It has become the most anticipated question in the financial press over the summer: When is the Federal Reserve going to raise interest rates? Ever since the Fed started sending signals that an increase in interest rates is a matter of when, not if, speculation has run rampant concerning...
The start of 2014 feels a little bit different than the past few years for many Los Angeles and Southern California business owners and executives. For the first time since before the financial crisis, there appears to be significant optimism among many owners and entrepreneurs as business conditions improve...
If nothing else, you can certainly say that the U.S. Congress has a flair for the dramatic. After letting the country technically fall over the fiscal cliff, Congress finally passed a compromise bill, the American Taxpayer Relief Act, on New Year’s Day. President Obama quickly signed the bill into...
Over the past few months, we have been discussing the potential impact of the “fiscal cliff” on businesses and taxpayers.
As the end of the year nears without any agreement, Congress is debating changes to the tax code, such as no longer allowing the mortgage interest...
Since officially emerging from recession more than three years ago, the U.S. economy has struggled to maintain much momentum, mostly limping along at a below-average growth rate. Unemployment has also remained stubbornly high, hovering around 8% nationally and remaining above 10% in California since early 2009. All of this has...
Terms such as “millionaires,” “upper income earners,” “top 1%,” “wealthiest Americans” and other expressions used to describe the well-heeled in this country have become very politicized. Pundits often conflate income and net worth when talking about wealth distribution, and it is not at all clear who or...
If there is one thing Americans across the political spectrum can agree on these days, it is that they are fed up with the bombast, posturing and fecklessness of Washington lawmakers. Furthermore, they are disgusted by the sleazy behaviors, unethical dealings and even outright corruption...
In the business world, the buck stops in the C-suite. It is here that the tough decisions must be made – including decisions about when it’s time to pull the plug on a promising project; when it’s necessary to rationalize a company’s footprint or downsize...
Whether or not our country is sliding into a double-dip recession, we are almost certainly facing a protracted period of sluggish economic growth.
Many prominent economists foresee stubborn high unemployment, disappointing GDP growth of between 1% and 2%, and weak consumer confidence for several years ahead....
Fortune Magazine’s 2011 ranking of the world’s largest corporations lists these top ten: Wal-Mart Stores, Royal Dutch Shell, Exxon Mobil, BP, Sinopec Group, China National Petroleum, State Grid, Toyota Motor, Japan Post Holdings and Chevron. Of these corporate giants, only Wal-Mart, Exxon Mobil and Chevron...