Peter Morici
As a CEO, President Obama Gets an “F”
CEOs of large organizations all face the same problem – driving their agendas in organizations too diverse and geographically dispersed to manage directly. They hire competent managers for their units, set goals and establish clear metrics for evaluating performance. As in politics, competition in business is tough, and CEOs must set ethical boundaries for their [...]
Europe’s Permanent Recession
On May 6, I wrote Europe was in danger of falling into a permanent recession-a depression. http://www.thestreet.com/story/11914649/1/dire-straits-for-europe.html Now, the European statistical agencies report France joined Italy and Spain’s recessions during the first quarter, and economic activity across the entire Eurozone continued to contract.
IRS and Associated Press Scandals Are a Failure of Presidential Leadership
News the IRS targeted conservative groups for intense scrutiny is just one in a series of revelations pointing to a culture of expediency and intolerance in the Obama White House that corrupts this administration. Consider the September slayings of Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other U.S. diplomats in Benghazi. If the attack were revealed to [...]
Forgiving Student Debt Won’t Help Students or Fix Colleges
College is too expensive, graduates can’t find decent jobs and pay off their loans, and students, parents and educators all share in the blame. Now, President Obama proposes to forgive more student debt and that will make a bad situation worse.
It’s Time to Start Taxing Internet Sales
The Senate recently passed a bill that would require internet retailers to collect sales taxes on behalf of local governments. This bill has flaws that could be fixed in the House, and should be passed. I don’t like the idea of the state and local governments collecting more taxes-they know no limits to their capacity [...]
Europe’s Depression
The whole of Europe is headed for a permanent recession–a depression. Austerity and labor reforms can’t save it. Radical measures–abandoning the euro and deficit spending in Germany–are the only way out. Unemployment exceeds Great Depression levels in Spain, many parts of Greece, Portugal and Italy, and is rising in northern Europe. Slashing government spending and [...]
Jobs Growth Rebounds in April but More Trouble Ahead
The Labor Department announced the economy created 165,000 jobs in April, and the unemployment rate slipped a notch to 7.5 percent. That’s better than March but hardly enough-getting unemployment down to 6 percent over the next three years would require 365,000 jobs a month, and that is not likely to happen. Adding in discouraged adults [...]
Top News
- Sprint raises Clearwire offer, not enough for some May 21, 2013By Sinead Carew (Reuters) - Sprint Nextel Corp raised its buyout offer for wireless service provider Clearwire Corp to $3.40 per share, but the new bid was not high enough to impress some investors. Clearwire shares almost immediately traded around the new offer price, having consistently traded well above the old $2.97-per-share bid. Sprint announced the re […]
- Ireland rejects blame for Apple's low tax rate May 21, 2013By Conor Humphries and Padraic Halpin CORK/DUBLIN (Reuters) - Ireland said on Tuesday it was not to blame for Apple Inc's low global tax payments and had no special rate deal with the company after the U.S. Senate said it paid little or no tax on tens of billions of dollars in profits stashed in Irish subsidiaries. The Irish government, which has seen t […]
- JPMorgan's Dimon faces shareholder referendum May 21, 2013TAMPA, Fla. (AP) — Jamie Dimon, chairman and CEO JPMorgan Chase, told shareholders Tuesday that last year's $6 billion trading loss had been expensive and "extremely embarrassing," but he also asked shareholders not to fixate on the issue. […]
- SAC's Martoma says U.S. impedes defense in fraud case May 21, 2013(Reuters) - Former SAC Capital Advisors portfolio manager Mathew Martoma said the government is impeding his ability to defend against criminal insider trading charges by trying to link him to an alleged long-running conspiracy for which it has only "vague" details. In papers filed on Monday night in U.S. District Court in Manhattan, Martoma said h […]
- Former IRS chief: Can't say how targeting happened May 21, 2013WASHINGTON (AP) — The man who led the Internal Revenue Service when it was giving extra scrutiny to tea party and other conservative groups seeking tax-exempt status told Congress on Tuesday that he knew little about what was happening while he was still commissioner. […]