In a much-linked article, the Washington Post reports that “the biggest” of the nation’s too-big-to-fail “banks are even bigger” today, with three big banks alone owning more than 30 percent of the nation’s deposits, and four big banks issuing “one of every two mortgages and about two of every three credit cards.”

The banks likely will get even bigger in the future, despite supposed regulatory constrictions, because government guarantees and the cheap money they generate speak louder than words. (more…)

The chairman of Britain’s Financial Services Authority (similar to our SEC), Lord Turner, yesterday floated the idea of a global tax on financial transactions to shrink “a swollen financial sector,” the FT reports.

Turner admits that “the problem of getting global agreement will be very difficult. But at least proposals for special financial sector taxes, with increased capital requirements, address the issue of excessive profits.” (more…)

The Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) has notified board members that the state-run authority has decided to petition a state judge to vacate state arbitrators’ recent award to the Transport Workers Union, which called for 11.3 percent raises over three years.

The MTA will make the case that the two of the three state panelists who voted for the award — the TWU’s Roger Toussaint and public representative John Zuccotti – failed to base their finding on the mandatory criteria that they must consider under the state’s Taylor Law, which governs public-sector labor negotiation and arbitration. (more…)

Today’s WSJ reports that “a stream of hedge-fund managers … are quitting the U.K.” as the nation levies a new tax rate of 51 percent on people earning more than $250,000 annually, starting next April.

“We have reached a tipping point, in terms of hostility to the U.K. tax system,” said lawyer Richard Jordan, who estimates that he spends 40 percent of his time advising clients interested in leaving Britain for a friendlier tax clime.

It’s too bad that New York City and State, too, along with the federal government, are all raising taxes or planning to, possibly bringing our top rate to 57 percent. Otherwise, we could compete on this issue.

Between the second quarter of last year and the same period this year, the ranks of New York City’s unemployed nearly doubled, from 192,987 jobseekers to 361,390 jobseekers, the city comptroller reports.

But unemployment among people who have a bachelor’s degree or higher has nearly tripled in the same time frame, from 33,285 to 98,103.

The Post reports that City Council Speaker Christine Quinn wants to spend $20 million giving developers of unsold condos up to $50,000 a unit if they’ll turn “market rate” homes in Harlem and Brooklyn into “affordable housing” homes.

In one example, a developer would take the payment for selling a home supposedly worth $500,000 for $300,000. (more…)

What issue got 2,000 rural upstate New Yorkers fired up enough to rally Sunday (under threatening skies) in opposition to a bill sponsored by the liberal Democrat who represents many of them in Congress?

It wasn’t health care.

“China’s much-vaunted stimulus package has exacerbated structural imbalances in the economy and may delay the country’s transition to a more sustainable growth model. … [M]ost of the stimulus [has] gone to the state sector.” — Financial Times, 8/21/09

(more…)

The unemployment rate in New York City jumped to 9.6 percent in July, up two-tenths of a percentage point since June, and the highest level in twelve years, even as the state figure fell slightly, to 8.6 percent from 8.7 percent, the state’s Labor Department reports.

Since the same time last year, unemployment in the city is up from 5.4 percent, with 93,200 private-sector jobs lost. (more…)

Writing in today’s Post, New York Building Congress head Richard Anderson counsels Gov. Paterson against signing a bill that would change governance procedures at the state’s public authorities. One main complaint, which Anderson calls a “fatal flaw” that would help “cripple” the authorities:

The bill would eliminate each authority’s flexibility to sell properties for less than market value even when there’s a defined economic-development/urban-planning objective to be achieved. Both the city and state have sponsored a number of essential projects — including the Hudson Rail Yards, East River Science Park and Willets Point — that have relied on the government’s ability to negotiate the terms of a sale, rather than being forced to blindly accept the highest bid. Rather than encouraging such long-term thinking, the bill would eliminate opportunities to leverage billions of dollars in private investment and achieve far-reaching economic-development objectives. (more…)