Tag Archives: Great Recession

POMP AND CIRCUMSTANCE

May 30, 2013 – 2:28 pm

by Hans Eisenbeis Spring is in the air, and so are millions of mortarboards. And while traditional markers of adulthood and the American dream may have morphed in recent decades, today’s graduates are as anxious as previous generations about one thing: finding a job. For high school graduates, that probably means finding a summer gig […]

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Latino and black Americans hit worst by hard times

August 30, 2011 – 7:47 pm

by Hans Eisenbeis WHAT’S HAPPENING The Great Recession did not hurt all Americans equally. It tended to punish the middle and lower classes worse than the well-off, and it hurt men more than women. But a July 2011 study shows that the biggest disparity may have been racial. According to the Pew Research Center, Latino […]

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AT DEBT’S DOOR

August 9, 2011 – 3:04 pm

by Hans Eisenbeis For a decade now — since the rise of the global economy — political pundits from Mumbai to Madrid, Hamburg to Honolulu have argued about “American exceptionalism”: the idea that the US is unique and can hold itself to different standards than all other nations. When it comes to love and war, […]

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HOT AND COLD

July 26, 2011 – 12:33 pm

by Hans Eisenbeis Last week much of the United States was plunged into hellacious heat, echoing the contentious situation in Washington, DC. While the weather is hot, the economy is cool, and no one is doing anything about either. The weather will eventually break, but can the economy fix itself? Although there aren’t many encouraging […]

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USA: More conservatives than liberals, and growing

May 18, 2011 – 9:47 am

by Hans Eisenbeis WHAT’S HAPPENING In a February 2011 survey, Gallup found that there are more conservatives than liberals in every state of the union — even in supposed bastions of liberalism like Massachusetts, New York and California (TheAtlantic.com, 29 March 2011). And for the first time on record, at least one state polls as […]

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WRITING OFF MEMORIES

April 5, 2011 – 3:38 pm

by Hans Eisenbeis It’s that time of the year: The birds are chirping in the trees, the snow is melting in the yard and IRS Form 1040 Schedule A is scrolling up my screen. I look out the window, and there sits my 1993 Dodge Caravan on three flat tires, with a squirrel’s nest under […]

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Good on ya! Consumers continue to pay off debt

November 30, 2010 – 3:53 pm

by Hans Eisenbeis WHAT’S HAPPENING Declines in consumer debt during the Great Recession (and ersatz recovery) have been accelerated by foreclosures because a mortgage is a big piece of debt that no longer burdens an evicted homeowner. But a November 2010 report by the Fed shows that unsecured, revolving credit debt — that is, primarily […]

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Consumers asked, banks listened: Instant debit cards

September 10, 2010 – 9:51 am

by Hans Eisenbeis WHAT’S HAPPENING Debit card growth through the Great Recession has been the silver lining in an otherwise black cloud, as consumers became control freaks about controlling their own money. Many card issuers have responded by focusing on innovations in debit products and service. A 2010 study by Pulse finds that one of […]

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DOUBLE DIP

September 7, 2010 – 10:35 am

by Hans Eisenbeis I said something wrong and she was really mad at me. I thought I’d smooth things over by picking up some ice cream from one of Minneapolis’s awesome creameries. Two scoops of vanilla with black pepper and rose water for my old friend — now that’s a personalized apology. You could say […]

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MAD WORLD

July 23, 2010 – 5:25 am

by Hans Eisenbeis I’ve been catching up on Mad Men, the hit TV series that launches its fourth season this week. As you undoubtedly know, it follows the triumphs and failures of an advertising agency in the man’s, man’s, man’s world of corporate Manhattan circa 1963. One of the things the show’s fans either love […]

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We know what you did this recession: Relaxed

July 21, 2010 – 5:08 am

by Hans Eisenbeis WHAT’S HAPPENING As of May 2010, 15 million Americans were unemployed (BLS.gov 6.4.10). That’s a lot of idle people, and economists are interested in understanding what they’re doing with all of their downtime. The Bureau of Labor Statistics actually tracks how Americans spend their time. And the American Time Use Survey for […]

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Who forecloses? It’s all in the math

July 6, 2010 – 8:40 am

by Hans Eisenbeis WHAT’S HAPPENING The toll of financial illiteracy — and even more fundamentally, math illiteracy — can be staggering. A June 2010 study by Columbia University researchers found a direct correlation between a lack of simple math skills and foreclosure rates (NYTimes.com 6.9.10). Economists found that about 16% of surveyed consumers could not […]

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Piggymojo tweets money saved, not spent

June 25, 2010 – 9:41 am

by Hans Eisenbeis WHAT’S HAPPENING Blippy pioneered the idea of tweeting all of its members’ credit card transactions. Now Piggymojo turns that idea on its head by allowing members to broadcast their thriftiness. Using text messages and Twitter, Piggymojo members can tell the world that they brownbagged lunch or drank office coffee for a small […]

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Building a better bond between urban and suburban communities

June 14, 2010 – 6:06 am

by Hans Eisenbeis WHAT’S HAPPENING In May 2010, the Ford Foundation committed $200 million to a broad revitalization program. The idea is to integrate urban and suburban communities through improved public transit, regional land banks, and more affordable housing (NYTimes.com 5.18.10). Central to the project is recognizing that communities which relied heavily on private automobiles […]

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Debit cards still whipping out more often than credit

May 28, 2010 – 7:00 am

by Hans Eisenbeis WHAT’S HAPPENING In May 2009, Visa announced that debit transactions had surpassed credit billings for the first time in company history. One year later, Mastercard announced that their cardholders had also debited more than they’d charged for the first time (ABCNews.com 5.6.10). In the first quarter of 2010, MasterCard users spent $118 […]

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