Our most clicked-on photos of the year. Click on an image to see it full size. More photos here.

What a year it’s been at EconomyBeat. Lay-offs, health-care trauma, long-term unemployment…honestly, this is not the kind of blog you want to see go on forever. One can only hope that its very premise — documenting the copious material online borne of massive economic dislocation and an historic financial crisis — becomes irrelevant sooner rather [...]

Occasionally I’ll post something that I think people will be really interested in that falls flat. Here’s my personal list of stuff I thought was really interesting but for some reason failed to capture your attention. Click now or forever hold your peace… Public Option – The Musical – guerilla musical theater from Billionaires for [...]

Chalk up another one for the abysmal 2000s. This decade was the worst ever for U.S. stocks. Ever. From last week’s Wall Street Journal:
In nearly 200 years of recorded stock-market history, no calendar decade has seen such a dismal performance as the 2000s.I nvestors would have been better off investing in pretty much anything else, from bonds to gold or even just stuffing money under a mattress. Since the end of 1999, stocks traded on the New York Stock Exchange have lost an average of 0.5% a year thanks to the twin bear markets this decade.

The rest of the article is filled with alarming statistics. Let’s go to the blogs, shall we?

Two views of the Senate health care bill from the left. First, Darcy Burner of the American Progressive Caucus Policy Foundation on the blog Open Left, who writes a post called “Joe Lieberman’s Healthcare Bill Is Worse Than Nothing. Kill It.” The post was written after Joe Lieberman forced the Democrats to drop an option [...]

For good or for ill, the Senate got ‘er done. With all the hubub over the removed public option, the failed Medicare buy-in gambit, and differing approaches between the House and Senate on abortion restrictions, a very important part of the bill has been lost in the shuffle:

The tanning tax.

After the nip and tuck lobby complained about a tax on cosmetic surgeries that Harry Reid had inserted into the bill (the “Bo-tax”), he took it out and replaced it with a 10% tax on tanning salons.

If the tanning industry wants to kill the tax in the House-Senate conference, they’ll probably need more of a campaign than this online call-to-action from the Indoor Tanning Association, which has a circa-1997 look-and-feel to it.

It may feel strange to be talking about tanning on Christmas Eve, but reaction on the Web is coming fast and furious.

Click on an image to see it full size. More photos here.

This ad for Volkswagen in France is called “Save The Traders,” a parody of musical charity events involving lots of pop stars. Gawker noted more recession-themed ads back in February.

Here’s a repost from EconomyStory.org on a segment from Sparrow Songs, filmmaker Alex Jablonski’s project in which he and cinematographer Michael Totten shoot a short documentary every month for one year. Here, Jablonski interviews people affected by the recession in the Echo Park neighborhood of Los Angeles.

That’s right. It’s Christmas Eve eve, er, eve. What a fine time to check out these parodies from the holiday songbook on Marcy Shaffer’s Versus web site. “It’s Beginning to Look a Lot More Riskless” Lyrics here “The Cinders of Ayn Rand” Lyrics here “Oh CRE” Lyrics here “Go Tell It In Accountin’” Lyrics here