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Official figures show Australia's unemployment rate remained steady in October at 5.4 per cent. Almost 11,000 new jobs were created and the number of people actively looking for a job fell slightly. In fact technically speaking the unemployment rate came in a fraction below 5.4 per cent, but the Bureau of Statistics rounds the number up. One Australian economist says the unemployment rate should now stay below 5.5 per cent. Other economists disagree.
Topics: unemployment, business-economics-and-finance, australia
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A nor'easter is bringing heavy snow, rain and gale force winds to parts of the United States which were hardest hit by hurricane Sandy less than a fortnight ago, such as New York and New Jersey.
Topics: storm-disaster, united-states
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Sport has long been part of the Australian government strategy to improve health and education in some Aboriginal communities. But a former sports administrator says too much government money is going to elite levels of sports and that and star-struck ministers aren't holding programmers accountable.
Topics: sport, indigenous-aboriginal-and-torres-strait-islander, australia
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The Federal Assistant Treasurer has told The World Today that the call by the state treasurers for a share of the revenue from income tax, on top of the money they already get from the GST, is ludicrous and ham-fisted. The Treasurers are meeting in Sydney today to try and find a way to get a more secure slice of federal funding.
Topics: tax, states-and-territories, australia
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Aboriginal people in the Top End of Australia often express frustration about the way government services are delivered to their communities. The small community of Binjari says it's dealt with more than 50 different service providers in just the last 12 months and that these services bring their own staff often duplicating existing resources.
Topics: indigenous-aboriginal-and-torres-strait-islander, nt
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President Obama will return to the Oval Office to face some big foreign policy issues. Among the most urgent - the bloody civil war in Syria and the standoff with Iran over nuclear weapons. But in this second term, Barack Obama will have to do without the services of his secretary of state Hilary Clinton. She has indicated that she wouldn't serve a second term.
Topics: foreign-affairs, united-states
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The Chinese Communist Party Congress is underway - a meeting that will usher in a new team of leaders to rule over a quarter of the world's population. A speech from the outgoing president, Hu Jintao this morning is seen as an attempt to shore up his place in history before Xi Jinping takes the reins. This morning's session has started with a speech from the outgoing president, Hu Jintao.
Topics: foreign-affairs, world-politics, china
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Robert Reischauer knows how difficult negotiations between the president and a hostile Congress can be - he was the director of the Congressional Budget Office during the end of the Bush and beginning of the Clinton presidencies. He says Barack Obama's immediate challenge is at least as big as a similar fight about US debt levels a few months ago.
Topics: foreign-affairs, budget, united-states
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For the US president Barack Obama there's been little time to bask in the glow of his victory. With Washington gripped by the same partisan gridlock that's dogged the past two years, he has an uphill battle to enact a second term agenda. And there's no shortage of tough problems awaiting the president, most urgent among them a looming series of tax increases and spending cuts that automatically kick in on the 1st of January. Unless Congress can agree on how to cut the deficit.
Topics: united-states
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President Obama's his biggest problem is ticking away in the US Congress. Republicans and Democrats remain deadlocked over the budget and tax increases and spending cuts are looming if he can't resolve it. Wall Street investors reacted badly to the continuing uncertainty and sent stocks down 2 per cent in a flight to safety. Meanwhile, guns stocks gained on bets that a second term for Barack Obama could see firearms sales surge.
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Wall Street closed more than 2 per cent weaker on investor concern about the congressional impasse over deep spending cuts and tax increase. The gun maker Smith and Wesson surged 10 per cent as traders bet that president Obama's victory sees gun sales rise.
Topics: international-financial-crisis, economic-trends, world-politics, united-states
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A world-first research project will compare the DNA of coral in the warm, salty Red Sea in the Middle East to species living on the Great Barrier Reef. Scientists say the study will show which species of coral are more resilient to climate change and those that are more vulnerable to help focus conservation efforts.
Topics: conservation, great-barrier-reef, dna, qld, australia, saudi-arabia
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The Foreign Minister Bob Carr expects Barack Obama's second term as president to include an ambitious foreign policy agenda, focusing on non-proliferation, climate change, Iran and a two-state solution in the Middle East. He says a key challenge will be dealing with the looming fiscal cliff.
Topics: united-states, australia
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The fight is over for president Obama's challenger Mitt Romney, but now the Republican Party has some issues to deal with. Its choice of candidate, the influence of the Tea Party movement and the fracturing of the Republican vote are all on the agenda, along with the handling of the campaign and why the party couldn't win against a president who was unable to reel in government debt and soaring unemployment.
Topics: united-states
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The US election result was met with a general air of relief in Europe where president Obama has consistently scored higher than Mitt Romney in popularity polls.
Topics: european-union
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Reaction to the second Obama win has been mixed in the Middle East where his new administration faces a series of vexed life and death challenges.
Topics: united-states, israel, palestinian-territory-occupied, syrian-arab-republic
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The Federal Energy Minister Martin Ferguson will today unveil the long-awaited energy white paper. The strategy contains big reforms which he says will require political courage from the states. It proposes electricity price deregulation and innovations to allow customers to better manage their energy use.
Topics: electricity-energy-and-utilities, federal---state-issues, states-and-territories, australia
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In a few hours the Communist Party Congress in Beijing will open as the country prepares to usher in its new leadership. The exact makeup of China's cabinet, the Politburo Standing Committee, is still a closely guarded secret but, according to many analysts, the more conservative elements in the party may have won the day.
Topics: world-politics, china
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With a second term in the White House now secured, US president Barack Obama is facing a looming financial crisis and a bitterly divided Congress. His most pressing challenges are all too familiar - a still weak economy and almost 23 million people out of work.
Topics: united-states
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The Australian dollar and local share market rose after Barack Obama was declared the winner of the US presidential race. The Commonwealth Bank, News Corp. and Harvey Norman all provided trading updates for the market today. The CBA and News Corp both produced solid results. Harvey Norman, on the other hand, delivered a weaker result. And new data out today shows the Australian construction industry continues to shrink, albeit at a slower pace.
Topics: stockmarket, business-economics-and-finance, currency, australia
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The United States may have chosen its leader for the next four years, but its economic woes are a long way from being resolved. At the heart of the problem is a political deadlock making it extremely difficult to pass fiscal legislation.
Topics: united-states
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Eric Roozendaal, the former general secretary of the ALP, former treasurer, former roads minister and still an MP has been suspended from the party. Mr Roozendaal spent yesterday in the witness box at the Independent Commission Against Corruption answering questions about a car he got through a fellow MP at a discounted price.
Topics: fraud-and-corporate-crime, corruption, nsw
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The Prime Minister Julia Gillard has travelled to visit a local school in Laos, and promised to replace it. The Australian Government spends $12 million annually on basic education needs in the impoverished nation.
Topics: gillard-julia, foreign-affairs, vietnam
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The Federal Government's hand-picked human rights commissioner says indefinite detention on Nauru is 'an egregious breach of international human rights law'. The Government says it 'respectfully disagrees'. The United Nations refugee agency has now weighed in, calling for an end to the delay in the claims.
Topics: human, federal-government, refugees, nauru, australia
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Brendon O'Connor from the US Studies Centre at the University of Sydney tells Mark Colvin the campaign was remarkably light on policy and fresh ideas, as Republicans head back to the table to reassess their policies for the next election battle.
Topics: united-states
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AEDT = Australian Eastern Daylight Savings Time which is 11 hours ahead of UTC (Greenwich Mean Time)
