New Rules News

The latest report from TARP Inspector General Neil Barofsky warns: 

"Even if TARP saved our financial system from driving off a cliff back in 2008, absent meaningful reform, we are still driving on the same winding mountain road, but this time in a faster car."

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MINNEAPOLIS, MN (Jan. 14, 2010) - More holiday shoppers deliberately sought out locally owned businesses this year, according to a national survey of more than 1,800 independent businesses.

The survey found that holiday sales for independent retailers were up an average of 2.2%. That contrasts with the Commerce Department figures released today, which show that overall retail sales were down 0.3% in December and up 1.8% in November.

The survey also found that independent retailers in cities with active "Buy Local" or "Think Local First" campaigns reported stronger holiday sales than those in cities without such campaigns. More

Hearings held to investigate the crash of 1929 led to the passage of the Glass-Steagall Act, which fundamentally restructured the banking industry.  Can the FCIC hearings, which get underway today, help to bring it back? More

Among the many charts in the Congressional Oversight Panel's latest report, this is probably the most arresting and important. 

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Credit card processing is not only highly concentrated - MasterCard, Visa, and American Express control 93 percent of the market - but competition among the card processors tends to raise, not lower, the fees they charge merchants, according to a new report from the U.S. General Accounting Office.  The report's findings point to the need for regulation to protect independent businesses from excessive card processing fees.  The GAO examines several policy approaches, including a cap on rates.  More

Despite being outspent 12-to-1, a grassroots group campaigning against a plan to build a massive big-box complex in Mendocino County, California, won a decisive victory when voters rejected the project by a nearly 2-to-1 margin.

Developers Diversified Realty, one of the largest big-box developers in the country, spent  $1.2 million trying to persuade the county's 24,000 voters to green-light an 80-acre project slated to include up to 800,000 square feet of big-box stores just north of the town of Ukiah.

Opponents of the project, organized as Save Our Local Economy, raised just $92,000, but ran a smart, creative campaign that, over the course of several months, involved more than 400 volunteers. More