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The best time to buy airline tickets
The Pulse is up today on news that a little planning (but not too much) could save you some cash on your next flight. Are you that traveler who sets online fare alerts and hopes to find a great deal...
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Misery Index falls
The Pulse is up today on news that we Americans are less than half as miserable as we were just six months ago. That’s according to the non-partisan Peterson Institute for International Economics’...
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USDA announces healthier school lunches
The Pulse is up today on news that U.S. school kids will be eating green foods during the school day that don’t start with the word “gummy.” With a third of American school kids categorized as...
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Financial Trust Index: Faith in U.S. banks slides
The Pulse is down today on news that only 23 percent of Americans say they trust the U.S. financial system. That’s according to the Chicago Booth/Kellogg School’s quarterly Financial Trust Index,...
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Who's in the union?
The pulse is up today on news that the 30-year precipitous drop in union membership has plateaued. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics report, 11.8 percent of workers counted themselves...
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Charitable giving up in 2011
The Pulse is up today on news that 2011 may have been the year that charitable giving may have returned to pre-recession levels. The Wall Street Journal reports that organizations like Oxfam America,...
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FTC punishes debt collector
The Pulse is up today on news that debt collectors have been getting some unnerving calls lately, too. Theirs are coming from the Federal Trade Commission, who received more than 165,000 complaints...
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11 million homeowners underwater
The Pulse dropped today on news that 28 percent of Americans are currently underwater on their homes. That’s up from 22 percent just a year ago, according to research by Zillow Inc., a Seattle-based...
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Worker productivity up again
The Pulse is up today on news that the American worker is finally running out of productivity bandwidth. According to a report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, U.S. workers were 0.7 percent more...
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Corporate tax hits 40-year low
Despite the unbridled joy surrounding today’s January job numbers, the Pulse is flat on news the federal government collected less than half as much in corporate tax receipts in the fiscal year that...
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Hasbro profits fall, board games blamed
The Pulse is down on news that what we think of as “toys” may just be changing. Despite a record-breaking year for holiday spending in the U.S., today, toy giant Hasbro reported fourth-quarter profits...
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U.S. edging toward energy independence
The Pulse is up sharply today on news that America is edging closer to energy independence. After 20 years of deepening reliance on foreign sources, domestic energy production has surged in just the...
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Low job ‘churn’ hurting economic recovery
The Pulse slowed today on news that fewer Americans are quitting their jobs. It sounds counterintuitive, but what economists call “churn” -- when an employee leaves, thus opening a spot for someone...
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$25 billion foreclosure settlement announced
The Pulse quickened today on news that some justice is coming to the creators of a housing bubble in the U.S. that culminated in a seemingly endless foreclosure fiasco. How much justice? About $25...
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Consumer sentiment slips
The Pulse is down a beat today on news that Americans are less enthusiastic about spending their hard-earned cash than we were a month ago. That’s according to the February consumer-sentiment index...
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Getting vets working again
The pulse is down today on news that veterans are having an even tougher time than the rest of us finding work. Unemployment among America’s vets is hovering at a stifling 13 percent. Worse yet,...
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$5-per-gallon gas?
The Pulse is down today on the fear we may set a new record this summer at the pump. The Department of Energy announced the average price of a gallon of gas rose to $3.51 yesterday. According to AAA's...
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Kellogg buys Pringles for $2.7 billion
The pulse is up on news that snacking is has become big business. Today, breakfast cereal giant Kellogg announced its purchase of the Pringles chip brand from Procter & Gamble for a top-popping...
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Opportunity index hits record high
The pulse is down today on this realization: no matter how you spin it, the housing market in America is still broken. According to the National Association of Home Builders/Wells Fargo Housing...
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Italian police seize $6 trillion in fake bonds
The pulse is up on news that today Italian police seized fake U.S. Treasury bonds with a face value of a cool $6 trillion. That’s more than a third of the U.S. national debt. The counterfeits were...
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