs Group Inc. to Wellpoint Inc. may be able to weaken or block what they consider President Barack Obama’s anti-business policies on health care, the environment, taxes and financial reform.

Republicans retook the House of Representatives yesterday with a gain of at least 60 seats, their biggest increase since 1938. The party will use its first majority in the House since 2006 to try to eliminate funding for parts of Obama’s health care bill opposed by business as well as curb regulations and government spending, Jay Timmons, senior vice president of the National Association of Manufacturers, a Washington-based lobbying group, said in an interview before the election.

“Americans voted for jobs and economic growth” and “resoundingly rejected” Obama policies, Thomas Donohue, president of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the biggest business lobbying group, said in a statement last night.

Republicans also scored a net gain of at least six seats in the Senate, though Democrats retained control of that body.

Bullet 333Barry Asmus, Senior Economist, National Center for Policy Analysis
Bullet 333David Bossie, President, Citizens United
Bullet 333Dan Celia, Host, "Financial Issues Live" Radio Program
Bullet 333Phil Clements, Managing Director, Center for Christian Business Ethics Today, LLC.
Bullet 333Chuck Colson, Prison Fellowship
Bullet 333Ward Connerly, Author/Founder and Chairman, American Civil Rights Institute
Bullet 333Tom DeLay, Former House Majority Leader, United States House of Representatives
Bullet 333William Devlin, National President, Redeem The Vote
Bullet 333Chuck Donovan, Senior Research Fellow-DeVos Center for Religion a, The Heritage Foundation
Bullet 333James Edwards, Cofounder, Olive, Edwards, & Cooper, LLC
Bullet 333Steve Elliott, President, Grassfire.org
Bullet 333Joseph Farah, CEO, Founder, WorldNetDaily
Bullet 333Frank Gaffney, Founder and President , Center for Security Policy
Bullet 333James Gelfand, Senior Manager of Health Policy, U.S. Chamber of Commerce
Bullet 333Lou Giuliano, Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer (r, ITT Corporation
Bullet 333Rick Green, President, Torch of Freedom Foundation
Bullet 333Colin Hanna, Colin Hanna, President, Let Freedom Ring USA
Bullet 333Lowman Henry, Chairman & CEO, Lincoln Institute of Public Opinion Research, Inc.
Bullet 333Larry Hunter, President, The Social Security Institute
Bullet 333Phillip Kim, Assistant Professor of Management and Human Resour, University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Business
Bullet 333Cliff Kincaid, President, America's Survival, Inc.
Bullet 333Jennifer Marshall, Director of Domestic Policy Studies, The Heritage Foundation
Bullet 333Gary Marx, Executive Director, Judicial Confirmation Network
Bullet 333Ryan Messmore, William E. Simon fellow in Religion and a Free Soc, The Heritage Foundation
Bullet 333Joe Murray, Columnist, The Bulletin
Bullet 333Grover Norquist, President, Americans for Tax Reform (ATR)
Bullet 333Phyllis Schlafly, President and Founder, Eagle Forum
Bullet 333Chuck Stetson, Co-founder and Managing Director, PEI Funds
Bullet 333Tony Strickland, Taxpayer Advocate
Bullet 333Lorianne Updike, President & Executive Director, The Constitutional Sources Project
Bullet 333John Weiser, Board Member, Westminster Theological Seminary , In Medias Res

Employers in U.S. Start Bracing for Higher Tax Withholding

Bloomberg.com

Employers in the U.S. are starting to warn their workers to prepare for slimmer paychecks if Congress fails to vote on an extension of Bush-era tax cuts.

“I’ve been doing payroll for probably close to 30 years now, and never have we seen something like this where it gets that down to the wire,” said Dennis Danilewicz, who manages payroll services for about 14,000 employees at New York University’s Langone Medical Center. “That’s what’s got a lot of people nervous. All we can do is start preparing communications with a couple of different scenarios.”

Lawmakers won’t start debating whether to extend the cuts, which expire Dec. 31, until after the Nov. 2 elections. Because it takes weeks to prepare withholding schedules, the Internal Revenue Service will probably have to assume the cuts will expire and direct employers to increase payroll deductions starting Jan. 1, experts say.

Value-Added Tax Would Hurt Economy, Kill Jobs, Business Group Study Finds

CNS News

An economic analysis sponsored by the National Retail Federation (NRF) shows that a Value-Added Tax (VAT) would damage economic growth and kill hundreds of thousands of jobs. The study showed that a large reduction in federal spending would be better for the economy.

The NRF study was conducted because President Barack Obama’s Fiscal Commission, which is scheduled to issue its first report soon, reportedly is considering a VAT as one option for reigning in out-of-control federal deficits.

China stakes claim to S. Texas oil, gas

My SA.com

State-owned Chinese energy giant CNOOC is buying a multibillion-dollar stake in 600,000 acres of South Texas oil and gas fields, potentially testing the political waters for further expansion into U.S. energy reserves.

With the announcement Monday that it would pay up to $2.2 billion for a one-third stake in Chesapeake Energy assets, CNOOC lays claim to a share of properties that eventually could produce up to half a million barrels a day of oil equivalent.

It also might pick up some American know-how about tapping the hard-to-get deposits trapped in dense shale rock formations, analysts said.

Dollar falls as 'currency war' concerns linger

Breitbart

The dollar fell against the euro and yen on Monday after the world's top finance officials failed to reach a consensus on measures to head off what some see as a looming "currency war", analysts said.

The euro reached 1.40 dollars, while the US unit hit a fresh 15-year low against the yen amid growing expectation that the Federal Reserve will pump more money to bolster the struggling US economy, they added.

"The euro was given a boost after the IMF meeting, which failed to resolve the so-called currency war," said Kathleen Brooks, an analyst for online trading company Forex.com.

White House Science Czar Says He Would Use ‘Free Market’ to ‘De-Develop the United States’

CNS News

In a video interview this week, White House Office of Science and Technology Director John P. Holdren told CNSNews.com that he would use the “free market economy” to implement the “massive campaign” he advocated along with Population Bomb author Paul Ehrlich to “de-develop the United States.”

In his role as President Barack Obama’s top science and technology adviser, Holdren deals with issues ranging from global warming to health care.

“A massive campaign must be launched to restore a high-quality environment in North America and to de-develop the United States,” Holdren wrote along with Paul and Anne H. Ehrlich in the “recommendations” concluding their 1973 book Human Ecology: Problems and Solutions.

“De-development means bringing our economic system (especially patterns of consumption) into line with the realities of ecology and the global resource situation,” Holdren and the Ehrlichs wrote.

“Resources must be diverted from frivolous and wasteful uses in overdeveloped countries to filling the genuine needs of underdeveloped countries," Holdren and his co-authors wrote. "This effort must be largely political, especially with regard to our overexploitation of world resources, but the campaign should be strongly supplemented by legal and boycott action against polluters and others whose activities damage the environment. The need for de-development presents our economists with a major challenge. They must design a stable, low-consumption economy in which there is a much more equitable distribution of wealth than in the present one. Redistribution of wealth both within and among nations is absolutely essential, if a decent life is to be provided for every human being.”

U.S. Home Seizures Reach Record for Third Time in Five Months

Bloomberg.com

U.S. home seizures reached a record for the third time in five months in August as lenders completed the foreclosure process for thousands of delinquent owners, according to RealtyTrac Inc.

Bank repossessions climbed 25 percent from a year earlier to 95,364, the most since the Irvine, California-based data provider began keeping records in 2005. Foreclosure filings, including default and auction notices, fell 5 percent to 338,836. One out of every 381 U.S. households received a filing, RealtyTrac said today in a statement.

“We’re on track for a record year for homes in foreclosure and repossessions,” Rick Sharga, RealtyTrac’s senior vice president, said in a telephone interview. “There is no improvement in the underlying economic conditions.”

Obama defends economic proposals, lashes out at GOP

Los Angeles Times

President Obama on Friday defended his administration's efforts to improve the economy while again lashing out at Republicans for blocking congressional action in a fiercely partisan election year.

In a wide-ranging news conference, Obama also said Mideast peace talks were worth the effort, called for religious tolerance while condemning a proposed Koran-burning by a Florida pastor and reminding Americans of Saturday's commemoration of the 9/11 terrorist attacks.. Despite reports of rising prices, Obama defended his healthcare insurance overhaul, another key GOP electoral point.

But with polls showing that Republicans are growing in popularity, Obama used his eighth formal news conference to argue the case for his economic agenda, but perhaps more importantly in this midterm election year, the political case Democrats hope will keep them in control of the Congress.

Small businesses feel squeezed by Obama policies

The Washington Post

Last year, even as he struggled through the worst of the recession, Chris Upham said revenue at his District-based real estate and construction businesses doubled -- allowing him to hire two agents.

But Upham said he hasn't increased his staff thus far in 2010 and he doesn't expect to for the remainder of the year.

That's because his taxes rose sevenfold. And he said he anticipates they'll increase again if the Bush tax cuts for people earning $250,000 and above expire at the end of the year.

As small businesses try to plot their recovery, attention is turning to what many owners consider burdensome policies -- higher taxes, new accounting procedures and health-care mandates. Even as the government tries to help with an array of small-business initiatives, many owners say the intervention is as much a hindrance to hiring as the faltering economy.

Bernanke: Fed will take action if economy falters

Associated Press

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke said Friday that the Fed will consider making another large-scale purchase of securities if the slowing economy were to deteriorate significantly and signs of deflation were to flare.

Bernanke acknowledged that the recent pace of growth is "less vigorous than we expected." He described the outlook as uncertain and said the economy "remains vulnerable to unexpected developments."

At the same time, he said growth is likely to pick up next year. He downplayed the odds of another recession, even after a series of dismal reports on housing and manufacturing this week stoked fears that the economy may be on the verge of another downturn.

Home Sales Plunge 27 Percent to Lowest in 15 Years

Associated Press

Sales of previously occupied homes plunged last month to the lowest level in 15 years, despite the lowest mortgage rates in decades and bargain prices in many areas.

July's sales fell by more than 27 percent to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 3.83 million, the National Association of Realtors said Tuesday. It was the largest monthly drop on records dating back to 1968, and sharp declines were recorded in all regions of the country.

The plunge in home sales also magnified fears about the broader economy.

Jobless Claims Rise to Highest Level in 9 Months

Associated Press

Employers appear to be laying off workers again as applications for unemployment insurance reached the half-million mark last week for the first time since November.

Initial claims for jobless benefits rose by 12,000 last week to 500,000, the Labor Department said Thursday. It was the fourth increase in the past five weeks and evidence that the economic recovery has weakened.

Homebuilders and other construction firms are laying off more workers as the housing sector slumps after the expiration of a popular homebuyers' tax credit. State and local governments are also cutting jobs to close large budget gaps.

US Says Bankruptcies Reach Nearly 5-Year High

Reuters

U.S. bankruptcy filings have reached the highest level since 2005, government data released on Tuesday show, as the economy slows and the unemployment rate hovers just below double digits.

There were 422,061 bankruptcy filings between April and June, according to the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts, up 9 percent from 388,148 in the prior three-month period, and up 11 percent from 381,073 a year earlier.

For the year ended June 30, there were 1.57 million bankruptcies, up 20 percent from 1.31

Federal Employees Earn 30 to 40 Percent More than Private-Sector Workers, Study Finds

CNS News

Federal employees earn 30 to 40 percent more money than their private sector counterparts on average, a study from the conservative Heritage Foundation finds. These pay discrepancies persist despite the recession, unlike the situation in the private sector, where unemployment is 9.5 percent and wages have steadily declined.

The report comes on the heels of a new unemployment numbers showing another month of anemic job growth in the midst of President Obama’s “Recovery Summer” tour, where he is highlighting what he calls signs of economic recovery.

Recession was deeper than gov't previously thought

Associated Press

The recession was deeper than the government previously thought.

The Commerce Department, in revisions issued Friday, estimates the economy shrank 2.6 percent last year -- the steepest drop since 1946. That's worse than the 2.4 percent decline originally estimated.

The economy's plunge underscores why the unemployment rate surged to 10.1 percent in October, a 26-year high. The revisions in gross domestic product, or GDP, now show zero growth in 2008. That compares with a 0.4 percent gain previously estimated.The economy also grew less in 2007 (1.9 percent) than earlier thought (2.1 percent).

Obama urges passage of small business initiatives

The Washington Post

President Obama on Tuesday urged lawmakers to move forward on a series of Democratic initiatives before they leave next week for their summer break, saying voters "sent us here to represent their interests, not our own."

His comments came after an hour-long, Oval Office meeting with congressional leaders from both parties. Obama called the meeting "productive," but in his remarks, he repeatedly accused the Republicans of blocking legislation for political gain.

"We shouldn't let America's small businesses be held hostage to partisan politics," Obama said as he makes a continuing effort to portray Republicans as the party of big corporations and Wall Street firms.

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