After receiving billions of taxpayer dollars to stay afloat and wrenching vehicle recalls, the major players in the US auto market Monday reported surging sales for April.

The so-called Detroit Three automakers — Ford, General Motors and Chrysler — all reported positive year-on-year sales figures, building an a gradual upward turn for the industry after a difficult 12 months.

Toyota USA, which has suffered through a massive global recall affecting some 10 million vehicles worldwide, also reported improved sales across its divisions.

The figures were another hopeful sign for US automakers struggling to find their feet after months of turmoil that saw both GM and Chrysler undergo government-financed bankruptcies.

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Wholesale prices rose more than expected last month as food prices surged by the most in 26 years.

The Labor Department said the Producer Price Index rose by 0.7 percent in March, compared to analysts’ forecasts of a 0.4 percent rise. A rise in gas prices also helped push up the index.

Still, there was little sign of budding inflation in the report. Excluding volatile food and energy costs, wholesale prices rose by 0.1 percent, matching analysts’ expectations.

Food prices jumped by 2.4 percent in March, the most since January 1984. Vegetable prices soared by more than 49 percent, the most in 15 years. A cold snap wiped out much of Florida’s tomato and other vegetable crops at the beginning of this year.

Gasoline prices rose 2.1 percent, the department said, the fifth rise in six months.

In the past year, wholesale prices are up 6 percent, with much of that increase driven by higher oil and other commodity prices. But the core index, which excludes food and energy, rose only 0.9 percent.

Yahoo!

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This year, the Social Security system will pay out more in benefits than it receives in payroll taxes, an important threshold it was not expected to cross until at least 2016, according to the Congressional Budget Office. 

Stephen C. Goss, chief actuary of the Social Security Administration, said that while the Congressional projection would probably be borne out, the change would have no effect on benefits in 2010 and retirees would keep receiving their checks as usual.

The problem, he said, is that payments have risen more than expected during the downturn, because jobs disappeared and people applied for benefits sooner than they had planned. At the same time, the program’s revenue has fallen sharply, because there are fewer paychecks to tax.

Analysts have long tried to predict the year when Social Security would pay out more than it took in because they view it as a tipping point — the first step of a long, slow march to insolvency, unless Congress strengthens the program’s finances.

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The bond market is saying that it’s safer to lend to Warren Buffett than Barack Obama.

Two-year notes sold by the billionaire’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc. in February yield 3.5 basis points less than Treasuries of similar maturity, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
Procter & Gamble Co., Johnson & Johnson and Lowe’s Cos. debt also traded at lower yields in recent weeks, a situation former Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. chief fixed-income strategist Jack Malvey calls an “exceedingly rare” event in the history of the bond market.

The $2.59 trillion of Treasury Department sales since the start of 2009 have created a glut as the budget deficit swelled to a post-World War II-record 10 percent of the economy and raised concerns whether the U.S. deserves its AAA credit rating. The increased borrowing may also undermine the first-quarter rally in Treasuries as the economy improves.

Bloomberg

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You don’t have t0 be a doomsayer or a survivalist to worry about the American economy collapsing.

If you can read, you can be worried. You should be worried. A look around the globe shows you why, look at Iceland, Greece and Portugal for a couple answers.
Could you survive or are you prepared to survive if the US economy collapses? An economic collapse is a very real danger that many people just don’t want to face up to.

The American budget deficit as a percentage of our GDP is projected at 10.64% this year after coming in at 9.91% last year. Greece had a 12.7% rate and they collapsed completely.
Greece has riots in the streets over proposed cuts in services, services they simply can’t pay for.

Portugal is at 9.3% and they are close to collapse and cutting every social service including welfare and medical coverage for the next four or five years.

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