Thanks to Wikicommons.

We have some bad news for you.  Brace yourself here it comes:

US payrolls GREW by 431,000 in May.

Bad news? that sounds like good news!?! Well it’s not good news… as economists expected 540,000 new jobs.

But wait, there is more.  Free Exhange, a blog brought to you by The Economist, notes:

Most of that big figure—fully 411,000 jobs—is attributable to temporary census hiring. The underlying employment trend looks quite weak. Private employment rose by just 41,000 in May, down from an increase of over 200,000 in April.

As shown by a drop in stock markets, after the job report was released, people are worried about unemployment.

However, not everyone is worried.  Dian Chu, writing for Zero Hedge, makes the reasonable point that

the big picture of the employment trend needs to be the key takeaway from the latest jobs report

…

Overall, the labor market is trending in the positive direction. Smart investors would focus on the fact that the US economy is improving vs. three months ago

So what should be the takeaway from last month’s job data?  We have no idea (we’re bloggers not geniuses).  That’s why we’re turning to you our readers.  Maybe if we all put our heads together we can find the answer.  Or maybe we’ll end up getting no where.  Either way it should be an interesting discussion.

Thanks to Wikicommons.

It’s spring again!  Flowers are blooming, the sky is blue, the birds are out singing, and the US Democrazy staff is stuck inside attempting to win next years Pulitzer Prize (since we failed to this year).

Sadly, the economy isn’t matching the weather; or is it?  Perhaps economic “green shoots” are starting to blossom?

With the Dow Jones Industrial average closing above 11,000 yesterday, the first time in 18 months, many voices are coming out declaring we’ve defeated the economic collapse.

Leading the charge Daniel Gross, writing for Slate and also Newsweek, proudly trumpeted that

America is coming back stronger, better, and faster than nearly anyone expected—and faster than most of its international rivals.

He continues to describe that the recession has changed America’s economy meaning

There will likely be fewer McMansions with four-car garages and more well-insulated homes, fewer Hummers and more Chevy Volts, less proprietary trading and more productivity-enhancing software, less debt and more capital, more exported goods and less imported energy.

Over at the New York Times, Floyd Norris agrees noting that we’re not out of the woods yet but

many Americans — both individuals and businesses — who cut back sharply when fear was at a peak a year ago are now finding that they overreacted.

But don’t get too excited. Although hope is often a good thing for growing economy (more investing and less hoarding) The Economist’s blog, Free Exchange, reminds us,

optimism could be dangerous if it leads the country to underestimate its continued vulnerabilities—to new financial shocks, to new shocks to household budgets (as from rising resource costs), to new deterioration in housing markets, to continued drag from an unemployment problem that remains very serious.

To help us keep our feet on the ground Mother Jones’ Kevin Drum has ten reasons why the economic misfortune may not be done yet (see the link for the full list).

2. In fact, there won’t be any further stimulus from lower interest rates. They’re already at zero, and (Fed Chief) Ben Bernanke has made it clear that he doesn’t plan to effectively lower them further by setting a higher inflation target.

…

4. The financial sector remains fragile and there could still be another serious shock somewhere in the world.

…

10. Unemployment and long-term unemployment continue to look terrible. Yes, these are lagging indicators, but still.

Now one thing is for sure.  Even the gloomiest bloggers are far cheerer then we’ve seen in the last couple months, so maybe the worst is over?  Or maybe we’re in for a double dip recession.

Thanks to Wikicommons.

Candles, cake, and intense political debate, what else would anyone want for their first birthday?  Especially if that special someone is the Federal economic stimulus bill!

Now, like most birthday celebrations (except for ours which you forgot) a variety of “gifts” and “wishes” have been flying in.

Led by President Obama, folks are trumpeting the stimulus as a success.

But for all the birthday cheer, there was also a load of Bronx cheers.

Some are questioning whether the bill actually helped the economy, particularly Republicans (who didn’t approve of the stimulus from day one).

Considering the mixed bag of gifts (including one ugly sweater) lets take a look at only a couple of them.

At Slate, Daniel Gross, comments that the stimulus bill has helped this year

there’s still $515 billion worth of tax cuts, contracts and loans, and aids to entitlement programs set to enter the economy in the next two years.

Republican Congressman Tom Price, for Red State, however, reminds us

The number of jobs our economy has lost in just the last year is approaching 4 million, and the unemployment rate has hung around 10% for the past 6 months. And then there’s the 6.1 million unemployed Americans who want to work but aren’t included in the oft-quoted unemployment rate.

Supporting the stimulus, despite the current unemployment, David Leonhardt of the New York Times, notes

Since February, aggregate wages and salaries have fallen, while consumer spending has risen. The difference between the two — some $100 billion — has essentially come from stimulus checks.

Over at the Atlantic, Meghan McArdle, makes a very interesting point that although the stimulus has been good for America’s economy

the main reason we didn’t have the Great Depression is that the Treasury intervened to prop up financial institutions, while the Federal Reserve pumped money into the economy with a fire hose.

With so many people giving so many opinions about the same issue we’re having trouble reaching a conclusion about the stimulus.  Now in a couple of year’s we’ll most likely be able to look back and reach a consensus.

However, we hate to wait.  So why don’t you, our loyal readers, chime in with your thoughts.

Stand up, sit down, applaud, guffaw, chuckle, smirk, repeat…for one hour.

That pretty much describe how the folks in the Senate chamber reacted to the State of the Union address last night.

If you were sleeping listening to the President’s speech, you heard a lot of talk and a lot of promises… But what does it all mean?

We’ve found some pretty good analysis of the big event to help answer that question (And make you sound incredibly informed during the discussion at the water fountain/cooler today).

Some of the best commentary came via live blogs and Tweets. Catch up on what we had to say on Twitter in case you missed it! Some other great Tweets:

From the political satirist @BorowitzReport: Instant Poll: 90% of Republicans Who Did Not See Obama’s Speech Disagree With It

Getting to the point is @PatrickRuffini: This change stuff is HARD #shortersotu

Political analyst @marcambinder indicates a positive response to the address: CBS Instapoll: approve of the proposals? 83% said yes. Obama has same priorities as you have? (57% to 73% in sample from pre to post)

Outside of the Twittersphere are people poring over the transcript, fact-checking, and wondering why Hillary Clinton wasn’t there. (For a good reason.)

Videos immediately started popping up around the web pointing out great, awkward, or important lines in the speech. It’s always nice to hear things straight from the horse’s mouth, so here’s a sampling of what you missed if you fell asleep at 9:00pm:

Chris Matthews may be catching some commentary for this remark (having to do with nothing other than race):

Obama creates his own little awkward moment when he calls out the Supreme Court for their recent decision on campaign finance (and Justice Alito shakes his head):

Watch CBS News Videos Online

Obama tells the Democrats they needn’t “run for the hills:”

And maybe most importantly, Obama tells the United States that he doesn’t give up on dreams:

That’s not everything there is to say by a long shot, but it’s a start to explaining the important stuff. And if you’re tired of hearing about this State of the Union already, see how things could be different with The Daily Beast’s compilation of some bad ones.

What did you think about Mr. Obama’s proposals? How did he do on his first State of the Union address?

So,  it’s not a secret, the US has some debt.

Not like “oops I overdrew this month” debt, more like a $1.35 TRILLION deficit for the coming year.

The latest attempt to decrease this depressing disaster comes from the President. President Obama will seek a three-year freeze on some domestic spending.

Let both sides of the political aisle prepare their mud catapults! We’ve got the rundown…

First the basics. NYTimes gives us the 411:

President Obama will call for a three-year freeze in spending on many domestic programs, and for increases no greater than inflation after that, an initiative intended to signal his seriousness about cutting the budget deficit, administration officials said Monday.

Our first reaction comes from Glenn Greenwald from Salon. He asks why cutting military spending is a political “no-no?”

As always, the notion of decreasing the deficit and national debt through reductions in military spending is one of the most absolute Washington taboos.  What possible rationale is there for that?

Nate Silver at FiveThirtyEight is givin’ the Freeze Plan a big thumbs down.

I’ll let the economists talk about the wisdom of curtailing government spending in the middle of a massive consumption deficit, but what concerns me more is the politics. Specifically, the sort of cognitive dissonance that is going to be created in the mind of the average voter…

Robert Reich says the Freeze Plan is nothing but doom and gloom for Mainstreet USA.

The bigger news is Obama is planning a three-year budget freeze on a big chunk of discretionary spending. Wall Street is delighted. But it means Main Street is in worse trouble than ever.

Bob Herbert on the NYTimes Opinion page says that this may all be happening a a very critical time for the President.

Mr. Obama will deliver his State of the Union address Wednesday night… Americans want to know what he stands for, where his line in the sand is, what he’ll really fight for, and where he wants to lead this nation.

Whew! 2010 wasted no time in getting politically heated!

credit: Pixar

At USDemocrazy, we scour the Internet, compiling news stories that we find insightful, hilarious or just plain interesting. Today, during our hard work (OK, we might have been playing Solitaire too), we found some stories from the business world – stories that suggest that the economy is doing better!

First up, Ebay reported growth in earnings for the last quarter and the world’s most famous coffee shop, Starbucks, saw its revenue get a caffeine jolt upwards.

Then, we read the GREAT news that Bank of America was increasing their employees’ paychecks. (Our editors could use a lesson from them!) Wall Street company Morgan Stanley is also spending more money on payroll, recently adding more workers.

Finally, Amazon introduced a plan to pay authors and publishers a greater percentage from their Kindle e-book sales.

Of course, we’re no economic experts (some most would say we’re not experts on anything), but during this time when a lot of folks are suffering, it’s good to hear there is SOME good economic news out there!

Last Sunday, we saw TV cat fights involving lions, tigers and even President Obama!

That’s right, on Sunday President Obama had his catty claws out. In an interview he referred to America’s Wall Street bankers as a bunch of “fat cats”.

To make the name calling worse, it was only a day before Mr. Obama was scheduled to meet with these very same top bankers.

What was this meeting about (clearly not another friendly beer summit)?

In Obama’s own words:

America’s banks received extraordinary assistance from American taxpayers to rebuild their industry — and now that they’re back on their feet, we expect an extraordinary commitment from them to help rebuild our economy

Obama was having a hissy-fit at the bankers. He wants them to start lending money again so that businesses can start growing again and in turn hire people (again).

Now normally most people would jump at a chance to meet the President.  However Obama’s cold words and the cold weather kept some bankers at home.

Bad weather grounded the commercial flights for the CEO’s of Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanly, as well as the Chariman of Citigroup.

The big question is will this meeting result in increased lending by the brow-beaten bankers?

Shahien Nasiripour, at the Huffington Post, doesn’t think so.

He could be wrong though.  After the meeting, Bank of America announced that it would increase loans to small and mid-sized businesses by $5 billion in 2010.

Who knows maybe those “fat cats” are cuter than people think?

With so much concern still surrounding the Economy these days, we at USDemocrazy thought it would be time for a good laugh.

So we have turned to satirist and comedian Harry Shearer (who has provided voices for multiple characters from “The Simpsons) for some inspired video. In the film above, he takes Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner and puts words in his mouth. We hope you enjoy the results!

Thanks to Wikicommons

Imagine for a moment someone owes you money (sounds familiar?) and then they tell you they may be, um… a little late paying it back (sounds rather too familiar?).

Now imagine that debtor is Dubai World, a company owned by the oil- rich emirate of Dubai (one of seven emirates, similar to states in the US) that makes up the United Arab Emirates.

Now imagine they owe you the hefty sum of $59 BILLION DOLLARS. (Yes, that’s BILLION).

We at USDemocrazy would get mighty worried… and the world stock markets were a bit worried at the news.

For the past couple of years Dubai has been turning the desert into an oasis.

The New York Times has a wonderful collection of photos covering this bloom (and some of its demise).

Now it seems the project has hit a desert dry spell. This new Middle Eastern real estate was metaphorically build on…well, sand.

There were warning signs.

At the Daily Beast, Matthew Yglesias scoffed at Dubai’s economic model remarking

Why would a place with a smaller population than Kansas need the world’s biggest mall, massive skyscrapers and a massive land reclamation projects? Well, it didn’t.

Andrew Sorkin, of the NY Times, agrees noting that

It’s a pretty good bet that a city with an average temperature of 90 degrees and an indoor ski slope is probably living a little too large.

Dubai is also feeling the heat in other ways.

Johann Hari, in an article for the Huffington Posts, describes the country’s questionable labor practices

Dubai is finally financially bankrupt – but it has been morally bankrupt all along.

The immigrant laborers used to build Dubai came mostly from South East Asia. They flocked there to collect high wages that could enrich themselves and their families.

Now, many are being laid off and sent home.

Some hope the mega-wealthy emirate Abu Dhabi would use its oil wealth to shore up Dubai. There are no signs of a bail out currently.

Free Exchange, brought to you by the Economist, suspects the impact could have be a lesson for other countries.

Don’t worry though the games not up for our desert friend.  Patrick Seale, writing his opinion for the NY Times, chimes in that

In my view at least, the world has been far too quick to suggest that the glossy city-state is about to go bankrupt.

It looks like we’ll just have to wait and see if Dubai is standing on quick profits or quicksand.

Image via tech.spreadit.org

In Line for Gifts: Were you standing in a line at the mall at 3AM this past Friday? Statistics show that despite an 8% decrease in the average Black-Friday purchase, sales were greater than last year’s.

In Line for Stamps: As a result of rough economic times, one in eight Americans relies on food stamps. Because of this, the stigma on federal aid is starting to go away.

In Line for the Ax?: Some people believe that the new GOP “Purity Test” will have some unintended consequences.

A New line of work: With the legalization of medicinal marijuana, many are turning towards its cultivation as a source of wealth in jobless markets. One Michigan 24-year-old has opened the first “School of Pot” to teach how to grow and administer this “new” medicine.