Read a little. Learn a lot. • Tightly-written news, views and stuff • Follow us on Twitter • Be a Facebook Fan • Tumble us!

14 Jan 2010 09:48

tags

Biz: Retail unexpectedly sucked last month; jobs sucked last week

  • -0.3% decline in retail sales in December; a growth of 0.5% was expected during the holidays
  • +11,000 increase in jobess claims last week; it wasn’t supposed to be quite that high source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

12 Jan 2010 10:41

tags

Biz: Reward for risk: The Federal Reserve made a huge profit in 2009

  • $46.1 billion the size of the Federal Reserve’s profits in 2009
  • $14.4 billion the increase in the Fed’s profits from 2008 source
  • Why the increase? Simple. The Fed lowered its standards and became the buyer of last resort, buying assets nobody else wanted, and getting profits from those assets. In case you’re wondering, by the way, they dump these profits back to the Treasury.
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

11 Jan 2010 21:32

tags

Biz: Obama’s thinking of charging Wall Street service fees. Hm.

  • That’s one way to get our money back from the banks. A year after being handed one of the worst financial crises to ever hit the U.S., Obama’s considering his options for making something back on that $700 billion investment that George W. Bush made back in the day. The one that’s standing out? Charging fees to companies like AIG and Bank of America. The nature of that fee hasn’t been decided yet, but we bet taxpayers might enjoy the just desserts. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

11 Jan 2010 09:56

tags

Biz: Higher salaries, fewer bonuses: Banks change up the mix a little

  • 65% of banks increased basic salaries for workers in the wake of the financial crisis
  • 88% cut back on bonuses – which had been vilified more than anything else source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

11 Jan 2010 09:33

tags

Biz: Online newspapers: Not many pay, but those that do pay handily

  • 2.4% of print newspaper subscribers are willing to pay money to get their traditional journalism online
  • anything the amount they can charge; those who pay are willing to pay whatever source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 2 Comments • Permalink

10 Jan 2010 10:06

tags

Culture: If Conan loses his “Tonight Show” time slot, he gets paid big bucks

  • $80 million paycheck to Conan if he gets bumped source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

09 Jan 2010 14:35

tags

World: Hugo Chavez screws with Venezuelan currency ’cause he can

  • 4.3 Bolivar could get you a crisp dollar bill as of yesterday
  • 2.15 Bolivar gets you a dollar bill today, on most items
  • 2.6 Bolivar per dollar for food and other necessities source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink
 

09 Jan 2010 13:42

tags

U.S.: California wants a ton of freaking money from the feds

  • $6.9 billion, which they’ll take in small bills source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

06 Jan 2010 10:12

tags

Biz: Cable TV is going to eat up larger amounts of your money over time

  • $75 average cost of digital cable for subscribers each month
  • 5% average increase in cable prices each painful, depressing year
  • $95 the expected average cost of digital cable in five years; blech source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

05 Jan 2010 11:23

tags

Offbeat: Gamer spends too much money on item that isn’t real

  • $330,000 for virtual item source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink
 
<< newer 
top tags
older >>