tax hikes and consumer confidence taking a nose dive as payroll hikes kick n. sandra smith has the latest from the cme today. bad consumer confidence numbers? yeah. didn t look so good. in fact, there are consumer confidence in the u.s. plunged in january to its low elf level in more than a year, as americans saw their tacks spike and paychecks shrink. the confidence index dropped to 58.6 last month. that was the lowest reading since november, 2011. the key reason for this plunge, economists say the higher taxes made americans feel less optimistic about the next six months and congress reached a deal to prevent taxes from rising on most americans, but they did allow a temporary cut in social security tax to expire. so for a worker earning dr. 50,000 a year, take-home pay will shrink by $1,000.
obama, despite a bear market, the firearms industry has seen stock prices jump by the hundreds. for one gun maker in particular, smith and wes son, it s went up. black friday 154,873 background checks made for potential gun owners. december was a record breaking month with 2.2 million background checks for those wanting firearms. that s a staggering 58.6% increase over the year before. this is not a new phenomena. gun sales spiked higher in the wake of the aurora, colorado movie shooting massacre. the same was true after columbine and the shooting in arizona that left gabby giffords wounded. newtown has kept pace, especially with ammunition to fill high capacity magazines
to take part-time work or simply given up looking. the labor department says is 14.9%. the former commissioner of the bureau of labor statistics say another key number shows the labor market is stagnant. the employment to population ratio, just what share the population is working, and that number now is at 58.6%. roughly the same it was three years ago. reporter: the president took a not so subtle swipe at romney s jet ski vacation, waxing nostalgic about vacation when he was 11. we went around the country on greyhound buses and trains and stayed at howard johnsons. reporter: he did not mention last summer s was nicer on ma that s vineyard. romney said the voters wouldn t begrudge him time off. all americans would appreciate the memory they have with the children and grandchildren. republican group cross road gps is keeping the heat on the president with a new $25 million ad buy.
economy was going to we the big issue in this campaign and a bad issue for the president but the economy keeps getting better. it has reiated more than a million jobs in the last six months. unemployment down to 8.3% even though a half million people entered the workforce last month. can t the president make the argument look, unemployment is still too high but inherited a mess and things are getting better? he is certainly going to make the argument that it isn t his fault but despite the liberal media elite saying how great the economy is the fact in the united states today or last month 58.6% of adults had a job. except for the obama administration you have to go back 30 years to 1983, 29 years, to find a time when that small a percentage of americans were working and 10% of those have a part-time job. so if they want to tell us how great it is, the 42% of
economy was going to we the big issue in this campaign and a bad issue for the president but the economy keeps getting better. it has reiated more than a million jobs in the last six months. unemployment down to 8.3% even though a half million people entered the workforce last month. can t the president make the argument look, unemployment is still too high but inherited a mess and things are getting better? he is certainly going to make the argument that it isn t his fault but despite the liberal media elite saying how great the economy is the fact in the united states today or last month 58.6% of adults had a job. except for the obama administration you have to go back 30 years to 1983, 29 years, to find a time when that small a percentage of americans were working and 10% of those have a part-time job. so if they want to tell us how great it is, the 42% of