By Elaine Donnelly
Extending sexual misconduct to combat units
Independent voices from the TWT Communities
Moody's Investors Service on Tuesday warned that it will downgrade the U.S. government's AAA credit rating if Congress and the newly installed president next year fail to produce a major budget agreement that stabilizes and reduces the U.S. debt.
Exports have been a rare strength and engine of growth in the U.S. economic recovery, aided by a big push from the Obama White House — but despite the positive signs, the sector has not proven to be the plentiful source of new jobs that many supporters had hoped.
The U.S. job market maintained solid growth in the face of global turmoil last month, with enough jobs created to draw the unemployment rate down to a two-year low of 8.8 percent, the Labor Department reported Friday morning.
President Obama's tax-cut compromise with Republicans should provide a powerful boost to the economy next year by putting a lot of extra cash in consumers' pockets, and was cheered on Wall Street on Tuesday.
"If policies remain unchanged, the debt will explode, which clearly is not sustainable," said John E. Silvia, chief economist at Wells Fargo Securities "The U.S. economy would, in a best-case scenario, face a period of slow growth.
One way to tackle the mismatch, Mr. Silvia said, is with reforms in the unemployment insurance program suggested by Mr. Obama, enabling employers to train and try out unemployed workers while theyre still collecting benefits.
