The New York Times
By David Stout
February 26, 2009
The president's budget assumes that some Americans will have to rely more on welfare and poverty-combating programs "in these tough economic times," and accordingly calls for spending more on a variety of program. But it also foresees savings by aiming to weed out fraud, waste and abuse.
The New York Times
By Jonathan D. Glater
February 26, 2009
The Obama administration outlined a vast overhaul of financial aid programs for college students, one that would end years of federal support to banks and other lenders, in its budget proposal unveiled on Thursday.
The New York Times
By Andrew Martin
February 26, 2009
President Obama's budget calls for an end to direct payments to "large agribusinesses that don't need them" but the proposal is likely to meetfierce opposition from farm-state lawmakers, particularly from the South.
The Wall Street Journal
By Suzanne Sataline
February 27, 2009
New York state's unemployment benefits are less generous than those in nearby states, but the Democrats in power say they intend to do something to change that.
World Magazine
By Mindy Belz
February 27, 2009
Delores McGruder is a drop of success in an ocean of failure. The 61-year-old widow from one of Houston's poorest neighborhoods bought her own home on Dec. 6, 2002. On Feb. 12, 2009, she paid it off.
The News & Observer
By Mary Beth Breckenridge
February 25, 2009
AKRON, Ohio -- Many in the building industry see the housing market's troubles as a disaster.
Russell Versaci sees them as an opportunity.
The Detroit News
By Nathan Hurst
February 26, 2009
Todd Beesley never thought he'd be living in a manufactured home.
But after suffering through a spate of mortgage troubles with his old homestead in Taylor, the father of four and his wife took a look at what seemed like the deal of the century: a four-bedroom ranch-style house with "twice the space at half the cost," Beesley said.
"It was a no-brainer. We moved."
The Miami Herald
By Hilary Lehman
February 25, 2009
Yanique Jean-Phillippe says everyone wants bustiers and tutus.
Of course, she's biased: The 17-year-old senior at North Miami Beach High School designs, makes and sells those items for her business, Anarchy Couture.
The Fresno Bee
By Bethany Clough
February 25, 2009
The federal stimulus plan could give a boost to local businesses by encouraging banks to lend more freely and getting more owners to take out loans.
Both could boost the economy and possibly create jobs, said Ron Truly, deputy district director of Fresno's Small Business Administration office. "It has a real trickle-down effect."
The New York Times
By Steve Lohr
February 25, 2009
The competitive edge of the United States economy has eroded sharply over the last decade, according to a new study by a nonpartisan research group.
The report by the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation found that the United States ranked sixth among 40 countries and regions, based on 16 indicators of innovation and competitiveness. They included venture capital investment, scientific researchers, spending on research and educational achievement.
MSNBC
By Andrew Stern
February 24, 2009
When out-of-work accountant Jim Ammon tires of scouring for scarce job listings, he takes out his frustrations by driving in nails for new houses he volunteers to build for the working poor.
The New Haven Independent
By NHI Staff
February 24, 2009
It began with a Conversation on Neighborhood Crime last July, when residents of the West River neighborhood came together to discuss the perceived increase in criminal activity in the neighborhood. From that conversation 15 to 30 neighbors began meeting on the fourth Tuesday of each month with one purpose: to make West River a neighborhood where people choose to live.
The Daily Siftings Herald
By Joe Phelps
February 24, 2009
Finding a location for a charitable health clinic and tackling another goal in the Clark County Strategic Plan was on the agenda Monday at a CCSP Health Committee meeting.
Creating a charitable health clinic has been an ongoing project which will act as a "clearing house" for those without any insurance to find affordable care through local volunteering health professionals. The project falls under CCSP Goal No. 2.
The Los Angeles Times
By Manuel Pastor
February 25, 2009
Being poor is hard enough. Having to squander what little money you have on payday lenders, check cashers and other high-cost financial services only makes matters worse. For too many Angelenos, when it comes to managing money, that's all they know and sometimes all they have access to. Life without banks, and the knowledge to use them, is costing them and the rest of us too much.
The Washington Post
By Jacqueline L. Salmon
February 21, 2009
Bipartisanship might not be getting far on Capitol Hill these days, but an unusual coalition of Christian leaders and policy experts from across the ideological spectrum this week aimed to bridge the political gap to try to solve one of society's most pervasive ills: poverty.
The Washington Post
By Lori Montgomery and Amy Goldstein
February 24, 2009
President Obama will make reforming the U.S. health-care system his top fiscal priority this year, administration officials said yesterday, contending that reining in skyrocketing medical costs is critical to saving the nation from bankruptcy.
The Wall Street Journal
By Tom Hayes and Michael S. Malone
February 24, 2009
The passage of the $787 billion stimulus bill has so far failed to stimulate anything but greater market pessimism. This suggests to us that the strategy behind the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act is wrong -- and worse, that the weapons it is using to fight the recession are obsolete.
The New York Times
By Tamar Lewin
February 21, 2009
Created in 1992 to simplify applying for financial aid, it has become so intimidating -- with more than 100 questions -- that critics say it scares off the very families most in need, preventing some teenagers from going to college.
Then, too, some families have begun paying for professional help with the form, known as the Fafsa,a situation that experts say indicates just how far awry the whole process has gone.
The Wall Street Journal
By Raymund Flandez
February 23, 2009
As the economic storm builds, local chambers of commerce have geared up to help small businesses in a key area: technology.
From Webcasts explaining how to use social-networking sites like Facebook and LinkedIn to find job candidates to Web sites where firms can solicit work proposals and network with peers, these initiatives are enabling small-business owners with limited resources to market their services more effectively, find clients and employees and shares ideas, among other things.
The Wall Street Journal
By Shelly Banjo
February 22, 2009
With the U.S. economy softening early last year, the owners of Julian Krinsky Camps & Programs in King of Prussia, Pa., looked for advice on attracting more customers from abroad.
The company, which offers sports, fitness and educational programs, got help from three M.B.A. students. And even better: The advice was free.
Post-Crescent
By Maureen Wallenfang
February 23, 2009
Amy Pietsch is the proud parent of hundreds of people in the Fox Cities.
As director of the Venture Center at the Fox Valley Technical College for more than three years, and a lead E-Seed teacher beforethat, she has helped guide hundreds in starting or improving businesses.
The Salt Lake Tribune
By Dawn House
February 20, 2009
It's not that Jose Ascua can work any harder running his tiny convenience store in this rural hamlet, off the main highway to Deer Creek Reservoir in Wasatch County.
Ascua opens the town's only retail outlet, In Solo Town, at 6 a.m. every day and closes around 9 p.m., or whenever the last customer leaves. He has a hot-breakfast and dinner menu, and stocks groceries and dry goods that residents might need to avoid a last-minute drive to Heber City, 15 miles north along a mountainous highway with no services in between.
The Miami Herald
By Fromma Harrop
February 21, 2009
Open most any urban newspaper to the foreclosure notices, and you'll find the list heavy with Hispanic names. Times are tough for Americans of every demographic, but for Latinos they are grimmer still.
Is this the end of the Latino-American Dream? The answer, in Spanish, is No.
The New York Times
By Mickey Meece
February 20, 2009
Workers assembled speakers at Orb Audio in Sherman Oaks, Calif. The stimulus law gives tax credits to businesses like Orb that hire disadvantaged workers, including high school dropouts.
"Who has time to read it?" said Michael J. Fredrich, president of MCM Composites, a maker of highly engineered composite molding parts in Manitowoc, Wis.
The New York Times
By Julie Bosman
February 20, 2009
Once a crutch for the most needy, food pantries have responded to the deepening recession by opening their doors to what Rosemary Gilmartin, who runs the Interfaith Food Pantry here, described as "the next layer of people" -- a rapidly expanding roster of child-care workers, nurse's aides, real estate agents and secretaries facing a financial crisis for the first time.
The New York Times
By Shaila Dewan
February 19, 2009
On Tuesday, Morris Brown College, one of a cluster of historically black institutions here, narrowly averted having its water shut off for the second time this school year by paying $150,000 toward an outstanding bill of more than $200,000.
But the college is not yet in the clear financially: It is down to 151 students and is $30 million in debt.
The New York Times
By Peter Baker and Robert Pear
February 19, 2009
Gov. Kathleen Sebelius of Kansas, an early Obama ally with a record of working across party lines, is emerging as the president's top choice for secretary of health and human services, advisers said Wednesday.
Should she be nominated, Ms. Sebelius would bring eight years of experience as her state's insurance commissioner as well as six years as a governor running a state Medicaid program.
USA TODAY
By Martha T. Moore
February 19, 2009
It was a struggle, but Christine Irons finally signed up.
She opened a savings account with $100 of the $2,000 she expects to get from her federal earned-income tax credit, paid to poor people who work but pay little or no income tax.
Irons, 43, earns about $20,000 a year from her jobs running a day care center and delivering newspapers, "not sufficient" to cover the cost of living for herself and her three daughters, she says. "Money is scarce. Money is very scarce," she says.
The Washington Post
By Michael D. Fletcher and Renae Merle
February 19, 2009
President Obama unveiled a foreclosure-prevention package Wednesday that would pour more than $75 billion into arresting one of the root causes of the nation's economic spiral by helping as many as 9 million homeowners obtain more affordable mortgage terms.
The package, part of the Obama administration's multibillion-dollar effort to jolt the nation out of its deepening recession, goes beyond what some analysts had expected and was welcomed by many of the nation's top lending institutions. But it also drew criticism from some housing experts and consumer advocates, who argued that it does not go far enough in addressing some critical aspects of the foreclosure crisis. Many key details of the plan will not be released until early next month.
The Washington Post
By Michael Gerson
February 18, 2009
The stimulus package is a terrible piece of necessary legislation.
Its flaws are gaudily obvious. The bill was written in monopartisan secrecy, weighed down by irrelevant spending, considered in a rushed, uninformed debate and passed on a virtually party-line vote. The law contains provisions that seem to weaken welfare reform and invite trade disputes. And it adds a massive burden of debt to existing massive entitlement obligations requiring massive borrowing from international sources -- or, if such credit dries up, the massive printing of money to buy these bonds, leading to inflation.
The New York Times
By Cara Buckley
February 17, 2009
They borrow leftover prescription drugs from friends, attempt to self-diagnose ailments online, stretch their diabetes and asthma medicines for as long as possible and set their own broken bones. When emergencies strike, they rarely can afford the bills that follow.
"My first reaction was to start laughing -- I just kept saying, 'No way, no way,' " Alanna Boyd, a 28-year-old receptionist, recalled of the $17,398 -- including $13 for the use of a television -- that she was charged after spending 46 hours in October at Beth Israel Medical Center in Manhattan with diverticulitis, a digestive illness. "I could have gone to a major university for a year. Instead, I went to the hospital for two days."
The Wall Street Journal
By Sam Mamudi
February 18, 2009
It might not be a cure-all for the market's ills, but one sector has been strong enough to help mitigate some of the worst losses: health care.
Stocks in the health-care sector have performed better than their counterparts in other industries due to steady demand, strong earnings and finances and expectations of industry consolidation. While the sector has long been viewed as defensive, it is notable that health care's success comes even as other traditionally defensive sectors have been hurt in the broader downturn.
The Wall Street Journal
By Sue Shellenbarger
February 18, 2009
K. Esther Szabo was a small child when the recession of the early 1970s sent her family's fortunes into a tailspin. Her father, an economist, struggled to find work, and her mother worried about paying the bills. The family eventually filed bankruptcy.
Getty ImagesThe tensions at home put a permanent mark on Ms. Szabo. To help her family, she started working at age 8, doing chores for neighbors, and has been working ever since. When a personal-finance class in college introduced her to the idea that calamities like the one that crippled her family could be avoided with careful planning, she found the idea "mind-blowing," she says. She now co-owns a Los Altos, Calif., financial-planning firm.
The Wall Street Journal
By Alina Dizik
February 18, 2009
Business schools haven't exactly seen a rush to the classroom the past few months: As companies cut their training budgets, many schools have seen enrollment in executive education dwindle.
But the recession itself is fueling demand in some areas -- namely, classes that help senior managers weather a downturn and manage through turbulent times. Many business schools have dreamed up a series of new offerings. And some schools are changing the focus of programs by combining classic business topics with rapidly developing research about the downturn.
The Wall Street Journal
By Deborah Soloman
February 18, 2009
President Barack Obama's plan to aid troubled homeowners, set to be unveiled Wednesday, will include efforts to cut monthly mortgage payments, allow more borrowers to refinance their loans and give bankruptcy judges greater power to modify mortgages, according to people familiar with the proposal.
The array of options fills in some of the blanks left by Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner last week when he unveiled the Obama administration's overhaul of the $700 billion financial-system bailout plan, which he said included an as-yet-to-be-outlined new approach to housing. Many economists say addressing the cycle of foreclosures and falling home prices is one key to ending the financial crisis.
By Iain Levison
February 15, 2009
Mark and Robert tell me that they've finished laying the carpet in the bedroom of an apartment in Raleigh, N.C. One small bedroom in one small apartment. It is the first time they have worked since Dec. 2.
They've driven in from Youngsville, which is 60 miles round trip, four gallons of gas. The pickup doesn't get great mileage when it's pulling a trailer full of carpet and tools. So take out $8 for the gas, $60 for supplies, and the job, which paid $220, nets $152 to be split between two guys. That's their total earnings for two months.
The New York Times
By Robert Pear
February 15, 2009
The $787 billion economic stimulus bill approved by Congress will, for the first time, provide substantial amounts of money for the federal government to compare the effectiveness of different treatments for the same illness.
Under the legislation, researchers will receive $1.1 billion to compare drugs, medical devices, surgery and other ways of treating specific conditions. The bill creates a council of up to 15 federal employees to coordinate the research and to advise President Obama and Congress on how to spend the money.
The New York Times
By Edmund L. Andrews
February 16, 2009
President Obama's plan to reduce the flood of home foreclosures will include a mix of government inducements and new pressure on lenders to reduce monthly payments for borrowers at risk of losing their houses, according to people knowledgeable about the administration's thinking.
The plan, to be announced Wednesday, is expected to include government subsidies for reducing a borrower's interest rate, which a lender would have to match with its own money.
The Washington Post
By Ceci Connolly
February 13, 2009
Washington policymakers contemplating a fundamental overhaul of the nation's troubled health-care system may want to study the saga of Wal-Mart.
Once vilified for its stingy health benefits, the world's largest company has become an unlikely leader in the effort to provide affordable care without bankrupting employers, their workers or taxpayers in the process. From its headquarters in Bentonville, Ark., the retailer is doing in the real world what many in Washington are only beginning to talk about.
The New York Times
By Sam Dillon
February 16, 2009
The $100 billion in emergency aid for public schools and colleges in the economic stimulus bill could transform Arne Duncan into an exceptional figure in the history of federal education policy: a secretary of education loaded with money and the power to spend large chunks of it as he sees fit.
Upon meeting department employees last month, Arne Duncan, the new education secretary, asked them to call him by his first name. "My name is Arne," he said. "It's not Mr. Secretary."
But the money also poses challenges and risks for Mr. Duncan, the 44-year-old former Chicago schools chief who now heads the Department of Education.
The Placer Herald
By Megan Wood
February 11, 2009
At 7 years old, Kate Hilton is learning what some adults still have yet to comprehend: saving money.
Hilton brings her weekly dollar allowance to her school cafeteria to deposit in her savings account through Umpqua Bank's Learn to Earn program.
One of 94 schools participating in California, Valley View Elementary School in Rocklin began hosting the program two years ago after Parent Teacher Council President Diana Ruslin, brought the idea to principal Chuck Kilbourne.
Danville Register & Bee
By Sarah Arkin
February 11, 2009
While homeowners across the nation are feeling the pinch of the foreclosure meltdown, at least one Danville resident is happy to finally have a home of her own, thanks to a local first-time homebuyer program.
In January 2006, Subrena Noble moved into a newly built home in the Seeland Crossing community on the condition that she would work toward purchasing it. Noble recently fulfilled her commitment and her dream.
Times-Picayune
By Kate Moran
February 13, 2009
The mixed-income community: It is that most utopian and worthy of ideals that proves so difficult to execute in real life.
How can developers and political leaders transform neighborhoods of concentrated poverty so that people of means will want to live there? How can policymakers minimize resistance to affordable housing in upscale areas?
At a forum in New Orleans on Wednesday evening, the founder and chief executive of PolicyLink offered strategies for working around the tensions and prejudices that often arise around integrating people of different economic classes to build diverse and textured communities that provide economic opportunity for all their residents.
Finance and Commerce
By Mark Anderson
February 12, 2009
Money should be all about making life a little easier, and a little more promising, which is why Julie Baker first dropped in on St. Paul's Eastside Financial Center last June.
Baker, a recently divorced mother of five, two of whom were still living at home, was living in a rented home that was about to be foreclosed. She was looking for a way to finally own a home, giving her family a measure of stability and control they'd long lacked.
But there was an obstacle.
The Wall Street Journal
By Jim Carlton and Bobby White
February 11, 2009
As Sacramento squabbles over the state's $42 billion deficit, Californians are getting a bitter taste of what's to come after the steep budget cuts that are inevitable when legislators and Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger finally hammer out a deal.
Some world-famous parks like Pfeiffer Big Sur State Park may not open this year. After-school programs in low-income areas are being scuttled, putting high-risk teens on the street just as police forces are being cut. Schools are closing classrooms, and some highway projects have ground to a halt. The state may not be able to monitor some sex offenders as required under law.
Northwest Herald
By Jenn Wiant
February 11, 2009
Business might be sluggish at many establishments because of the recession, but it's booming for fifth-graders at Cambridge Lakes Learning Center.
On a recent weekday morning, four students were busy popping 240 bags of popcorn in preparation for a dance at the charter school. They planned to sell the bags for 25 cents each, as they do once a month for students at the school. They use the money they earn to restock their supplies and to pay back the principal and interest on a loan they took out to buy the popcorn popper.
SmartMoney.com
By Aleksandra Todorova
February 11, 2009
In an appeal to parents reeling from steep losses incurred in their 529 savings plans, several states are offering safer, government-insured investment options like savings accounts and CDs. But going the "safe" route may not be worth it for many college savers.
On Wednesday, Utah launched an FDIC-insured savings account in its Educational Savings Plan, becoming the sixth state to offer these more risk-averse investment options. (Each of the states allows nonresidents to contribute to their 529 plans. For more information on the individual plans, see our table below.)
The New York Times
By Brent Bowers
February 11, 2009
Job losses, falling property values, more people without health insurance. With the current state of the economy so bleak, those are the issues getting a lot of attention. But they are not the whole picture.
One, Craig Brandman, founder of Medilinq, a provider of medical discounts for low-income people, predicted in a recent interview that his company would increase the number of its participants by more than sixfold this year, to 200,000 from 30,000 at the end of 2008.
The Wall Street Journal
By Laura Meckler
February 12, 2009
The economic-stimulus agreement reached Wednesday expands federal aid to an array of programs aimed at the poor and jobless, with billions of dollars for health care, unemployment insurance, food stamps and other programs.
Final negotiations between the House and Senate stripped away some of the more aggressive expansions that had been on the table, including an option to let states open their Medicaid programs to the unemployed. But the final deal still represents a larger federal contribution to nearly every major aid program the government administers.
The Oregonian
By Elizabeth Suh
February 11, 2009
Concepcion Giron says it's hard for friends to believe that someone would give her three dollars for every dollar she saves.
But during six months of saving through Adelante Mujeres' individual development account program, Giron put in $1,200 and came away with $4,800.
As the first graduate of the program, which started last spring, Giron, 42, of Hillsboro is starting a carpet-cleaning business with her husband, Onesimo.
The Daily Voice
By Pamela D. Reed
February 11, 2009
Here we go again.
Having just read Cynthia Tucker's commentary "Month robs Blacks of part in U.S. History" in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, I am saddened beyond measure. And I am perplexed. CNN's Anderson Cooper has even linked this article on his AC360° blog.
I wonder: Why do many prominent African Americans, and right-wing ideologues like Ann Coulter, consistently feel the need to decry anything that attempts to glorify the accomplishments--or the very survival, even-- of Black people in America? And, better still, why do the mainstream media--even the Associated Press, no less--advance this line of discussion?
Honolulu Star-Bulletin
By Kristen Consillio
February 5, 2009
Farrington High School students played "financial football" yesterday with members of the New England Patriots and San Francisco 49ers as part of a statewide launch of a national money management program for Hawaii students.
New England Patriots wide receiver Wes Welker and San Francisco 49ers linebacker Patrick Willis spoke about their personal finance experiences and played the interactive video game with about 30 students at the Farrington library to encourage them to save their money and live within their means.
The Houston Chronicle
By Jeannie Kever
February 9, 2009
Joe Konkel and his friends may not be able to save the world, but they hope to make it a little sweeter.
Konkel is one of the honey connoisseurs in the University of St. Thomas' microcredit program, which encourages students to make small loans to would-be entrepreneurs in developing countries.
The students support several honey-producing efforts in Mexico and recently agreed to expand into a remote region of Pakistan.
Making honey, it turns out, isn't just a matter of letting bees do their thing.
The Wall Street Journal
By Arden Dale
February 10, 2009
Even as the recession is taking its toll, some small-business owners are adopting 401(k)s for their employees.
They see the plans as a way to retain valued workers and get people who otherwise wouldn't save for retirement to do so. But to be able to afford the plans, some companies are having to make some trade-offs, including delaying employer matches or offering the matches in lieu of raises.
The New York Times
By Claire Cain Miller
February 8, 2009
Would you trust a Web site created by anonymous individuals to give you better advice on stocks than professional advisers? Wikinvest hopes so.
Following the model of Wikipedia, the online encyclopedia that anyone can edit, Wikinvest is building a database of user-generated investment information on popular stocks. A senior at Yale writes about the energy industry, for example, while a former stockbroker covers technology and a mother in Arizona tracks children's retail chains.
The Wall Street Journal
By Nick Timiraos
February 9, 2009
A proposed tax credit for home purchases is raising the hopes of the real-estate industry, which believes the credit could be just the stimulus needed to stabilize the housing market and get hesitant buyers to take the plunge.
A provision included in the Senate version of the stimulus bill would provide a tax credit for 10% of the purchase price of a home, up to a maximum $15,000. The provision faces an uncertain future even if the stimulus passes in a Senate vote set for Tuesday. The measure would have to win backing from the House, which last week voted to repeal a provision that requires an existing $7,500 tax credit to be repaid over 15 years. That credit, which has income limits, applies only to first-time home buyers, who last year accounted for about 40% of all buyers, according to the National Association of Realtors.
The Leader-Telegram
By Liam Marlaire
February 7, 2009
Kelly Ostrander has firsthand experience with the financial pressures put on consumers at an early age.
"I have a stepson who's 22. When he was 17 or 18, he would get at least four credit card offers a week in the mail," said the Altoona High School business instructor. "Students are also getting phone calls at home from credit card companies."
Christopher Brooke, a branch manager for Associated Bank in Eau Claire, said financial literacy is more important now than in the past.
The Berkshire Eagle
By Scott Stafford
February 8, 2009
A new group hoping to dispel the notion that a good artist is bad at business.
Assets for Artists, with the financial and philosophical backing of local banks, businesses and cultural institutions, aims to take a few visual artists at a time and give them the incentive and training in business skills to reduce costs, make a profit, save money, and purchase a home or studio space.
The Washington Post
By Howard Schneider
February 6, 2009
The U.S. economy lost another 598,000 jobs in January, a larger than expected decline that highlighted a weak global economy and the pressure building on companies to cut costs and payrolls.
It is the largest one-month job loss since December of 1974, and pushed the unemployment rate to 7.6 percent, from 7.2 percent in December.
The New York Times
By Vikas Bajaj and Tara Siegal Bernard
February 5, 2009
People seem to pass certain milestones on the road of financial desperation. First the unpaid bills pile up. Then the bank forecloses. Finally, they reach the end of the line: bankruptcy court.
Joseph A. Peiffer, a bankruptcy lawyer in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, who has represented both farmers and lenders, favors giving bankruptcy courts the power to modify home loans.
But now policy makers are talking about redrawing this map by putting the bankruptcy court before foreclosure to give people a chance to keep their homes.
The San Diego Union Tribune
By Lori Weisberg
February 6, 2009
As many as 300 low-and middle-income households in San Diego County will be the beneficiaries of more than $17 million in federal aid designed to clean up neighborhoods hard hit by foreclosures and to provide affordable housing opportunities.
While hardly a cure-all given the magnitude of the region's foreclosure problem, the money is expected to turn hundreds of renters into home owners as well as deeply subsidize the rents of some of the county's lowest-income households.
The Los Angeles Times
By Marcy Gordon
February 5, 2009
WASHINGTON (AP) -- A majority of U.S. banks say they have made their branches more welcoming and convenient for people who shun the banking system, but less than 10 percent of the institutions offer special savings accounts geared toward those people, a new survey shows.
The survey was released Thursday by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., which has been leading a project to help bring the so-called "unbanked" into the financial mainstream.
The Hawaii Reporter
By Rev. Daniel Paul de Gracia II and Sarah Ann Hunt
January 5, 2009
One of the top New Year's resolutions of many elected officials in Hawaii's local government is to see the realization of the Native Hawaiian Government Act which seeks to create what the Honolulu Advertiser characterized in a January 16 editorial as "a pathway for establishing Hawaii's indigenous people as a political entity, enabling their reconstitution as a 'state within a state' government." It has been argued that without a native government, the Hawaiian people can never succeed and never attain their highest dreams.
The Honolulu Advertiser
By Andrew Gomes
February 2, 2009
Hawai'i's deflating housing market dragged home sales to a decade low last year, and the slump hasn't spared a sector of residential real estate serving an overwhelming need: affordable housing.
A number of factors, including tighter lending restrictions and rising fears about jobs and the economy, have taken a toll on low and moderate-income households seeking the American Dream in one of the nation's costliest places to own a home.
Even with interest rates falling to historic lows and moderately softening median home prices, the low end of the housing market is expected to face continued challenges.
The Washington Post
By Jane Black
February 5, 2009
When former Iowa governor Tom Vilsack was nominated as secretary of agriculture, many food policy activists, noting his reputation as a friend to corporate agriculture and ethanol producers, rendered a verdict that was swift and harsh: agribusiness as usual.
But Vilsack, newly installed in his regal but still-undecorated office on Independence Avenue, is out to redefine himself and his vision. In an interview this week, he called for a "new day" for the U.S. Department of Agriculture's sprawling bureaucracy, which he believes should champion not only farmers but also everyone who eats.
The Washington Post
By Shailagh Murray
February 5, 2009
Seeking to jump-start the housing market, the Senate added new tax relief for homebuyers to its $900 billion economic stimulus bill yesterday as the legislation moved toward a final vote.
The amendment, offered by Sen. Johnny Isakson (R-Ga.), represents a significant victory for Republicans. GOP lawmakers have complained that the package includes few of their priorities for easing the economic crisis, including more help for the housing sector, which has been devastated by foreclosures and the frozen credit market.
The Boston Globe
By Foon Rhee
February 5, 2009
A day after he had to jettison the person he hoped would be the architect of a healthcare overhaul, President Obama this afternoon will get to claim a smaller victory.
He signed into law a bill, given final approval by the House today, to extend subsidized coverage to 4 million more children across the country. The bill on the State Children's Health Insurance Program costs nearly $33 billion and covers children whose parents earn too much to qualify for Medicaid, but find it expensive to buy private insurance.
The Wall Street Journal
By Alina Dizik
February 4, 2009
Since September's financial meltdown, community colleges and universities offering free personal-finance courses online have seen a sharp increase in enrollment.
Many people are turning to the more than 180 business courses offered through the OpenCourseWare Consortium -- a group of about 250 universities world-wide, including the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and University of California-Irvine. These courses aren't exactly classes, but they offer free access to online syllabi and study materials, along with lecture notes and exams.
The Wall Street Journal
By Jesse Drucker
February 4, 2009
As part of the stimulus bill, Congress is grappling with ways to fix a looming crisis in the nation's affordable-housing program caused by the economic downturn.
The federal government for many years has tried to stimulate the building of affordable housing through the tax code, by letting large companies shelter some profits in exchange for financing the development of low-income properties.
But the biggest players no longer have profits to shelter, slowing the construction of affordable housing across the U.S. just as need for such housing is growing.
The Los Angeles Times
By Jordan Rau and Patrick McGreevy
February 4, 2009
Reporting from Sacramento -- California's bond rating was downgraded below that of every other state Tuesday by a major Wall Street rating agency, as lawmakers trying to resolve the state's financial problems faced growing resistance from powerful interest groups.
Citing the state's prolonged budget impasse and its nearly empty treasury, Standard & Poor's lowered its rating on $46 billion in general obligation bonds, which investors usually consider one of the safest investments because they are backed by taxpayers.
The Houston Chronicle
By Shannon Buggs
February 2, 2009
Apparently, I gave too many of the banks and credit unions participating in the Bank on Houston program too much credit last week.
I praised them for joining with City Controller Annise Parker to get the unbanked into the financial mainstream with low or no-cost accounts, which addresses a major community need.
The public-private partnership allows consumers to keep their money safe from theft and loss and banks to tap into a vast pool of new and former customers.
The Seattle Times
By Keith Ervin
February 3, 2009
When Ron Sims goes to Washington, D.C., he will leave King County a legacy of denser suburbs, more open space, a larger trail network and a technologically advanced sewer system designed to handle continued growth.
When Ron Sims goes to Washington, D.C., he will leave King County a legacy of denser suburbs, more open space, a larger trail network and a technologically advanced sewer system designed to handle continued growth.
The Boston Globe
By Rebecca Tuhus-Dubrow
February 2, 2009
But a growing movement argues that every baby should be a trust fund baby: a modest trust fund should be a basic right, like education and adequate nutrition. By opening a savings account for every American newborn, the thinking goes, the government would give all citizens a foothold in the financial system, as well as access to a nest egg, however small.
In the most commonly promoted version of the plan, the government would contribute an initial deposit at birth, with low-income families receiving a supplement. The family could add to the fund, which would accrue interest tax-free, and the government would offer some matching incentives. At 18, the accountholder could begin to withdraw money for higher education, homeownership, and eventually, retirement.
The New York Times Magazine
By David Leonhardt
January 27, 2009
I. WHITHER GROWTH?
The economy will recover. It won't recover anytime soon. It is likely to get significantly worse over the course of 2009, no matter what President Obama and Congress do. And resolving the financial crisis will require both aggressiveness and creativity. In fact, the main lesson from other crises of the past century is that governments tend to err on the side of too much caution -- of taking the punch bowl away before the party has truly started up again. "The mistake the United States made during the Depression and the Japanese made during the '90s was too much start-stop in their policies," said Timothy Geithner, Obama's choice for Treasury secretary, when I went to visit him in his transition office a few weeks ago. Japan announced stimulus measures even as it was cutting other government spending. Franklin Roosevelt flirted with fiscal discipline midway through the New Deal, and the country slipped back into decline.
By Dawn House
January 31, 2009
Wallsburg--It's not that Jose Ascua can work any harder running his tiny convenience store in this rural hamlet, off the main highway to Deer Creek Reservoir in Wasatch County.
Ascua opens the town's only retail outlet, In Solo Town, every day at 6 a.m. and closes around 9 p.m. or so, whenever the last customer leaves. He has a hot breakfast and dinner menu and stocks groceries and dry goods that residents might need to avoid a last-minute drive to Heber City, 15 miles north along a mountainous highway with no services between the scattered towns.
When Ascua started falling behind on his bills, he asked the town to grant him a license to sell six packs of beer, one of the few items customers repeatedly ask for. But by a unanimous vote in early January, Wallsburg council members turned down a beer permit, a decision that Ascua says could put him out of business.
By Dan Wallach
February 1, 2009
Lynn Gary of Port Acres felt her eyes opening as she learned how much money was slipping through her fingers every month.
Trips to the grocery store. Trips to the dollar store. Trips here, there. Nothing much out of the ordinary. No big-ticket items like a car or refrigerator. Just stuff.
Because she started writing down every transaction, every time money in any denomination left her hand, she saw how it added up. And up. And it left her scrambling sometimes as she had more month left than money.
The New York Times
By Jason Deparle
February 1, 2009
WASHINGTON -- Despite soaring unemployment and the worst economic crisis in decades, 18 states cut their welfare rolls last year, and nationally the number of people receiving cash assistance remained at or near the lowest in more than 40 years.
The Washington Post
By Martin Crutsinger
February 2, 2009
WASHINGTON -- Americans are hunkering down and saving more. For a recession-battered economy, it couldn't be happening at a worse time.
Economists call it the "paradox of thrift." What's good for individuals _ spending less, saving more _ is bad for the economy when everyone does it.
