With another 427 point drop today, the Dow Jones Industrial Average has dropped 16.66% since Barack Obama was elected to become President of the United States.
Welcome to reality, President-Elect Obama. Any chance of putting your tax increases and tariffs on hold indefinitely?
Read More...The Chicago City Council is debating the 2009 budget. Clout Street’s City Hall reporters are there and live-blogging the proceedings. Please scroll down for earlier updates…
Updated at 1:18 p.m.
Aldermen approved the budget 49–1, with Ald. Billy Ocasio (26th) the only vote against.
Updated at 1:07 p.m.
Aldermen appear to be nearing the end of the budget speeches and as expected, Daley’s budget looks like it will pass.
Ald. Virginia Rugai (19th) said this economic situation is far worse for the city budget than other hard times in 1992 and 2001.
“They look so insignificant in comparison to now,” said Rugai, who added that she’s voting for the budget.
Ald. Richard Mell (33rd) said the recession has hit Chicago like a tsunami, but the worst is yet to come.
“My fear is what’s going to happen next year… Next year could be like a meteor hitting Chicago and the ... Read More...
Have you heard the latest fashionable anxiety? It’s not about economics at all.
It’s orthorexia: an obsession with healthy eating.
The term was first used in 1996 by the American physician Steven Bratman, as told by Michael Pollan in his new book, In Defense of Food. The book exposes the forces behind America’s poor eating habits—particularly the powerful marketing of processed foods—and offers advice on how to circumvent them.
It’s no secret that, for all our talk of health and fitness, Americans are overweight and suffering from heart disease, cancer and diabetes in alarming numbers. Remember back when 60 Minutes did the segment on the French Paradox? That’s the notion that French people freely consume foods like brie and fois gras and swill copious amounts of wine, yet remain slim and healthy. (Sales of red ... Read More...
“We may think we can prosecute and incarcerate our way to a less violent society, but it is going to take more than that.”
U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald said that Tuesday in his speech to the Lake County Bar Association at Greenbelt Forest Preserve.
Fitzgerald said public corruption gets all the headlines—Tony Rezko, former Chicago Ald. Edward Vrdolyak and Republican power broker Bill Cellini—and violence gets far fewer.
“People are tired of worrying about guns, gangs and drugs, but people are imprisoned in their own homes, afraid to go out even in the middle of the afternoon,” he said.
Read More...The upstart and lower-fare Virgin Airlines’ plans to initiate service at O’Hare Airport, and thus bring competition, more jobs and economic development to the Chicago area, appears jeopardized by the sweetheart deal between the Daley administration and the legacy airlines that control the airport.
Which raises the question: When will someone, especially in the business community that is so dependent on air travel, finally get mad on the lunatic ways of O’Hare Airport.
Virgin Airlines, which provides international service from both coasts, has been planning a major expansion into America’s heartland, with O’Hare as its base. But it has been stymied because it has been unable to lease gates at the airport, even though more than enough are sitting idle. Virgin said it will have to decide in a few weeks whether to cancel its O’Hare plans and look for another alternative. Meaning, I assume, another Midwest city in which ... Read More...
The cost of living in the U.S. fell by the most on record as fuel costs plummeted and retailers used discounts for cars and clothing to entice consumers hobbled by job losses and sinking home values.
Consumer prices plunged 1 percent last month, more than forecast and the most since records began in 1947, after being unchanged the prior month, the Labor Department said in Washington. Excluding food and energy, so-called core prices unexpectedly fell for the first time since 1982.
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