While oil and gold are thriving, most stock values have been dropping precipitously. The S&P 500 opened trading in 2007 at 1,418 and closed Jan. 9, 2008 at 1,409. Stocks have lost ALL the gains they made last year, and then some.
While retailers may have pulled out all the stops the last few months to get customers to the shelves, a new CareerBuilder.com study reveals retailers themselves have some shopping to do - for talent.
Euro area annual inflation was 3.1% in December 2007, unchanged compared with November. A year earlier the rate was 1.9%. Monthly inflation was 0.4% in December 2007.
The members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) produced an average 32.03 million barrels per day (b/d) of crude oil in December, according to a Platts survey of OPEC and oil industry officials January 14. This is up from November's rate of 31.65 million b/d
Recession concerns and the credit crunch cloud the U.S. economic outlook for 2008, but U.S. productivity growth will accelerate to 1.7% this year, while Japan's rate will pick up to 1.9%, according to the latest annual productivity report from The Conference Board, the global business research organization.
The level of economic freedom found throughout the world remained essentially unchanged over the last year, with overall gains in only two of the five regions examined in the 14th annual Index of Economic Freedom, released by The Heritage Foundation and The Wall Street Journal.
Pressure on companies to provide work/life balance programs for employees combined with advances in mobile technologies is increasing the number of mobile workers in the U.S. and around the world. By year-end 2011, IDC expects nearly 75% of the U.S. workforce will be mobile.
The new edition of European business - Facts and figures, published by Eurostat, the Statistical Office of the European Communities, covers the main sectors of the European business economy from energy and the extractive industries to communications, information services and media.
Half of the world's 20 freest economies are in Europe, the only region where most countries are skewed toward freedom, according to the 2008 "Index of Economic Freedom" published annually by The Wall Street Journal and The Heritage Foundation.
