And it's official: We've broken into the double digits with 10.2 percent unemployment. That brings me to our favorite beginning of the month chart, above and here, which includes the all important U-6 number.

Exciting news on the housing front: Effectively nationalized mortgage lender Fannie Mae has adopted a new policy to deal with foreclosures: Letting homeowners remain in their homes as renters instead of kicking them out and abandoning the property, as happens in many foreclosures.

In an interview a few minutes ago, House Financial Services Committee Chair Barney Frank responded to criticism of the systemic risk legislation, proposed by the administration, that he is moving through Congress. During a hearing yesterday, several members of Congress, along with regulators like FDIC Chair Sheila Bair, expressed concern about the proposal for dissolving failed banks, which relies on an after-the-fact fee on the rest of the financial system. Bair and Rep.

GDP measures for the third quarter of this year have come in, and it's official: The economy grew 3.5 annualized percent, thanks in large part to the stimulus package, the first time it has increased over a quarter since a year ago. Also important: There was no sign of inflation, which should keep deficit hawks quiet. Well, it won't keep them quiet but it should convince policy-makers not to listen to them. Another good sign: exports grew 14.7 annualized percent over the same time period.

Via Kevin Drum, Steve Waldman has a smart post about the difference between asset and consumer price inflation, and how inequality contributes to asset bubbles. Essentially, the monetary policy constructed during the "Great Moderation" of the nineties and oughts created an untenable situation where the wealthy were able to invest, driving up asset prices into a bubble, and the middle class relied on credit to fund their purchases as wages stagnated. But ...

No, but you might think so from reading Robert Reich below, who says:

Eight months ago it looked as if Wall Street was in store for strong financial regulation -- oversight of derivative trading, pay linked to long-term performance, much higher capital requirements, an end to conflicts of interest (i.e. credit rating agencies being paid by the very companies whose securities they're rating), and even resurrection of the Glass-Steagall Act separating commercial from investment banking.

Last week, we touched on the symbolic win the administration's compensation watchdog, Kenneth Feinberg, scored against Bank of America CEO Kenneth Lewis.