Free Republic

We must all hang together, or assuredly we shall all hang separately. - Benjamin Franklin, at the signing of the U.S. Declaration of Independence- The previous article in this series on Saudi oil policies asked what the Saudis planned to do as their encore in 2016 after sacrificing approximately $100 billion in crude oil export revenue in 2015 in pursuit of market share. This article provides the author’s answer: the Saudis must alter course, seek a consensus on prices and volumes with their fellow OPEC members, coordinate with Russia, and reduce output from 2015’s average (approx. 10.5 mmbbl/d) to signal...

Comparing net worth, income, debt and retirement nest eggs for the typical American. Is your network higher or lower than people of a similar age? How does your pay compare with others? Do you have more debt than the average Joe or Jane? Do you have more or less money set aside for retirement than your neighbors? Knowing how you stack up financially to your peers can offer up insight that allows you to make changes that can secure your financial future, so let's take a closer look at how you stack up against the average American.Net worth varies widelyLast...

The Obama administration rewarded its union allies last month with a decision that threatens millions of jobs and thousands of businesses, from staffing agencies to cleaning services and auto-repair shops to construction companies. In a case involving Browning-Ferris Industries (BFI), the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) decided to unilaterally redefine the concept of joint employment—when more than one business is responsible for an employee or group of employees—and made it easier to unionize large corporations. This ruling could have a devastating effect on small businesses, job creation, and the U.S. economy.......... Before last week, two businesses were deemed joint employers...

In Segment 1, Dr. Ireland explains the benefits of lifting the decades-old ban on exporting U.S. crude oil. In Segment 2, Dr. Ireland explains the benefits of building the Keystone XL pipeline.

While the world breathlessly awaits the outcome of this week’s FOMC meeting—will the Federal Reserve raise interest rates or won’t it?—one thing is clear regardless: the Fed is driving the U.S. into a 2nd depression in order to carry out its one and only remit now that America’s ability to produce real jobs has been reduced to ash, namely, propping up criminal banks with multi-trillion-dollar giveaways. What’s so disturbing about the fatal path that the Fed has been on for 7 years is that it's one the Fed went down before, when—by its own admission—it extended and deepened the Great...

Yellen has inherited a complete nightmare. Thursday’s decision to delay yet again the long-awaited liftoff from zero interest rates is illustrating that the world economy is totally screwed. There is a lot of speculation about why the Fed seems so reluctant to “normalize monetary policy”. There are of course the typical domestic issues that there is low inflation, weak wage gains in the face of strong job growth, a hike will increase the Federal deficit and then there is the argument that corporations that now have $12.5 trillion in debt. All that is nice, but with corporate debt, our clients...

The #Florida Turnaround story under Governor Scott @FLDEO

Coca-Cola was notified by the IRS that it owes $3.3 billion more in federal taxes, as well as interest, for 2007 to 2009, the company said Friday. The Atlanta-based company said in a regulatory filing that it believes the assessments from the Internal Revenue Service are without merit and plans to pursue "all administrative and judicial remedies necessary to resolve the matter." The maker of Sprite, Dasani, Powerade and other drinks says the disagreement is over how much it should report as taxable income in the U.S., in relation with licensing that allows its foreign affiliates to sell products like...

Trump Nails It- By: Larry Walker II -Last year our trade deficit with Mexico totaled $53.8 billion, and is projected to end about the same in 2015. When the last three decades are summed, we find that the United States 30-year trade deficit with Mexico amounts to $910.2 billion. Although this has been great for Mexico, it hasn’t been so great for the United States. Looking back over the last 30 years, we find that the United States actually ran trade surpluses with Mexico in 1991 through 1994, and then came the North Atlantic Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA - 1994)....

The centers are seen to help micro-, small-, and medium-scale entrepreneurs with business registration, financing, and market promotion.MANILA, Philippines — The Philippines expects to complete construction of 100 Go Negosyo centers by the end of September – 3 months ahead of target – providing micro, small, and medium enterprises (MSMEs) extra push to expand operations. "For Negosyo centers, we have 92 up already. We continue to monitor the progress of the centers. Anecdotally, we’ve seen that they’ve been able to help micro and small entrepreneurs," Senator Paolo Benigno Aquino IV told reporters on the sidelines of P&G Leadership College 2015...

You needn’t Google far for recent case studies of Internet outrage. Log in to a social network and you’ll find it directed at celebrities and civilians alike. (See: Woody Allen, Stephen Colbert and Justine Sacco, the former communications director for IAC who posted an insensitive Twitter message about AIDS in Africa.) Politicians are a perennial favorite: Chris Christie, Rob Ford, Anthony Weiner. Then there’s the bigger game: courts of law, social movements, news media outlets, corporations and governments that have rubbed people the wrong way. As a now-hackneyed joke goes on Twitter, “What are we angry about today?” Bile has...

Summary: Seven years after the financial crisis, check out these five charts to see how President Obama's policy decisions helped America narrowly avoid another Great Depression.

WASHINGTON: The US Federal Reserve kept interest rates unchanged on Thursday in a nod to concerns about a weak world economy, but left open the possibility of a modest policy tightening later this year. In what amounted to a tactical retreat, the US central bank said an array of global risks and other factors had convinced it to delay what would have been the first rate hike in nearly a decade. "Recent global economic and financial developments may restrain economic activity somewhat and are likely to put further downward pressure on inflation in the near term," the Fed said in...

Since the end of the Great Recession, nearly every sector of Michigan’s economy has seen significant growth, with a total of 360,500 more private sector jobs in 2014 than in 2009, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Michigan went from having 3.87 million jobs in 2009 to 4.18 million jobs in 2014. In 2005 the state was on a transition from a gradual economic decline into what became a very steep one. Since 2010, both employment and the Michigan economy have been on an upswing. The strongest employment growth has been in the professional and business sector (+117,500...

Economic issues will be the focus of the next televised GOP presidential debate, which will be held Oct. 28 at the University of Colorado in Boulder and broadcast on CNBC. CNBC's debate titled "Your Money, Your Vote: The Presidential Debate on the Economy" will address jobs, taxes, the deficit and the national economy. The network will moderate the debate. "Presidential elections are often won or lost based on core economic positions, understandings and values," said Mark Hoffman, CNBC chairman, in a statement. "Our nation's economy and place in the world, job growth, entrepreneurship and the pursuit of the American dream...

In one of the most widely anticipated Federal Reserve decisions in decades, the U.S. central bank left interest rates unchanged Thursday. The Fed's pronouncement to leave rates at historic lows—where they’ve been since roughly the start of the Great Recession in 2008—signals that the U.S. economy has yet to fully recover from the near collapse. Market professionals are now looking ahead to a press conference from Fed Chair Janet Yellen at 2:30 p.m. EDT, searching for further hints as to the timing of the Fed’s future course of rate hikes. “Uncertainty from the Fed has been the biggest issue,” Stephen...

Fed decision day: The event traders across the globe have anticipated for months has finally arrived. As of 8:00 a.m. ET, Dow Jones Industrial Average futures were 43 points lower, or 0.26% to 16621. S&P 500 futures shed 6 points, or 0.31% to 1982, while Nasdaq 100 futures slid 10 points, or 0.24% to 4370. Today’s Markets Months of speculation about whether September was the month in which the Federal Reserve would begin to lift short-term interest rates is finally coming to a close. The Federal Open Market Committee meets for the final day of its two-day policy-setting meeting, which...

Economy: After six-plus years of President Obama's big-spending, tax-raising policies, middle-class families have seen their incomes decline and more families have fallen into poverty, Census data show. The Census Bureau's latest annual report on income and poverty in America shows that there was little to cheer about in 2014. Median family income dropped slightly to $53,657, down from the year before. Every income group suffered losses, with the lowest fifth of households dropping close to 1%. The overall poverty number barely budged. But it climbed by almost 600,000 among blacks in 2014, more than half of whom were under age...

FRED = Federal Reserve Economic Data This is the perfect handout for just about discussion of the Democrats' libtard agenda!

Urging business leaders to lobby Republican lawmakers for higher spending, President Obama said Wednesday that partisan gridlock in Washington is a bigger threat to the U.S. than Chinese cyberattacks or Russian military aggression. “Our problem is not that China’s going to out-negotiate us, or that [Russian President Vladimir] Putin is sort of out-strategizing us,” Mr. Obama said. “Has anybody taken a look at the Russian economy lately? That’s not our problem. Our problem’s us, typically. We engage in self-inflicted wounds, like this potential government shutdown. It’s unnecessary.” The president spoke to the Business Roundtable in Washington as the Oct. 1...