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NEW YORK (AP) -- McDonald's reported disappointing sales for its fourth quarter Thursday, as the world's largest hamburger chain saw fewer customers visit its restaurants. The Oak Brook, Ill.-based company says global sales slipped 0.1 percent at established locations. In the U.S., where it recently revamped its Dollar Menu to include items that cost a little more, the figure fell 1.4 percent.

Get ready for the next era in retail—one that will be characterized by far fewer shops and smaller stores. On Tuesday, Sears said that it will shutter its flagship store in downtown Chicago in April. It's the latest of about 300 store closures in the U.S. that Sears has made since 2010. The news follows announcements earlier this month of multiple store closings from major department stores J.C. Penney and Macy's. Further signs of cuts in the industry came Wednesday, when Target said that it will eliminate 475 jobs worldwide, including some at its Minnesota headquarters, and not fill 700...

WASHINGTON - President Obama's bogus promises, predictions and claims are legendary, but perhaps you've forgotten his "sky is falling" forecast about the $85 billion budget sequester. Last February, as Congress's automatic budget cuts began chipping away at the government's out-of-control spending levels, Obama went hyperbolic. The spending cuts would deal a "huge blow... to our economy as a whole" and "all our economic progress could be at risk." In a string of speeches, the president played his fear card again. Air traffic control operations were being put at risk. Cancer research projects would be halted. Your food safety was in...

(CNSNews.com) -- A record 20% of American households, one in five, were on food stamps in 2013, according to data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA). The numbers also show that there were a record number of individuals on food stamps in 2013 and that the cost of the program, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), was at an all-time high.

The number of Able-Bodied Adults Without Dependents (ABAWDs) receiving food stamps zoomed from 1.7 million to 3.9 million between Fiscal Year 2007 and Fiscal Year 2010. In that same period, food stamp recipients in total grew from 26 million to nearly 40 million. Spending on food stamps now totals somewhere around $80 billion, twice what the number was in Fiscal Year 2008. Presently, the work waivers foisted on the states by Obama allow ABAWDs to receive food stamps indefinitely--without working or preparing for work.

Everyone agrees that the employment report last Friday was very bad. Unemployment went down to 6.7 percent, but that was because the Household Survey showed that 347,000 people left the labor force in December while only 144,000 found jobs. In a healthy growing economy you are supposed to get the work force increasing faster than the actual employment, as people join the labor force confidently looking for work.If you look at the data for the five years since President Obama was inaugurated, you can see that we are not just talking about a bad month. It's all bad, from...

Although in recent decades women have made historic advances in nearly all areas of American public life, a staggering number of women across the country are still teetering on the verge of poverty and economic disaster, a new report released Sunday shows. The report, co-authored by NBC News special anchor Maria Shriver and the Center for American Progress, takes a wide-angle snapshot of a national economic crisis — seen through the eyes of women. The key findings paint a portrait of an estimated 42 million women — and 28 million dependent children — saddled with financial hardship. "These are not...

Since taking office in 2009, it has been tough sledding for the economy. Congress and the administration have increased the federal debt held by the public from $7.5 trillion to $11.2 trillion in 2012. To clarify, in terms of percent of gross domestic product-a measure of the nation's total output-the federal debt has grown from 54 percent of GDP in 2009 to 72 percent of GDP in 2012, according to the Congressional Budget Office. But sector by sector, the administration appears bent on imposing the regulations that thwart entrepreneurial activity and economic growth. ObamaCare, the jewel of Obama presidency, is...

Friday's December jobs report was a major disappointment, showing the economy gained just 74k jobs last month. Economists had expected the economy to gain around 200k jobs. The unemployment rate, however, dropped to 6.7% as 347k frustrated job-seekers gave up and left the labor force. We are in an upside-down world where a drop in the unemployment rate is a bad sign for the economy. The overall labor force shrunk dramatically last year. In December 2012, 155.4 million workers had a job or were actively looking for one. Last month, though, 154.9 million were in the labor force, a drop...

Sears, once America's golden retailer, is a company in crisis. The company has shuttered hundreds of stores in recent years. The embattled company has been selling some its most profitable stores to raise money. And now, shares are tumbling after Sears lowered guidance for the quarter and announced that comparable sales in the fourth quarter have slid more than 7%. Brian Sozzi, chief equities strategist at Belus Capital Advisors, took poignant photos inside of New Jersey and New York Sears locations in October. "To understand why Sears is in a 'sell stores mode' one must look no further than the...

The axe is falling at Macy's. The department store operator said Wednesday that it was laying off 2,500 workers and closing five stores. The company is also consolidating its regional management and restructuring its retail and merchandise planning staff. "[W]e have identified some specific areas where we can improve our efficiency without compromising our effectiveness in serving the evolving needs of our customers," Macy's CEO Terry Lundgren said in a statement.

"The combination of financial healing, greater balance in the housing market, less fiscal restraint, and, of course, continued monetary policy accommodation bodes well for U.S. economic growth in coming quarters," Bernanke said Friday in Philadelphia.

President Obama on Tuesday will meet with Americans who lost unemployment benefits at the start of the year, as the White House ramps up pressure on Republicans to extend the federal aid for three months. Labor Secretary Thomas Perez announced the White House gathering during a conference call with reporters, the latest attempt by the Obama administration to highlight the 1.3 million Americans no longer receiving federal unemployment insurance. “This was not only the right thing to do; it was the smart thing to do,” Perez said of the economic repercussions of halting the jobless benefits. “These programs don’t get...

Despite the 6.5% stock market rally over the last three months, a handful of billionaires are quietly dumping their American stocks . . . and fast. Warren Buffett, who has been a cheerleader for U.S. stocks for quite some time, is dumping shares at an alarming rate. He recently complained of “disappointing performance” in dyed-in-the-wool American companies like Johnson & Johnson, Procter & Gamble, and Kraft Foods. In the latest filing for Buffett’s holding company Berkshire Hathaway, Buffett has been drastically reducing his exposure to stocks that depend on consumer purchasing habits. Berkshire sold roughly 19 million shares of Johnson...

(AP) Retirement unlikely for some blue-collar Americans By EMILY WAGSTER PETTUS Associated Press Tom Edwards grew up in a family that's been cutting trees and hauling timber in the Pacific Northwest for more than a century. The Spanaway, Wash., resident says he has worked as a logger since he was a kid _ it's just what an able-bodied youngster was expected to do.

In regards to the 1.3 Million still unemployed for 2 or 3 years and still begging for more,anyone want to take a guess where the bulk of them live? If we had a "Top 10 Laziest/Least Educated Towns" in America, odds are most of these 1.3 Million live there.These unfortunate/unemployed have had plenty of time to look for work and develop new work skills to get them back into the working class. And yet the left is making the GOP look so evil because they want to stop wasting billions on these people who should of found a job by...

The last few months have taken their toll on President Obama's popularity. Currently vacationing in Hawaii, Obama is finishing 2013 with approval ratings at an all-time low – and the lowest they've been for any president at this point in their term since Richard Nixon, according to one new Washington Post-ABC News poll. The Real Clear Politics average puts Obama's approval rating at just over 42 percent, and his disapproval rating at 54 percent. The numbers are particularly striking when you consider that just a year ago, they were reversed, with approval ratings of about 54 percent and disapproval ratings...

He said it’s crucial for retailers to get sales post Christmas as consumers visit stores to redeem gift cards, which don’t count as sales until after they are redeemed. In fact, Dec. 26 and this Saturday both are expected to be among the season’s top 10 shopping days. “There’s a lot of money that’s still out there.” Meanwhile, weak in-store sales are being partly offset by growth online. Online sales between Dec. 15 and Dec. 18, for instance, jumped 13%, with 23% traffic growth, according to Custora Pulse, which tracks real time data from over 100 U.S. retailers. Indeed, other...

<p>NEW YORK – Sparse crowds at malls and “50 percent off” signs at The Gap, Ann Taylor and other stores give a clue as to how the holiday season is going.</p> <p>This is shaping up to be the most discount-driven holiday season since the country was in a deep recession. It’s also one of the most disappointing for stores.</p>

U.S. home resales fell sharply in November to their lowest level in nearly a year, hurt by a rise in interest rates since the spring and ongoing price increases that have shut some home buyers out of the market. The National Association of Realtors (NAR) said on Thursday that sales of previously owned homes dropped 4.3 percent last month, the third monthly fall in a row, to an annual rate of 4.90 million units. That was the lowest annual rate since December 2012, and well below the median forecast in a Reuters poll of a 5.03 million unit pace. "It...