Fueling up: Marathon Oil Corp. says the expansion of its Garyville refinery is 91% complete and on track to open by the end of the year, reports Reuters. Marathon officials gave an update on the refinery work during a conference call with reporters and analysts today. The $3.4 billion project, which started in 2007, will bring the refining capacity of the plant from 256,000 barrels of oil a day to 436,000 barrels. That will make Garyville America’s fourth largest refinery.
Biggest drop since 1932: The recession is starving the government of tax revenue, just as the president and Congress are piling a major expansion of health care and other programs on the nation’s plate and struggling to find money to pay the tab. The numbers could hardly be more stark: Tax receipts are on pace to drop 18% this year, the biggest single-year decline since the Great Depression, while the federal deficit balloons to a record $1.8 trillion. Other figures in an Associated Press analysis underscore the recession’s impact: Individual income tax receipts are down 22% from a year ago. Corporate income taxes are down 57%. Social Security tax receipts could drop for only the second time since 1940, and Medicare taxes are on pace to drop for only the third time ever.
