Recession | featured news

U.S. abortions fell 5 percent during the recession and its aftermath in the biggest one-year decrease in at least a decade, perhaps because women are more careful to use birth control when times are tough, researchers say....

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke on Tuesday urged Congress and the Obama administration to strike a budget deal to avert tax increases and spending cuts that could trigger a recession next year.

Congressional leaders of both parties will meet with the president in an effort to reach a deal to avoid across-the-board tax increases and spending cuts that could push the economy into recession.

The 17-country eurozone has fallen back into recession for the first time in three years as the fallout from the region's financial crisis was felt from Amsterdam to Athens. And with surveys pointing to increasingly depressed conditions across the 17-member group at a time of austerity and high unemployment, the recession is forecast to deepen, and make the debt crisis — which has been calmer of late — even more difficult to handle.

Amid a global fright over Washington's political brinkmanship, U.S. lawmakers return to the capital on Tuesday with a seven-week deadline to reach agreement on scheduled tax hikes and budget cuts that threaten to trigger another recession.

After a long period of consumer retrenchment, U.S. families have cut their once-out-of-control debt loads down to pre-recession levels, largely removing one major obstacle to a faster economic recovery.

Lithuanians have voted out their conservative government after one of the world's deepest recessions, early results suggest. Two leftist parties, Labour and the Social Democrats, are currently placed first and second.

Britain will have to keep cutting public spending to reduce the budget deficit, Prime Minister David Cameron said on Sunday, underlining the government's tough task of pulling the country out of recession while winning back waning public support.

U.S. births fell for the fourth year in a row, the government reported Wednesday, with experts calling it more proof that the weak economy has continued to dampen enthusiasm for having children.

Euro zone economic sentiment defied expectations of stabilization and again fell sharply in September, underlining the economic gloom brought on by the sovereign debt crisis as the euro zone sinks into a recession.