VOL. 35 | NO. 39 | Friday, September 30, 2011
Tired of layoffs, cutbacks and mergers, Nashville entrepreneurs take the leap
It’s no secret Nashvillians are having a tough time finding work. With Tennessee’s unemployment rate still hovering just below 10 percent, those lucky enough to find jobs are often “underemployed” or struggling with part-time gigs that offer no benefits.
Cathy Shannon, job searching since last November, worries she doesn’t have a chance of standing out in the “mob” of resumes. She says the gap in her employment from 10 years as a stay-at-home mom means companies won’t give her a second look, even though she has extensive experience as a marketing director and as a customer service manager.
As social network sites such as LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook continue to grow, they are giving a boost to the traditional methods people use to find jobs. Employers and job seekers have both taken notice.
One of the more difficult issues facing job seekers is how to negotiate a compensation package after a position has been offered. There is little room for discussion with some employers, while others are open to some give and take. Understanding negotiations can prevent the process from becoming a barrier between you and the job you want.
The 49-year drought of no liquor stores in Bellevue may be over, but the battle for liquor-store customers is only just beginning.
REALTY CHECK
I ran into an executive from the automobile industry at the Elvis Costello concert at the Ryman. A smashing performance by Liverpool’s Elvis and an interesting conversation with the man from the motor trade, a term made famous by some other Liverpudlians.
TERRY McCORMICK
Everyone has a theory as to why Chris Johnson and the Tennessee Titans’ running game remains stuck in neutral.
NEWSMAKERS
Former U.S. Sen. William H. Frist, M.D., who founded the Vanderbilt Transplant Center and served as its director from 1989 to 1993, has been appointed adjunct professor of surgery in the Department of Cardiac Surgery and clinical professor of surgery at Meharry Medical College.
BUSINESS BOOK REVIEW
You’ve run out of breath just running in place.
I SWEAR
The columns on mondegreens and incorrectly sung lyrics generated viewer mail.
KAY'S COOKING CORNER
I am thinking, pondering and exploring the possibility of buying a bike. I have been thinking, pondering and exploring this issue for about a year, maybe even two, now. So far, I haven’t gained much momentum with it, because I still don’t have one. Maybe this is the month for it!
STATEWIDE
NASHVILLE (AP) - Gov. Bill Haslam announced Thursday that he has reached a deal with Amazon.com for the online retailer to begin collecting Tennessee sales tax in 2014 and add 2,000 full-time jobs at two new distribution centers.
NASHVILLE AREA
NASHVILLE (AP) - Federal prosecutors confirmed there's a criminal investigation under way related to the recent raid on Gibson Guitar in a filing that asked a judge to delay efforts by the company to reclaim wood that was seized.
LEBANON (AP) — City officials in Lebanon have announced a proposal to build a retail and office space facility, followed by an arena-events center.
NASHVILLE (AP) — Former U.S. Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales is joining a Nashville law firm.
NATIONAL BUSINESS
WASHINGTON (AP) — The average rate on the 30-year fixed mortgage this week fell below 4 percent for the first time ever, to 3.94 percent.
NEW YORK (AP) — September offered the latest sign that Americans will shop, but only when they think they're getting a deal.
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Steve Jobs saw the future and led the world to it. He moved technology from garages to pockets, took entertainment from discs to bytes and turned gadgets into extensions of the people who use them.
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama is remembering Apple co-founder Steve Jobs as one of America's greatest innovators and says the world has lost a visionary.
Oil prices rose above $80 a barrel Thursday, continuing a rebound from 12-month lows on signs that European finance officials are moving to bolster the region's banks.
NEW YORK (AP) — The National Retail Federation, the nation's largest retail trade group, expects winter holiday sales to rise 2.8 percent to $465.6 billion this year.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Obama administration wants to speed up permitting and construction of seven proposed electric transmission lines in 12 states, as it moves to create jobs and modernize the nation's power grid.
NATIONAL POLITICS
WASHINGTON (AP) — The GOP presidential field apparently set, Republican primary voters are likely facing a choice between an experienced, establishment candidate in Mitt Romney and an insurgent presidential campaign novice in Rick Perry.
WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 5
NASHVILLE AREA
A new statewide alliance has been formed by communications experts from Memphis to Knoxville to provide blanket geographic coverage for products and issues in Tennessee.
STATEWIDE
When officials with the parent company of First Tennessee Bank walked through the company’s second quarter earnings in July for analysts, they noted that the implementation of stricter rules governing debit card fees would mean an annual $15 million to $20 million hit to the company’s revenue.
NASHVILLE (AP) — An association of brick-and-mortar retailers says a legal opinion from state Attorney General Bob Cooper should cancel a sales tax exemption for online merchant Amazon.com.
NASHVILLE (AP) — Tennessee judges and attorneys have joined forces to create a program geared to educating the public about the legal system.
NASHVILLE (AP) — The University of Tennessee will help train food safety officials at the local, state and national levels.
NATIONAL BUSINESS
NEW YORK (AP) — Stocks rose for a second straight day Wednesday on signs that the U.S. economy grew in September and that European officials are moving to support the region's struggling banks.
WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. service companies cut workers last month for the first time in 13 months, according to a private survey. The decline is a pessimistic sign two days before the government reports on job growth in September.
NEW YORK (AP) — Bank of America's website is having troubles for the sixth straight day, meaning customers may still have difficulty signing into their accounts.
ISSAQUAH, Wash. (AP) — Costco Wholesale Corp.'s fiscal fourth-quarter net income climbed 11 percent as the wholesale club operator made more money on membership fees and saw its sales rise.
NEW YORK (AP) — Oil is rebounding from 12-month lows on signs that financial leaders will move to bolster struggling European banks.
LONDON (AP) — Stocks in Europe recouped some recent losses on Wednesday on hopes that European policymakers were thrashing out a plan to shore up the banking sector, which has been damaged by fears of a Greek debt default.
ROCHESTER, N.Y. (AP) — Buffeted by fierce foreign competition, then blindsided by a digital revolution, photography icon Eastman Kodak Co. is teetering on a financial precipice after a quarter-century of failed efforts to find its focus.
NATIONAL POLITICS
WASHINGTON (AP) — Senate Democrats are scrambling to rewrite portions of President Barack Obama's jobs bill as they seek elusive party unity around the measure, even as Obama tries to pin the blame on Republicans for Congress' failure to act.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court will decide whether the government can get involved in a workplace dispute between a church and one of its employees.
TUESDAY, OCTOBER 4
STATEWIDE
NASHVILLE (AP) - A new law designed to curb illegal voting by noncitizen residents has gone largely unnoticed, overshadowed by Tennessee's new voter identification law.
NASHVILLE (AP) — Rating agencies have decided not to downgrade Tennessee's debt after the state submitted a detailed game plan for how each agency would respond to deep federal spending cuts.
NASHVILLE (AP) — State officials expect the already busy driver service centers to get even more crowded over the coming months.
NATIONAL BUSINESS
CUPERTINO, Calif. (AP) — Apple Inc. unveiled a new iPhone on Tuesday that is faster and more powerful but stops short of a more radical upgrade. It said Sprint customers will now be able to use one.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Businesses ordered more computers, communications equipment and other big-ticket items in August, a sign they aren't cutting back spending plans despite weak economic growth.
DETROIT (AP) — Ford Motor Co. will pay its U.S. factory workers a $6,000 signing bonus and add thousands of U.S. factory jobs as part of a four-year contract deal reached Tuesday with the United Auto Workers union.
LONDON (AP) — Stocks slid again Tuesday as Europe's debt crisis showed few signs of being solved any time soon and officials said Greece will have to wait until November to get its hands on much-needed bailout cash.
NEW YORK (AP) — Investors are running out of reasons to bet on higher oil prices.
NATIONAL POLITICS
WASHINGTON (AP) — Two federal law enforcement officials say that during the presidency of George W. Bush, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives in Tucson, Ariz., ran an operation called Wide Receiver in which it permitted hundreds of guns to be transferred to suspected arms traffickers.
WASHINGTON (AP) — If Democrats want President Barack Obama's jobs bill, the Senate should vote on it right away, a top Republican says. But Senate Democrats aren't ready to bring it up for a vote yet.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke is reiterating that Congress should not cut spending sharply while the economy is weak.
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama said Monday he does not regret a $528 million loan to a solar energy company that later collapsed, saying officials always knew a clean energy loan program would not back winners 100 percent of the time.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Mortgage giant Fannie Mae knew about allegations of improper foreclosure practices by law firms in 2003 but did not act to stop them, a government watchdog says.
WASHINGTON (AP) — To the dismay of consumer groups and the discomfort of Democrats, President Barack Obama wants Congress to make it easier for private debt collectors to call the cellphones of consumers delinquent on student loans and other billions owed the federal government.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Congress is poised to fund the government for six weeks to give President Barack Obama and lawmakers more time to work out some $1 trillion of unfinished agency budgets for the fiscal year already days old.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Seeking to gain political advantage, President Barack Obama insisted Monday that Congress vote on his entire $447 billion economic plan this month, a step promptly rejected by Republicans who called for both sides to find common ground in their competing proposals to stimulate growth.
MONDAY, OCTOBER 3
NASHVILLE AREA
FRANKLIN (AP) - Nissan North America Inc. said Monday that its September U.S. sales rose 25.3 percent on strong demand for both its cars and trucks.
NASHVILLE (AP) — Former U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales will be teaching at Belmont University College of Law starting next year as the Doyle Rogers Distinguished Chair of Law.
NATIONAL BUSINESS
DETROIT (AP) — Chrysler's U.S. sales jumped 27 percent in September, boosted by strong demand for new models of car and trucks.
WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. builders increased spending on homes, office buildings and other projects in August after a big decline in July. The gain still left the construction industry far below levels considered healthy.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Manufacturing grew at a faster pace in September than in August, though the pace of growth remains weak.
NEW YORK (AP) — ABC News is joining forces with Yahoo to deliver more digital news content to their audiences. With the deal, the companies say ABC News content will be prominently featured on the Yahoo News and Yahoo front page.
ROME (AP) — Fiat said Monday it will produce Jeep SUVs at its Mirafiori factory in Turin from 2013 as it takes advantage of flexible work rules approved earlier this year by union rank-and-file.
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Apple fans are amped. The computer and gadget maker is expected to announce a new, more powerful version of its wildly popular smartphone this week — more than a year after it unveiled the iPhone 4.
NEW YORK (AP) — Oil begins the last quarter of 2011 at its lowest level in more than a year as fears of another recession spread.
NEW YORK (AP) — Amazon's Kindle Fire is a Catch-22 for retailers: The $199 tablet computer could both help Christmas traffic and hurt future sales.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The recent listeria outbreak from cantaloupe demonstrates one likely cause of large-scale occurrences of serious illnesses linked to tainted food: the long and winding road what we eat takes from farm to fork.
FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 30
NASHVILLE AREA
MURFREESBORO (AP) — An annual conference being held today and sponsored by Middle Tennessee State University is designed to promote free enterprise.
NASHVILLE (AP) — State officials are sponsoring document shredding Saturday in Nashville to promote identity theft awareness.
NATIONAL BUSINESS
WASHINGTON (AP) — Consumers spent slightly more last month but earned less for the first time in nearly two years. The new data on spending and incomes suggest Americans tapped their savings to cope with steep gas prices and a weaker economy.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The economy is showing signs of modest improvement — not enough to reduce high unemployment but enough to ease fears that another recession might be near.
NEW YORK (AP) — Bank of America will start charging debit-card users $5 a month to pay for purchases. The move comes as the cards increasingly replace cash and as banks look for ways to offset the loss of revenue from a new rule that will limit how much they can collect from merchants.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Fixed mortgage rates have fallen to historic new lows for a fourth straight week and are likely to fall further.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The number of Americans who signed contracts to buy homes fell in August, after a weaker-than-expected peak buying season.
NATIONAL POLITICS
WASHINGTON (AP) — Military retirees will pay slightly more for their health care starting Saturday, and more cost increases are on the way.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Federal regulators bowed to pressure from big banks seeking a quick exit from the financial bailout program and did not uniformly apply the government's own conditions set for repaying the taxpayer funds, a new watchdog report says.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The nine justices of the Supreme Court, who serve without seeking election, soon will have to decide whether to insert themselves into the center of the presidential campaign next year.