GOP Lawmaker’s Health-Care Vote May Boost Re-election Odds
Brody Mullins reports from Washington on Congress Heading into this weekend, Republican Rep. Anh “Joseph” Cao of Louisiana was considered by some political pundits as the single, most-likely Republican lawmaker to lose re-election in 2010. Cao may have given his career a little self-administered CPR on Saturday night, when he became the only Republican in the House to cross party lines and vote for the Democrats’ health-care legislation. Elected on the GOP ticket in the 2008 election, Cao won one of the most-Democratic districts in the country.  In the presidential election the same year, Barack Obama receiv

Full Text: Tim Geithner’s Statement at the G-20
The following is the full text of the statement by U.S. Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner at the G-20 meeting of finance ministers and central bank governors: I want to start with the state of the global economic recovery. Yesterday’s jobs numbers in the United States reinforced that this is still a very tough economic environment. The pace of job losses has slowed sharply, but unemployment is very high and still rising. Millions of Americans are out of work, or working less than they would like. The crisis caused enormous damage, and that damage has left consumers and businesses still cautious and tentative about the future. We need a period of sustained

U.S. Factories Are ‘Grossly Underutilized’
U.S. manufacturing is finally on the mend — though as many factory bosses are quick to point out, when you’re in a hole this deep, everything looks up. That’s certainly true of capacity utilization. The numbers show U.S. factories remain “grossly underutilized,” writes Daniel Meckstroth, chief economist of MAPI/Manufacturers Alliance, in a new report. Capacity utilization, which includes manufacturing, mining and utilities, has been hit hard in this recession, reaching 70.5% in September after being in the 80s for yea

Jobs Report: Something for Politicians of Every Political Stripe
Friday’s employment report may not have provided any clear signal as to when the U.S. economy might start creating jobs, but it did have something to offer for politicians of just about any stripe. President Barack Obama speaks about Friday’s jobs report. (Getty Images) Democrats who want to argue that the Obama administration’s stimulus measures are working can point to the headline number: a shrinkage of 190,000 job

Airlines Illustrate Why Layoffs Continue
Why are companies still laying people off if the economy’s looking better? A closer look at the airline industry might help answer that question. While carriers say they see glimmers of evidence that the plunge in passenger demand that began a year ago is bottoming out, they aren’t seeing many signs that travelers are coming back or are willing to pay more for tickets. So the airlines are continuing to trim jobs, drop money-losing routes and take seats out of the air. The shrinking began in earnest in 2008, when oil prices were surging, but the recession gave them new incentives to keep it up late last year and into 2009. And