new jersey

North Dakota topped Gallup's list of best places to find jobs last year, followed by other states rich in natural resources, such as South Dakota and Alaska. Meanwhile, Nevada, New Jersey and California were the worst states for job hunters.

Can you say image problem? For the first time in the more than 70 years that Gallup has been measuring the popularity of unions, in 2009 more than half the public didn't approve of them. The current showdowns have plenty of precedent when it comes to transformative moments for organized labor.

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie has made autism services a priority in his proposed budget for the 2012 fiscal year. But some services may still suffer cuts: nonprofit Autism NJ says it's set to lose a state contract -- and Medicaid cuts also could reduce autism services, activists say.

Though the media often reports on eye-popping salaries of government officials, such as school superintendents and other political appointees, most public-sector workers don't do nearly as well. Typically, they earn about 6% less than workers in the private sector.

A New Jersey court has invalidated a foreclosure by insisting on a basic concept of due process -- that the bank must authenticate the documents it uses to make its case. But in the case of Wells Fargo v. Sandra A. Ford, there are more issues than just who owns the mortgage. She has fraud claims that go back to the very beginning.

The economy may be rebounding, but the benefits have yet to filter down to the hundreds of thousands of homeless Americans. Here's the story of one homeless mother: how she wound up in a shelter in a tough town and how the world looks from her perspective.

When the state tightened its foreclosure rules in response to the document crisis, it ordered the six largest servicers to explain why they should be allowed to continue foreclosing on homes. In effect, their response went something like this: "Trust us, everything's fine now."

Jersey residents voted in 2005 to give their state a lieutenant governor. Still, with Gov. Chris Christie vacationing in Florida while his state got pounded by a blizzard, there's a leadership vacuum in Trenton because Lt. Gov. Kim Guadagno is away on vacation, too.

Common sense suggests that as home prices decline, the property taxes based on their valuations ought to as well. But property taxes nationally are clicking higher. Why is this occurring? Several factors are at work -- and they bode ill for state budgets.

Millions of houses are in foreclosure in the U.S. Even if your house is safe, your neighbors may be in trouble, and your neighborhood could suffer as a result. Here's the story of one house in a neighborhood in New Jersey.