Sightline's Alan Durning has a good post on the connection between spikes in gas prices and recessions. It's very topical on a day that the Dow exhibited tremendous volatility, gaining 936 points. Our economic pulse is shocky, and Durning argues that at least in part its because high oil prices "sucked hundreds of billions of dollars out of the US economy" the last five years. It's this economic suffocation--not just from gas at the pump, but from jumps in manufacturing and shipping costs--that's led people to fail to pay all those mortgages they could barely afford. Meet the pit bull of vicious circles. more ›