Taiwan has opened up key parts of its manufacturing and service sectors to Chinese investment as another barrier falls between the once bitter foes. The new rules announced Tuesday are part of President Ma Ying-jeou’s ambitious effort to move Taiwan’s economy…

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Taiwan – Ma Ying-jeou – Chinese Taipei – China – Asia

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Taiwan opens door for Chinese investment

ED MURRAY/THE STAR-LEDGERChuck Pierce has been trying to pay two years worth of unbilled gas bills for his Independence Township home. Most of the time, consumers write to Bamboozled for help when they’ve been wronged. They’ve tried to wriggle through…

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Elizabethtown Gas didn’t bill Hackettstown man, but he was ready to pay

Home price declines are stabilizing, but delinquent mortgages and foreclosures are getting worse despite efforts to modify unaffordable loans

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Housing: The Good and Bad News

GENEVA (Reuters) – The world’s airlines lost more than $3 billion in the first quarter of 2009, the International Air Transport Association (IATA) said on Tuesday, maintaining its estimate for full-year losses of $9 billion.

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Airlines lost $3 billion in first quarter

2008 STAR-LEDGER FILE PHOTODavid Socolow, commissioner of the N.J. Department of Labor speaks to the Senate Budget and Appropriations Committee in the Statehouse Annex in Trenton last year. Layoffs over the past year might have saved companies money — perhaps…

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N.J. Dept. of Labor commissioner offers a primer on slumping jobless fund

Amity Shlaes has a very interesting commentary on Bloomberg. Shlaes responds to the Sanford scandal this way:

…instead of blowing up their marriages, Republicans might try blowing up their party platform.

The single most-profitable franchise for the Republican Party is growth, the kind of growth that sustains the relative competitiveness of the U.S. Instead of being the GOP, the Republicans should become the POG, the Party of Growth.

This growth franchise is Republicans’ for the taking because the Democratic Party leadership is in hot pursuit of other franchises — the green biz, civil rights and their dearest goal, more government health care.

The growth franchise is also valuable because a lot of people, including many Democrats, recognize that a growth agenda is the only way to preclude a crisis worse than the current one. That crisis is the currency crisis that will occur if the world no longer wants to invest here.

Shlaes has four suggestions for making “the GOP a POG.”

– Junk the social conservatism.
– Take budget-balancing seriously.
– Push for growth-oriented tax cuts, the kind that make foreign businesses want to expand here.
– Stand up for property rights.

Leaving aside the specifics of her proposals, I think Shlaes raises an important question: Will the Republicans or the Democrats become the Party of Growth? Right now, it’s up for grabs.

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Will the Republicans or the Democrats be the ‘Party of Growth’?

Amity Shlaes has a very interesting commentary on Bloomberg. Shlaes responds to the Sanford scandal this way: …instead of blowing up their marriages, Republicans might try blowing up their party platform. The single most-profitable franchise for the Republican Party is growth, the kind of growth that sustains the relative competitiveness of the U.S. Instead of being the GOP, the Republicans should become the POG, the Party of Growth. This growth franchise is Republicans? for the taking because the Democratic Party leadership is in hot pursuit of other franchises — the green biz, civil rights and their dearest goal, more government health care. The growth franchise is also valuable because a lot of people, including many Democrats, recognize that a growth agenda is the only way to preclude a crisis worse than the current one. That crisis is the currency crisis that will occur if the world no longer wants to invest here. Shlaes has four suggestions for making “the GOP a POG.” — Junk the social conservatism. — Take budget-balancing seriously. — Push for growth-oriented tax cuts, the kind that make foreign businesses want to expand here. — Stand up for property rights. Leaving aside the specifics of her proposals, I think Shlaes raises an important question: Will the Republicans or the Democrats become the Party of Growth? Right now, it’s up for grabs.

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Will GOP or Dems be the “Party of Growth”?

LONDON (Reuters) – British authorities have frozen $100 million linked to Texas billionaire and alleged swindler Allen Stanford following a request from the United States Department of Justice.

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Britain freezes $100 million linked to Allen Stanford

BAGHDAD (Reuters) – Iraq auctioned off eight giant oil and gas fields on Tuesday in its first major tender since the 2003 invasion, but there appeared to be a big gulf between what Iraq was willing to pay and firms willing to accept.

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Iraq historic oil and gas auction off to shaky start

Linda Tancs, career coach and branding consultant in Hillsborough. Online professional networks such as LinkedIn provide job applicants with a powerful tool to gain the attention of employers and recruiters. LinkedIn currently has more than 42 million members in…

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A successful LinkedIn profile takes effort

BRUSSELS/FRANKFURT (Reuters) – Efforts to save two leading European carmakers took a twist on Tuesday that could change the ownership of both crisis-hit General Motors Corp’s Opel and German sportscar maker Porsche.

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Magna-Opel deal in doubt

The recession is making the sandwich generation feel a financial pinch. But they should not skimp on retirement savings. Here?s how to save more with less

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The Sandwich Generation is Smooshed

(Reuters) – Stock futures pointed to a higher start on Wall Street on Tuesday, with futures for the S&P up 0.4 percent, Dow Jones futures up 0.2 percent and Nasdaq 100 futures up 0.1 percent at 5 a.m. EDT.

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Stock futures point to a higher start

The latest Standard & Poor’s/Case-Shiller housing index numbers out today show the market falling less dramatically than it had been earlier in the year. The 10 and 20 city indices were both down 18% in April, versus the same month in 2008. But that decline was less severe than it had been in January, February and March.

“The pace of decline in residential real estate slowed in April,” says David Blitzer, Managing Director and Chairman of the Index Committee at Standard & Poor’s. ”Every metro area, except for Charlotte, recorded an improvement in monthly returns over March. While one month’s data cannot determine if a turnaround has begun, it seems that some stabilization may be appearing in a few of the regions.”

The worst hit cities include Phoenix (down 35%), Las Vegas (-32%) and San Francisco (-28%). Best performers were Denver (only down 4.9%), Dallas (-5%) and Boston (-7.7%). Dallas has held up the best since its market peaked in June 2007, falling only 9.6%. Phoenix fared worst, off 54% from its June 2006 peak.

Cameron Findlay, the Chief Economist of mortgage site LendingTree.com, says the clearest sign of where the housing market is now, lies not in a national price index from two months ago but in the cost of mortgages today. Rates on a 30 year conventional mortgage have dipped down to 5.37% from a recent high of 5.74%. That’s telling us the housing market hasn’t recovered. The Fed is still committed to buying $300 billion of long-term Treasury bonds to inject more liquidity into the system, he notes.

“There was a wide anticipation that the Fed would ease off on, not purchase as much,” he notes. “Bonds started selling off, rates started rising.” That’s changed. Findlay expects rates to stay at this level at least until the Fed finishes its bond buying in September or until more convincing signs emerge that the housing market has come back.

“It’s still down,” Findlay says of the Case-Shiller index. “The only positive news is that Colorado slightly improved. There’s still extreme pressure due to (mortgage) delinquencies.”

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Case-Shiller Home Prices Decline Only 18%

Equities slumped Tuesday on a dip in June consumer sentiment. But major indexes posted solid gains for the second quarter

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Stocks End Quarter on a Down Note