Business and economics headlines from The News & Observer last week: "Bernanke utters the 'R' word." "Jobless figures head upward." "Sales of Triangle homes off again." "Auto sales dip in March for all makers." "Gas prices continue rise." "Oil industry executives: It's not our fault."

Jeepers, can't The N&O find anything positive to say about the U.S. economy?

That's a question editors hear increasingly as the economy slips into ... whoops, performs less well. The seemingly unceasing torrent of bad business news weighs on readers' minds and, some think, makes things worse.

"The economy is not the best it has been, I will grant you that," wrote reader Edward Betz Jr., with whom I had an ongoing colloquy last week. "But it was some typical economic problems that continually occur, no matter who is in office, and those liberal-leaning media outlets starting hitting on them hard. People, being what they are, stopped spending as much as they normally would have and guess what? -- a self-fulfilling prophecy -- the economy starts to slow down."

Some readers also complain that The N&O's portrayal of a negative national economic picture doesn't adequately take account of more positive conditions in local markets. Real estate people, in particular, have complained.

Herb Wakeford, a member of The N&O's Community Panel, wondered at our meeting in March why we can't find the positive side of things. Yes, Exxon's profits are at record highs, but that's good news for their employees and shareholders. "There's always another side, and I think that's overlooked," he said.

I won't argue with the proposition that the media tend to focus on the negative. That could be a whole column. But there's an overwhelming case to be made for reporting the hard truth. Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke did tell Congress last week that recession is a possibility. Does the newspaper just ignore that?

Business Editor Mary Cornatzer hears the bad-news plaint regularly. "I think we just try to be realistic," she said. "That's our goal. We want to give people a realistic assessment. We're not writing for corporate boards. We're writing for their investors. We're writing for their employees. We want people to be aware of how things are, how they stand, so they can be prepared to make decisions."

I talked to a couple of academic types to see if there's any validity to the notion that negative press makes a bad economy worse. To some extent, that's true, says N.C. State economist Michael Walden. "Consumers, if they don't feel confident, won't spend money, and that's what we need to bring us out of a down cycle. There probably is some impact on consumer confidence of people reading about the state of the economy."

But, he said, "the media do not create economic issues. The situation that we're in now -- with the probability of a recession, the issues in the financial markets -- those are created by other factors. We do have real economic issues."

Walden said he thought reporting on the economy by the local media, including The N&O, has been responsible, although he said he detects a bias to the negative among some national media.

Chris Roush, a professor of business journalism at UNC, said the media wouldn't be doing their job if they tried to sugarcoat the economic news. "I don't look at the news as being negative," he said. "I look at it as the news that I need to make proper personal financial decisions."

He said, "I can remember just as many positive stories about the economy in the business section in 2003, 2004 and 2005 as the negative stories I see now. It's just the reality of what's going on in the economy." We might note here that the newspaper business itself is in economic distress and doesn't benefit from bad business news, as highlighted in last Sunday's Q Section.

I don't think The N&O should be judged on its business and economic coverage so much by whether the news is positive or negative, but by how useful it is to readers. As Roush says, we're looking for news now that helps us navigate the economic turbulence.

There are two kinds of stories that can help readers in that respect: consumer information that helps us cope with the direct impact of the economy on our lives, and in-depth coverage and analysis that helps us understand the broader winds buffeting the economy

In the first instance, I think The N&O is doing a good job. Last Sunday's Work & Money section featured a woman struggling with rising mortgage payments, trying to avoid foreclosure on her home. A series the previous week focused on people dealing with rising gas prices. Retail writer Sue Stock regularly delivers shopping advice on how to save on daily living expenses.

I haven't seen as much help with the big-picture stuff. The paper reports the breaking news such as the Fed bailing out Bear Stearns, the Treasury secretary proposing regulatory reform, Congress approving mortgage relief. But for the in-depth stories that put that news in context, I have to go to other information sources. A recent front-page story headlined "Can we fall farther? You bet" was an attempt, but it struck me as more alarmist than informative.

A local paper like The N&O is handicapped in that it has limited space for national and world news and relies mostly on wire services for non-local coverage. Our franchise is local news.

But with recent polls showing that the economy has risen to the top of people's concerns, coverage that explains, analyzes and educates seems to me the best service a paper can provide to readers struggling to understand forces over which they have little control -- but which have a huge impact on their lives.