TheStreet: 3 Reasons to Be Bullish on the U.S. Economy -- And 3 More Not to Be

By SIMON CONSTABLE

NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- The state of the U.S. economy is almost Dickensian: It's the best of times and the worst of times. There are reasons to be bullish as well as reasons to be bearish.

First, the good news:

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OZY: The Fed And The Cost Of Your New Home

By SIMON CONSTABLE

For weeks we held our breath — at least those of us a little on the nerdy side did. And even if we weren’t quite so engrossed with the economy, we knew that the Federal Reserve’s decision on whether to raise interest rates was kind of important. After all, it hadn’t happened since Barry Bonds (remember him?) was still a big star.

Yep, economists, bankers and stockbrokers were in suspense over the Fed’s next step — and last week, we learned it was sitting pat. But if you’re about to click to another story, figuring this is a Wall Street type of thing, affecting only high finance, let us inform you that the news hits you right in the comfort of your own living room — namely, by impacting how much it’ll cost you to borrow money.

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WSJ: Financial Adviser or Financial Planner?

By SIMON CONSTABLE

What can you expect from a financial adviser? Is it different from what you’ll get from a financial planner?When it comes to financial advice, labels can be deceiving.

Some advisers might offer as much guidance as some planners—and in some cases both might provide less help than those titles imply. The important thing for investors is to look beyond the labels to see exactly what they are being offered. Read more here.

WSJ: Everybody Knows Men Take More Investing Risks Than Women. Is It True?

By SIMON CONSTABLE

The conventional wisdom is that when it comes to investing, women take fewer risks than men. Julie Nelson, professor of economics at University of Massachusetts in Boston, says the conventional wisdom is wrong. 

Ms. Nelson recently published peer-reviewed research that concludes not only that the appetite of men and women for financial risk is largely the same, but that much of the earlier data suggesting there were such differences has been misinterpreted. Read more here.

Forbes: How the Fed Lost Its Cred.

By Simon Constable

The Federal Reserve bottled out Thursday when it decided not to raise the short term cost of borrowing money. It’s unfortunate, because the lack of action now removes any semblance of a fig leaf it could hide behind and still claim credibility.

“Clearly, the FED does not even think it knows what it is doing,” writes Woody Dorsey of Market Semiotics. That seems to sum it up in a nutshell. But let me breakdown some of the details of exactly  how the century old institution became a joke.

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Forbes: Boy Battles Stigma And Depression With Book

By SIMON CONSTABLE

Years ago when I worked on Wall Street, the employee benefits manager once told me that 30% of the bank’s staff in the United States were prescribed Prozac. It is perhaps the most famous antidepressant medication in the world. But it is just one of a multitude of similar drugs that are used to treat mental illness.

I didn’t ask that manager for details, but my guess is that many more than three in 10 of the employees were medicated with antidepressants. At the time I saw it as sign that the stresses of that workplace were affecting a vast portion of people. It is true that such stress, like that found in the high pressure jobs of investment banking, can trigger such things. But it’s also a fact that depression can arrive without apparent reason or cause. It can even afflict the young, such as 21-year-old comedian Kevin Breel.

His book, Boy Meets Depression: Or Life Sucks and Then You Live, was published Tuesday.

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OZY: Our Real Inflation Problem

By SIMON CONSTABLE

Despite these shaky stock markets, some of us are still angling for a shiny new ride — complete with that leather-laden new-car smell. But while you may hear news on the way to the dealership that inflation is still under control, you won’t believe it once a sales rep tells you their full-size American cars will cost you the better part of $40,000.

How can this be, when inflation is supposed to be muted? 

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