News & Comment

Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph E. Stiglitz said the U.S. economy faces an “anemic recovery” and the government will need to enact another round of “better designed” stimulus measures. more »

More companies are linking future stock and cash bonuses to specific targets, according to a study of 157 companies in the Fortune 250 released today by Hewitt Associates Inc., a Lincolnshire, Illinois-based human resources consultant. Thirty- five percent of companies in the Fortune 250 had performance plans in place in 2009 compared with 18 percent in 2003.

Senate leaders said Wednesday that debate would most likely begin in September over whether to let the Bush income tax cuts for the rich expire at the end of this year as scheduled, setting up a new battle just weeks before the midterm elections.

Senate Democrats will hold a September showdown over trillions of dollars in expiring tax cuts passed under President George W. Bush.

Senior Democrats had expected the controversial issue to be postponed until after the election, but Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) plans to bring it up when lawmakers return from a five-week August recess.

The U.S. Senate might leave town this week without finishing up what Democrats had hoped would be a significant political achievement before the August recess: passing a multibillion-dollar swath of programs to help struggling small businesses.

James Currell is struggling to prevent his Minnesota home from being foreclosed. But his lender isn't a bank. It is the U.S. government.

The Federal Reserve Bank of New York is facing the prospect of foreclosing on a number of properties in the coming months, from homes to commercial buildings, a result of a souring mortgage portfolio it took over when it helped bail out Bear Stearns in 2008.

U.S. consumer bankruptcies, after rising 9 percent last month from June, might exceed 1.6 million this year, according to the American Bankruptcy Institute.

The 137,698 bankruptcy filings in July also represent a 9 percent increase from a year earlier, the institute said yesterday in a statement posted on its website, citing data from the National Bankruptcy Research Center.

President Obama and congressional Democrats -- out of options for another quick shot of stimulus spending to revive the sluggish economy -- are shifting toward a longer-term strategy that promises to tackle persistently high unemployment by engineering a renaissance in American manufacturing.

The $26.1 billion package will likely rise or fall on the vote of Maine Republican Sen. Susan Collins but the spending cuts are also a big part of the story as Majority Leader Harry Reid (D—Nev.) tries to unite his caucus and take away the “deficit and debt” arguments of the GOP.

The issue isn't that conservatives don't care about the deficit. We don't really know whether Republicans care about the deficit. They say they do, and they would certainly prefer to reduce the deficit than give people health-care coverage or keep states from firing 500,000 employees. The issue is that they care about tax cuts and defense spending more. more »