All Blog Posts from Couric & Co.
Day in the life: 12 hours with the business team
CBS/AP
CBS News business producer Guy Campanile offers a behind the scenes look at his day yesterday, when Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner was interviewed for the CBS Evening News.
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Where are the Jobs? Welcome to Jobstown, USA
(Credit:CBS)First impressions mean a lot. As soon as I got off the plane at Austin-Bergstrom International Airport I could tell this place was different from nearly all the mid-size US cities we have visited since the beginning of the Great Recession. It was close to midnight and the tarmac was crowded with aircraft parked nearly wing-tip to wing-tip. Continue »
Summer Jobs Scarce for Young People
By even the most generous estimate, the middle aged woman standing in the hotel lobby was perhaps five feet tall. But there was no way to get past her.
"Go home now!" she ordered after a quick inspection of a 15-year-old who made the mistake of wearing flip-flops. The teen tried desperately to plead her case but the woman made it clear there would be no compromise.
"There's no way you are going into a job interview like that. Stop arguing with me. Go change and hurry back. You are wasting time."
Just steps away from the confrontation, the hotel's main ballroom was filled with young job applicants. Most were high school sophomores and juniors wearing their Sunday best. About 400 teenagers turned out to interview for 200 summer jobs at a fair organized by White Plains, a city about a half-hour drive north of Manhattan. The employers included local police departments, hospitals, school districts and not-for-profit organizations.
Among those zipping from table to table was 15-year-old Brittney McKenzie. She was closely studying a floor plan to find summer camps offering counselor positions. Many of the kids at the fair want to avoid working indoors. McKenzie knows she may have little choice. The Summer of 2010 is shaping up as one of the worst ever for teens looking for summer employment.
"I really need a job this summer!" McKenzie said. She was hoping to save her summer earnings to pay for a trip to Jamaica to visit her grandparents for the first time.
Continue »Summer Bummer - Job Hunt
The loss of American jobs over the last two years has been the most important factor in the depth and length of the Great Recession.
A good part of the burden has been shouldered by young Americans just entering the work force or looking for a summer job.
The national unemployment rate for teens was 25.4 percent last month after hitting 27.6 percent in October - the highest rate since 1948, when the federal government began tracking the number of teens actively seeking work.
College students graduating this month also face a very tight labor market. This year employers plan to make just 5 percent more job offers to graduates than in 2009 according to data from the National Association of Colleges and Employers.
Just one out of four members of the Class of 2010 has a job waiting for them and their average starting salary dropped from 2009 by 1.7 percent to $47,673. That may sound like good money, but remember many college students enter the work force carrying more than $20,000 in debt. Often the debt can be well over $50,000.
Are you a recent college grad still on the job hunt? Or are you the parent of a teenager who can't find summer work?
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Send us an e-mail, and put "job hunt" in the subject line.
We'd like to know more about your story.
Behind the Foreclosure Numbers: "Strategic Defaults"
In 2006, I endured a four hour predawn flight to Denver followed by an hour long drive through a blizzard to meet with a real estate agent in Greeley, Colorado. At the time, Weld County was the foreclosure capital of the United States.
I was there to try and find out what was going on. "Subprime" was still months away from entering the national conversation.
Yet there I was, shell-shocked by seeing block after block of foreclosed homes.
I remember the real estate agent's warning that day -- "See this? It's going to spread everywhere."
Four years later there are signs the foreclosure crisis may have reached its summit. Realtytrac's latest report on foreclosure filings shows a spike in defaults.
March was the worst month ever for foreclosure filings (367,056 properties). What's really striking is the number or bank repossessions in the first three months of 2010 - a 9 percent increase compared to a 13 percent decline in the first quarter of 2009.
Continue »Plastic Penalties
A new survey from Credit.comfinds more than 43 percent of consumers (up from 34 percent from June 2009) say their card company has made one or some combination of the following changes to a credit card account:
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- Closed their account 11% (up from 6% in June 2009 survey)
- Increased their interest rate 27% (up from 19% in June 2009 survey)
- Increased their fees 19% (up from 14% in June 2009 survey)
- Lowered their credit limit 13% (down from 14% in June 2009 survey)
- Increased their minimum payment due 15% (up from 12% in June 2009 survey)
- Reduced their rewards program 11% (up from 9% in June 2009 survey)
CBS News is working on its own poll about changes in credit card spending as many Americans are deciding to cut back on credit card use. Are you passing on the plastic? Have you decided to choose debit over credit? Let us know if you are changing your credit card habits.
Fighting Closure in Connecticut
CBS Reports: Where America Stands
Estella and Mike Pesapane have been punching the clock at the Pratt and Whitney engine centerin Cheshire, Connecticut for 30 years.
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Inside World's Largest Corp.Training Ctr.
What may look like an odd combination of an American College campus and Disney World – is actually the largest corporate training center in the world. CBS News is the first American television network to get inside.
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