This is one scary number. Bloomberg has a story on how demand is drying up so fast, literally 21,000 jobs disappeared in a day. Not one week, not a few days, 1 day.
At least 21,000 jobs were targeted for elimination yesterday as employers from Hertz Global Holdings Inc. to Advanced Micro Devices Inc. grappled with recession-choked demand.
More than 20 companies said they were cutting jobs, ranging from Amonil SA, Romania’s second-biggest fertilizer maker, to Fiat SpA’s Magneti Marelli auto-parts division. Hertz, the second-largest U.S. rental-car company, said it will cut more than 4,000 jobs, as businesses and consumers slow travel because of the global recession.
Well, this went sliding by. Obama's stimulus plan repeals tax breaks given to banks for mergers and acquisitions earlier this year. The repeal only affects future mergers and acquisitions.
To address the financial industry meltdown, the Treasury Department last fall issued a new tax rule to make it more attractive for healthy banks to buy troubled ones hit hard by the mortgage crisis. It allowed healthy banks to avoid billions of dollars in taxes by offsetting their profits with the losses of the banks they acquire.
Before, the merged bank could write off only a limited amount of the losses. Removing much of the restrictions enabled the acquiring banks to make huge reductions in their tax liabilities.
Obama's new CTO, or Chief Technology Officer is boiling down to two candidates. Guess what? Both of them are being said to promote offshore outsourcing, wage arbitrage and U.S. worker displacement through the use of guest worker Visas, the most notorious of these being H-1B.
They are Padmasree Warrior, the chief technology officer of Silicon Valley networking giant Cisco Systems (CSCO), and Vivek Kundra, who holds the same title in the government of Washington, D.C., the sources say.
The two candidates offer President-elect Obama a clear choice of skills. Warrior, who previously was CTO at Motorola (MOT), represents hard-core technology expertise. Kundra, who was named to the D.C. post in 2007, has held similar government positions in the past and has a reputation for using technology to make government more open and inclusive
Consumer prices in December fell ( -1.0 %) non-seasonally adjusted. Inflation for the entire year 2008 was 0,1%! (meaning I have officially won my bet wtih Bonddad). In the first seven months of the year, driven by soaring gas prices, inflation surged 4.6%. And then the deflationary bust hit. In the last 5 months, prices have fallen ( - 4.4 %), or at an annual rate of ( - 11.0%). Here is how our Deflationary Recession compares with others from the past 100 years, as of year end 2008:
Make a bad acquisition? No problem. The treasury department is now giving BoA $20 Billion to absorb losses from it's acquisition of Merill Lynch. BoA has already received $25 billion. Oh yes, they get loan guarantees too.
The loan guarantees will cover about $118 billion in loans and other holdings such as securities backed by residential and commercial real estate loans. The bulk of these holdings were obtained by Bank of America in its acquisition of Merrill Lynch, a deal which closed earlier this yea
If anyone recalls, no one was twisting BoA's arm to acquire Merrill Lynch.
Research and Development is moving out of the United States and offshore. In a new Economic Policy Institute study titled The Offshoring of Innovation, Dr. Ron Hira made the acceleration clear.
The economic and national security outcomes of increased resource input into the innovation process are going to be different than they have been in the past. We need fresh thinking about policies that will re-shape the new national innovation system to achieve desired outcomes
There is no anything to give the money directly to homeowners. We have only Larry Summers claiming to ease foreclosures.
That means nothing. They can claim almost anything would help homeowners when in fact the money goes directly to banks where as it is we have no accountability.
There's been mistake after mistake, embarrassment after embarrassment, and a complete lack of accountability in the TARP program," said Vitter. "The American people are not going to be fooled twice ... I urge all of my colleagues not to be fooled again, to say no to an open checkbook.
It's Friday Night! Party Time! Time to relax, put your feet up on the couch, lay back, and watch some detailed videos on economic policy!
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