Economy

The stereotype of lazy southern Europe and the hard working North is just not reflected in the data. We came across this BLS data set over the weekend which was very enlightening and, in part, smashes this widely held generalization.

Rumors of an impending bank failure in Latvia over the weekend led to a run on bank machines. In many places it was impossible to get money.

Here are two interesting charts courtesy of the Macro Business Superblog. In outlining how the latest European crisis response policy fails to deal with the underlying issues in Euroland, Macro Business also illuminated the individual debt…

If this doesn’t convince you we’re on the elbow of the technology exponential curve, nothing will. Stay tuned, it’s going to be interesting next 20 years!

Here’s some interesting data from the Atlantic that shouldn’t have surprised us, but was an eye opener, nonetheless. The U.S. Federal payrolls are dominated by men and state and local government by women.

On Thursday the European Banking Authority released the results of the latest European stress tests showing a total capital need of €114.7 billion across 71 banks. While German banks might argue that they got the worst of the surprises,…

Here's what I'm listening to right now. Prince rocks the house in the video below. Eat your heart out, Jon Corzine.

Here’s a great chart from the BLS showing the collapse of construction employment from May 2006-10. No surprise the largest declines are in the four housing bubble states — Nevada, Arizona, Florida, and California. Stunning employment in…

Bill Black was on Capital Account talking to Lauren Lyster about MF Global. As usual, Capital Account delves deep into the real issues. Black never disappoints. Video below

In sum, it seems clear that the next few days will not produce a long-term solution to the European debt crisis. However, the various nations and financial institutions realize the gravity of the situation, and it seems likely that they…