The Homebuyer Tax Credit was a sweet little perk for the housing market, but now it's over. That leaves home prices to rise — or fall — on the merits. Many housing experts believe that with the inventory of unsold homes still high, there could be more price weakness in many markets, so for people thinking about buying a home it may be too early. But not every market is the same, so it pays to understand well ...

John Kenneth Galbraith, one of the most famous practitioners of the high-minded guessing game known as economics, once noted that in the dismal science, "the majority is always wrong." How else to explain the fact that so many economists upgraded their growth forecasts for the American economy at the end of last year, often to well above 3%, when the numbers so far this year have come in below 2%? The plunge is due to many things, from higher food ...

CAN a nation with a trillion-dollar economy be running out of money? That startling question is forcing itself upon every government official who must shape a budget, from President Nixon down to the head of the smallest local mosquito-abatement district. By most measures of private wealth, the U.S. is the world's richest country. But in terms of its ability to pay for the public services—health care, education, welfare, garbage pickup, pollution control, police and fire protection—that make the life of ...

The campaign leading to Singapore's May 7 general election had the trappings of a larger political drama. Before the thronged gates of a suburban sports stadium, where a rally for the opposition Workers' Party was under way one hot night, vendors hurriedly pressed ice-cream sandwiches into the hands of the thousands pouring inside. Encircling the lit stadium were high-rise public housing blocks, from whose open windows and crowded outdoor passageways hundreds more were listening to the boisterous ...

Homeownership has let us down. For generations, Americans believed that owning a home was an axiomatic good. Our political leaders hammered home the point. Herbert Hoover argued that homeownership could "change the very physical, mental and moral fiber of one's own children." Franklin Roosevelt held that a country of homeowners was "unconquerable." Homeownership could even, in the words of George H.W. Bush's Secretary of Housing and Urban Development , Jack Kemp, "save babies, save children, save families ...

My eyes always cringe at the sight of a homeless veteran. As I know the pains of war firsthand, it breaks my heart to see that people who have sacrificed so much for my freedom are suffering to such a degree. But it's comforting to know that groups like the American Legion Homeless Veterans Housing Project in Jewett City, Conn., have been renovating old buildings and turning them into shelters for veterans for quite some time. They've ...

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Monday that a complete halt of Jewish settlements will not happen, according to a parliament source. Netanyahu said at a closed-door Knesset committee meeting that Israel would agree only to a partial reduction of housing construction and for a limited time, not the year the United States would like, said a government official who was not authorized to speak about the meeting and did not want to be identified. Netanyahu said no agreement had ...

Van Thy says the government evicted her from her home in the Cambodian capital and trucked her and others out to a town an hour away where she now lives in a hot green metal shed with no running water and dim prospects. Before the move, she had a job as a dishwasher, but now the 36-year-old woman is unemployed, penniless and her health has taken a turn for the worse. She has AIDS like many of the others in ...

Homebuilders are getting back to work. Is that good news for the housing market? In June, the number of new houses being built unexpectedly jumped from the month before. The Census Department recently reported that June also showed an increase — a small increase, but one nonetheless — in the amount of money going toward residential construction. Housing permits, which also speak to builder confidence, are creeping up too. As an Aug. 10 report from Oppenheimer Asset Management ...

Judge Sonia Sotomayor, who rose from the housing projects of the Bronx to the top of the legal profession, made history Thursday when the Senate confirmed her to become the nation's first Hispanic Supreme Court justice. Sotomayor was easily confirmed in a 68-31 vote. Nine Republicans joined a unanimous Democratic caucus in supporting her nomination. Sen. Ted Kennedy, D-Massachusetts, supported Sotomayor but was not present for the vote because of illness. Sotomayor, a 55-year-old federal appeals court judge, will ...