Senators approved a giant farm bill Thursday that is estimated to cut the deficit by almost $24 billion, largely by ending direct payments to farmers and replacing them with taxpayer- subsidized crop insurance to assist farmers in need.
He works with the precision and concentration of a surgeon because, well, he is one. But in the basement workshop of Kirk Withrow's Birmingham home, the stakes are much lower.
Dr. Kirk Withrow, an Alabama surgeon, spends some of his downtime crafting instruments from cigar boxes.
Seventy-five years later, the innovation and courage of those who designed and built the Golden Gate Bridge shine as brightly as the span's orange towers.
Most of the provisions in a landmark food safety law which passed 16 months ago still haven't gone into effect and are stuck in a rule-making process at the White House, four months overdue.
Sara Shaw with Occupy DC talks about a noon deadline for protesters to vacate two parks on Monday.
In an episode of the popular sitcom "30 Rock," television CEO Jack has a hallucinatory encounter with his future self, from whom he receives life advice that helps him avoid major mistakes.
President Barack Obama accused Republicans of making a blunt political calculation after his election three years ago, deciding to resist his initiatives, skirt compromise and bank on the economy getting worse to bolster their re-election prospects.
Unemployment in the UK has risen by 114,000 to 2.57m, its highest level for 17 years, as the country's painfully slow recovery from recession takes its toll on the labour market.
The percentage of Americans who owned their homes has seen its biggest decline since the Great Depression, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.
The U.S. economy is staring down another recession, according to a forecast from the Economic Cycle Research Institute.
"I may have spoken too soon," Bob Orsa said the other afternoon, with a sardonic laugh that didn't carry much mirth.
The Wallaces know what it means to struggle.
Poverty rates among children have risen sharply. CNN's Athena Jones talks with one family to see how they're coping.
I'm a Republican. Always have been. I believe in free markets, low taxes, reasonable regulation and limited government. But as I look back at the weeks of rancor leading up to Sunday night's last-minute budget deal, I see some things I don't believe in:
Democrats and Republicans squared off in the 50th annual Congressional Baseball Game at Nationals Park Thursday night.
The Great Recession had many lasting negative effects -- high unemployment, falling home prices, stunted growth -- just to name a few. But the news isn't all bad.
This is the only number that matters: 350.
The number of Americans filing for first-time unemployment benefits rose more than expected last week, remaining above the 400,000 mark for the 11th straight week.
In an off-hand remark before cameras and microphones, economist and housing market guru Robert Shiller opined earlier this year that he would not be shocked if there was another 10% to 25% in the nation's home price plunge -- and he's not backing down from that statement.
The exit of former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee from the 2012 presidential race opens a huge void in the Republican field.
Do children still dream of running away to join the circus?
Throughout most of her 86 years, Florence Hand had been haunted by "floating dreams" that always revealed "somebody in the room besides me," she said.
During the years B.C. -- that is, Before the Crash -- Caroline Chesnutt was the very model of a modern young investor.
October 2010: Have technology and globalization killed the American dream? CNN's Fareed Zakaria reports.
Here's a New Year's resolution for the nation in 2011: Stop predicting the death of the American Dream.
The population of the United States grew 9.7% to 308.7 million people over the past decade -- the slowest rate of growth since the Great Depression -- the Census Bureau reported on Tuesday.
The government's monthly labor report threw a curve ball Friday morning as November's job growth came in far lower than expected and the unemployment rate rose to 9.8%. U.S. employers added 39,000 jobs to their payrolls in November, the Labor Department reported. That marks a major slowdown from October, when the economy added an upwardly revised 172,000 jobs.
The votes are in, the numbers tallied and your number one iconic photograph is "Migrant Mother," by Dorothea Lange.
Democrats and Republicans agree on extending tax cuts to the middle class. People who are already struggling to get by do not want to see their taxes go up on January 1.
Even as remnants of a recession leave the nation's real-estate market in a lurch, machines crank out millions of tiny hotels and houses at a factory in western Massachusetts.
The board game Monopoly turns 75 and the workers who make the game reflect on why it's still going strong.
The midterm election was clearly a repudiation. The question is, a repudiation of what?
From job fairs to seminars on credit counseling, many churches and religious institutions are not only caring for its congregation's spiritual life, but also taking an active role in its financial life, too.
Sorry, Mr. President. Nobody's listening.
Economic experts may believe the recession is over, but try telling that to the public.
Did the federal stimulus plan work in fixing the economy?
The Great Recession ended in June 2009, according to the body charged with dating when economic downturns begin and end.
Question: Looking into the future of the American economy, I see tons of debt, the yoke of increasing social spending, pork-fed bureaucratic waste, the exporting of jobs and the importing of poverty. While this may paint a negative picture, I feel it's reality. We all want to be patriotic, but aren't there more fiscally responsible places to invest in that may offer a better landscape? --Dave, Bethlehem, Penn.
Franklin Delano Roosevelt's grandson, Curtis Roosevelt, recently gave this speech about the presidents at an event in Washington, DC.
FDR said we have nothing to fear but fear itself -- and even though we're a long way from the Great Depression, uncertainty about the economy is proving pretty scary, and a major drag on the recovery.
He was raised an orphan of the West Virginia coal mines years before the Great Depression.
One of the best pieces of advice I ever got was from a former editor, who told me how to handle topics that were likely to annoy the powerful. "Don't nibble at their toes," he told me. "Go for their throat."
Atlanta radio personality Jimmy Baron describes the events that left him unemployed as a perfect storm. In 2006, the radio station where he had worked for 13 years was bought and the new owner cut his pay by 60 percent.
Last October the Federal Reserve issued proposed guidance to banks on the structure of bank pay. The reason for the guidance was the need for banks to change pay so it would no longer encourage the excessive risk taking that led to the financial crisis.
As the nation struggles to shrug off the worst housing crash since the Great Depression, it may be hard to believe a housing shortage could be on its way.
Investors have socked away billions of dollars since March 2009 and it's unlikely that money will come pouring into the stock market anytime soon.
Sadly, the down economy has put a lot of workers over age 50 in the unenviable position of needing to find a new profession. Don't believe that old cliché about middle-aged dogs and new tricks, though; lots of wildly successful people found big success in careers they began after their fiftieth birthdays.
After 161 years of treating survivors of major catastrophes, from the sinking of the Titanic to the attacks of September 11, and leading early HIV treatments, New York's St. Vincent's Hospital closed Friday.
You know that stocks have a knack for climbing a wall of worry. You saw that firsthand last year, when in the midst of the global financial crisis, the Standard & Poor's 500 index skyrocketed more than 70% from its March 2009 lows.
A strong first-quarter reporting period is underway, igniting what could be a big year for corporate profit growth.
Movie audiences have always known the joys of in-seat snacking, but it took the theaters a while to come around.
It may be the most iconic piece of office equipment of the past half-century.
The number of Americans filing for initial unemployment insurance fell last week, the government said Thursday.
The annual unemployment rate rose across all states and the nation's capital last year, with Michigan and Nevada posting the biggest jumps, according to a government report released Wednesday.
Just a year after he unleashed a flood of dollars in a bid to prevent a second Great Depression, Ben Bernanke's job is on the line. More than a dozen senators have said they will oppose the Fed chairman's reappointment after his first term ends on Jan. 31. The rest of the vote counting is still in question.
Congress will soon spar over how to spur jobs.
Two small banks failed Friday night, making them the second and third banks to close in 2010.
The first bank to fail in 2010 is Horizon Bank, based in Bellingham, Washington.
My timing stinks!" my friend Jackie moaned. "I always do the right thing at the wrong time."
Since cratering at 12-year lows in March, the S&P 500 has staged a powerful rebound as investors turned what could have been an abysmal 2009 into the second best year of the decade for stock returns.
Call the last 10 years whatever you want: the Naughty Aughties, the Awful Aughts or the Zilches are all appropriate. If you are an investor, you're probably thankful the decade is over and are longing for better times ahead in the Teens.
In another ominous sign for state budgets nationwide, state and local governments reported another drop in overall tax revenue on Tuesday.
The ubiquity of the "Joy of Cooking" is staggering. More than 18 million copies have sold since the Great Depression -- when a Midwestern widow named Irma Rombauer published her recipes and anecdotes in the hope of lifting America's spirits.
This year, despite the recession and record-high unemployment, Americans appear to be getting into the holiday spirit by starting to shop again.
Gold prices have taken a dive this week as investors rekindle their faith in the stock market and the almighty dollar.
The balance has shifted: More states reported declining unemployment in November than posted increases, according to a government report released Friday.
Regulators closed regional banks in three U.S. states Friday, bringing the total number of failed banks this year to 133, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. said.
Two years into the recession, Americans don't see economic conditions getting better any time soon, and the steady growth in optimism that previous surveys measured throughout the year appears to have stalled, according to a new national poll.
It emerged in anger and it threatens to split in anger.
Question: My wife and I have two small kids and we're saving for a house that we'd like to buy within the next two years. We've got a significant pot of cash (more than $100,000) that we almost invested before the market tanked, but thankfully did not. I'm now wondering, however, whether I should invest some or all of it to grow our house fund more quickly or whether I should just keep this money liquid. What do you think? -- Dave, Boston, Mass.
These should be good times for Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, who some economists give much of the credit for averting a second Great Depression.
Economic growth was weaker in the third quarter than originally reported, according to government data released Tuesday.
State regulators shuttered Commerce Bank of Southwest Florida in Fort Myers, Fla., Friday night, bringing the 2009 national tally to 124.
Two Florida banks and one in California failed Friday night, bring the 2009 national tally to 123. Regulators closed Century Bank, Federal Savings Bank in Sarasota, Fla., Orion Bank in Naples, Fla., and Pacific Coast National Bank in San Clemente, Calif.
A key index of U.S. manufacturing activity jumped in October, reaching its highest level in three and a-half years, a purchasing managers' group said Monday.
The economy is growing again. So when are the jobs that go with growth going to get here?
Last autumn I took time off to go back to school. The timing turned out to be just right: My American economic history course at the University of California at Berkeley got to the Great Depression in early October, around the time everyone became convinced we were about to have another one.
The U.S. economy grew at a 3.5% annual rate in the third quarter, ending a string of declines over four quarters that resulted in the most severe slide since the Great Depression. But some economists raised doubts about how long such strong growth can last.
The economy may get a good report card Thursday for the first time in a long time.
The dollar slumped Wednesday, with the euro rising above $1.50 for the first time in 14 months, as optimism about the global economic recovery boosted demand for higher yielding currencies.
Without the bold steps taken by the federal government over the past year, the country could have fallen into a second Great Depression, said the White House's chief economic adviser.
Planning the celebration of a lifetime during the biggest financial crisis since the Great Depression is a daunting task, so it's no secret that many brides are cutting back. The average amount a couple is spending on their wedding this year is down more than $5,000 from 2008, theweddingreport.com estimates.
We are witnessing a wingnut war break out in American politics, organized on the Internet and fought out in airwaves and in town halls, wingnuts firing their shots from the outer reaches and strafing the common sense center.
Americans appear to actually thrive on adversity, according to a study published this week that reached the conclusion after researching the nation's biggest economic downturn.
Are you finally ready for some good news about the recession? As it turns out, a shaky economy might actually be good for your health.
In cities across the country, people with nowhere to live have done what many would have thought unthinkable before the economic crisis: moved into tents.
A tent camp in Seattle offers a temporary haven for the homeless. CNN's Patrick Oppmann reports.
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