News
Market Watch | Sales of existing homes up 4.3% in January
Sales of U.S. existing homes rose 4.3% in January and inventories fell to nearly seven-year lows, as lower prices, unusually warm weather and an improving economy all lifted demand.
Politico | Transportation bills to get tune-up during recess
It may be recess, but House and Senate leaders are working overtime this week to make the massive transportation bills more attractive to skeptical lawmakers.
CNN Money | Economy in recovery? Not so fast
Employers are hiring, manufacturing is revving up and stocks are rallying. It looks like the recovery could finally be taking hold.
Bloomberg | Euro-Area Manufacturing, Services Unexpectedly Contract Amid Budget Cuts
European services and manufacturing output unexpectedly shrank in February as the euro-area economy struggles to rebound from a contraction in the fourth quarter.
Market Watch | U.S. economy is getting stronger, but . . .
Main Street and Wall Street have been buoyed by data that shows the U.S. economy is getting stronger, but nobody’s declaring happy days.
CNN Money | Consumer bureau targets overdraft fees
The new consumer bureau said Wednesday that it plans to target a kind of bank fee that makes customers see red: Overdraft protection penalty fees on checking accounts.
Econ Comments & Analysis
Forbes | The "Robo-Signing" Settlement: Seeds of Recovery, Or Chaos?
After over a year of wrangling, last week the Obama Administration and 49 state attorneys general announced that they had reached a comprehensive settlement with five large mortgage servicers over claims related to their infamous “robo-signing” foreclosure practices.
Investors | If Economy's Improving, Why Is Dependency Growing?
The government is at full throttle to present the economy as improving especially in light of the upcoming election. At the same time, there has been a stunning rise in dependency as most recently presented by the Heritage Foundation.
Market Watch | Is the European crisis over or just beginning?
The stock market is never wrong and prices are the ultimate arbiter of variant financial views.
New Republic | The Memo that Larry Summers Didn’t Want Obama to See
For the past three years, Washington journalists and politicos have obsessed over a 57-page memo that Barack Obama’s incoming economic team prepared for him in late 2008.
Economist | Over-regulated America
The problem is not the rules that are self-evidently absurd. It is the ones that sound reasonable on their own but impose a huge burden collectively. America is meant to be the home of laissez-faire.
Blogs
Daily Capitalist | The Great Repression
Financial markets don’t really do the long term anymore, but if they did, they might spend less time drooling at the prospect of more monetary crack, and more time wondering who will be funding all the government debt that now towers above everyone further than the eye can see.
Daily Capitalist | OECD GDP Down “Sharply” Q4 2011
Provisional estimates show that quarterly gross domestic product (GDP) growth in the OECD area decelerated sharply to 0.1% in the fourth quarter of 2011, against 0.6% in the third quarter.
