Business Week in Pictures

The government's top financial regulator backed radical plans for a multibillion-pound tax on banks as a way to tackle the City's persistent bonus culture. Lord Turner, chairman of the Financial Services Authority, warned bankers that he would support a new wave of taxes on the City to prevent excessive profiteering if they continue to take excessive risks. In a searing critique of the industry, Lord Turner described much of the City's activities as 'socially useless' and questioned whether it has grown too large Photograph: Martin Argles

Almost two million children now live in households where there is no working adult, according to official figures that laid bare the social effects of the recession. The Office for National Statistics said the number of children in workless households rose by 170,000 to 1.9 million in April-June of this year, compared with the same period last year. One in six children now live in homes where there is no adult in employment Photograph: Matt Cardy/Getty Images

President Barack Obama nominated the chairman of the Federal Reserve, Ben Bernanke, to serve a second four-year term, delivering a vote of confidence that the US central bank chief is the right man to steer the world's largest economy out of the deepest recession since the 1930s. In a pre-emptive move to end speculation on the financial markets about the Fed's leadership, Obama interrupted his summer holiday at the seaside resort of Martha's Vineyard to announce that he wanted Bernanke to continue when his term officially ends in February Photograph: Jewel Samad/AFP/Getty Images

Toyota is considering cuts at its factory in Derbyshire. The carmaker announced plans to suspend a production line in Japan for more than a year. It is the first time it has done so in its domestic market and underlines the severity of the downturn in the car industry. It is scaling down production following the global plunge in sales, with reports suggesting it may cut its capacity by up to 1m vehicles a year Photograph: David Sillitoe

BT has become one of the first big name companies to scrap its graduate recruitment scheme, adding to fears that dwindling job prospects may lead to a 'lost generation' of young people leaving school or university and failing to find work. BT blamed the economy on the decision to axe the scheme and said there was no certainty when it might start recruiting again. BT is Britain's ninth-largest employer and has 147,000 workers Photograph: Christopher Thomond

Profits at WPP, the world's largest advertising company, almost halved in the first six months of the year as the global recession forced companies to slash spending and the owner of agencies such as JWT and Ogilvy & Mather had to meet the cost of cutting more than 7,000 employees to cope with the drop in business. Martin Sorrell, WPP chief executive, gave the City little to cheer about as he used his trademark skill with metaphors to suggest the recession would be 'L-shaped' – an italic capital L, to be exact. He said that while chief executives and marketing managers may have recently begun to feel slightly more positive about the global economy, that was not yet translating into actual spending Photograph: Martin Argles

Japanese IT group Fujitsu is cutting 1,200 jobs, almost 10% of its UK workforce, as the recession has caused corporate clients and public bodies to cut budgets to conserve cash Photograph: Shizuo Kambayashi/AP

A record surge in confidence among business professionals indicates Britain's recession is at an end, according to research. Optimism among professionals in the third quarter hit its highest level since the start of the financial crisis two years ago, the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales said Photograph: Ian Nicholson/PA