Economy, Middle Class | featured news

Senators rejected dueling Democratic and Republican small-business tax cut plans on Thursday, the latest futile effort to break the election-year gridlock that’s consumed Capitol Hill on issues dealing with jobs and the economy... “There is no reason for [Republicans] to have killed this bill other than they are trying to hurt President Obama, small businesses and the middle class,” Reid, who introduced the bill, said at a news conference.

Hunger was such a constant companion in Yao Qizhong's childhood that even now, at age 40, he'll stoop down to salvage a single clove of garlic that falls from his table at the Beijing market where he hawks fresh produce....

When I started to write my book The Chinese Dream three years ago, people in the United States did not even believe there was a middle class in China. Today, China’s middle class is already larger than the entire population of the United States and is expected to reach 800 million in fifteen years.

Previewing key elements of his State of the Union address, President Barack Obama is announcing on Monday a series of initiatives aimed at calming some of the economic fears of struggling middle class families.