Mar 15 Obama and FCC Betting on Broadband as Stimulus By Chris Amico _pap_embed_custom('news01s3cc0qe29',482,304,""); The Federal Communications Commission and the Obama administration will unveil a plan Tuesday to broaden high-speed Internet access in the United States and encourage telecom companies to provide faster download speeds. The plan comes from a directive in last… Continue reading
Mar 15 Dodd Unveils Financial Regulation Bill Sen. Chris Dodd, D-Conn., unveiled a bill Monday to overhaul the U.S. financial system, proposing new powers for the Federal Reserve to oversee the nation's largest financial firms; a consumer protection agency housed within the Fed; and a new… Continue reading
Mar 15 From the Archive: Tackling Financial Reform Editor’s note: With Sen. Chris Dodd unveiling a bill to overhaul the nation’s financial system Monday, we’re dipping into our Business Desk archives to pull out expert commentary featured here over the past few months on how sweeping the changes… Continue reading
Mar 12 Wall Street 'Abuzz' Over Lehman Autopsy Report A massive 2,200-page report detailing what brought about the collapse of Lehman Brothers in September 2008 was released late Thursday, concluding that "accounting gimmicks" and "balance sheet manipulation" by some executives helped turn the 158-year-old financial firm into… Continue reading
Mar 12 Economist Andrew Lo on 'Existential Vertigo' By Business Desk Paul Solman: MIT economist Andrew Lo, who beyond guest-blogging his favorite recent economics book here on Making Sense this week, appears on Friday's NewsHour, discussing how human frailty and bad decision-making… Continue reading
Mar 12 Black: The Best Econ Books I've Read Recently Bill Black: I recommend looking at three books. Two of them focus on the interplay of economics and politics. James Galbraith is a professor of economics at the LBJ School of Public Affairs… Continue reading
Mar 12 Watch Evaluating and Preventing a Massive Financial Crisis As part of his continuing series of reports making sense of business and the economy, Paul Solman talks to MIT finance professor Andrew Lo about why he's asking Congress to keep investigating the financial crisis. Continue watching
Mar 12 Watch Boost in Retail Sales Hints at Economic Recovery Retail sales increased in February, despite major snowstorms in the eastern United States and consistently high unemployment. Judy Woodruff talks to an economist about whether recovery could soon follow. Continue watching
Mar 11 Lo: The Best Econ Book I've Read Recently Andrew Lo: The best economics book I’ve read recently is Human: The Science Behind What Makes Us Unique by Michael Gazzaniga. Now it’s true that Gazzaniga is a cognitive neuroscientist, not an economist, but the insights in this book… Continue reading