News
FOX News | Foreclosures made up 20 pct. of home sales in 3Q
Despite the decline, foreclosures still represented 20 percent of all homes sold in the July-September period — about four times more than at the height of the housing boom, foreclosure listing firm RealtyTrac Inc. said Thursday.
CNN Money | Federal student loan rate set to double
Loans taken out for the current school year carried an interest rate of 3.4%, thanks to a 2007 law that phased in rate reductions for subsidized Stafford loans to undergraduate students. But the law did not specify the rate after this year. So unless something is done, rates on new loans will revert back to 6.8% -- where they were in 2007.
Politico | More Americans optimistic about economy, new poll finds
37 percent of Americans think the economy will improve in 2012, the highest level in more than a year, according to a new NBC-Wall Street Journal poll. Only 17 percent think that the economy will get worse.
FOX News | Taxpayers still owed $132.9B from bailout
Some bailout programs, such as the effort to help homeowners avoid foreclosure by reducing mortgage payments, will last as late as 2017, costing the government an additional $51 billion or so.
National Journal | Obama Proposes Legislation to Boost U.S. Manufacturing
Making good on his promise to announce new legislation targeting outsourced manufacturing jobs, President Obama announced six pieces of “insourcing” legislation on Wednesday.
Bloomberg | U.S. Durable Goods Orders Beat Forecasts
Bookings (DGNOCHNG) for goods meant to last at least three years climbed 3 percent after a revised 4.3 percent gain the prior month that was more than previously estimated, data from the Commerce Department showed today.
Econ Comments & Analysis
AEI | Common shock is the real cause of the financial crisis
It is certainly possible to find prime borrowers among people whose incomes are below the area median. But when more than half the mortgages Fannie and Freddie bought had to have that characteristic, the government-sponsored enterprises had to substantially reduce their underwriting standards in order to meet the affordable housing quotas.
Washington Times | Keystone Kops energy policy
Mr. Obama’s decision to kill the Keystone XL pipeline, which would carry oil from Alberta, Canada, to refineries on the U.S. Gulf Coast, is one more example of his administration’s ongoing war on fossil fuels - and the most recent example of how the president promises the exact opposite of what he is delivering.
Daily Finance | Is American Manufacturing on Track for a Comeback?
In December, Detroit's big-three automakers -- Ford (F), General Motors (GM), and Chrysler -- announced that they were going to hire 33,000 new workers.
NBER | Incentives and Adaptation: Evidence from Highway Procurement in Minnesota
We develop a theory of highway procurement in which contractors must modify their construction rate following a productivity shock. We model how time incentives affect the work rate and time taken, characterizing the efficient contract design.
Market Watch | Obama refi plan has bumpy road ahead
President Barack Obama’s State of the Union proposal to have Congress approve a sweeping mortgage-refinancing program funded by a bank tax has little or no chance of passage, analysts said.
Blogs
Heritage Foundation | State of the Housing Market: New Refinancing Promises?
So far, government interventions and the bailout of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have cost taxpayers $300 billion. The new plan may cost taxpayers hundreds of millions, perhaps billions, depending on how many families will be covered and what mortgage interest rate will be used for refinancing.
Marginal Revolution | What does the inequality-immobility link mean?
I see two big and very real problems: slow income growth for many income classes and a problem with excessively high returns to finance at the very top.
National Review | Claims and Contradictions in SOTU
Obviously, the whole speech last night was confused and self-contradicting. Here is some evidence of that, in the president’s own words
The American | Five energy errors from the State of the Union address
The Institute for Energy Research (IER) has a great post up today detailing the … let’s call them errors … regarding energy in President Obama’s State of the Union address last night.
