Results tagged “economy”

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."

With national unemployment at 9.8%—and NYC unemployment at 10.3%—many have been wondering if (and hoping that) unemployment benefits will be extended. Now it's reported that the Senate has reached a deal to continue benefits for another 13 weeks.

A survey done by eFinancialCareers.com of 1,074 Wall Street workers said that 83% of people expected some sort of bonus, 36% expected a bigger bonus, and 11% expected that bonus to have increased by half from last year. This of course comes after a year of credit collapse and soaring unemployment, which many say was fanned by ridiculous pay packages.

Former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan gave his predictions on the economy and unemployment: He thinks the economy will grow 3% in the third quarter (which is more than he previously thought)—and that unemployment will break through 10% and be there for a while.

Third quarter real estate data for Manhattan showed that sales for condos and co-ops improved from the second quarter... but sales still trail 2008 third quarter numbers. So, is the glass half full or empty?

Ugh, the economy. America lost 263,000 jobs in September, far more than analysts expected, and the national unemployment rate rose to 9.8 percent, according to the Labor Department's monthly report. (Last month it was announced that 10.3% of NYC is unemployed, the highest rate since the Dinkins administration.) State and local governments across the country slashed 47,000 jobs last month, and now the unemployment rate is at a 26-year high.

Bank of America CEO Kenneth Lewis announced he would resign at the end of the year. One analyst tells Bloomberg News that Lewis had become a "distraction" after taking over Merrill Lynch and buying subprime mortgage company Countrywide, "He’s drifting out to sea like a dying Eskimo, knowing the company can do better and thrive without him."

There's bad news and slightly less bad news in the unemployment data for August, released yesterday at a grim press conference held by Mayor Bloomberg, Governor Paterson, and state labor commissioner M. Patricia Smith. First, the bad news, if you're the kind of person who likes prosperity and abundance: The city’s unemployment rate rose from 9.5 percent in July to 10.3 percent in August, its highest level since May 1993. NYC's unemployment rate is now well above the national rate of 9.7 percent, and more than 415,000 residents are jobless. Paterson told reporters that Ben Bernanke's recent Pollyannaish pronouncement about the national recession being over "doesn’t apply to us."

With the U.S.'s decision to put tariffs on tire imports from China—and China's unhappiness with the decision—there are concerns that China may impose retaliatory action on imports of U.S. poultry and vehicles. However, the NY Times suggests there's a secret weapon that Chicken Little might appreciate (or might not). A poultry economist and consultant, Paul Aho, tells the Times, "We have these jumbo, juicy paws the Chinese really love so I don’t think they are going to cut us off." While exports of U.S. chicken to China and Hong Kong only amount to 2% of the total poultry export revenue, it's very profitable: "About half of the chicken parts sold to China are wings and feet, which are worth only a few cents a pound in the United States. As delicacies in China, they fetch 60 cents to 80 cents a pound, a price that no other foreign market comes close to matching." And apparently U.S. poultry companies are the "world’s leading supplier of king-size chicken feet." Cato Institute trade expert Daniel Griswold said there's some risk, "If we are playing a game of chicken with China we are going to be big losers." In the meantime, China wants talks with the U.S. at the WTO.

Federal Reserve Chairmand Ben Bernanke said that the recession is probably over but had a caveat: "From a technical perspective, the recession is very likely over at this point. It's still going to feel like a very weak economy for some time because many people will still find that their job security and their employment status is not what they wish it was." He added in his remarks to the Brookings Institute, "Unfortunately, unemployment will be slow to come down. It will come down but it may take some time. Obviously, that's a very serious concern." Unemployment was 9.7% last month; it's expected to hit 10% by the end of the year.

This morning, President Barack Obama warned about Wall Street going back to its dangerous ways, "There are some in the financial industry who are misreading this moment. Instead of learning the lessons of Lehman and the crisis from which we are still recovering, they are choosing to ignore them. They do so not just at their own peril, but at our nation's." Though he did say, "We can be confident that the storms of the past two years are beginning to break," Obama added, "Normalcy cannot lead to complacency... I want everybody here to hear my words. We will not go back to the days of reckless behavior and unchecked excess at the heart of this crisis, where too many were motivated only by the appetite for quick kills and bloated bonuses. Those on Wall Street cannot resume taking risks without regard for consequences, and expect that next time, American taxpayers will be there to break their fall." Here's the full text.

President Barack Obama will be speaking at Federal Hall in lower Manhattan to discuss financial reform today (it is the eve of the one year anniversary of Lehman Brothers' bankruptcy filing), so expect traffic diversions on the roads while some subway station entrances and exits may be temporarily closed and bus routes may be diverted. As for his pitch, Obama wants Congress to pass financial regulatory reform; the Washington Post reports, "He will urge members of the financial community 'to take responsibility, not only to support reforming the regulatory system but also to avoid a return to the practices on Wall Street that led us to the financial crisis,' an administration official said Sunday."

With the year anniversary of Lehman Brothers' collapse—and the subsequent global economic meltdown—approaching (September 15, 2008 is when Lehman filed for bankruptcy), there are plenty of stories from ex-employees. The Post says "a number of former Lehman employees in its fixed-income, emerging markets and other banking areas will be heading to various watering holes and clubs near Lehman's former Midtown headquarters on Sept. 15, for events that promise to be equal parts networking, reminiscing and working to erase that terrible chapter of their careers"—so consider that a warning! A former mortgage securities broker now admits to the NY Times, "I have blood on my hands," but thinks others are more responsible for the downfall ("regulators, senior executives, rival firms and traders who believed that their elaborate computer algorithms insulated them from risk"). And the Daily News notes that Famous Famiglia pizzeria, right near Lehman's headquarters, had to lay off five of 27 employees.

Attorney General Andrew Cuomo is continuing to investigate Bank of America's acquisition of Merrill Lynch—and he's not very happy with BoA's uncooperative, client-lawyer confidentiality stance! His office sent a letter (PDF) saying that they found four instances where the company failed to disclose "material non-public information to shareholders" (such as Merrill's $9 billion 4th quarter losses, $3.6 billion accelerated bonus payments), "The facts of the cascading losses and bonus payments -- and the facts of Bank of America's senior executives' knowledge of these events -- are straightforward. However ... the decision-making process by which Bank of America and its executives decided not to disclose these material facts to Bank of America's shareholders has been hidden from our investigation by Bank of America's repeated invocation of the attorney-client privilege." Additionally, there are questions surrounding the dismissal of BoA's general counsel: "[Timothy] Mayopoulos was let go the day the bank informed its board that Merrill was bleeding money at an unexpected pace," just days after he discussed the "mounting losses at Merrill Lynch, which were not disclosed to shareholders before the deal closed" with BoA's CFO. Yeah, that's not fishy at all!

Bloomberg News has a long article looking at Lehman Brothers' collapse last year, reporting that Lehman executives actually predicated in the memo to government officials, "Massive global wealth destruction... Impacts all financial institutions... Retail investors/retirees assets are devastated." But apparently the banking executives gathered by Treasury Secretary Paulson and then-Federal Reserve Bank of NY (and now current Treasury Secretary) Geithner were thinking about themselves; former Merrill Lynch CEO John Thain tells Bloomberg News, "The discussion among the CEOs was ‘How do we prevent the next firm from going under?’ There should have been much more discussion about the impact directly on the markets if Lehman went bankrupt." Mohamed El-Erian, CEO of Pacific Investment Management Co., "the world’s largest bond-fund manager" remembers, "I remember at the end of the week calling up my wife and saying, 'Jamie, go to the ATM, go to the cash machine, and take cash out.' She said, ‘Why?’ I said, ‘I don’t know whether the banks are going to open tomorrow.’" And some believe the government hasn't learned the lesson, by allowing banks to stay big or get bigger without a thorough regulatory process.

The U.S. Department of Labor released the latest unemployment figures, revealing that the unemployment rate rose to 9.7% in August, up from 9.4% in July, "The rate had been little changed in June and July, after increasing 0.4 or 0.5 percentage point in each month from December 2008 through May. Since the recession began in December 2007, the number of unemployed persons has risen by 7.4 million, and the unemployment rate has grown by 4.8 percentage points." The possible good news: Employers cut 216,000 jobs last month, which is less than expected and the least since August 2008 (!). An economist told Bloomberg News, "What we’re learning is that the pace of job declines is subsiding. The economy is no longer detonating, but we are still losing jobs, and the unemployment rate is going up. It’s going to be a very tough environment for the consumer." Related: NY State, NYC unemployment figures for July.

The Real Estate Group of New York released its August data on the Manhattan rental market yesterday, "Renters have been able to take advantage of relatively bargain prices, which continue to significantly lag in year-over-year trends, while this flurry of activity has led to decreasing inventories around Manhattan good news for landlords and property managers." Notably, in non-doorman buildings, rents for studios dropped 8.03% vs. August 2008, while one-bedrooms were down 5.92% and two-bedroms fell 8.24%; in doorman buildings, studios were -7.09% (vs. August 2008), one-bedrooms -10.02% and two-bedroms -6.87%. TREGNY says "we’ve seen some landlords begin to test the market again this month with price increases," but "it seems to us that this is still a gamble unless one truly feels their current inventories can withstand the market’s current volatility." TREGNY's CEO Dan Baum added that landlords want their tenants, "The concessions out there right now are pretty aggressive."

President Obama will re-appoint Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke, the Wall Street Journal reports, "opting for continuity in U.S. economic policy despite criticism in Congress of the low-key central banker's frantic efforts to rescue the financial system." White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel said, "The president thinks that Ben’s done a great job as Fed chairman, that he has helped the economy through one of the worst experiences since the Great Depression and that he has essentially been pulling the economy back from the brink of what would have been the second Great Depression."

In its fall preview, New York magazine has assembled five different people—professors, economists, etc.—to give their thoughts on the future of NYC's economy—and it's helpfully arranged like a weather forecast, from "Those Clouds Still Look Ominous" to "Do I See Some Sun?" Here's a little from "The Storm’s Not Over Yet" prognosis (aka, glass is more half empty) from Independent Budget Office director Ronnie Lowenstein, "We’re expecting the city to lose a total of 250,000 jobs, and we’ve lost about half of that at this point. We are anticipating that we will continue to shed jobs through the second quarter of 2010... The financial sector is continuing to lose jobs, and because that remains the main driver for the local economy, that means nearly all of the other sectors of the local economy are shedding jobs as well. Credit remains very tight, and there’s a huge glut of unsold apartments, and that’s causing construction employment to plummet." Okay, let's just think about how the weather is nicer.

You might want to trade in that half-caf soy blended latte for a regular cup of coffee. For the first time in the coffee giant's history, Starbucks will be slashing prices. A "tall" coffee will cost $1.50, down from $1.75, and most cappuccino and latte concoctions will get a 10 to 15 cent discount. However, not all Starbucks addicts are celebrating. The more complex drinks, like the addicting Frappuccino, will be up to 25 cents more expensive. Maybe that's what's going to pay for all their new locations in NYC. One anonymous commenter pointed out on Starbucks Gossip that these price drops still leave the drinks more expensive than they were just four months ago, predicting "Customers are going to like the decrease I guess (although not back to original prices on some beverages) but they are going to be left extremely confused and upset that for 4 months they had to pay all that extra." Whatever, everyone knows America runs on Dunkin Tim Horton's.

The U.S. Department of Labor revealed that the unemployment rate for July was 9.4%—which is actually down from June's 9.5% rate. Bloomberg News writes, "The pace of U.S. job losses slowed more than forecast last month and the unemployment rate dropped for the first time since April 2008, the clearest signs yet that the worst recession since the Great Depression is easing." (About 2.7 million jobs have been lost since December 2007.) Many analysts had expected the rate to hit 9.6%, so the news is unexpectedly pleasant, though unemployment is still a huge problem. Additionally, the Labor Department reports, "The average monthly job loss for May through July (-331,000) was about half the average decline for November through April (-645,000)," and here are some other unemployment rate stats: "Adult men (9.8 percent), adult women (7.5 percent), teenagers (23.8 percent), whites (8.6 percent), blacks (14.5 percent), and Hispanics (12.3 percent) were little changed in July. The unemployment rate for Asians was 8.3 percent, not seasonally adjusted."

Remember when the financial crisis waterboarded the American economy to within an inch of its life, and then taxpayers threw all their money at Wall Street to stop the drowning? That's all behind us now, and those of you reading this in the basement of your parents' tent under the bridge can take comfort in knowing that everything's coming up Goldman. Though CEO Lloyd Blankfein recently urged employees not too buy anything flashy in the wake of record profits, everything else at Goldman is back to normal and no lessons have been learned, just like the end of a Seinfeld episode."Our risk appetite continues to grow year on year, quarter on quarter, as our balance sheet and liquidity continue to grow," crows Goldman president Gary Cohn to the Times. What could go wrong?

Goldman Sachs has caught the public's eye in recent weeks thanks to record profits and damning exposes about the bank's historic role in the economy's boom and bust cycle. Oh, and the pedophilia. Like many rich and powerful institutions, Goldman doesn't appreciate the attention, coming as it does as tent cities and soaring unemployment are turning the nation into a Dickens novel by way of Mad Max. An employee tells the Post that CEO Lloyd Blankfein has been urging his employees to avoid any high-profile purchases: "This is a sensitive time for us, and [Blankfein] wants to make sure that we're not being seen living high on the hog." While it's probably wise to postpone buying that diamond-encrusted office bidet for now, isn't this kind of bad news for the city economy? What happened to trickle-down economics? How much longer does the service industry—the chauffeurs, the naked sushi models, the bidet installers—have to wait for conspicuous consumption to come back in style?