Results tagged “economy”

After poring over NY State data, the NY Times suggests that "courtrooms are now seeing the delayed result of the country’s economic collapse... New York’s judges are wading into these types of cases by the tens of thousands, according to the new statistics, cases involving not only bad debts and soured deals, but also filings that are indirect but still jarring measures of economic stresses, like charges of violence in families torn apart by lost jobs and homes in jeopardy." Chief judge Jonathan Lippman said, "Society’s problems come to us. We are the emergency room for society.” And another judge, who has seen many credit cases, said of the future, "I would describe it as a train wreck and I think it’s going to get worse for the next couple of years.”

The NY State Department of Labor released November unemployment information, and the numbers were a little better over October's: The state rate is now 8.6%, down from 9% in October, while the NYC rate is 10%, down from 10.2% in October. (In 2008, the November state unemployment rate was 6.3% while the NYC rate was 6.7%.) The one sector with job growth was education and health services.

'Tis the season for somewhat infuriating news: The Washington Post reports, "The federal government quietly agreed to forgo billions of dollars in potential tax payments from Citigroup as part of the deal announced this week to wean the company from the massive taxpayer bailout that helped it survive the financial crisis."

After saying on 60 Minutes last night, "I did not run for office to be helping out a bunch of fat cat bankers on Wall Street," President Obama met with many of those fat cats at the White House today. Obama wants bankers to support his administration's financial industry reforms.

Citigroup has announced that it will return $20 billion that the U.S. government gave it in TARP bailout money last year. According to Bloomberg News, the banking giant "will raise the funds with a sale of $20.5 billion of equity and debt" and "also plans to substitute 'substantial common stock' for cash compensation." Notably, the move from under the government's thumb will also allow the firm to avoid executive pay restrictions.

To keep the state from becoming "insolvent," Governor Paterson announced that he will withhold 10 percent of nearly $1.9 billion in funding for schools and municipalities — including New York City — that was supposed to be issued on Tuesday. As part of what he has described as a last ditch effort to avoid crossing "the financial Rubicon into fiscal disaster," Paterson will indefinitely delay the payout of $60 million in school aid and $23.9 million in municipal assistance that would have come to New York City.

Larry Summers, current Obama White House economic adviser (and former Treasury Secretary under Clinton), appeared on This Week and said, "Everybody agrees the recession is over"—though unemployment could continue to climb. even though many experts predict unemployment could climb higher. The AP reports, "Summers says key indicators have shown that the economy is beginning to expand again and that job creation probably will follow... He acknowledges it will take 'substantial time' before the economy recovers entirely. But he says that 'what we can take satisfaction from is we've walked back from the brink.'"

History as it happens: NY Times looks at how different colleges and graduate schools are adding new classes or updating courses to include the recent global economic crisis that has left the world hurting. An American Studies course from Columbia University professor Steven Fraser previously only covered Wall Street culture though the 1990s, but now includes last year's meltdown. He says, "The class is struck by the similarities between today and the darker periods of Wall Street’s past, for example in the Gilded Age — the meltdown, the bonuses, the reckless speculation, the impact of Wall Street’s behavior on the rest of society. We compare the confidence man of 1840 to the confidence man of today," adding, "One kid is doing a paper comparing Jay Gould, who was known as the Mephistopheles of his day, to Richard Fuld."

Governor David "Downer" Paterson was at the Museum of American Finance on Wall Street earlier today to talk about how screwed New York is. He called the state "ground zero for the recession" and said, "We have a ‘lack of cash’ crisis in this state. We are in a very deep quagmire. New York is now at the breaking point. We are about to cross the financial Rubicon into fiscal disaster." To bail water, Paterson promised to begin delaying payments for services in order to keep the state solvent. And he's ready to defend the stop-payments in court.

The Department of Labor released jobs data for November and it turns out the country "only" lost 11,000 jobs last month, bringing unemployment to 10%, after being at 10.2% for October. Now the Dow has jumped over 100 points on the news.

CNN Money reports, "Cyber Monday sales rose 14% this year compared to 2008 and consumers also bought nearly 30% more items per order versus last year, according to research firm Coremetrics. Also, the firm said shoppers bought 10% more items per order online than they did in stores on Black Friday." It's suspected that sales could be $900 million. However, one analyst told Bloomberg News it doesn't mean the retail sector is going to have a happy holiday, "Online retail sales are still the vast minority of total holiday sales. Being such a small number, the results aren’t going to change overall sales this holiday at all."

Defying conventional wisdom, crime is not on the rise despite the miserable economy. Police records reveal that as the city faces a 10.3-percent unemployment rate and record numbers of homeless families, "the number of major crimes is continuing to fall this year in nearly every category," the Times reports.

The National Retail Federation says that Black Friday weekend sales grew slightly, 0.5% over last year, because shoppers were snatching up bargains. The NRF, which expects holiday spending to fall 1% this year, said, "While retailers are encouraged by the number of Americans who shopped over Black Friday weekend, they know they have their work cut out for them to keep people coming back through Christmas. Shoppers can continue to expect retailers to focus on low prices and bargains through the end of December."

Anecdotal reports suggest that crowds on Black Friday—the day after Thanksgiving—were up compared to last year, but retailers won't know how that translated into sales for another few days. Macy's president and CEO Terry Lundgren told the NY Times that over 5,000 waited outside the Herald Square location yesterday (more than last year) and said this year's customer was going to be more careful, "They've got a budget that they’ve planned to spend and I think most consumers will stick to that. We expect that this will be a market-share holiday season. We don’t need consumers to spend more money. We just need to make them spend more money with us."

Or is it Ellen DeGenerous? A Bronx mom wrote to the talk show host, who held a Dough-vember contest, about her troubles: Rozina Pijuan was out of work since she was studying to be a radiology technician. And even though she moved in with her mother, Pijuan couldn't afford Metrocards and had to walk her two boys to school and walk to her own school, adding that she did get her license, in hopes of some day getting a car. On Tuesday, DeGeneres surprised Pijuan with a gift of a GMC Terrain SUV, a year's worth of Metrocards for herself and her kids, and "$10,000: $1,000 to cover gas, $2,000 to buy the kids Christmas gifts, $5,000 to pay off their debt and an additional $2,000 for good measure." The show will air next Wednesday at 4 p.m. on NBC.

For some reason, spending billions on skyscrapers and man-made palm-shaped island leads to...debt! So far, the Dow Jones, S&P; 500 and Nasdaq have fallen at least 1% (even up to 2% as soon as the markets opened today), due to, as the Wall Street Journal puts it, "fears...about the potential fallout of debt prolems at Dubai World, the city-state's largest corporate entity, which asked creditors for a six-month stay on repayment of its $60 billion in debts." UBS actually estimates that Dubai's overall debt may be over $80 billion.

Like clockwork, stores hyped up their Black Friday/Doorbuster sales and potential shoppers waited outside for hours, in hopes of getting great deals. A crowd was waiting outside a Jersey City Best Buy; one person told WCBS 2, "There's a lot of people on this line for laptops, like HP laptops for $197. Normally it's $500 or $600," with another possibly bragging that he "was here yesterday since 12 o'clock in the afternoon"—as in noon on Thanksgiving.

Apparently news that Goldman Sachs employees would help out at the Salvation Army's Thanksgiving meals isn't good enough for the NY Times editorial board! The Times published an opinion piece slamming Goldman Sachs for its "non-apology." Noting that CEO Lloyd Blankfein said, "Certainly, our industry is responsible for things. We’re a leader in our industry, and we participated in things that were clearly wrong and we have reasons to regret and apologize for," the Times thinks the investment firm should try a lot harder:

It is widely and correctly understood that Wall Street, with Goldman as a leader and with regulators in thrall, helped to inflate and profited from a credit bubble that burst and cost tens of millions of Americans their jobs, incomes, savings and home equity. American taxpayers continue to stand behind the bailouts and other government interventions that have stabilized the financial system, including Goldman, enabling the firm to post blowout profits in 2009 and to set aside $16.7 billion for bonuses so far this year...

Continue reading "NY Times Not Happy With Goldman Sachs"

The city’s unemployment rate is at 10.3 percent, its highest level in 16 years, and the unemployment rate statewide reached 9 percent in October, the highest rate since April 1983, the State Labor Department reported yesterday. Making matters worse, the usual holiday hiring bump doesn't seem to be happening; instead, the retail sector shed 1,100 jobs in October. Leisure and hospitality, which usually picks up toward the end of the year, lost jobs last holiday season and is doing slightly worse so far this year. At this point, we'd ask for a stiff drink, but who's left to pour it? Yet there is a silver lining empty lining where some copper wire used to be!

The Observer reports that Mayor Bloomberg wants to cut $1.2 billion from next year's budget and $550 million from this year's, according to a letter from budget director Mark Page: "For the current year, Bloomberg is seeking to cut 1.5 percent from the Department of Education, 2 percent from 'uniformed forces' and 4 percent from all other agencies. For next year, Bloomberg wants 4 percent cuts from the Department of Education and uniformed forces, and 8 percent cuts from all other agencies. The cuts should lower the city's budget by $1.2 billion." The letter also says, "The target can be met by reductions in personal service costs or other than personal service costs and/or assured, recurring revenue actions."

With the latest proof that sometimes poverty can't even pry the Gingerbread Lattes out of peoples hands, it seems that many victims of the economy are just now learning the severity of 10.2% unemployment, as they're beginning to reach the bottom of their severance packages. How did they learn? Well, it turns out that spending as much money as you did when you had a job just doesn't work the same way when you don't have one.

The AP reports that Bronx resident Florian Penev was arrested by Connecticut police who say he "offered strangers paid sex with his wife in an Internet ad has been fined $2,000... Norwalk police say they arrested Penev and his wife, 36-year-old Zdravka Zotkova, in June after officers responded to their Craigslist ad, which offered sex with Zotkova at a Norwalk hotel." Penev pleaded guilty to misdemeanor prostitution conspiracy charge and paid a fine, while his wife "was allowed into a court program that will result in prostitution charges against her being dismissed if she completes it." And why was Penev advertising his wife? He said he lost his job as a graphic designer.

After the U.S. Department of Labor announced that October's unemployment rate was 10.2%, one thing that was left unsaid was the number of people who have been unemployed so long they've given up looking for work, not to mention the people who are working part-time but would rather be in full-time jobs. According to the NY Times, "In all, more than one out of every six workers — 17.5 percent — were unemployed or underemployed in October. The previous recorded high was 17.1 percent, in December 1982."

Hundreds of New Yorkers fought on Thursday to become Times Square "restroom ambassadors" — a highly coveted gig that pays $10,000 for just six weeks of employment. The toilet paper manufacturer Charmin is looking for five hosts and hostesses who will direct an estimated 500,000 loo-users to the temporary public bathrooms between Nov. 23 and New Year's Eve, when Times Square itself becomes a massive public bathroom. The ambassadors are expected to be "outgoing and enthusiastic" and detail their experiences on Twitter and Facebook.

The U.S. Department of Labor released the latest unemployment numbers, which have now finally hit the double digits and broken the "10% psychological barrier"—October's unemployment rate is 10.2%, the highest since April 1983, with employers cutting a "deeper-than-expected 190,000 jobs."

Yesterday, the Senate passed a bill extending unemployment benefits 98-0. The House is expected to approve the bill and the President Obama is also expected to sign it. NY State, which has already extended unemployment benefits to 79 weeks for the longterm unemployed, would get another 20 weeks because its unemployment rate is higher than 8.5% (it was 8.9% in September; the NYC rate is 10.3%). The NY State Labor Dept.'s Twitter has been keeping followers apprised of the bill's progress.

A few weeks ago, the Post reported that the economy had forced the annual Village Halloween Parade to downsize from 11 floats last year to just three (there were 20-25 floats in more flush years). But then this week, the parade said there would be a dozen—and the parade's director is giving credit to the Post for helping make it a real parade.

NYU professor Nouriel Roubini, who predicted the housing bubble would collapse and the ensuing financial crisis, believes the recession is over, according to Bloomberg News. But "The economic recovery in advanced nations will still be 'anemic,' Roubini...said via satellite to a conference in Cape Town, South Africa. The economist said he’s “more optimistic” on the outlook for growth in emerging markets." He also "said this month that stock markets have 'gone up too much, too soon, too fast.'"

Today, as some economists said the recession was over (unemployment will still hit 10% though!), the Dow Jones crossed the 9,900 mark. According to CNBC, stocks were "fueled by earnings optimism, but then pulled back as investors took some profits." Another fun fact: "This came after the Dow logged its highest close in over a year on Friday, which, coincidentally, was also the two-year anniversary of its record close above 14,000." Jeez, 14,000—that seems so long ago.

According to a survey of low-income New Yorkers, Crain's reports that "two-thirds have less than $1,000 in savings to fall back on should even tougher times hit, while one-third have no savings at all."