so it s it s i would say it s half full, half empty, more half empty than half full. we should be doing much better than this. and lots of people argue the only reason we re doing as well as we are is that the federal reserve has maintained these extraordinary policies, very low rate, other kinds of programs that pump cash into the system. well, certainly keeping rates low. there is no rational reason not to keep them low. basically, you know, business doesn t see a lot of investment opportunities, how people are not ready to buy houses in large numbers yet so you have have to have a cheap money environment and at least thankfully the fed has been doing its job. a lot of people argue what the federal reserve is doing has not produced that much in terms of robust recovery by your own admission, but instead what it has done has fueled asset bubbles, very, very significant asset bubbles so have you stock market prices going up, you have, you know, real estate
you do not default if you are paying interest on your debt. all these top bankers that held a meeting with president obama and top republicans said this prioritization pay the interest first, that will not work. you go past the deadline with no deal, interest rates will go up, stock market prices will go down and the economy will take a very big hit. they are saying prioritization, paying interest first, it won t work. that s what they say. but look at the timetable. between october 17 and november 15 we have to pay $36 billion in interest and we have to pay $50 billion out in medicare, social security and military pay. we have enough money coming in in fox receipts to cover those bills. pry sortization is not required. so you have got a warning from the banks, a warning from china and wall street is yawning.
coaster we have seen in stock market prices. what about down? it went down slightly from may. it s still near six-year highs. it s still better than economists had expected. the biggest takeaway is we re looking at a tale of two american consumers right now. lower income consumers are not actually feeling good about the market, about the economy at all. but higher earning americans. so people making $75,000 and more are feeling better because we are seeing an increase in home prices. despite that roller coaster, we are seeing stocks higher. they re feeling better about spending because household wealth is feeling fuller. let s talk about mortgage rates. those are going up. there seems to be some miss perception, some are saying, based on what s actually happening. mortgage rates are spiking. 4.46%, for a 30-year fixed rate. that is the largest weekly increase we have seen in about
trenches. the problem is not that the economic data is so great, it s not. it s clearly not getting particularly worse, and there s a lot of evidence it s getting a little better in terms of jobs and income. that totally removes the steam from the argument of, you ve messed everything up. sure. in addition to the actual data, there s some polling that indicates that people at least feel like the economy is improving, and the right track/wrong track question. a lot of folks more than six months ago saying we think the country is moving in a good directions. how does that happen? if the numbers aren t dramatically different how can people feel like things are okay. you have two phenomenon that are better, house prices and stock market prices. stock market matters if you have a retirement account. a lot of americans don t, if you do it s done better. housing prices have a whole lattice of connection to job mobility and everything else. the final point about this and
researchers believe you may be doing yourself more harm than good. it is tuesday, october 11th. this is your a.m. wake-up call. i m carol costello joining you live from new york. president obama s $447 billion jobs bill faces its first vote in the senate later today. in a warning to republican critics, the president s senior campaign strategist says that voting against the measure could cost them the election. next year in a member row release the by the obama campaign david axelrod wrote the more people know about the american jobs act, the more they want congress to pass the plan. axelrod also takes aim at critics of the bill s millionaires tax quoting while republicans claim it is class warfare, the american people are seeing right through their opposition to asking the wealthiest to do their part. some democrats have doubts and while they control the senate there is no guarantee the bill will get the 60 votes needed to clear tonight s procedural hurdle. the occupy