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After politics, almost all of the remainder of the day's news agenda was preoccupied with the troubled economy. The only exceptions were medical research on heart disease, which was covered by all three newscasts, and a lone piece of international reporting, by Kevin Tibbles in Ontario for NBC.
NBC's Tom Costello walked us through the day's recession news: American International Group, the insurance conglomerate, needs a further federal bailout; Detroit's Big Three automakers need a federal loan of $25bn or $50bn "just to stay afloat;" Circuit City the retailer has declared bankruptcy; and "one bright spot--McDonald's sales surged in October as Americans sought out cheaper food."
Want more bad news? NBC sent Lee Cowan to Wilmington Ohio, the hub and company town for DHL air freight. DHL has thrown in the towel in its domestic competition with UPS and FedEx and is closing its Ohio operation. The 9,500 layoffs represent fully half of the town's workforce. NBC's Lisa Myers went to Texas to check out the mortgage service center for IndyMac Bank, which went broke and was taken over by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation. IndyMac is now the pilot bank for an FDIC scheme to lower interest rates and extend payment schedules for mortgage holders so that no one spends more than 38% of monthly income on housing payments. "It does not forgive debt so many borrowers may still owe more than their homes are worth." Yet the plan may be extended to other banks and applied to 2m homebuyers nationwide.
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