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More than one in four American adults have encountered employment discrimination, according to a new survey by FindLaw.com.

The survey, which asked 1,000 adults if they believe they have ever experienced discrimination by an employer in job interviews, hiring, pay or promotions, found race topped the list (39 percent), followed by age (34 percent), gender (30 percent), religion and sexual orientation (7 percent) and other (26 percent)

"It is important to note that not all discrimination is prohibited by law," said Stephanie Rahlfs, an attorney and editor at FindLaw.com. "Only discrimination based upon a classification that is considered ‘protected’ – race, color, religion, national origin, sex, age, disability, or union activity under the federal anti-discrimination laws – is illegal 1 hour cash advance.”

Among the survey’s findings:

• Forty-two percent of African-Americans have experienced racial discrimination in the workplace.

• One in 10 women claim they have experienced gender discrimination in the workplace.

• One in seven people age 45 and older (15%) claim they have experienced age discrimination in the workplace.

• One in eight people ages 18 to 24 (13%) say they have also experienced age discrimination.

• While racial discrimination was highest in the South, age, gender and religious discrimination were most likely to occur in the Midwest.

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MOD-PAC Corp. said revenues declined in the third quarter but the printer and paper board packaging company was able to turn a slight profit.

Net income was $14,000 compared to a $1.1 million loss last year.

Revenue totaled $12.6 million, off 3.4 percent from $13.1 million in the 2007 second quarter cash loan till pay day in one hour.

Officials of the Buffalo-based company (NASDAQ: MPAC) said the sluggish economy hampered sales but restructured operations have helped reduce costs.

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The allegations of overstated revenue and financial fraud at Entellium are sparking a debate in the Seattle technology community about board oversight and the role of audits at venture-backed companies.

Seattle accounting firm Moss Adams today acknowledged that it never completed a full audit of Entellium, whose top two executives were charged with wire fraud in Seattle U.S. District Court Wednesday for allegedly “cooking the books” at the software startup.

Moss Adams’ chief practice officer Neal West said his firm was engaged to perform audits on Entellium in “multiple years,” but did not complete any of the audits and therefore never issued any reports or opinions. West did not know which years the audits were started and why they were never completed, but said his office is looking into it.

“We did not complete any audits and therefore never issued any opinions on their financial statements,” West said.

“We’re still in the midst of looking at our records on this, and beyond that I’m not able to comment,” West said.

Asked if Entellium was using any other accounting firms, West said “not to my knowledge.”

It was unclear whether Entellium or its board requested audits. Ignition Partners, one of the largest venture backers of Entellium, did not immediately return calls seeking comment on the audit question.

There is some disagreement among investors, lawyers and accountants as to whether an audit actually would have uncovered fraudulent activities at Entellium.

“It surprised me there wasn’t an audit, but I don’t know what went into that decision,” said Alan Smith, a partner at the Fenwick & West law firm in Seattle. Smith said startups often get an audit after the first major funding rolls in.

Smith added: “Even the best-intended directors that are active and engaged are going to have a difficult time uncovering something like this if management is determined to hide it (online instant cash advance).”

Bill Bryant, a venture capitalist at Draper Fisher Jurvetson, agreed.

“Entellium should have at least had a review, but that may not have caught the fraud,” he said. “Enron and Worldcom had full audits, and people still didn’t catch on to what was going on for a number of years.”

Roger Clark, an accountant with the Seattle office of Grant Thornton, said an audit of Entellium’s business most likely would have uncovered discrepancies in revenue.

“It was likely that an audit was never done on this company,” said Clark. “You test the numbers the company gives you, and then you see if those numbers match the auditing work.”

In this case, an auditor would have investigated key customer contracts, revenue recognition, receipts and other factors, he said.

While Clark said it is common for venture capital firms to request audits before making an investment, he added that they are sometimes waived in tough times due to the added expense.

In the Entellium case, Clark said it appears that executives allegedly adjusted revenue with the hope of making up the shortfall in future quarters. In the end, Clark said, “they got trapped.”

“It is really a disaster for everyone involved,” Clark said. “It is a personal disaster for the two officers. It is a disaster for the venture funds that lost their money. And it is a disaster for employees who were trusting their leaders.”

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The fate of German lender Hypo Real Estate (HRXG.DE: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) hung on the outcome of a showdown on Sunday between Chancellor Angela Merkel’s government and banks over who would foot the bill for a bailout.

Banks and insurers withdrew their support for a government-led 35 billion euro ($48.50 billion) rescue deal for HRE after new refinancing problems came to light at the Munich-based lender.

Berlin scrambled to arrange talks to hammer out a new deal before markets open on Monday and also announced that it would provide an unlimited guarantee for private deposit accounts as part of its reaction to the banking crisis.

The banks involved in the talks welcomed the deposit guarantee as a sensible step and were confident agreement could be reached in the coming hours, a banking source familiar with the situation said on Sunday, adding “we are making progress (fast cash loan).”

Earlier on Sunday, Merkel and her Finance Minister Peer Steinbrueck, speaking at a hastily arranged news conference, expressed exasperation at HRE and the banks that pulled out of its rescue.

“I am pretty angry that the management of (HRE) in the last few days has revealed a further liquidity hole of unknown size,” Steinbrueck said.

“The federal government refuses to be forced into some sort of shared responsibility by this bank or to put the entire burden of the risks on taxpayers.”

HRE is relatively small when compared with other firms in Frankfurt’s blue-chip DAX .GDAXI index of leading companies, but its role as a lender for commercial property, infrastructure and government financing makes it a major financial player. 

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St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital CEO William Evans has been elected chairman of the Tennessee Technology Development Corp.

TTDC is charged with improving Tennessee’s competitiveness in research and development, venture capital formation and entrepreneurship. Last year, the state infused $5 million into the nonprofit organization.

Evans, who is a doctorate of pharmacy, will “lead TTDC’s revitalization strategy as the organization works to improve the state’s economic competitiveness in the knowledge economy of the 21st century,” according to a TTDC statement.

“Dr. Evans is a life-long Tennessean who has built a reputation as a leader within this state’s medical and scientific research community for more than 30 years,” said Eric Cromwell, CEO of TTDC, in a statement. “He acutely understands the strengths of Tennessee’s research infrastructure and knows firsthand the challenges and opportunities of bringing new innovations and ideas out of the lab to market faxless payday loans. Bill is uniquely qualified to provide the insight we need as TTDC launches new programs and initiatives to build innovation capacity and encourage more technology transfer from our state’s research institutions.”

Evans said TTDC complements the work of the Department of Economic and Community Development by “focusing on the pillars of innovation as an economic engine.”

“Tennessee has extraordinary assets, and we need to invest strategically to effectively leverage these assets to compete and win in emerging industries like biopharmaceuticals, energy technologies and medical devices,” he said in a statement.

Based in Memphis, St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital is a leading pediatric treatment and research facility focused on children’s catastrophic diseases. It employs more than 3,000 in Memphis.

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In America, Hayes Clinical Laboratory is a single testing facility cornered in by the national powerhouses that dominate their industry. But, when the family-owned business tapped the overseas market, it scored a deal that could lead to dozens of clinical testing facilities in India.

Boynton Beach-based Hayes Clinical made a joint venture in June with the Neon Healthcare and Research Institute, one of the largest lab companies in Calcutta, in India’s West Bengal state. They petitioned the government to set up labs in 54 hospitals and academic medical centers around that area.

Hayes Clinical would help with training, introducing more advances tests and facility design. It would also make sure Neon follows the same accreditation standards as an American lab would under the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, Hayes Clinical VP Trent Hayes said. India doesn’t have any equivalent regulating body. In that country, health care is a cash market.

The Indian market for diagnostic tests was valued $520 million in 2007, according to a research report by New York-based Kalorama Information. It projected that it would grow to $1 billion in 2012.

“Many have speculated that growing demand for private health care in India will drive demand for more advanced diagnostic equipment,” the report noted.

In exchange for its work, Hayes Clinical would get an annual payment from Neon. Trent Hayes would not say how much.

Trent Hayes is one of five family members who work at the company. Shelby Hayes, a Kentucky native who has worked in lab testing since 1962, founded Hayes Clinical in 1999. He previously ran the lab at Bethesda Memorial Hospital. His son is Trent Hayes, his daughter heads the lab and his son-in-law is company president.

Competing as a stand-alone lab is tough credit scores. Most health plans have exclusive contracts with one of the nation’s two dominant testing companies, Quest Diagnostics and Laboratory Corp. of America. Hayes Clinical has offered to do the services for less, but the insurers are locked into these contracts and won’t deal with them, said Judy Hayes, the company’s CFO and Shelby Hayes’ wife. While some patients pay cash or have covered insurance, about 90 percent of the company’s business is Medicare.

That means doctors who send most of tests for insured patients to Quest and Lab Corp. would have a third pickup box outside their door for Hayes Clinical. Shelby Hayes said his long relationships with local doctors have kept those boxes busy.

Expansion under such circumstances was difficult, so the Hayes family turned to Gora Aditya, an India native and co-owner of Hayes Clinical. He now resides in the Toronto area, where he runs a large clinical lab and real estate companies. Aditya heard about Neon’s desire to partner with an American lab, and he brought Hayes Clinical on board.

But, Hayes Clinical isn’t alone in its foray into India. In 2007, Quest opened an office in Delhi to provide diagnostic services to clinical research organizations.

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The world's leading central banks should keep interest rates at their current levels as they try to balance strong inflation with weak expansion, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development said.

The U.S. Federal Reserve's decision to leave its benchmark rate at 2 percent was vindicated by the credit squeeze and likelihood that the slowing economic growth will restrain inflation, the Paris-based group said today. The European Central Bank should keep its key rate at 4.25 percent to curb underlying price pressures, while the Bank of Japan is advised to maintain its main rate at 0.5 percent as a buffer against deflation.

The report, which did not seek to revise the OECD's June forecast of 1.8 percent global growth this year, projected “weak activity through the end of the year'' as financial- market turmoil, downturns in major housing markets and high commodity prices “continue to bear down on global growth.''

Projections for the major economies based on the organization's statistical model maintained June's forecast for growth of 1.4 percent in the Group of Seven. It suggested growth of 1.8 percent in the U.S. this year, stronger than the 1.2 percent forecast by the OECD in June, and 1.2 percent in the 15- nation euro area, down from 1.7 percent. The projection for Japan was trimmed to 1.3 percent from 1.7 percent, according to the model.

U.K. Recession

The OECD said tax cuts in the U.S. and ongoing financial turmoil meant it was difficult to predict the outlook for the world's largest economy, with growth in the final two quarters of this year balanced between expansion and contraction fast cash now.

The model's central projections suggested the U.K. economy is now in recession with growth expected to shrink in the current and subsequent quarters. It was less sure on the outlook for the euro-area, Japan and Canada. It projected each will avoid recession, although the range of forecasts given by the model suggests it remains a possibility for all three.

With banks having acknowledged most of their losses related to the collapse of the U.S. subprime mortgage market, financial markets are now at risk from “signs of weakness'' in economies, the OECD said. “The eventual depth and extent of financial disruption is still uncertain, however, with potential further losses on housing and construction finance being one source of concern,'' it said.

Housing Markets

The housing slump continues to play out in many economies with reduced credit supply adding to pressure on prices, the OECD said. U.S. home prices continue to fall, threatening another round of defaults and foreclosures that may hurt the market anew, while in Europe signs are emerging that housing troubles are spreading beyond economies such as Spain and the U.K., it said.

While the price of oil has fallen from a record, fuel supply remains tight and prices of other commodities such as food have “steadied at high levels,'' the report said. “If commodity prices are sustained at their recent, and in cases such as oil, lower levels, some moderation of both headline and underlying inflation is to be expected,'' it said.

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Dillard’s will close its store at the Palm Beach Mall. The retailer said on Friday it will be laying off 109 employees by Oct. 31.

It’s one of 14 locations nationwide that Dillard’s (NYSE: DDS) plans to close. The Little Rock, Ark.-based company operates in 29 states.

Dillard’s also said Friday it will close its travel agency business as part of the company’s strategy of reducing its underperforming units.

Dillard’s is working to relocate the 160 associates who work in the agencies, which are in 43 of the company’s 318 stores paydayloan. The agencies are no longer booking new travel arrangements, but will honor pending travel bookings.

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French business confidence fell to the lowest in more than three years in July as record oil prices and a stronger euro dimmed the outlook for economic growth.

An index of sentiment among 4,000 manufacturers dropped to 98 from 101 in June, according to Insee, the Paris-based national statistics office. That was the weakest since May 2005. Economists expected a reading of 100, according to the median of 22 estimates in a Bloomberg News survey.

Growth in the French economy is deteriorating as inflation and surging oil prices squeeze purchasing power and push up production costs just as the stronger euro hurts exports. The jump in consumer prices prompted the European Central Bank to raise interest rates earlier this month and President Jean-Claude Trichet is refusing to abandon his inflation-fighting rhetoric.

“The outlook for higher interest rates and the lingering uncertainty about the economic outlook are likely to continue to weigh on confidence,'' said Joost Beaumont, an economist at Fortis Bank in Amsterdam. “Overall, we think that confidence will continue to move around the 100 level in the near term, which is below its average in the past 10 years of 104.''

Insee's sub-index of how executives see the economic outlook fell to minus 34 from minus 15; a gauge of orders dropped to minus 18 from minus 13; and a measure of foreign orders slipped to minus 14 from minus 7.

Europe's largest economies have shown signs of slowing since the end of the first quarter. Industrial orders in the euro region dropped more than twice as much as forecast in May payday loans in 1 hour. Business confidence in Germany and Italy probably also fell this month, separate surveys showed.

`Growth Trough'

The Isae Institute will release the data at 9:30 a.m. today in Rome and Germany's Ifo Institute publishes figures 30 minutes later.

Trichet said last week there will be a “trough'' in growth through the third quarter before the economy gathers strength toward the end of the year. The bank raised its benchmark rate by 25 basis points to 4.25 percent this month.

For companies such as Airbus, the world's biggest planemaker, the euro's 14 percent appreciation against the dollar over the past year is a “deep, substantial problem,'' Chief Executive Officer Tom Enders said yesterday. The euro climbed to a record $1.6038 on July 15 and traded at $1.5683 at 7:51 a.m. in London.

“We are preparing ourselves for a sustained period of a low dollar,'' Enders told reporters in Toulouse, France. With record oil prices also hurting the industry, Airbus faces a “challenging environment,'' he said. Crude oil has risen 70 percent in the past year, reaching a record $147.27 a barrel on July 11.

French Finance Minister Christine Lagarde last week said growth this year would be at the lower end of the government's forecast of between 1.7 percent to 2 percent.

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Michael Fenley, a veteran of the East Bay retail scene, has been selected as the new general manager of Sunvalley shopping center in Concord.

Fenley, who has worked in shopping center management for 32 years, replaces Larry Beermann, who had served as general manager of the 41-year-old regional mall since early 2007. Beermann had a relatively short tenure compared with his predecessor, Tom McCracken, who served in Sunvalley's top post for more than 20 years.

To take the Sunvalley job, Fenley leaves the general manager position at Stoneridge shopping center in Pleasanton, which he had held since last fall. He has previously worked as general manager of the Bay Street mixed-use project in Emeryville for about a year and as general manager of Hilltop mall in Richmond for eight years.

A spokeswoman for Stoneridge could not be reach for comment on whether that upscale mall, owned by Simon Properties Inc., the nation's largest shopping center operator based in Indianapolis, has found a replacement for Fenley paydayloans.com.

His appointment at Sunvalley marks Fenley's return to Taubman Centers Inc. of Bloomfield Hills, Mich., which used to own Hilltop and Stoneridge.

Sunvalley has more than 160 stores, anchored by two Macy's stores, as well as Sears and JCPenney.