Economy

Economic growth for the third quarter, which was estimated at 3.9% a month ago, was revised upward to 4.9% by the government's Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA). The BEA announcement is here. This of course explains why a Google News search I just did on "recession" has hundreds and hundreds of articles talking about a possible recession, including 481 in the first 20 listings (/sarc). Key…

As the Christmas shopping season went into full swing in 2005, I sensed that journalists in general have a strong preference for using the term "holiday shopping" instead of "Christmas shopping" when covering business and commerce, but that when it came to people losing their jobs, they preferred to describe layoffs as relating to "Christmas." My instincts have been proven correct, as you can see…

CNN's senior business correspondent Ali Velshi had an interesting question for viewers this morning.Before telling viewers that consumer confidence is at the lowest level in two years, Velshi asked if the media have anything to do with it."Do you think we're feeding this thing? Do you think we're fueling this sort of misery?" asked Velshi on "American Morning" November 28.A question for…

As the 2008 election approaches, the New York Times uses the image of a sinking red "RECE$$ION" to communicate a fear that is so far only a phantom menace. Peter Goodman's Sunday Week in Review cover story, "Trying to Guess What Happens Next," displayed plenty of pessimism about the U.S. economy after years of foreign-financed easy money. But the accompanying graphic communicated even more…

Of course, the expectations game can be frustrating, and we won't know for sure until the actual report is released Thursday at 8:30 a.m. But there appears to be remarkably good economic news ahead. Naturally, it is getting the barest of coverage from an Old Media business press corps that seems intent on talking the economy down. First, a week ago Monday, MarketWatch's Greg Robb, in an article…

For years, NewsBusters and its parent, the Media Research Center, have been reporting on the disparity in economic coverage by mainstream media outlets during the Clinton and Bush administrations. In the past seven years, economic data that would have been praised when Bill Clinton was in the White House has continually been presented as recessionary, or even depression-like. With that in…

Widows and orphans, beware: the Republicans are coming!That was the upshot of Chris Matthews's observation today about two Republican front-runners.View video here.Financial Times US Managing Editor Chrystia Freeland has become a "Hardball" regular of late. CHRYSTIA FREELAND: The other thing that people worry about is if someone forecloses on their home, and that's the issue we haven't really…

So, did you hear the United States was recently ranked by an independent, international economic think-tank as number one in global competitiveness? You didn't? Well, how could you, for according to LexisNexis, not one major American press outlet aside from Investor's Business Daily thought the announcement was important enough to share with the citizenry. I guess this would go too contrary…

Just in time for Thanksgiving, BMI Director Dan Gainor stopped by ‘Fox and Friends' to remind everyone that the economy is not as bad as people think, and that despite what the media said about your Thanksgiving dinner, it wasn't that bad. "If you look at the inflation-adjusted number, it [Thanksgiving dinner] is actually 9 percent cheaper over the last 20 years," Gainor said…

Was that Mike Huckabee on "Morning Joe" today -- or John Edwards? The former Arkansas governor found an odd way to refute charges he's not a true conservative, indulging in some class-warfare rhetoric that would have been the envy of the former North Carolina senator.Mika Brzezinski hit Huckabee with an excerpt from Bob Novak's column of today. Here are the opening paragraphs from Novak's False…

*****Critical update at end of post: Yahoo switched articles inside the link about to be discussed!Was there a directive at the Associated Press on Friday for business writers to do their darnedest to bash the economy? After publishing a truly disgraceful column Saturday practically predicting a depression as a result of the current credit crunch, the AP offered readers an article about the…