Author Archives: Laura Hertzfeld

Relationships in recession

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Perhaps the most critical way the recession is affecting our lives is the toll it has taken on personal relationships. This week, our look at stories from stations focuses on family relationships that are changing due to the economic climate.

WNET in New York City hosted a question-and-answer session with Al Roker and his wife, Deborah Roberts, about the new Sesame Street special Families Stand Together: Feeling Secure in Tough Times, which addresses how families can talk to their kids when a parent loses their job.

But sometimes things don’t work out — recession or not. At WFCR in Amherst, Mass., Tina Antolini reports on how the recession is slowing down divorce proceedings.

And in May, Minnesota Public Radio told the story of couples who have had to separate temporarily to relocate to work in different areas of the country.

Has the recession had an impact on your family dynamic? How have you explained these changes to your loved ones?

P.S. The videos featured on EconomyStory can be found at the new site: videos.economystory.org, Thanks to our friends at Miro.org for setting this up!

Mapping the global economy

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Times are hard in the U.S. But how do they compare to the downturn worldwide?

A World of Trouble is an interactive map showing unemployment and other hardship indexes by country and connecting them with real-life examples.

For instance, the entry for China talks about how many fewer migrant workers are seen in Beijing now that construction has slowed. The map is from Global Post, an online-only publication that distributes through partnerships with traditional media, including PRI’s The World and PBS’ WorldFocus.

Another way of visualizing economic change is through trade routes. PRI’s The World reported on the benefits and downsides of a new trade route that would drastically change how goods travel from the Pacific side to the Atlantic side of South America. Instead of using the Panama Canal, the port city of Manta in Ecuador would be an alternative.

Mint.com puts wealth distribution in perspective with a map showing the richest and poorest areas of the world. It’s interesting to look at where the differences are vast – between different countries in Africa, for example; and where they are relatively even, like between the U.S. and Russia.

In developing nations, gender also can influence political and economic instability, as
WNYC’s The Takeaway reported this week on New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn’s new book on women in the global economy.

“In our travels, it seemed to us that those countries that were more effective in fighting poverty and creating stability were those that actually educated and empowered women; and that those that didn’t, were those that were most prone to instability,” said Kristof.

One year later

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Fannie Mae headquarters/Credit: Flickr/FutureAtlas

Fannie Mae headquarters/Credit: Flickr/FutureAtlas

It’s been a year since both Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae were taken over by the federal government (here’s a look at why), followed by the fall of Lehman Brothers. While the recession may have deeper roots, the banking collapse got the media looking at how we got here, and now – how to get out. Planet Money’s first podcast, a year ago this week, looks at how investments in China may have contributed to banking insecurity.

Fast forwarding to this week, NPR’s Tell Me More spoke with Wall Street experts Marcus Mabry of the New York Times.

“You already had a recession, and recessions happen. That’s a normal part of life in a capitalistic system… The financial crisis took what was already a recession that was well underway and just amplified its effects,” Mabry said on the program. “I mean, the fear here – and we saw this with the recovery under George W. Bush. We saw jobless recovery for the majority of that recovery, which meant that the economy was growing, but companies were exacting so much from their current workers that they actually -as far as work and productivity – that they were actually not hiring new workers….Ironically, those banks that we talked about, the ones that survived the economic cataclysm of a year ago, are actually many of them wealthier and richer – Goldman Sachs comes to mind – than ever.”

Has the stimulus package had an effect yet on helping average Americans survive the crisis that started with the banking system? On the 200th day since the Recovery Act was passed, Vice President Joe Biden argued that the bill was an overall plan, not a single “silver bullet” for bringing back jobs and helping those in need. ProPublica’s Shovelwatch blog fact-checked some of Biden’s claims:

“According to Biden, one of the main goals of the Recovery Act was to “bring relief to those hardest hit by the recession.” But as ProPublica reported last month, a county-by-county breakdown of contracts, grants and loans showed no relationship between where the stimulus money is going and either unemployment or poverty.”

Recovery.gov has a new chart plotting tax relief so far from the Recovery Act

But while most economists agree that the worst is over, even many major banks aren’t out of the woods yet. NewsHour reported just this week that more banks may be on the road to failure, having not recovered from bad loans and the mortgage crisis.

School's in

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Credit: Flickr/James Sarmiento

Credit: Flickr/James Sarmiento

It’s Labor Day weekend, and Tuesday students all over the country will be heading back to school – some to the neighborhood elementary school, others to colleges far away, but a larger number than usual are starting classes at community colleges. Why the uptick?

The struggling economy has boosted community college enrollment all over the country, and in this week’s station roundup, we take a look at places where this trend is apparent.

WOSU in Columbus, Ohio first reported on this trend back in Februrary , citing both the less expensive tuition and older students who are returning to study after being laid off from their jobs as reasons enrollments have increased.

“DeVry University has grown steadily nationwide says Galen Graham, President of the Columbus Campus. In Ohio enrollment in online classes has grown by 30 percent in the past year, a change that he says could be attributed to higher gas prices and the slowing economy. Students are also staying enrolled longer.”

Salt Lake City NPR station KPCW recently found a 33% rise in community college enrollment in their area, and that the local colleges are having trouble staffing up.

“She says the college is trying to keep up with the influx of students by hiring new faculty and opening more courses. But she adds that prospective students should know their choices could be limited if they don’t act soon.”

A school counselor in California relayed her concerns about growing enrollment to Marketplace’s Tamara Keith in July:

“You know there’s nothing I hate worse than knowing there are students who have personal and family responsibilities that depend on them getting the training they need to get a job, and they come to our institutions and they can’t find the courses they need.”

At the heart of community college growth is the overwhelming expense of a four-year college education. NPR’s Tell Me More analyzed whether the pricetag reflects the benefits of education in trying economic times.

What kinds of educational choices have you had to make for yourself or your family due to the economy? Share your story here.