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How Life Would Change Under the GOP Budget
Tweet Share on Facebook April 5, 2011 Comment (40)Don't worry about the scary-sounding federal budget proposed by House Republicans ever becoming law. Democrats who control the Senate—and the White House—will never approve it. But pay attention to the details anyway, because sooner or later, many of the deep cuts and other hardships envisioned in the plan are likely to happen.
[See how to survive tax hikes and spending cuts.]
The audacious Republican proposal, authored by Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin, is the first serious effort to tackle the mushrooming cost of government-funded healthcare for retirees and the needy. And Ryan is aiming high. He wants to cut $6.2 trillion in government spending over the next decade, and balance the federal budget by 2015. To reach those extremely aggressive goals, Ryan would phase out the current pay-for-everything Medicare program for Americans who turn 65 beginning in 2022, replacing it with government subsidies that would help seniors pay for insurance they buy on the open market. He's instituted deep Medicaid reforms that would mean fewer healthcare benefits for the poor. There would also be unspecified changes to Social Security and cuts in most other categories of government spending. The sugar that's supposed to make this bitter medicine go down is a simplified tax code, along with tax cuts for individuals and corporations.
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Why I'm Shunning Groupon
Tweet Share on Facebook April 5, 2011 Comment (10)There's a new tech rally in America. Companies like Facebook, Twitter, Groupon, and Foursquare are attracting millions of new users monthly, and soaring in value. They're also hiring, and restoring a bit of swagger to the hobbled U.S. economy: We may not build much in America anymore, but we've certainly got the lead on social media.
[See 10 industries that will hire the most in 2011.]
But rooting for home-grown businesses doesn't mean I want to become their customer. In fact, Facebook & friends represent an unsettling blend of revolutionary technology and outdated hucksterism. While the people behind these companies have invented brilliant new ways to bring people together, they're mainly doing it to sell them stuff they don't really need. The main reason these new tech darlings have sky-high valuations is that corporate America is drooling over the marketing potential, once they can get access to the millions—or soon, billions—of consumers who willingly join social media sites and share coveted personal information there. In a way, it's just a sophisticated way of peddling toasters.
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Something To Cheer When You Get In Your Car
Tweet Share on Facebook April 1, 2011 Comment (1)It's trendy to trash the government, look on the dark side and, if you're part of the news media, trumpet everything that's going wrong. But at great personal risk, I'm taking a short break from cynicism.
[See 20 cars that could rally while Japan digs out.]
Here's some good news that affects nearly every American: The number of people dying in car crashes has fallen to the lowest level since 1949, when the government started collecting data. Figures compiled by the Department of Transportation show that an estimated 32,788 people died in car crashes in 2010, down from 33,808 fatalities in 2009. The plunge in overall deaths is remarkable, because American drivers log nearly three times as many miles as they did in 1970, when the feds began tracking those numbers. Driving is still one of the riskiest things most people do, but this improving safety record is akin to a medical breakthrough that saves thousands of lives per year.
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Why the Middle-Aged Are Missing Out on New Jobs
Tweet Share on Facebook April 1, 2011 Comment (19)Jobs are back. Just not for everybody.
Like many other things in the stutter-step economic recovery, the job market is finally recovering, but progress is uneven and some people are being left out. The latest jobs report, for example, shows that the economy created 216,000 jobs in March, for a total of about 1.9 million new jobs since employment levels bottomed out at the end of 2009. That's a healthy pace of job growth that will help bring down the uncomfortably high unemployment rate, and, with luck, cement the recovery.
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Cars That Could Rally While Japan Digs Out
Tweet Share on Facebook April 1, 2011 Comment (2)When General Motors and Chrysler declared bankruptcy in 2009, it was obviously bad news for them—but a boost for competitors, who picked up market share as car buyers fled the two damaged brands.
[In Pictures: 20 Cars That Could Rally While Japan Digs Out.]
The American carmarkers now have a chance to gain back a bit of that turf. The devastating earthquake in Japan was obviously an act of nature—not a man-made debacle, like the mismanagement of the two American automakers was—but it has left Japanese automakers reeling all the same. A few assembly plants were damaged, while others are operating fitfully on account of power rationing. Perhaps most pernicious is the damage done to several parts manufacturers in the quake zone that supply paint, electronics, and other key components for many Japanese cars—and some American ones as well.
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How Oil Reveals Where the Next Bombs Will Fall
Tweet Share on Facebook March 30, 2011 Comment (3)When President Obama explained America's involvement in Libya's civil war, he didn't mention oil once. Instead, he used euphemisms like "national interest" and "strategic interest." Yet it's hard to imagine that the United States or its European allies would be mounting airstrikes in Libya if the African nation weren't one of the world's top 20 oil producers.
[See 5 upsides to global turmoil.]
The other conditions Obama cited to justify airstrikes are valid: It was obvious that Libyan leader Moammar Qaddafi was massacring civilians and intent on murdering many more. Some form of meaningful opposition was forming. Airstrikes by coalition jets could accomplish something tangible, by holding off or driving back Qaddafi forces. Yet the same conditions exist in other nations, and the West doesn't intervene there.
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What It Will Take to Fix the Housing Market
Tweet Share on Facebook March 30, 2011 Comment (14)If you're a squeamish homeowner, you probably can't bear to follow the housing news anymore. Home prices have fallen by more than 30 percent over the last five years, yet the pain still isn't over: After a respite when it looked like the bust was ending, price declines have been accelerating once again. Sales are abysmal, despite the lowest interest rates in a generation. The inventory of foreclosures and other fire-sale homes is going up, not down, which will put further downward pressure on prices for much of 2011. Housing usually rebounds after a recession, giving the recovery legs. But the housing market is so bad that some analysts worry it could drag the whole economy back down into a dreaded double-dip recession.
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How Geraldine Ferraro Conquered Career Setbacks
Tweet Share on Facebook March 28, 2011 CommentGeraldine Ferraro, who died at 75 on March 26 from blood cancer she battled for more than a decade, is best known for her historic 1984 bid as the first female vice-presidential candidate. But her life and career also reflected the everyday challenges women have faced over the last several decades as they've become an economic, political, and social force in America. I interviewed Ferraro in 2009 and asked about her career breakthroughs and setbacks. Here are some of her remarks:
I was eight years old when my father died suddenly. My father was not a peasant. He came here [from Italy] first-class. When he was alive, I could have anything I wanted. At 44, he had a heart attack. I missed him something awful. I was the youngest of four. One of my parents' kids died at six days. Another died in a car crash at three years. I was named after him.
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Where Rents Are Rising the Most, and Least
Tweet Share on Facebook March 28, 2011 Comment (4)We all want our living costs to go down, not up. But a surge in rents may represent a surprising bit of good news for the beleaguered housing industry, which has been in the dumps for half a decade.
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One Sign the Housing Bust Could End Soon
Tweet Share on Facebook March 28, 2011 Comment (7)It's not usually welcome news when the landlord hikes your rent. But for the housing market, rising rents may be one of the most hopeful signs in years.
The markets for rented and purchased homes usually move in opposite directions. When the housing market is hot and more people are buying homes, rents tend to stay low or go down, because there are fewer renters. But when high interest rates or other factors cool the housing market, more people rent. Since it takes awhile for builders to add more units, the supply-demand mismatch drives rents up.
