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Nearly every man who develops an idea works it up to the point where it looks impossible, and then he gets discouraged. That's not the place to become discouraged.
Thomas Edison Categories
Tag Archives: recession
Heard Off the Street: A Return to Normalcy … Relatively Speaking
Over the last few weeks, we have started to think that things might work out better here in the US than most people currently expect. This brighter future would emerge from the confluence of two unrelated, but equally important, developments. Read More
Central bankers see slowdown but no recession
The world’s leading central bankers said Monday, September 12, that while the global economy is slowing they do not expect it to enter recession. Read More
Shoppers lift economy but will they keep spending?
The economy might not be on the brink of another recession after all. Consumers, who drive most economic growth, spent more on cars, furniture, electronics and other goods in July — and more in May and June than previously thought.
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More on the Decoupling of the Macro from the Micro
The US economy has slowed significantly in recent months compared to late 2010 and early 2011. We’re not forecasting a recession … yet. But we are talking about a marked deceleration in the growth rate of our gross domestic product. Read More
Defusing the Debt Trap
Burdened by an IOU totaling more than $14 trillion, the US economy is stumbling toward a debt trap – with no easy escape in sight. Read More
Retirement confidence falls in past decade
Workers are less inclined to describe themselves as very confident about many financial aspects of retirement this year than in 2001. For many of the issues, confidence was improving until the recession set in and confidence waned. Read More
Former restaurant goers learn to love their ovens
Eating at home may be one of the few behavioral changes from the recession that stick. Forced to eat more meals at home when money was tight, people learned new habits. Some discovered they enjoy cooking and dining in. As the economy improves and families have more spending money, they’re still saving restaurants for special occasions. Read More
Prizes for thriftiness? WA eyes savings lotteries
Saving money isn’t sexy. But winning money — now that’s a different story.
As consumers crawl their way back from the worst savings rates in generations, state lawmakers from coast to coast are looking to spice up financial responsibility by offering lottery-like prizes for people who sock their money away. The concept, which has been employed for years in other countries, is gaining greater attention in the U.S. following a two-year-old experiment in Michigan called “Save to Win.” Read More
2010 ends as 2nd worst year for home construction
U.S. homebuilders are coming off their two worst years in more than a half-century, and the outlook for this year is only slightly better.
Economists say it could take three more years before the industry begins building homes at a healthy rate. In the mean time, the housing downturn is dragging on the broader economy, with one-quarter of the jobs lost since the recession began in the construction field…read more Read More
An engaging exploration of why we pay what we do
“The Price of Everything: Solving the Mystery of Why We Pay What We Do” (Portfolio/Penguin Group, $27.95), by Eduardo Porter: New York Times editorial writer and longtime journalist Eduardo Porter offers an engaging rumination proving the adage that everything has its price. And he means everything: work, women, even faith and the future.
Porter explores the factors we weigh, consciously and unconsciously, in making decisions about things we don’t traditionally think of as having prices. And he shows that in every imaginable context our choices are influenced by circumstances…read more Read More
AP-Gfk Poll: Holiday shoppers cautious with credit
As the holiday shopping frenzy hits a fever pitch this weekend, a new Associated Press-GfK poll finds consumers planning to be more cautious when paying with plastic this year.
Among the one in five Americans who plan to pay for most of their holiday season expenses with credit cards, 84 percent say they plan to pay the bills in full as soon as they arrive, up nine points over last year and 18 points since 2008…read more Read More
Economy recovering, but recession’s shadow is long
Layaway, once the province of the poor, has gone mainstream. At the Mall of America in Minnesota, shoppers dart in for just one or two things. In New York, socialites do the unthinkable: They wear the same ball gown twice.
During the Great Recession, people made drastic changes in how they spent their money. They stopped treating credit cards as cash. They learned to save and learned to wait . . . read more Read More
In a tough economy, old stigmas fall away
The Goodwill store in this middle-class New York suburb is buzzing on a recent weekend afternoon. A steady flow of shoppers comb through racks filled with second-hand clothes, shoes, blankets and dishes.
A few years ago, opening a Goodwill store here wouldn’t have made sense. Paramus is one of the biggest ZIP codes in the country for retail sales. Shoppers have their pick of hundreds of respected names . . . read more Read More
