U.s. Economy | featured news

Technically, the economy has been in recovery for two years. But it turns out the rich have been doing most of the recovering. In 2010 -- the first full year since the end of the Great Recession -- virtually all of the income growth in America took place among the country's very wealthiest people, says an economist at the University of California, Berkeley. The top 1 percent of earners took in a full 93 percent of all the income gains that year, leaving the other 7 percent of gains to be sprinkled among the vast majority of society.

U.S. stocks rose on Friday, propelling the Nasdaq index to an 11-year high, after January's U.S. employment report sailed past expectations, boosting hopes for world's largest economy.

The economy created jobs at the fastest pace in nine months in January and the unemployment rate dropped to a near three-year low of 8.3 percent, indicating last quarter's growth carried into early 2012.

The U.S. economy grew at a modest 2.8 percent in the final three months of last year, the fastest growth in 2011. Americans spent more on cars and trucks, and companies built up their stockpiles. But growth in the October-December quarter — and all of 2011 — was held back by the biggest annual government spending cuts in four decades. The Commerce Department says the economy grew just 1.7 percent last year, roughly half of the growth in 2010 and the worst since the recession.

Ben Bernanke presided over his first meeting as Federal Reserve chairman in March 2006 believing the nation's economy could pull off a "soft landing" from falling home prices. Three months later, Bernanke had begun to grasp that he and others had underestimated the risk housing posed to the economy....

Projections suggest the debt will continue to grow faster than the economy, which would have to expand by at least 6% a year to keep pace.

President Obama is getting 'mediocre' marks for his handling of the economy from a group of economists polled by the Associated Press.

The Federal Reserve said Tuesday that the U.S. economy has improved modestly as hiring and consumer spending have risen, and it's holding off on any new steps to boost the economy. Fed officials cautioned in their statement that unemployment remains high. And it noted that global economic growth has slowed — a reference to Europe's debt crisis. They left open the possibility of taking new steps next year if the economy worsens.

The third quarter’s gross domestic product grew at a 2.0 percent annual rate, the Commerce Department said in a revised estimate, down from the previously estimated 2.5 percent.

An acceleration in the pace of U.S. economic growth in the second half of this year is expected to ebb as 2012 gets underway, although the odds of another recession have receded to one-in-four, a Reuters poll showed on Wednesday.