The economy may be sputtering, but buyers paid top dollar to acquire small businesses in the third quarter of 2008, according to local and national sales data.

A spike in the unemployment rate - the biggest in more than two decades - raised new concerns Friday that a weak labor outlook, high oil prices and continuing woes in the housing and credit markets are leading the U.S. economy into a painful recession.

Last week State Comptroller Susan Combs said Texas continues to fare better economically than most states. But talk to local business owners and the story may be different. As small businesses struggle with “tight money” conditions, weekly payrolls an

Immigrants - both documented and undocumented - contributed $229 billion to the state’s economy a figure that represented nearly one quarter of New York’s economy in 2006, according to a report recently released by the Fiscal Policy Institute.

Soaring gas prices and weakening job prospects left shoppers gloomier about the economy in May, sending a key barometer of consumer sentiment to its lowest level in almost 16 years.