New statistics out of Greece show that austerity shrunk the economy more than expected last year. GDP in Greece fell 6.8% in 2011, and a slightly faster 7% in the fourth quarter. The country is in a fifth straight year of recession, and the numbers are rapidly approaching a full-on depression. So of course, the [...]

As I mentioned on Sunday, the Greek Parliament agreed to a bailout deal that exchanges funds from Europe for new austerity measures that will sink the economy even further. Via David Atkins, Talos has some of the specifics of what this will entail for the Greek people: Greece is already a “labor wasteland” where jobs [...]

Amid general strikes and riots in Athens, the Greek Parliament has a late-night vote on new austerity measures that are seen in European capitals as a prerequisite to the release of bailout funds for Greece. Expectations are high that Parliament will accept the bailout deal, which includes a number of additional austerity programs. The vote [...]

Greece has agreed to new bailout terms, with brutal austerity measures attached, but Eurozone finance ministers don’t believe the Greeks will follow through, so they’ve held up the provision of the funding. With the clock ticking on a possible sovereign debt default by Athens within weeks, eurozone finance ministers postponed a decision on Greece’s rescue [...]

The Greek leadership closed in on a bailout deal yesterday that would add more austerity to the economically ravaged country. The negotiation consisted of the technocrat Prime Minister Lucas Papademos forcing the parties in his unity government to accept the terms. After a drama-filled few days as discussions were repeatedly delayed, (Papademos) had to persuade [...]

The White House has told Congressional Republicans they only have one avenue to avoid the defense trigger that would cut the military budget by around $600 billion over the next ten years: they would have to increase revenue by a similar amount. In light of Congressional Republicans’ abandonment of a key part of the debt [...]

Greek bailout talks have deadlocked again, but at the moment the culprit is not the hedge funds seeking a higher payout on the distressed debt they bought, but the “troika” of the EU, ECB and the IMF. They gave Greece a Monday deadline to accept bailout terms. And those terms, frankly, are totally insane. The [...]

Another solid jobs report ticked down the topline unemployment rate two notches to 8.3%. The economy added 243,000 jobs in January, with slight revisions upwards for November and December, and an annual benchmarking process also generally revised employment upward slightly. The topline unemployment rate has now gone from 9.1% in August to 8.3% in January, [...]

The Administration will release details on its mass refi proposal today, which is a bid to increase funds in the hands of homeowners at a low cost to the government. Notice I didn’t say that it’s a housing policy. Because it isn’t. This is a stimulus policy, which could be effective depending on the scale. [...]

The Congressional Budget Office released their latest budget and economic outlook for 2012. CBO outlooks are frequently wrong, so we shouldn’t read a whole lot into this. But there are a few nuggets worth pulling out. First, there really is no pressing deficit problem. While the FY 2012 deficit should clock in, according to CBO, [...]

After fits and starts, Greece may be on the verge of a deal on its private sector debt. European Union leaders need to bless the deal in a summit in Brussels today.  Greece will apparently get the lower interest rate it wanted out of its creditors, though not all of them will participate. Greece will [...]