About 70 percent of U.S. chief financial officers say that credit conditions are worse or much worse than in 2007, limiting businesses' ability to hire and continuing to dampen economic growth.

That's one grim finding from the latest quarterly survey of 1,389 chief financial officers, released this morning by Duke University and CFO Magazine.

"CFOs are telling us the credit crunch has not abated," said Duke professor Campbell Harvey, left, in a prepared statement. "It is hard to run the economic engine without any financial lubricant. This prolonged financial crunch poses a real risk of sending us into a double-dip recession."

About half of U.S. companies plan to increase full-time employment in the next year, but hiring remains modest at best and 56 percent won't get back to pre-recession employment levels until 2012 or later.

Bassadour Butler & Eugene, a Raleigh-based real estate development company, filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy last week.

The company joins a growing list of local real estate firms that have run into trouble since lenders tightened standards and
the pace of new construction slowed.

In February, Mammoth Grading of Raleigh and Fowler Contracting of Cary declared bankruptcy. Last month Durham-based Mainline Contracting filed for Chapter 11.

BB&E's filing lists assets of up to $50,000 and liabilities of between $100,000 and $500,000. Total creditors number between 50 and 100.

The largest creditor listed is GMAC at $96,000. Other creditors include Ford Motor Credit ($35,000), BP Gas ($18,000), and Office Max ($15,000).

BB&E started in 1994. The company provides design, construction and consulting services to residential and commercial projects.

A call to the company's Boylan Avenue office went straight to voice mail this afternoon.