Economic Recovery Puts An Office Out Of Business

At the height of the financial crisis, I visited an orientation for 500 new employees in Irvine, California. Their mission: Take over failing banks.

They were being hired to staff a brand new office of the FDIC — a federal agency that insures bank deposits and shuts down banks that are on the brink of failure.

Now, more than 100 failed banks later, the Irvine office is being closed. That's a good sign for the economy — the FDIC thinks bank failures peaked last year — but it means the people employed there will soon be looking for work. Copyright 2011 National Public Radio. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.