Economic Crisis & Bailout

Katel, Peter. "Vanishing Jobs." CQ Researcher 13 Mar. 2009.
Will the president's plan reduce unemployment? The news is grim and getting grimmer. The jobless rate recently hit 8.1 percent — the highest level in a quarter-century. American workers lost 651,000 jobs in February alone. All told, more than 12.5 million Americans are jobless — including 2.9 million who have been unemployed for at least 27 weeks. The nation is banking on the Obama administration's newly enacted, $787 billion “economic stimulus” bill to spark job growth through government spending on infrastructure projects and other programs. Conservatives argue that the spending won't help, and some liberals say the magnitude of the crisis calls for still more stimulus money. The huge spending measure also includes funds to encourage states to expand eligibility for unemployment insurance, though some governors are resisting on the grounds that their states will wind up footing future bills. With no quick turnaround predicted, creating or saving jobs will remain the top priority for President Barack Obama and the millions of citizens counting on his administration's rescue plan. From the CQ Researcher. Reprinted with permission from CQ Press.

Billitteri, Thomas J. "Middle-Class Squeeze: Is more government aid needed?" CQ Researcher 6 Mar. 2009.

Billitteri, Thomas J. "Financial Bailout: Will U.S. and overseas action stem the global crisis?" CQ Researcher 24 Oct. 2008.

Clemmitt, Marcia. "The National Debt: Has it gotten too big?" CQ Researcher November 14, 2008

Jost, Kenneth. "Financial Crisis: Did Lax Regulation Cause a Credit Meltdown?." CQ Researcher 9 May 2008 : 409-432.

Clemmitt, Marcia. "Mortgage Crisis: Should the government bail out borrowers in trouble?." CQ Researcher 2 Nov. 2007: 913-936.

FACTS.com

The Economic Downturn: From Credit Crunch to Global Recession. Research Feature. World News Digest. Jan. 2009. Facts On File News Services. - Extensive outline with key events and links to relevant articles.

Key Issue: Subprime Mortgage Lending - overview linked to key news events.

Article Searches:

EBSCOhost
SU unemploy* AND GE united states - over 2750 full text articles on the subject "unemployment" (or "unemployed") as it relates to the geographic location "United States"

economic stimulus AND united states

SU (mortgage* or loan*) and subprime

Federal Reserve and SU ( financ* or mortgage* or lend* or credit ) and ( crisis or crises )

CO (FANNIE Mae or freddie mac)

ProQuest
(AIG OR American International Group) AND bonus*

SUBJECT (Bailouts AND Automobile Industry)

SU(subprime lending or predatory lending) AND SU(mortgage*)

SU(subprime lending or predatory lending) AND SU(foreclosure*)

Books
From the CBC Library Catalog on (su:Debt or su:Credit or kw:Mortgages) and su:United States

Ebrary - ebooks
Maynard, Micheline. End of Detroit: How the Big Three Lost Their Grip on the American Car Market. Doubleday, 2004.

Wallison, Peter J. and Bert Ely. Nationalizing Mortgage Risk : The Growth of Fannie Mae & Freddie Mac. Washington, DC: American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research, 2000.

Reference

Oxford Reference Online - Search dictionaries of economics, banking and finance

Guttentag, Jack. Mortgage Encyclopedia. McGraw-Hill, 2004.

Web
Planet Money - NPR.org site for stories related to the economy.

Recovery.gov - Federal economic recovery tracking site, set up by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.

Recovery.wa.gov - tracks Federal recovery funding for Washington.

Schau, Dean. "Why Bad Things Happen To Good Economies, January 2009." Article on the recession and the Tri-Cities, by CBC Professor and Regional Labor Economist Dean Schau.

Psychology Articles - Peer-Reviewed?

Distinguishing a psychology magazine article from a peer-reviewed psychology article

This is an example of an article from a magazine:

Ayan, Steve. "Laughing Matters." Scientific American Mind Apr. 2009: 24-31. Academic Search Premier. EBSCO. Columbia Basin Coll. Lib., Pasco, WA. 20 May 2009 .

The author cites several studies and famous anecdotes to demonstrate the positive effects of humor on mental health, but does not report on his own original research. The magazine is intended for the educated, interested member of the general public; you don’t have to be a psychology student/professor/professional to appreciate it.

Here is a peer-reviewed article on a similar subject:

Zweyer, Karen, Barbara Velker, and Willibald Ruch. "Do Cheerfulness, Exhilaration, and Humor Production Moderate Pain Tolerance? A FACS Study." Humor: International Journal of Humor Research 17.1/2 (2004): 85-119. Academic Search Premier. EBSCO. Columbia Basin Coll. Lib., Pasco, WA. 20 May 2009 . Prior studies have shown that watching a funny film leads to an increase in pain tolerance. The present study aimed at separating three factors considered potentially essential (mood, behavior, and cognition related to humor) and examined whether they are responsible for this effect. Furthermore, the study examined whether trait cheerfulness and trait seriousness, as measured by the State-Trait-Cheerfulness-Inventory (STCI; Ruch et al. 1996), moderate changes in pain tolerance. Fifty-six female subjects were assigned randomly to three groups, each having a different task to pursue while watching a funny film: (1) get into a cheerful mood without smiling or laughing ("Cheerfulness"); (2) smile and laugh extensively ("Exhilaration"); and (3) produce a humorous commentary to the film ("Humor production"). Pain tolerance was measured using the cold pressor test before, immediately after, and twenty minutes after the film. Results indicated that pain tolerance increased for participants from before to after watching the funny film and remained high for the twenty minutes. This effect was moderated by facial but not verbal indicators of enjoyment of humor. Participants low in trait seriousness had an overall higher pain tolerance. Subjects with a high score in trait cheerfulness showed an increase in pain tolerance after producing humor while watching the film whereas subjects low in trait cheerfulness showed a similar increase after smiling and laughter during the film. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Here are several ways to distinguish it from a non-peer-reviewed article (not all will appear in absolutely every instance, but these are common):

• Multiple authors.
  
• Long (35 pages, that is long even for a peer-reviewed article!)
  
• Abstract written by the authors.
  
• Abstract includes indicator words “the present study….examined…measured…results indicated.” All of these tell you that this is a report on original research.
  
• If you open the article it has sections for an introduction, methods, results, discussion, and references.
  
• At the end of the discussion section it notes that the authors are affiliated with a particular University.

Math Journal Reading & Response - Bartrand

Math Horizons - current issue on browsing racks, request back issues at Circulation

Mathematics Teaching - EBSCOhost (2002-present)

Mathematics teaching in the middle school in ProQuest from 05/01/1998 to 10/01/2003

Mathematics teacher - from 01/01/1992 to 10/01/2003 in ProQuest

Teaching children mathematics - - current issue on browsing racks, request back issues at Circulation, 05/01/1997 to 10/01/2003 in ProQuest

What's Happening in the Mathematical Sciences
Main Collection QA1 .W46