At first, Samara McAuliffe thought of her layoff earlier this year as a good thing.
"I kind of saw the layoff as an opportunity to find a dream job," McAuliffe told HuffPost. "I didn't realize how long it would take to find a job."

    Now all she wants is a job, any job. She said she's applying for all kinds — she used to do HR for a big bank — and nobody's responding except Starbucks. "They were kind enough to send an email that I didn't meet their qualifications."

     McAuliffe, 30, said her husband is still working and that the family of four is better off than many in similar situation. Nevertheless, they're still "feeling the pinch" because of her reduced income.
"My son is four. He's at that age where Santa is a big deal," she said. "We did have a talk because he remembers Christmas last year. He can list almost every gift he received. I told him, 'Santa was cutting back in the North Pole this year, the focus was going to be more on family.' He doesn't understand, but I tried."


    McAuliffe, who lives in central New Jersey, said she will receive her final unemployment check next week unless Congress reauthorizes Emergency Unemployment Compensation and Extended Benefits programs, which provide up to 73 weeks of federally-funded aid for people who exhaust 26 weeks of state benefits without finding work.
   
    Congress will probably reauthorize the benefits this month by attaching them to a reauthorization of tax cuts for the rich. More than a million people have already been cut off since the EUC and EB programs lapsed two weeks ago.
  
    McAuliffe said the debate in Congress over reauthorizing the benefits hits home. She takes it personally when politicians insinuate, as the frequently do, that the unemployed don't want to work and would rather receive benefits worth a fraction of their former pay.
"What is frustrating for me the idea that people on unemployment are making a living off of being on unemployment. I don't think that's the case," McAuliffe said. "It's embarrassing and demoralizing not being able to find a job."

    A major expense is health insurance. McAuliffe said she's been able to continue her former employer's health insurance policy thanks to COBRA, but she lost her job one month too late to be eligible for a 65 percent COBRA subsidy that expired in May. The monthly premium is more than $1,350 — almost as much as she takes in unemployment benefits.
"I feel like now we're sort of those people they're talking about in the news — relatively comfortable middle class, now still middle class but less comfortable."

    In yet another sign of growing fiscal problems for states and municipalities, Detroit may be cutting key services in certain portions of the city, the WSJ reports.

    This could mean that city officials will be faced with the tough decision whether to repurpose or outright abandon certain sections of the city, as the population has dwindled by half since 1950. Here's the WSJ:

"Until now, the mayor [Dave Bing] and his staff have spoken mostly in generalities about the problem, stressing the need for community input and pledging to a skeptical public that no resident would be forced to move. But the approach discussed by city officials could have that effect. Mr. Bing's staff wants to concentrate Detroit's remaining population--expected to be less than 900,000 after this year's Census count--and limited local, state and federal dollars in the most viable swaths of the city, while other sectors could go without such services as garbage pickup, police patrols, road repair and street lights."

     The move comes after the city borrowed $100 million to fund its police and fire departments and used other bond offerings to raise funds.
Mayor Dave Bing also recently announced that the city will offer incentives to residents to move to certain less blighted areas of town. Here's the AP with more details:

      "The city has identified at least seven to nine population centers that would encompass two-thirds of its 139 square miles, the newspaper reported. Bing said his administration by spring plans to make the locations of core areas public and final decisions haven't been made. Details of incentives also haven't been decided.
"I don't want people to think that, if they hold out, there's going to be a pot full of money somewhere, because there's not," Bing said.
At a news conference Thursday, Bing aide Karla Henderson said the idea behind the plan is to concentrate the city's limited resources into stronger, more compact neighborhoods.
"We don't have a formal plan, but we feel we need to go back out to the community and share this information with our residents," said Henderson, group executive of the city's planning and facilities department.

   Wall Street Set For Best Two Years Ever, Thanks To Bailout

     Two agonizing years for the U.S. economy have been some of the best years on record for Wall Street.
After first receiving billions in taxpayer aid, and now ultracheap funding from the Federal Reserve, Wall Street banks are on track to wrap up two of their best years ever.

     Even if the current quarter only matches the third in revenue, this year will be the second best ever for Wall Street, capping a two-year winning streak fueled by government dollars, Bloomberg reports. With more than $100 billion in their pockets from the Troubled Asset Relief Program, which offered them hundreds of billions more, the five biggest investment banks -- Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan, Bank of America, Citigroup and Morgan Stanley -- have seen their revenue this year climb to $93.7 billion.
"This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for most of these banks, and I think they've recognized it as that," finance professor Charles Geisst told Bloomberg.

      The assistance hasn't stopped with TARP. The Fed is in the process of buying $600 billion in government debt -- from banks. As part of its quantitative easing program, the Fed announces its purchases ahead of time, giving certain banks an opportunity to profit on the trades. The asset-purchase program, intended to augment the flow of cash through the economy, is first and foremost a boon for corporate America.

       According to an October estimate, Wall Street firms are set to pay out $144 billion in bonuses this year, to break a record for the second year in a row. When the government looked at pay practices of firms that got government help, then-pay czar Kenneth Feinberg determined the bonuses were "ill-advised" but decided they shouldn't be clawed back -- even though he later portrayed Wall Street banks as "using taxpayer money to feather their own nests."

      Critics note the disparity between banks' earnings and the state of the real economy.
"An economic recovery is about what happens to American families, it's what happens in the real economy," special White House adviser Elizabeth Warren told Bloomberg television. "It isn't meaningful to talk about profits and a growing economy until Americans are stabilized."

      After the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression, caused in part by large-scale gambling on Wall Street, unemployment has remained stuck around 10 percent. Companies, meanwhile, are hoarding cheap cash instead of using it to create jobs. According to Federal Reserve data released last week, companies increased their cash holdings by 7.3 percent in the third quarter, setting a new record. Relative to their short-term liabilities, corporations haven't sat on this much cash since 1956.

      Even as Wall Street celebrates its winning steak, Wall Street pay practices, which rewarded short-term risk-taking in the years leading up to the crisis, have worsened, according to a new report. Rules that were intended to make chief executives concerned for their companies' long-term health have instead caused their salaries to grow, without adding any real incentive to curb excessively risky behavior, the Council of Institutional Investors report concludes.

    Mariah Carey speaks with gay-rights magazine The Advocate in their latest issue, addressing among many other things, long persistant rumors claiming that she is a bisexual.

   "If it makes somebody happy to say that, then whatever, but that's not the reality," she said. "I don't have a discriminatory policy of who I'm friends with, so yes, I'm friends with women who are gay -- gay, straight, it doesn't matter to me. So I don't get upset when I hear that, because it is what it is. I guess I could lie about it to seem more exciting."

     Carey, married to actor Nick Cannon and expecting twins in the spring, is an open advocate of gay marriage rights.

    "If two people want to get married, it's their prerogative -- we hope. Everybody should be able to do what they want to do and be in the pursuit of happiness," Carey told the magazine. "Ever since I was a little girl, my mother was very open-minded and had many different types of friends, so being gay never seemed wrong or strange to me."

    In fact, Carey helped facilitate a gay marriage proposal on stage at one of her concerts in Las Vegas, demonstrating her embrace of a legion of loyal gay fans. Though she is straight, she has an idea why they all seem to connect to her.

    "Maybe part of the connection is that I do write songs from an outsider perspective. A lot of my die-hard gay fans don't just know my singles, but they also know all the album cuts," Carey posited. "I have songs about feeling different and alienated, because I grew up with my own issues, being biracial and not having money."
To read much more from this interview, click over to The Advocate.

    Meet the new boss, same as the old boss? Not if Steve Carell had his say. The star of 'The Office,' is leaving after seven seasons, and he'd like a new type of character to replace his famously bumbling Michael Scott.

   Speaking on 'The Ellen Degeneres Show,' Carell said, "You know what. I'm leaving that to the producers. I think it would be in their best interest just to sort of go in a different direction and not try to do the same type of character."

   That being said, he likes what he's hearing.
"Oh, thanks. I honestly don't know what they're going to do. There are various ideas. It's funny. The producers have, time to time, thrown names out there to screw people up," he told Ellen. "They'll just put anybody. They'll just start naming [people}. Colin Powell, I think is going to be the next Michael Scott. And people jump on it and don't see the irony at all."

    In July, coexecutive producer, writer and star Mindy Kaling said that she wanted to see Dwight Schrute (Rainn Wilson) taking the reins.

   "I'd love to see Rainn Wilson in that position," she said. "Dwight has become so nuanced--you actually care about him now. I think if [we did a good job laying the groundwork] this coming season, he would be a fantastic boss.

   But while he's taking himself out of the decision, it doesn't mean he doesn't care about the fate of his soon-to-be-former cast mates.

   "Yeah, it's a little sad. It's sort of bittersweet because a lot of these people are my best friends. I feel like it's time for me to move on but it's sad. I'm going to miss everybody a lot."
The episode airs on Tuesday, December 14th.

This is no rumor: Leighton Meester says she's leaving 'Gossip Girl,' in "two more years."
Meester, who stars in the upcoming musical drama, 'Country Strong,' told E! Online's Marc Malkin that while she, "obviously enjoys working on the show and living in New York," it's time to move on to other projects. So why two years? "Because we're under contract," she said.

In August, rumors claimed that Meester's co-star, Blake Lively, wanted out of the show, but they were quickly shot down by executive producer Josh Schwartz on Twitter.

"Have to respond. No truth to rumors that BL (Blake Lively) requested to have Serena killed. All is well," he wrote.
Another star, Taylor Momsen, was rumored to be indefinitely suspended from the show in November, in part due to outrageous behavior, but those claims were discredited by the show's producers.

There's no word yet on whether the show will end when Meester departs, but she doesn't seem to think that'd be a bad idea.
"I don't know," the star said, "but I think there's that old saying about wanting to go out on top."

   'Narnia' Crushes 'The Tourist' In Weekend Box Office

   LOS ANGELES — The latest chapter in "The Chronicles of Narnia" saga has sailed to the top of the weekend box office, though the franchise sank to a weak debut compared to the first two movies.
"The Voyage of the Dawn Treader," the third in the franchise based on C.S. Lewis' fantasy novels, took in $24.5 million domestically, according to studio estimates Sunday.

   Johnny Depp and Angelina Jolie's romantic thriller "The Tourist" opened in second-place with $17 million.
"Dawn Treader" revenues showed a huge drop from 2005's "The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe," which took in $65.6 million over opening weekend, and 2008's "Prince Caspian," which did $55 million.

   But with the movie topping $80 million in 85 countries overseas, for a worldwide total of $105.5 million, executives at distributor 20th Century Fox said they are making good headway toward recouping the movie's budget of just under $150 million.
 
  "We had a huge task ahead of us to resurrect this franchise and get movie-goers back to that feeling of affection they had for the first movie. I think all the evidence says we've accomplished that," said Chris Aronson, head of distribution for Fox, which took over the "Narnia" series when Disney dropped it after the second movie finished at $141.6 million domestically, less than half the $291.7 million haul of the first. "I think they all had such a bad taste in their mouth from the last one. That's why we really had our work cut out for us."
  
   "Dawn Treader" follows the adventures of some of the Pevensie siblings from the first two films as they take a magical sea voyage with their royal pal Caspian. Liam Neeson again provides the voice of talking lion Aslan.

    Sony's "The Tourist" also had a quiet start. The film stars Jolie as an Englishwoman who picks up a mild-mannered American (Depp) on a train in Europe as a diversion while she's on the run from cops and gangsters.
  "You have two of the biggest stars in the world, so expectations could be skewed a bit," said Rory Bruer, Sony's head of distribution. "But it certainly is a respectable opening."
The previous weekend's No. 1 movie, Disney's animated musical "Tangled," slipped to third-place with $14.6 million, raising its domestic total to $115.6 million.

    Hollywood remains in a lull as it heads into the Christmas frenzy. Among the movies that will compete for holiday audiences are Jeff Bridges' sci-fi tale "Tron: Legacy," Robert De Niro and Ben Stiller's sequel "Little Fockers," Jack Black's comic adventure "Gulliver's Travel's" and Reese Witherspoon's romance "How Do You Know."

    Overall revenues totaled $94 million, down 3 percent from the same weekend last year, when "The Princess and the Frog" was No. 1, according to box-office tracker Hollywood.com.
"The marketplace is pretty much in a malaise, unless you're a specialty or indie film playing in a limited number of theaters," said Hollywood.com analyst Paul Dergarabedian. "Those are really the bright spots in an otherwise lackluster post-Thanksgiving period."

   In limited release, Natalie Portman's ballet drama "Black Swan" expanded to more theaters and leaped into the top-10, coming in at No. 6 with $3.3 million in just 90 cinemas. That gave it a strong average of $37,024 a theater, compared to $6,892 in 3,555 cinemas for "Dawn Treader" and $6,168 in 2,756 locations for "The Tourist."

    Distributor Fox Searchlight expands "Black Swan" into nationwide release Friday, three days after the Golden Globe nominations, where the film is considered a likely contender in acting and other categories. Portman, also a strong Academy Awards prospect, plays a ballerina coming unglued amid the stress of fending off a rival for the lead in "Swan Lake."

    Mark Wahlberg and Christian Bale's boxing drama "The Fighter" was the latest awards contender to put up huge numbers in a limited-release opening. The Paramount film took in $320,000 in four theaters, averaging a whopping $80,000.

    "The Fighter" stars Wahlberg as real-life boxer Micky Ward, who overcame harsh family conflicts to earn a title shot in his mid-30s with help from half-brother Dicky Eklund (Bale), an ex-fighter whose life unraveled amid crime and crack addiction. The film expands to wide release Friday.

    Disney's Shakespeare adaptation "The Tempest," with Helen Mirren playing the traditionally male lead of the play, opened modestly with $45,000 in five theaters, for a $9,000 average.
Estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at U.S. and Canadian theaters, according to

   Hollywood.com. Final figures will be released Monday.
1. "The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader," $24.5 million.
2. "The Tourist," $17 million.
3. "Tangled," $14.6 million.
4. "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1," $8.5 million.
5. "Unstoppable," $3.8 million.
6. "Black Swan," $3.3 million.
7. "Burlesque," $3.2 million.
8. "Love & Other Drugs," $3 million.
9. "Due Date," $2.55 million.
10. "Megamind," $2.5 million.
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Online:
http://www.hollywood.com/boxoffice
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Universal Pictures and Focus Features are owned by NBC Universal, a unit of General Electric Co.; Sony Pictures, Sony Screen Gems and Sony Pictures Classics are units of Sony Corp.; Paramount and Paramount Vantage are divisions of Viacom Inc.; Disney's parent is The Walt Disney Co.; Miramax is a division of The Walt Disney Co.; 20th Century Fox, Fox Searchlight Pictures and Fox Atomic are owned by News Corp.; Warner Bros. and New Line are units of Time Warner Inc.; MGM is owned by a consortium of Providence Equity Partners, Texas Pacific Group, Sony Corp., Comcast Corp., DLJ Merchant Banking Partners and Quadrangle Group; Lionsgate is owned by Lions Gate Entertainment Corp.; IFC Films is owned by Rainbow Media Holdings, a subsidiary of Cablevision Systems Corp.; Rogue Pictures is owned by Relativity Media LLC; Overture Films is a subsidiary of Liberty Media Corp.