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Monthly retail sales figures released by the Department of Commerce show strong gains despite foul weather conditions that plagued much of the east coast in February, noted the Retail Industry Leaders Association (RILA).

Property and casualty insurance industry net income nearly tripled in 2009, to $35 billion, according to the Highline Data Performance Monitor.

comScore, Inc., a leader in measuring the digital world, today released its monthly comScore qSearch analysis of the U.S. search marketplace. In February 2010, Americans conducted 14.5 billion core searches, with Google Sites accounting for 65.5 percent search market share.

American attitudes towards Wall Street are ambivalent. Most people believe that Wall Street benefits the country and that what it does is “absolutely essential.” However, attitudes towards the people who work on Wall Street are overwhelmingly negative and are far lower than they were before 2008 and the bail-out of large banks and other financial institutions, with little or no improvement over the last year. The net result? Fully 82% of all adults believe that Wall Street should be regulated more toughly.

MerchantCircle, the nation’s largest social network of local business owners, issued the results of its second quarterly “Merchant Confidence Index,” a survey that gauges confidence levels of local business owners in the current U.S. economy. Seven out of 10 merchants indicated that today’s economy was the same or better than it has been over the last 12 months.

In the first two months, the total investment in real estate development amounted to 314.4 billion yuan, up by 31.1 percent year-on-year, and went up by 30.1 percentage points over same period of previous year. Of which, investment in commercial residential buildings reached 223.3 billion yuan, 32.8 percent of increase year-on-year, picking up 32.0 percentage points over same period of previous year, which occupied 71.0 percent of the investment in real estate development.

The EU will surpass its target to consume 20 per cent of its energy from renewable energy by 2020, according to national forecasts submitted to the European Commission. In its summary, the Commission finds that the EU will reach an overall share of 20,3 per cent renewables.

Thirty states and the District of Columbia recorded over-the-month unemployment rate increases, 9 states registered rate decreases, and
11 states had no rate change, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported. Over the year, jobless rates increased in all 50 states and the District of Columbia. The national unemployment rate fell from 10.0 percent in December to 9.7 percent in January, but was up from 7.7 percent a year earlier.

Plans to step up EU funding to develop innovative low-carbon technologies to help cut greenhouse gas emissions by 20% by 2020 were welcomed in a resolution approved on Thursday. MEPs want the EU funding to develop applications for these technologies over the next 10 years, but also acknowledge that additional private, public and EU resources will be needed to hit the target.

Private industry employers spent an average of $27.42 per hour worked for total employee compensation in December 2009, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported. Wages and salaries averaged $19.41 per hour worked and accounted for 70.8 percent of these costs, while benefits averaged $8.00 and accounted for the remaining 29.2 percent. Total compensation costs for state and local government workers averaged $39.60 per hour worked in December 2009. Total employer compensation costs for civilian workers, which
include private industry and state and local government workers, averaged $29.37 per hour worked in December 2009.