13 posts tagged “economics”
Muhammed Matloob, who manages a gas station at Coney Island Avenue and
Lewis Place in Brooklyn, is out of 4s for his regular pumps and 5s for
his diesel.
If one is the loneliest number, then four is the hottest — at least when it comes to gasoline.
With regular gas in New York City at a near-record $4.40 a gallon, station managers are rummaging through their storage closets in search of extra 4s to display on their pumps. Many are coming up short.
That’s why Vishal Nair, who runs the Lukoil station at Eighth Avenue and 13th Street in Greenwich Village, took another plastic number last week, turned it over and scribbled “4” on it with a black magic marker. The result was an obviously homemade “$4.47,” but it would have to do until he received the extra 4s he ordered months ago.
“Typically, we have a lot of 9s and 1s, and we had a shortage of 3s before we got a lot of 3s in,” Mr. Nair said.
The missing digits are an unanticipated barometer of how frequently prices are changing. The average price of regular gasoline in New York City has risen by 35 percent this year, forcing station managers to change their price displays almost every time they get a delivery, which can be daily at some stations.
Franchises often order numbers from their parent companies, though like independent station owners, they can buy directly from sign companies. Sets of 40 include equal numbers of each digit, which are magnetic or slip into plastic holders. Digits, which are often in a Helvetica font, are sold individually for as little as a $1.50. In New York, numbers must be 4.5 or 9 inches tall.
When prices passed $4, many stations ran out of 4s, and managers improvised by photocopying signs or stenciling numbers by hand.
The makeshift digits are legal as long as they are similar to the neighboring numbers, said John Browne, the assistant director of enforcement for the city’s Department of Consumer Affairs’ petroleum unit.
“As long as the color and size are correct and it is apparent what the number is, they are fine,” said Mr. Browne, who inspected Mr. Nair’s handiwork last Friday at the Lukoil station.
Jessica Chittenden, a spokeswoman for the state’s Department of Agriculture and Markets, which regulates gas stations, said inspectors were being lenient because prices were changing so rapidly and because few manufacturers made the signs.
“People are running out of 4s and 5s, so we’re allowing them to post makeshift numbers as long as they are the right size,” she said.
Sanjay Thakker, president of Gasoline Advertising in Clifton, N.J., said that sales of his magnetic digits had risen as much as 20 percent this year, though because it costs only about $10 to outfit the signs above the pumps with enough numbers, the product is not a huge money maker.
Until extra digits arrive, improvising can be tricky. Alex Kubotki, 27, who runs the Exxon on Coney Island Avenue at Caton Avenue in Brooklyn, ran out of 4s for his large sign on the corner. So on Sunday, he painted a fresh “4” that was roughly the same as the manufactured digit, and avoided using a paper number because it might bleed in the rain.
“Everybody’s doing the same thing,” he said.
Even stations in New Jersey, where gasoline prices have only recently breached the $4 barrier, are getting ready. At the Getty station on Tonnelle Avenue in North Bergen, Jatinder Sarin, the manager, said he will order a bunch of new magnetic numbers next month. He was selling a gallon of regular gasoline for $3.85, but assumed that $4 a gallon was inevitable.
“We know it’s going to go up,” he said. “Usually it goes a digit up, and it stays there five or six months. Let’s hope they stay at 4.”
But back in New York, stations are already grappling with the next problem.
“Now that we seem to be going to go to $5 a gallon,” Mr. Nair said, “we might order more 5s, too.”
In fact, diesel prices are already over $5 a gallon.
On Monday, at a BP station on Coney Island Avenue and Lancaster Avenue in Gravesend, Brooklyn, a “2” had been turned upside down to make a 5 for the large sign on the corner.
“I don’t have enough 5s,” said Serdal Ozumer, 51, a clerk. “I got to talk to the manager.”
June 13, 2008
PLAINVILLE, Conn. (AP) -- They don't climb tall buildings in a single bound, but the mysterious "Gas Men" are super heroes to some fed-up motorists. The unknown duo were dressed in sunglasses, baseball caps, khakis and matching green golf shirts when they gave Gayle Kilburn a $100 bill on Thursday as she filled up her car at a Citgo in Plainville.
They also handed her a card that read "Re-Fueling Our Community" and was signed "The Gas Men."
Kilburn says she was stunned by the gesture and at first thought it was a stunt with Monopoly money. She later realized it was real cash and used it to fill her tank.
She said the Gas Men also helped five or six other customers.
June 15, 2008
SAN DIEGO (AP) -- If there's pain at the pump in the U.S., Mexico may just have a remedy. A gallon of regular unleaded gasoline in San Diego retails for an average price of $4.61 a gallon. A few miles south, in Tijuana, it's about $2.54 - even less if you pay in pesos.
More and more people appear to be taking advantage of the lower price.
"I used to buy exclusively in the U.S. before gas started really going up," said Patrick Garcia, a drama teacher at an elementary school in San Diego who lives in Tijuana. "Since then, I've been buying all my gas in Tijuana."
The lower prices mean a U.S. motorist could save almost $54 filling up a two-year-old Ford F150 pickup with a 26-gallon fuel tank in Mexico.
The [difference in the price of] diesel is even greater, selling at $5.04 a gallon in San Diego County and $2.20 in Tijuana.
Paul Covarrubias, 26, who lives in Chula Vista and works in construction in San Diego, crosses the border each week just to refuel his dual-cab Ford F-250 pickup.
"I fill it up with diesel in Tijuana for $60," he said. "It would be almost twice that in San Diego."
Gas is cheaper in Mexico because of a[n anti-inflation] government subsidy.
Still, international gas-buying trips don't make sense for everyone. The wait getting back into the U.S. at the border in Tijuana frequently takes longer than two hours and cars can burn about a gallon of gas for each hour they idle.
By H. JOSEF HEBERT
Associated Press Writer
Jun 11, 2008
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Saved by Senate Republicans, big oil companies dodged an attempt Tuesday to slap them with a windfall profits tax and take away billions of dollars in tax breaks in response to the record gasoline prices that have the nation fuming.
GOP senators shoved aside the Democratic proposal, arguing that punishing Big Oil won't do a thing to lower the $4-a-gallon-price of gasoline that is sending economic waves across the country. High prices at the pump are threatening everything from summer vacations to Meals on Wheels deliveries to the elderly.
The Democratic energy package would have imposed a 25 percent tax on any "unreasonable" profits of the five largest U.S. oil companies, which together made $36 billion during the first three months of the year. It also would have given the government more power to address oil market speculation, opened the way for antitrust actions against countries belonging to the OPEC oil cartel, and made energy price gouging a federal crime.
"Americans are furious about what's going on," declared Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D. He said they want Congress to do something about oil company profits and the "orgy of speculation" on oil markets.
But Republican leaders said the Democrats' plan would do harm rather than good - and they kept the legislation from being brought up for debate and amendments.
On world markets, oil prices retreated a bit Tuesday but remained above $131 a barrel. Gasoline prices edged even higher to a nationwide record average of $4.04 a gallon.
At the Capitol, Democratic leaders needed 60 votes and they got only 51 senators' support, including seven Republicans who bucked their party leaders. Sen. Mary Landrieu of Louisiana, a state tied closely to the oil industry, was the only Democrat opposing the bill. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid voted in favor of the measure, but for procedural reasons changed his vote to "no" so that he could bring it up again.
"We are hurting as a country. We're hurting individually as Americans ... and the other side says, `Do nothing. Don't even debate the issue,'" complained Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y.
"Average citizens are scratching their heads and saying, what's wrong with Washington," said Schumer.
GOP opponents argued that little was to be gained by imposing new taxes on the five U.S. oil giants: Exxon Mobil Corp., Chevron Corp., Shell Oil Co., BP America Inc. and ConocoPhillips Co.
While these companies may be huge, they don't set world oil prices and raising their taxes would discourage domestic oil production, the Republicans said of the Democrats' plan.
"In the middle of what some are calling the biggest energy shock in a generation ... they proposed as a solution, of all things, a windfall profits tax," Republican leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky chided the Democrats. He called their proposal "a gimmick" that would not lower gasoline prices and only hold back domestic oil production.
"The American people are clamoring for relief at the pump," agreed Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M., but "they will get exactly what they don't want" under the Democrats' plan - higher prices and an increase in oil imports.
The bill's supporters argued that their proposal was different from the windfall profits taxes of the early 1980s that thwarted domestic production and led to a rise in imports. The oil companies could avoid the tax by using their "windfall" to push alternative energy programs or refinery expansions, they said.
Shortly after the oil tax vote, Republicans blocked a second proposal that would extend tax breaks that have either expired or are scheduled to end this year for wind, solar and other alternative energy development, and for the promotion of energy efficiency and conservation. Again Democrats couldn't get the 60 votes to overcome a GOP filibuster.
Neither Republican presidential candidate John McCain nor his Democratic rival, Barack Obama, were in Washington to cast votes on the energy issue on Tuesday.
Obama, in a statement, said Republicans had "turned a blind eye to the plight of America's working families" by refusing to take up the energy legislation. Obama has supported additional taxes on the oil companies. McCain is opposed to such taxes and has proposed across-the-aboard tax reductions for industry as a way to help the economy.
Election-year politics hung over the debate. Democrats know their energy package has no chance of becoming law. Even it were to overcome a Senate GOP filibuster - a longshot at best - and the House acted, President Bush has made clear he would veto it.
But there was nothing to lose by taking on Big Oil when people are paying $60 to $100 to fill up their gas tanks.
The oil companies have been frequent targets of Congress. Twice this year, top executives of the largest U.S. oil producers have been brought before congressional committees to explain their huge profits. And each time the executives urged lawmakers to resist punitive tax measures, blaming high costs on global supply and demand.
In addition to the proposed windfall profits tax, the Democrats' bill also would have rescinded tax breaks that are expected to save the oil companies $17 billion over the next 10 years. The money would have been used to provide tax incentives for producers of wind, solar and other alternative energy sources as well as for energy conservation.
In an attempt to dampen oil market speculation, the legislation would require traders to put up more collateral in the energy futures markets and would provide authority to regulate U.S.-based trading in foreign markets. And it would make oil and gas price gouging a federal crime, with stiff penalties of up to $5 million during a presidentially declared energy emergency.
After Tuesday's defeat, Democrats did not rule out pushing the issue again.
"This was politics at its worst," complained Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo. "This was a refusal to debate the biggest problem confronting the American people. ... That takes nerve."
"Nerve"? It's not nerve, it's evil.
Also: why on Earth couldn't the democrats get a filibuster going? What's wrong with these people?
By CHARLES DUHIGG
The New York Times
Published: May 6, 2008
As home prices continue their free fall and banks shy away from lending, Washington officials have increasingly relied on two giant mortgage companies — Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac — to keep the housing market afloat.
But with mortgage defaults and foreclosures rising, Bush administration officials, regulators and lawmakers are nervously asking whether these two companies, would-be saviors of the housing market, will soon need saving themselves.
The companies, which say fears that they might falter are baseless, have recently received broad new powers and billions of dollars of investing authority from the federal government. And as Wall Street all but abandons the mortgage business, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac now overwhelmingly dominate it, handling more than 80 percent of all mortgages bought by investors in the first quarter of this year. That is more than double their market share in 2006.
But some financial experts worry that the companies are dangerously close to the edge, especially if home prices go through another steep decline. Their combined cushion of $83 billion — the capital that their regulator requires them to hold — underpins a colossal $5 trillion in debt and other financial commitments.
The companies, which were created by Congress but are owned by investors, suffered more than $9 billion in mortgage-related losses last year, and analysts expect those losses to grow this year. Fannie Mae is to release its latest financial results on Tuesday and Freddie Mac is to report earnings next week.
The companies are sitting on as much as $19 billion in additional losses that they have not yet fully acknowledged, analysts say. If either company stumbled, the mortgage business could lose its only lubricant, potentially causing the housing market to plummet and the credit markets to freeze up completely.
And if Fannie or Freddie fail, taxpayers would probably have to bail them out at a staggering cost.
“We’ve taken tremendous risks by loosening these companies’ purse strings,” said Senator Mel Martinez, Republican of Florida and a former secretary of housing and urban development. “They could cause an economywide meltdown if they got into real trouble and leave the public on the hook for billions.”
Concerns over the companies’ finances have prompted a fierce behind-the-scenes battle between nervous government officials and the two companies. Bush administration officials, the Federal Reserve and lawmakers all believe that the companies’ financial safety cushion is far too thin and have pleaded with them to raise more capital from investors.
Freddie and Fannie, which are enjoying new growth and profits, have largely resisted those pleas, people briefed on the talks say, because selling new shares could dilute the holdings of existing shareholders and drive down their stock prices. Though executives have promised to raise money this year, they refuse to specify how much and when.
Moreover, the companies are using their newfound clout to push Congress and their regulator to roll back the limits that were imposed after recent scandals over accounting and executive pay, according to participants in those conversations.
More Capital Sought
As a result, high-ranking government officials are now quietly threatening to publicly criticize the two companies if they do not soon raise large amounts of capital, people with firsthand knowledge of those threats say. William Poole, a president of a Federal Reserve bank who has since retired, has warned that companies like Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are “at the top of my list of sources of potentially serious trouble.”
A report last month by the agency overseeing the companies said that they pose “significant supervisory concerns” and that Freddie Mac suffers “internal control weaknesses.”
Lawmakers are pushing to rein in the companies with new legislation. Senator Christopher J. Dodd, the Connecticut Democrat who leads the Banking Committee, will soon take up legislation giving the government broad authority over the companies. Lawmakers say it is likely a bill will pass this year.
“They are on real thin ice financially,” said Senator Richard C. Shelby of Alabama, the senior Republican on the Banking Committee. “And the way the law is written right now, there is very little we can do to correct that.”
Criticisms Rejected
“The irony is that right now I’m seeing the best opportunities since I’ve been in this business,” said Daniel H. Mudd, chief executive of Fannie Mae, in an interview conducted last month.
The companies also say that they have not demanded anything. Rather, they say, the limitations have been dropped because of the companies’ commitment to financial transparency and aiding the housing recovery.
But others remain concerned. Though the companies’ main regulator, James B. Lockhart III, director of the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight, has voiced strong confidence in the companies, a high-ranking member of his staff said some officials had begun considering the worst.
“It’s not irrational to be thinking about a bailout,” said that person, who requested anonymity, fearing dismissal.
Fannie and Freddie do not lend directly to home buyers. Rather, they buy mortgages from banks and other lenders, and thereby provide fresh capital for home loans. The companies keep some of the mortgages they buy, hoping to profit from them, and sell the rest to investors with a guarantee to pay off the loan if the borrower defaults.
Because of the widespread perception that the government would intervene if either company failed, they can borrow money at lower interest rates than their competitors. As a result, they have earned enormous profits that have enriched shareholders and managers alike: from 1990 to 2000, each company’s stock grew more than 500 percent and top executives were paid tens of millions of dollars.
Those profits were threatened earlier this decade, however, when new competitors emerged and after audits revealed that both companies had manipulated their earnings. The companies were forced to replace top executives, pay hundreds of millions in penalties and consent to strict growth limits.
To keep profits aloft and meet affordable-housing goals set by Congress, the companies began buying huge numbers of subprime and Alt-A mortgages, the highly profitable loans often taken out by low-income and riskier borrowers. By the end of last year, the companies had guaranteed or invested in $717 billion of subprime and Alt-A loans, up from almost none in 2000.
Then the housing bubble burst. In February, the companies revealed a $6 billion combined loss in the fourth quarter of 2007, and both companies’ stock prices fell more than 25 percent in less than two weeks. Freddie Mac fell to $17.39 on March 10 from $24.49 on Feb. 28, while Fannie Mae declined to $19.81 on March 10 from $27.90 on Feb. 28.
Despite those troubles, lawmakers had few alternatives to asking Fannie and Freddie to buy more and riskier mortgages.
“I want these companies to help with affordable housing, to help low-income families get loans and to help clean up this subprime mess,” said Representative Barney Frank, a Massachusetts Democrat and the chairman of the House Financial Services Committee. “Otherwise, why should they exist?”
Demands for Repeals
But now that the government depends on Fannie and Freddie to keep markets humming, the companies are making demands of their own — namely, repealing some of the limits created after the scandals and even some established by law.
Last year, in return for buying billions of dollars of subprime mortgages to help stabilize the market, executives won the right to expand their investment portfolios. In March, the companies agreed to raise more capital within the year. In exchange, they received an additional $200 billion in purchasing power.
Last month, the companies promised to pump money into the more expensive reaches of the housing market. In return, Congress temporarily raised the cap on the size of the mortgages they can buy to almost $730,000 from $417,000.
“We have to bow and scrape and haggle each time we need help,” said a senior Republican Senate assistant who spoke only on the condition of anonymity.
Each time Congress or regulators have given the companies new room for growth, their stock prices have risen. But so far the companies have balked at raising more capital. That hesitation has lawmakers concerned that when the companies raise money this year, it will not be enough.
In a March meeting, Freddie Mac’s chairman, Richard F. Syron, bolstered those fears by saying the company would put shareholders’ interests first. Michael L. Cosgrove, a spokesman for Freddie Mac, said Mr. Syron is committed to both satisfying the company’s public mission and creating shareholder value. Fannie Mae, which is in a regulatory-imposed quiet period because it will soon release financial information, declined to comment on capital-raising issues.
As worrisome as the need for new capital, some analysts say, are the companies’ books.
A report released earlier this month by Mr. Lockhart, the regulator, noted that although Freddie and Fannie had a combined $19.9 billion of “unrealized losses” on mortgage-related investments, neither company had reduced its earnings to reflect those declines. That is because they judged the losses to be temporary — in essence wagering that the mortgage market would recover before those assets were sold. Such a wager is permitted by the rules but difficult for outsiders to analyze.
Fannie Mae declined to discuss unrealized losses. Mr. Cosgrove, the Freddie Mac spokesman, said the company discloses all financial choices and downgrades all potentially impaired securities when appropriate.
The regulator’s report also noted that Freddie used accounting choices that gave it an immediate $1 billion capital increase. While those and other tactics are technically permitted, the regulator said, they deserve scrutiny.
“Companies can make assumptions that cause very large differences in what they report,” Mr. Lockhart said in an interview. He has repeatedly said that the companies are making good progress and have fixed many of their problems. But at least one accounting choice, he said, “concerns us.”
Mr. Cosgrove said Freddie Mac’s accounting choices had been the best way to reflect financial realities.
Both companies have also recently changed their policies on delinquent loans, which they previously recorded as impaired when borrowers were 120 days late. Now, some overdue loans can go two years before the companies record a loss.
Fannie Mae declined to discuss the accounting of impaired loans. A representative of Freddie Mac said marking loans as permanently impaired at 120 days does not reflect that many of them avoid foreclosure. But the biggest risk, analysts say, is that both companies are betting that the housing market will rebound by 2010. If the housing malaise lasts longer, unexpected losses could overwhelm their reserves, starting a chain of events that could result in a federal bailout.
A version of those events began in November, when Freddie Mac’s capital fell below congressionally mandated levels. The company stemmed the decline by selling $6 billion in preferred stock. But it might not manage that again if there is another unexpected loss, analysts say.
“The last two years have shown the real need for a stronger regulator,” Mr. Lockhart said. If his agency did not curb the companies’ growth earlier this decade, he added, “they would be part of the problem right now instead of part of the solution.”
By Zachary Gorchow and Naomi Patton
Free Press Staff Writers
May 2, 2008
A top aide to Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick warned the City Council today that Kilpatrick will implement “drastic cuts” in services [NB: What services? We don't have any services anymore, you witling!] if the council doesn’t approve a proposed deal to sell the city’s half of the Detroit-Windsor Tunnel.
Deputy Mayor Anthony Adams told the council the mayor would not support selling bonds to patch the $65-million hole in the 2007-08 fiscal year budget if the city doesn’t sell its half of the tunnel to a new authority run jointly by the cities of Detroit and Windsor. Under the deal, the city would transfer title on its half of the tunnel to the authority and the city of Windsor would in turn provide Detroit with $75 million.
But Councilwoman Sheila Cockrel said she wouldn’t bow to scare tactics. Cockrel said the deal may make sense, but is so complex and said the administration continues to provide information about it in a piecemeal manner at the last minute.
“I’m not going to get bullied into a transaction no matter how conceptually great it may be,” she said.
Adams responded that he wasn’t bullying anyone.
“I’m speaking to the hard fiscal realities in our city,” he said.
That prompted Cockrel to retort that instead of threatening to cut city services, the mayor should start “with all the family and friends with all the contracts in city government.”
Adams said he wanted to know what contracts to which Cockrel was referring.
“We’ll have that for you real soon,” Cockrel shot back.
In other work on the budget, Auditor General Loren Monroe told the council today he is concerned the budget's projected revenues are based on revenues such as the tunnel sale; a $25-million credit from the Police and Fire Retirement System pension fund; $22.3 million for the sale of surplus city-owned property; and $194.8 million in casino taxes.
The sales transactions have not be finalized, city officials have not completed negotiations for the pension fund credit, and the projected casino revenues were "overstated" by about $12.9 million, Monroe said.
When asked by Cockrel if the inclusion of these projected revenues in to the mayor's proposed budget really "translate in to a possible deficit," Monroe was noncommittal. The mayor’s office has said it expects the 2007-08 budget to end balanced, but the council’s Fiscal Analysis Division has projected a $113-million deficit.
Monroe said the budget "would be kind of risky based on those assumptions."
By JIM ABRAMS and LAURIE KELLMAN
The Associated Press
Friday, May 2, 2008
WASHINGTON -- The Federal Reserve and other regulators initiated steps Friday to end "unfair and deceptive" credit card industry practices assailing consumers who are already struggling to cope in a bad economy.
The proposed rules would be the biggest clampdown on the industry in decades, aiming at protecting people from credit card companies that arbitrarily raise interest rates or don't give borrowers adequate time to pay their bills.
The proposals would also restrict such lender practices as allocating all payments to balances with lower interest rates when a borrower has balances with different rates. The Fed board voted Friday to approve the recommendations.
Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke said the proposed rules "are intended to establish a new baseline for fairness in how credit card plans operate." Consumers using credit cards "should be better able to predict how their decisions and actions will affect their costs," he said.
Lawmakers who have demanded tougher controls on the credit card industry were generally positive about the proposed rules, as were consumer groups. But some questioned whether the changes would be strong enough and soon enough to help the millions of households struggling with credit card debt.
The Fed drew considerable criticism for its slow response to abuses that contributed to the subprime mortgage crisis.
"These steps are a significant improvement," said Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., a member of the Banking Committee and a leader in legislative efforts to make credit card companies more forthcoming about the interest rates they charge. "While they can still go further, the Fed deserves credit for acting, particularly for banning some awful practices rather than relying solely on disclosure."
Last year the Fed proposed rules that would make credit card bills and solicitations easier to understand, but Friday's proposals go well beyond those in tightening interactions between the industry and consumers.
"At first blush, this does seem to be good news for credit card holders," said Sen. Robert Menendez, D-N.J., author of pending legislation addressing some of the same credit card abuse issues. "However, it remains to be seen if these proposals will go far enough."
The banking industry opposes the changes, and says they could lead to higher interest rates. The rules could be finalized by the end of the year.
The proposed new rules would prohibit:
- Placing unfair time constraints on payments. A payment could not be deemed late unless the borrower is given a reasonable period of time, such as 21 days, to pay;
- Unfairly allocating payments among balances with different interest rates;
- Retroactively raising interest rates on pre-existing balances;
- Placing too-high fees for exceeding the credit limit solely because of a hold placed on the account;
- Unfairly computing balances in a computing tactic known as double-cycle billing;
- Unfairly adding security deposits and fees for issuing credit or making credit available;
- Making deceptive offers of credit.
The agencies said the proposed rules also would require federal credit unions to give consumers a chance to opt out of an overdraft protection program. And they would prohibit those institutions from charging a fee for an overdraft caused by a hold placed on consumer's funds when a person uses a debit card.
Ken Clayton, senior vice president of card policy for the American Bankers Association, described the proposed changes as "aggressive regulatory intervention in the marketplace that will result in higher prices and less consumer credit."
"If card companies cannot fully reflect risk, then millions of consumers with good credit histories will end up with higher rates," the ABA's president and CEO, Edward L. Yingling, said in a statement.
"It's unfortunate that the industry continues to buck the immense groundswell of support that is building for credit card reform," said Rep. Carolyn Maloney, D-N.Y., who has introduced consumer protection legislation in the House. She said the Fed endorsement of provisions in her bill "puts to rest the credit card companies' assertion that reform will somehow harm consumers or the economy."
The Consumer Federation of America estimates that credit card debt held by consumers is about $850 billion, some four times what it was in 1990. The group says the average debt for those 58 percent of card-holding households that do not pay their balance in full every month is about $17,000.
Travis Plunkett, legislative director for the federation, said the rules were a "good-faith effort by the Federal Reserve to curb some of the most significant abuses that have been hurting credit care users for over a decade." He singled out the practice of lenders increasing interest rates on a borrower because of a supposed problem with another creditor or a drop in the borrower's credit score.
The Fed is acting in conjunction with the National Credit Union Administration and the Office of Thrift Supervision.
Bush Fixes Economy Whines About Congress
Dorkus
W. Dildo had a press conference today, in his garden. He is very rich
and has an entire hospital to attend to him and bombs anything that
makes him confused and no matter what crime he does, he never gets sent
to prison, so he is exactly like ordinary poor Americans like you. Bush
Junior has heard about how maybe the "economic" is a problem, so he
told those losers who still have to act like he's important — you know,
the White House correspondents — that he "figured out" what was wrong
and guess what, it's Congress, which has Democrats.
"The average person wants to know whether or not we know that they're paying higher gasoline prices and they're worried about staying in their homes," Bush said. Yes, that's a bunch of jumbled nonsense with a slight relation to the subject, so Consumer Confidence immediately plunged to its lowest level in nearly six years and consumer sentiment plunged to its lowest level in 26 years and inflation rose again and home prices are falling faster than ever with "no sign of the bottom" and the number of Americans who can even dream of affording a little vacation in the next six months fell to a 30-year low.
Said Bush Junior: "I repeatedly submitted proposal to help address the problems. Time after time, Congress chose to block them."
Nobody has any idea what he's talking about, or even cares about how he thinks he "repeatedly submitted proposal."
Congress and the White House did agree to send everybody in America a little bit of money, and those checks will start arriving this week. Many people plan to "splurge" by spending their Economic Stimulus money on the heating bill, or a 50-lb. sack of rice, or half a tank of gas.
Bush Says Congress Blocking Progress [CNN]
Too stupid to learn how to speak Yankistani let alone English, but can make $$$ hand over fist while we move and change jobs so we can afford gasoline.
Wonkette's so lovely.
published:
Thursday | April 17, 2008
Shelly-Ann Thompson, Staff Reporter
Minister of Agriculture Dr Christopher Tufton makes his
contribution to the 2008/2009 Budget Debate in the House of
Representatives yesterday. - Rudolph Brown/Chief Photographer
AN APPEAL for Jamaican consumers to decrease their dependence on food imports was yesterday put out by Agriculture Minister Dr Christopher Tufton, who warned that the developing world food crisis posed a "clear and present danger" to the nation.
Tufton, in making his debut presentation in the annual Budget Debate in Parliament yesterday, spent just under three hours stressing the necessity for the nation to increase its agriculture output and feed its own people.
Noting that some 61 per cent of the country's basic food items were imported, the agriculture minister said data from the Statistical Institute of Jamaica showed that the nation's food import bill had increased from US$479 million in 2002 to US$662 million up to November 2007.
"The frightening reality of increasingly high food prices, together with the daunting projections, are in fact a summons to action now," Tufton said. "Countries the world over, regardless of size or economic profile, are taking conscious and deliberate steps to combat this emerging threat."
Food-planting project
However, though the agriculture minister outlined measures aimed at addressing the spiralling food bill, those measures will not immediately slash costs.
Chief among the measures announced is a national food-planting programme that is intended to be the highlight of Labour Day 2008.
Tufton said Cabinet agreed on Monday to place the focus of Labour Day, to be observed on May 23, on food security. The theme will be 'Eating What We Grow and Growing What We Eat'.
The school garden programme will also be expanded through the Jamaica 4-H clubs in collaboration with the ministry.
At a cost of $30 million, the ministry will distribute some 200,000 packets of vegetable seeds to each student from grades eight to 11 in every secondary institution. These seeds are expected to be planted at home or within their communities on Labour Day.
In addition, commencing this year, school gardens will be established within 966 public institutions.
Backyard gardening
"The intention is to encourage our young people to appreciate agri-culture, nature and the environment, and to impress on them the critical importance of food security," said Tufton.
Another initiative to boost agricultural production is an Urban Backyard Garden Programme, which will be implemented immediately within 400 households in Portmore and Spanish Town, St Catherine.
Initially, selected residents within these communities will be given free of cost a backyard garden kit, developed by the Rural Agricultural Development Authority.
Tufton said that, by planting two cycles of tomato, cucumber, sweet pepper and pak choi, the average household would save some $12,000 annually.
"This Government believes that we must return to the days when householders grew a little something for themselves in their backyards," said Tufton.
Agriculture Minister Dr Christopher Tufton says the successful implementation of a technology-driven programme and food security initiatives will require sustained funding. This funding will be secured through:
The Planning Institute of Jamaica, working with the Caribbean Development Bank to access some US$8 million at two per cent, with a payback period of 30 years. It is expected that these funds will be channelled through the Development Bank of Jamaica (DBJ).
The DBJ has approved a loan package of $250 million, at an interest rate of 7.8 per cent, to be on-lent through the PC banks and credit unions and other micro financing institutions.
The Government is currently finalising a US$2.5 million grant grant from the Chinese Government, to be used for agricultural development projects.
Through a $15 million programme financed by the International Development Bank, the DBJ, supported by the Agricultural Credit Board, will be conducting a restructuring exercise within the PC banks.
State has 2,236 more people unemployed in week
By MARTIN CRUTSINGER
ASSOCIATED PRESS
March 20, 2008
WASHINGTON — The number of newly laid-off workers filing for unemployment benefits rose last week to the highest level in nearly two months, providing more evidence that the weak economy is having an adverse impact on the labor market.
The Labor Department said Thursday that applications for jobless benefits totaled 378,000 last week. That was an increase of 22,000 from the previous week and was a far bigger jump than had been expected.
The four-week average for new claims rose to 365,250, which was the highest level since a flood of claims caused by the 2005 Gulf Coast hurricanes.
The current economic slowdown, which many economists believe has already turned into a full-blown recession, is starting to show up in the labor market in terms of higher layoffs and weaker hiring numbers.
The total number of payroll jobs fell by 63,000 in February, an even bigger decline that the drop of 22,000 jobs in January, which had been the first monthly decline since mid-2003.
“We have no doubt that the trend in claims is upwards and is approaching the levels seen in the earlier stage of the recession in 2001,” said Ian Shepherdson, chief U.S. economist at High Frequency Economics.
Part of the increase in benefit applications in recent weeks occurred because of a three-week strike at a major parts supplier to General Motors Corp., which has forced GM to close all or part of 28 plants, affecting more than 37,000 hourly workers.
The number of unemployed workers who are receiving benefits totaled 2.865 million, the largest amount since late August 2004.
The Federal Reserve this week cut a key interest rate by a sizable three-quarters of 1%, wrapping up the most aggressive two months of credit easing by the central bank in a quarter century.
The Fed has also greatly expanded its loans to cash-strapped banks and used a Depression-era process to supply money to Wall Street investment houses in an effort to keep a serious credit squeeze from pushing the country into a deep recession.
For the week ending March 8, 28 states and territories reported an increase in jobless claims and 25 reported declines. The states with the biggest increases were California, up by 3,755; Michigan, up by 2,236, and Indiana, with an increase of 2,158. The layoffs in Michigan and Indiana were attributed in part to higher layoffs in the auto industry.
The states with the biggest drop in claims two weeks ago were New York, down by 13,504, and Connecticut, which fell by 2,228.
