from the Detroit Free Press:
SUSAN TOMPOR
Time to be honest: We've got money problems
Credit crisis hurts, but there's hopeBY SUSAN TOMPOR • FREE PRESS PERSONAL FINANCE COLUMNIST • March 9, 2008
We're knee-deep into the credit crunch and only one thing is certain: We're not as rich as we thought we were. And we must come clean and admit it.
Every day, sometimes twice a day, we get hit by tales of financial turmoil. Banks are edgy about handing over money to everybody from hedge funds to homeowners. The stock market stinks. Our homes aren't the nest egg that we thought, either.
Jobs, the price of gas and groceries, you name it -- everything makes you worry about just how bad things could get. No matter what the numbers say, things seem far more ominous than just a run-of-the-mill slowdown. Are they? No one knows.
On Friday, U.S. stocks fell to the lowest point since October 2006. The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed at 11,893.69 points -- down 146.7 points.
The Dow Average has fallen 16% -- or 2,270.84 points -- since closing at 14,164.53 on Oct. 9.
As oil shot up above $100 a barrel, auto stocks have sped to a stop. General Motors Corp.'s stock had been trading around $40 a share in mid-October. But GM closed at $21.96 a share Friday, down 39 cents, or 1.74%, for the day.
Ford Motor Co. -- which had been about $9 a share in mid-October -- closed at $5.78 a share, down 16 cents, or 2.69%, Friday.
We also heard Friday about the biggest drop in jobs in five years: The Labor Department reported that employers nationwide slashed 63,000 jobs in February. The nation's jobless rate dipped to 4.8% in February, down from 4.9% in January, mainly because many people got discouraged and stopped looking for work. .......(more)
The complete piece is at:
http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080309/COL07/803090698