Increasingly our economy is becoming bifurcated. And the essential dividing line is between companies that are exporting to faster-growing countries and those that aren't.

Specifically, large companies that derive a significant portion of revenues from exports are growing pretty nicely. On the other hand, corporations with a smaller level of sales from international business are not faring as well.  The 10 companies in the Dow Jones Industrial Average with the most revenues from international sales will grow an average of 8.3 percent over the next year, according to the Wall Street Journal. The 10 with the smallest portion of revenues from exports will grow 1.6 percent.

At long last, one writer has seriously addressed the potential problems with more stimulus spending. (I sent Paul Krugman a question about this more than a week ago, via a comment on his blog, but from what I can see he has yet to address it. And Dean Baker too easily dismisses the issue, in my opinion.)

The problem is not the federal budget deficit, not at least in the short term, but the potential political fallout from bad decision making. That way, says Steve Randy Waldman, indeed lay a possible US currency crisis. And this is ultimately where Friedrich Hayek and his associates were coming from in blaming Weimar for the disasters that followed.

Submitted by Adrienne Gonzalez, republished from Going Concern, Accounting News for Accountants and CFOs.

Administrative expenses are a part of any non-profit's overall operating expenses and though donors generally give to charity with the hope that their contributions will help fulfill the organization's mission as opposed to cover SG&A, Charity Navigator has a top ten of the worst offenders when it comes to admin expenses. Let's take a look, shall we?

I'm down at the Hackett Group's best practices conference in Atlanta and just finished a video interview with Stewart Glendinning, CFO of Molson Coors, on the topic of outsourcing.

While the video won't be up for awhile, I can report that Glendinning wowed the crowd of 250 or so finance executives in attendance this morning with a frank keynote address on the subject.

Let's face it: No matter what you think about the historic health care bill that President Obama is poised to sign, unless you are morally bankrupt you must at least think it is a good idea that people with pre-existing conditions not be denied insurance or that people should not go bankrupt simply because they have been so sick they hit some sort of arbitrary lifetime cap on reimbursements.

On the other hand, the insurance companies and other health care providers wound up with a free pass, as Congress did nothing to rein in overall health care spending. For example, insurance companies still enjoy their puzzling anti-trust exemption, and they still can't cross state lines to market their policies, thus increasing competition.

Bad news for President Obama. The morning after our leader joined the rest of Americans and finally acknowledged that jobs are the most important issue facing the country, chief financial officers signaled they don't expect the employment picture to improve anytime soon.

Sure, 62 percent of the 371 corporate CFOs who participated in the latest quarterly survey conducted by Financial Executives International (FEI) and Baruch College's Zicklin School of Business said they do not plan any layoffs for this year. Big deal. Most companies have already gotten around to this cost-cutting measure. In fact, 77 percent of those surveyed said they already cut rank and file during the economic downturn.

Much of the press on Tuesday ignored or at least downplayed the fact that third quarter GDP came in way below initial estimates.

In fact, the revision, to a final 2.2 percent estimate from an initial 3.5 percent, was the biggest change in the Commerce Department estimates since the fourth quarter of last year, when its Bureau of Economic Analysis reported that GDP had contracted by 6.3 percent instead of the 3.8 percent it had initially estimated.

To heck with "It's better to give than receive."

While consumers may be more optimistic about the economy, and may start to spend more on themselves and their homes this holiday season, they're still not ready to be as generous with others, according to consulting firm Deloitte.

I see that Bloomberg is agog over the flow of funds report for the second quarter because it shows the first increase in household net worth in two years.

But guess what, guys. Fully 80 percent of the $2 trillion increase for the three months that ended on June 30 was due to the big stock market rally during the quarter.

This article by Dave Leonhardt in today's Times stopped me in my tracks this morning. After all, real wage growth would provide some substance to the idea of an economic recovery, seeing as how consumers represent 70 percent of GDP and are saving rather than spending what they're making and are in no mood to borrow more even if they could.

And I see that Felix Salmon has weighed in with a fancy explanation of the findings.