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$19
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By Gore Vidal
$16.00
$20
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Gage Skidmore (CC-BY-SA)
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Did you know that it was actually jumping gas costs, and not deceptive lending practices on the part of mortgage financiers and deregulation madness on Wall Street, that got us into the recessionary quandary in which the majority of Americans still find themselves?
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Luojie, Cagle Cartoons, China Daily, China —
Posted on Feb 26, 2012
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Mr. Fish
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The whole “hope” thing is a little much, and the “change” bit is played out, so however will Barack Obama spin his slogans for this presidential campaign as the embattled incumbent? Let’s call it American Dream Lite, if you will.
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AP / Mark Lennihan
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Analysts are heralding the Dow Jones’ jumps past 13,000 on two brief occasions Tuesday as a sign that all this talk of economic recovery may be more bull market than, well, bull. Here’s hoping they’re right.
Posted on Feb 21, 2012
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Flickr / Veronica V (CC-BY-SA)
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The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau may not be popular with some conservatives, but the CFPB and its stealthily appointed Director Richard Cordray are here to stay, and the watchdog agency is kicking into action by making debt collectors and credit rating companies accountable for their actions.
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AP / Cliff Owen
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On Thursday, state and federal government representatives announced that five major banks—Wells Fargo, Bank of America, Ally Financial, Citigroup and JPMorgan Chase—had agreed to pay their part in a settlement of more than $25 billion stemming from the mortgage market meltdown that caused millions of Americans to lose their homes.
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hotelworkersrising.org
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By Scott Tucker — For anyone who does not belong to the very capstone of the American social pyramid, the old slogan of the labor movement is gaining a new and terrible meaning: An injury to one is an injury to all.
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Flickr / edEx
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The first month of 2012 turned out to be the best in three years in terms of the ongoing unemployment crisis in the U.S. Although 8.3 percent is nothing to get too excited about, it was supposed to tally up at 8.5 percent for January, so we’ll take it.
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mynews3.com
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Although Mitt Romney owned, in an interview with Nevada journalist Jon Ralston on Thursday, that he “misspoke” the day before in saying he was “not concerned about the very poor,” the presidential candidate might not have much wiggle room amid a speed-fueled news cycle and a chilly Rick Santorum standing watch.
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Flickr / clementine gallot (CC-BY)
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Geography is one of those seemingly stodgy fields that’s enjoyed an infusion of innovation in recent years, and here’s a sobering yet useful map of the U.S. to illustrate that point. Specifically, you’ll see how different zones of the country have fared in terms of long-term unemployment. Looking good, Middle America.
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AP / Michael Probst
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Once again, European leaders convened for a eurozone pep rally on Tuesday, meeting up in Brussels to see if their economic resuscitation efforts in recent months are paying off and if Greece will stop hogging all the attention anytime soon.
Posted on Jan 31, 2012
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Flickr / respres (CC-BY)
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A joint investigation by NPR and ProPublica has rustled up some disquieting trading practices on the part of Freddie Mac that suggest the taxpayer-run mortgage company hasn’t exactly done its darndest to help struggling Americans hold on to their homes—in fact, the opposite may be more the case.
Posted on Jan 30, 2012
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Flickr / SimonAlparaz (CC-BY)
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For obvious reasons, Americans’ savings accounts are shrinking during this ongoing recession, both because there’s not as much money to deposit and many more reasons to make withdrawals. This has consequences for the economy’s long-term recovery prospects, as does another currently popular method of payment: the credit card.
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Wikimedia Commons / Lynda Poulter (CC-BY-SA)
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British Prime Minister David Cameron made a good call Monday by declaring that no funds from U.K. taxpayers’ pockets should be funneled toward gifting Queen Elizabeth II with a shiny new $90 million yacht on the occasion of her Diamond Jubilee.
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AP / Erich Schlegel
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Here’s a sobering dose of reality: Poverty in America has risen to the 27 percent mark in the last half-decade and, perhaps worse, the prospects for our nation’s poorest won’t necessarily get better as the economy picks up. It’s not news many want to hear, but we’re glad a group of researchers at Indiana University were gutsy enough to release it.
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Do Americans really want a tectonic shift in our economic system? Or are we happier “muddling through”? And most important, what would Jesus do in this seemingly relentless recession? Truthdig’s own Robert Scheer has some thoughts on all of the above this week, as do show regulars Arianna Huffington, Tony Blankley and Matt Miller.
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Wikimedia Commons / U.S. House of Representatives
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Once again, folks, we have deadlock on Capitol Hill. Happy holidays! Although President Obama and the majority of the U.S. Senate hoped that the House of Representatives would cooperate and pass legislation that would extend unemployment benefits and a payroll tax break, that didn’t happen Tuesday.
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Dario Castillejos, Cagle Cartoons, El Imparical de México —
Posted on Dec 17, 2011
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Dario Castillejos, Cagle Cartoons, Dario La Crisis —
Posted on Dec 17, 2011
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Tom Janssen, Cagle Cartoons, The Netherlands —
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AP / Geert Vanden Wijngaert
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At the close of an economic summit that appears to have failed to rescue Italy, Spain and more of Europe from sinking deeper into a mire of recession, Guardian economics editor Larry Elliott prefigures the collapse of the euro as a unifying currency of the European Union. (more)
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AP / Remy de la Mauviniere
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Granted, he is the head designer at Chanel, and haute couture has never been about realism or frugality, but Karl Lagerfeld might do well to drop his socioeconomic commentary to the level of a whisper breathed to like-minded luxe junkies from behind a lacy fan in Paris.
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Flickr / respres
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Those critics of Occupy Wall Street who claimed the movement lacked direction might look to foreclosed homes around the country, as well as housing auctions at select banks, where activists turned up Tuesday as part of the Occupy Our Homes initiative.
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Manny Francisco, Cagle Cartoons, Manila, The Phillippines —
Posted on Dec 4, 2011
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John Darkow, Cagle Cartoons, Columbia Daily Tribune, Missouri —
Posted on Dec 3, 2011
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AP / Alex Brandon
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November’s dip in the official unemployment rate is nothing to clap about. Scrutiny of the details reveals that the new figure of 8.6 percent is due mostly to 315,000 Americans dropping out of the search for work, and most of the newly created positions were low-paying ones. That includes temporary jobs created to support the spike in commerce that comes with the holiday season. (more)
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Brian Fairrington, Cagle Cartoons —
Posted on Dec 1, 2011
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Wikimedia Commons / Dan Smith (CC-BY-SA)
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Here we have some news that Ohio Sen. Sherrod Brown believes “can unite the tea party and Occupy Wall Street.” Sound implausible? Well, Bloomberg News’ parent company went to court to access 29,000 pages of documents from the Federal Reserve, from which the outlet gleaned ... (more)
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AP / Matt Rourke
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By Robert Scheer — On this Thanksgiving we have been cheated of the bounty of the harvest as one in three Americans descends into poverty.
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Pat Bagley, Cagle Cartoons, Salt Lake Tribune —
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Daryl Cagle, Cagle Cartoons, MSNBC.com —
Posted on Nov 20, 2011
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Rick McKee, Cagle Cartoons, The Augusta Chronicle —
Posted on Nov 19, 2011
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AP / Mary Altaffer
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On Thursday, two months into the Occupy Wall Street movement, protesters turned out en masse in New York, Los Angeles and other flash points around the country to continue their call for financial reform and to make a show of solidarity after New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg and his counterparts in ... (more)
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Flickr / quinn.anya (CC-BY-SA)
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As America’s middle class continues to diminish, it follows that the middle-class neighborhoods they once called home would shrink accordingly. Well, they are, finds a new Stanford University study, which charted changes in Americans’ living quarters since 1970. The results are sobering, if unsurprising.
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drpepper.com
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What better way to jack up men’s flagging sense of masculine prowess in these times of economic instability, with gender roles shifting by the minute, than by introducing a line of house paints that includes the colors “Bro Code” and “Zombie Apocalypse”? (more)
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Wikimedia Commons
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It’s already bad to think of a congressman cashing in on his insider knowledge of impending economic catastrophe, as Alabama’s Rep. Spencer Bachus stands accused of doing, but it’s all the more darkly ironic given his role as chairman of the House Financial Services Committee.
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Flickr / Alessio85
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Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi has powered his way through political crises with all the subtlety and grace of a battering ram, but in the end, he couldn’t fix Italy’s foundering economy. So, Il Cavaliere (The Knight) is about to lose his occupazione (job).
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Wikimedia Commons/Agência Brasil
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Either Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi is in serious denial mode or he’s about to pull off a recession-defying stunt of unprecedented proportions, as pressure is mounting for the embattled PM to follow the fresh example of his Greek counterpart ... (more)
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Rick McKee, Cagle Cartoons, The Augusta Chronicle —
Posted on Nov 6, 2011
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Osama Hajjaj, Cagle Cartoons, Abu Mahjoob Creative Productions —
Posted on Nov 2, 2011
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Rick McKee, Cagle Cartoons, The Augusta Chronicle —
Posted on Nov 2, 2011
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Flickr / clementine gallot (CC-BY)
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Back in June, the Federal Reserve predicted a sunnier economic future for the U.S. than it did Wednesday, when the Fed released revised figures for both growth (it’ll happen more slowly) and unemployment (it’ll continue to hover around 9 percent) through 2012. But the news wasn’t all gloomy.
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A radio show decades ago is misremembered as having caused widespread panic on Halloween; Congress has become just another form of legalized bribery; and the left-wing San Francisco Chronicle has been covering that city’s Occupy movement like a right-wing paper. These discoveries and more after the jump.
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AP / Thomas Watkins
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By Bill Boyarsky — While Occupy Wall Street and similar movements around the country take aim at financial institutions and their political cronies for taking the country into recession, let’s not forget those at the very bottom who were victims of economic depression long before the current collapse.
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bbc.co.uk
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While the international media zoomed in on Libya on Thursday, another important story was unfolding in Athens, where two days of strikes and protests failed to sway parliament members from passing a bill of austerity measures the Greek government insisted was necessary to avoid an even more catastrophic economic mess.
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AP / Mark Lennihan
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Even bad news has a way of turning around fast for Goldman Sachs. The financial giant was forced to concede Tuesday that it did not, for once, defy the laws of market physics as it has done even in the throes of the ongoing recession (you can keep your sketchy recession timeline, New York Times), and that it had ... (more)
Posted on Oct 18, 2011
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Anonymous via Eddie Colla
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Camping out by Wall Street and peacefully protesting are but two ways of signaling collective displeasure about America’s compromised economic system, but here comes Anonymous with another handy tip for would-be opponents of our nation’s banking behemoths: Let the currency of their realm do the talking.
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Flickr / Mel R
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More interesting, perhaps, than this New York Times article’s proffered data on falling household incomes and the reasons for same is its official timeline for our nation’s most recent recession: “ … From December 2007 to June 2009.” (more)
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Randall Enos, Cagle Cartoons —
Posted on Sep 29, 2011
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Bank of America Lied to Homeowners and Rewarded Foreclosures, Ex-Employees Say
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