Bernanke blames banks for holding back housing market

Ben Bernanke has said that the overly stringent lending requirements of banks are hurting the US housing recovery.

Fed officials signal more action may be needed

VANCOUVER, Wash/WOOSTER, Ohio (Reuters) - Federal Reserve officials on Tuesday signaled more help for the U.S. economy may be necessary despite recent data that suggested the recovery was picking up steam going into 2012.

The Greatest Depression Has Only Begun

The greatest depression in human history is still in its starting stages. What the media and many officials often refer to as the "hangover" from the global financial crisis is in fact the end of the beginning. Originating in 2008, the global economic crisis took the world by storm: banks collapsed, the "too big to fail" became bigger by consolidating the rest, governments bailed out their financial industries, masses of people lost their jobs, the 'developing' world was plunged into a deep systemic crisis, food prices rose, which in time spurred social unrest; and the Western nations that took on the bad debts of the big banks are on the precipice of a great global debt crisis, originating in Europe, hitting Greece and Spain, but destined to consume the industrialized world itself. Though many claim that we are in a "recovery," things could not be further from the truth.