The New York Times Paywall Looks Good

Leaky enough to preserve traffic and ads, but strong enough to add incremental revenue

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 17, 2011 at 12:32 PM

The New York Times paywall is here, and it's about time. Don't ask me why it took so long and... More

The Journal Shines a Light on Modern Debtors’ Prisons

The paper finds creditors, including folks like AIG, getting thousands thrown in jail

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 17, 2011 at 11:30 AM

The Wall Street Journal has an excellent story today reporting on the country's modern-day debtors' prisons, which I'd thought were... More

The Libor Lag

Why are investigators only now looking into things that happened three and four years ago?

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 16, 2011 at 07:12 PM

The business papers all report news that the Department of Justice, SEC, and Commodities Futures Trading Commission (and apparently other... More

Gingrich’s Disingenuous Journal Op-Ed

Misleading on Obama, the Bush tax cuts, and the economy

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 16, 2011 at 05:33 AM

Newt Gingrich is no doubt a smart man. So he surely knows better than to write what he and his... More

Audit Notes: Two Economies, Red-Handed Raj, Life at SXSW

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 15, 2011 at 08:30 PM

Steven Pearlstein of the Washington Post comments on a new study out from an NYU prof that shows how globalization... More

As the Revolving Door Turns

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 15, 2011 at 02:44 PM

The Wall Street Journal reports today that the head of the Federal Housing Administration, David H. Stevens, will become CEO... More

Audit Notes: When a Loss Isn’t a Loss, Lehman, WSJ on Nukes

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 15, 2011 at 01:01 AM

You're going to hear a lot about all the "losses" insurers are going to be taking on the catastrophe in... More

Breakingviews Misses on the Fed’s Debit Card Rules

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 14, 2011 at 07:20 PM

The banking lobby is pushing back bigtime against the Federal Reserve rules that would force it to stop gouging consumers... More

Watchdogs Eye the AG’s Foreclosure Fraud Settlement

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 14, 2011 at 02:41 PM

Gretchen Morgenson yesterday criticized the states attorneys general for their proposed foreclosure fraud settlement, writing that it's a slapdash rush... More

Audit Notes: Lehman’s Green Monster, Sands Storm, Amazon Taxes

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 11, 2011 at 07:55 PM

Bloomberg's Christine Harper Richard and Bob Ivry circle back to the Fenway deal Lehman Brothers made with Hudson Castle that... More

A Zombie Lie Is Born

CNBC’s false welfare-state story spreads far and wide

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 11, 2011 at 12:21 PM

Two days ago I fisked a false report from CNBC that said more than a third of all wages and... More

The WSJ Flags an Accounting Trick on Private Pensions

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 10, 2011 at 03:25 PM

The Wall Street Journal had an excellent story yesterday on how major companies are playing around with their pension accounting... More

Audit Notes: More Murdoch, Hiltzik on the Social Security Trust Fund

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 9, 2011 at 07:45 PM

A couple of weeks ago, Allan Sloan wrote about Rupert Murdoch is using $673 million of his shareholders' money to... More

Corporate Cousins

A walk down memory lane with the Murdoch media

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 9, 2011 at 05:08 PM

Daniel Gross brings up the fact that it's been two years since Michael Boskin's editorial in The Wall Street Journal... More

Conflating Social Security and Medicare/Medicaid

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 9, 2011 at 10:38 AM

Meanwhile, while we're pointing out games journalists play and the question of whether Social Security is welfare, WaPo's Robert J.... More

CNBC Misleads on “Welfare State” Dominance

Bad math overstates government payouts

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 9, 2011 at 10:20 AM

(UPDATE: See my follow-up post here: A Zombie Lie Is Born: CNBC’s false welfare-state story spreads far and wide.) There... More

The Times Ups the Ante on the SEC’s Madoff Mess

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 9, 2011 at 01:00 AM

The New York Times has a great scoop this morning advancing the ball on the SEC's entanglement with Bernie Madoff.... More

Deal Myopia in the WSJ and NYT on Hard Drive Merger

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 8, 2011 at 02:52 PM

Here's a good example of how poorly the business press covers acquisitions that could hurt competition. The Wall Street Journal... More

Audit Notes: Journalists Subpoenaed, Private Pension Woes, Galleon

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 7, 2011 at 11:53 PM

Matthew Goldstein of Reuters reports that several business journalists are caught up in the crossfire between Fairfax Financial and hedge... More

The WSJ Overreaches On Wisconsin Democrats Story

By Ryan Chittum   Mar 7, 2011 at 02:24 PM

The Wall Street Journal went A1 with a big scoop this morning that "Democrats to End Union Standoff" in Wisconsin.... More