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☆ The Disappearing White-Collar Job
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-15 | by ( Chip Cutter | Harriet Torry | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

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☆ Is the Fed Done Raising Rates?
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-05 | by ( Harriet Torry | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Inflation is slowly easing, but it is still far from the Fed’s 2% target. WSJ’s Nick Timiraos explains how 2% became the central bank’s sweet spot. Photo illustration: Preston JesseeFederal Reserve officials this past week raised interest rates to a 16-year high and signaled they might be done hiking them for now. But they didn’t say exactly how they will know when they have reached that point. Fed Chair Jerome Powell said at a Wednesday press conference that policy makers will base the decision “on the totality of incoming data and their implications for the outlook for economic activity and inflation.”

☆ U.S. Trade With World Rose in March on Energy, Auto Shipments
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-04 | by ( Harriet Torry | Anthony Debarros | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Imports declined 0.3% in March from the prior month, reflecting lower shipments of semiconductors, chemicals and cellphones and higher imports of consumer goods. Photo: Jordan Vonderhaar/Bloomberg NewsU.S. trade with the rest of the world increased in March as companies shipped more oil, natural gas and vehicles overseas and exported more products to China after it lifted Covid restrictions. Newsletter Sign-up Real Time Economics The latest economic news, analysis and data curated weekdays by WSJ's Jeffrey Sparshott. Preview SubscribeU.S. businesses also imported more consumer goods, but reduced imports of industrial supplies and capital goods. The trade figures aren’t adjusted for inflation and reflect both demand and price changes.

☆ Biden Runs on an Improved, but Still Troubled Economy
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-26 | by ( Harriet Torry | Rosie Ettenheim | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

WASHINGTON—President Biden launches his re-election campaign facing voters soured on a U.S. economy with high inflation, climbing interest rates and a strong but cooling labor market. By several measures, the economy is better for many Americans since Mr. Biden took office amid its rebound from the short but severe pandemic-driven recession of 2020. Unemployment has fallen since he was inaugurated on Jan. 20, 2021, amid robust job growth and rising wages. That helped fuel strong consumer spending, though broader economic growth has been uneven.

☆ Global Economy Gets Boost but Inflation Worries Linger
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-21 | by ( Paul Hannon | Harriet Torry | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Surveys suggest the European Central Bank is on course to raise its key interest rate in May. Photo: KAI PFAFFENBACH/REUTERSU.S. and European business activity rose in April at the fastest pace in about a year, a boost for the global economy but a potentially complicating factor for central banks working to reduce high inflation. Demand for services drove the growth, according to surveys by data firm S&P Global covering U.S., eurozone and U.K. businesses. That kept pressure on price increases in regions where inflation last year reached its highest level in decades.

☆ Retail Report to Show Demand as Consumers Faced Banking Troubles, Rising Rates
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-14 | by ( Harriet Torry | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

A report on U.S. retail sales will gauge consumers’ willingness to spend at stores, restaurants and online in March, amid turmoil in the banking sector, rising interest rates and easing hiring. Households pulled back on retail shopping and dining out in February after spending strongly in a warmer-than-usual January. Consumers benefited recently from lower gasoline prices and a broad cooling in inflation. Prices rose at the slowest rate in nearly two years in March. That could keep the Federal Reserve in position to keep raising interest rates at its next meeting.

☆ Retail Sales Report Shows Americans Pulled Back on Big-Ticket Purchases as Interest Rates Rose
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-14 | by ( Harriet Torry | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

☆ World Bank Warns of Lost Decade for Global Economy
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-02 | by ( Harriet Torry | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Over the past year, governments around the world have announced tax breaks, subsidies and new laws in a bid to accelerate investment, combat climate change and expand their workforces. That might not be enough.

☆ Banking Strains, Inflation Threaten Global Economic Rebound
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-24 | by ( Paul Hannon | Harriet Torry | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Large parts of the global economy continue to show signs of a modest rebound after a sharp slowdown at the end of last year, but the improved outlook is threatened by stubbornly high inflation and banking strains in the U.S. and Europe. Business surveys published Friday recorded pickups in activity across Europe that were almost entirely driven by services providers, while Japan saw a similar acceleration that was aided by the arrival of tourists from China after the lifting of Covid-19 restrictions.

☆ Pricey Child Care Is Keeping Many Parents Out of the Workforce
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-18 | by ( Harriet Torry | Photographs Kim Raff For The Wall Street Journal | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Many lower-income Americans who left the workforce when the pandemic began three years ago are staying on the sidelines because of a lack of child care, a factor contributing to worker shortages and historically low unemployment. An estimated 380,000 Americans in their prime working years, aged 25 to 54, held jobs before the pandemic but no longer did late last year, according to estimates from Bank of America . Bank economists said the lack of affordable and quality child care is a significant factor.

☆ February Retail Sales to Show if Consumers Pulled Back
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-15 | by ( Harriet Torry | Sarah Nassauer | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

A report on February retail sales will show whether Americans pulled back on spending after a strong start to the year, aided by unseasonably warm weather and a strong labor market. U.S. consumers have shown surprising vigor in early 2023, after their spending weakened late last year. Retail sales, a measure of spending at stores, online and in restaurants, rose by a seasonally adjusted 3% in January, the Commerce Department said. That was the largest monthly gain in nearly two years and came after sales fell in November and December.

☆ Bowling for $418? Surge Pricing Creeps Into Restaurants, Movies, Gym Class
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-12 | by ( Harriet Torry | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Alex Yenni recently endeavored to take his wife and 5-year-old son bowling with another family in Petaluma, Calif., close to their home. The plan quickly went into the gutter. Mr. Yenni, a 42-year-old advertising executive, tried to book online in advance at AMF Boulevard Lanes, where he wanted to reserve two lanes for two hours at 3 p.m. on the last Thursday of the year during winter break.

The global economy is showing vigor despite rising borrowing costs and elevated energy and food prices, a sign that central banks may need longer than anticipated to bring inflation under control. Data from the U.S., China and Europe have shown surprising vitality in these regions’ economies since the start of 2023, confounding predictions from the World Bank and other economists that the global economy was set for one of its weakest years in recent decades.

☆ Economy Showing Strength in Early 2023 After Last Quarter’s GDP Gain Revised Modestly Lower
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-23 | by ( Harriet Torry | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

A worker picking up food for delivery from a restaurant in Holly Springs, N.C. The U.S. economy appears to be exhibiting strength early this year, after posting solid, but slightly weaker, growth at the end of 2022. Gross domestic product, a broad measure of the goods and services produced across the U.S., rose at a 2.7% annual rate in the fourth quarter, adjusted for seasonality and inflation, the Commerce Department said Thursday. That was down from a previous estimate of 2.9% growth, and slower than the third quarter’s 3.2% growth.

☆ U.S. Households Lifting Economy After Being Stung by Inflation Last Year
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-17 | by ( Jon E. Hilsenrath | Harriet Torry | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Consumers are showing resilience after being squeezed by high inflation, rising interest rates and the end of federal Covid-relief programs. The U.S. economy started the year with surprising vigor, thanks partly to rising household incomes and consumer resilience. Slowing inflation, pay raises negotiated last year, cost-of-living adjustments for retirees and state tax cuts have lined up to lift consumer purchasing power, fortifying spending and economic growth at a time when many analysts were predicting a slowdown or even recession. This marks a turnabout for households that were squeezed last year by high inflation, climbing interest rates and the end of Covid-related federal relief programs.

☆ Fed’s Williams Says Policy Will Have to be Kept Sufficiently Restrictive For ‘Few Years’
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-08 | by ( Harriet Torry | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

A senior Federal Reserve official said the central bank will need to keep monetary policy sufficiently restrictive for ‘a few years’ to bring down inflation and realign supply and demand in the U.S. economy. “To me, the important thing is we need a sufficiently restrictive stance, we need to retain a sufficiently restrictive stance of policy, we’re going to need to maintain that for a few years to make sure we get inflation to 2%, then eventually we’ll get interest rates presumably back to more normal levels,” New York Fed President John Williams said at The Wall Street Journal’s CFO Network Summit in New York. Fed officials last week approved lifting the benchmark federal-funds rate by a quarter-percentage point to a range between 4.5% and 4.75%. That was a slower pace than at prior meetings, they raised it by a half point in December and 0.75 point in November.

☆ Fed Officials Signal Higher Interest Rates Will Be Needed to Contain Inflation
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-08 | by ( Harriet Torry | Nick Timiraos | ) www.wsj.com time to read: +3 min

A senior Federal Reserve official said the economy will need higher borrowing costs for a few years to bring down inflation and prevent price pressures from strengthening. “We still have some work to do to get interest rates in the right place,” said New York Fed President John Williams at The Wall Street Journal’s CFO Network Summit in New York on Wednesday. The Fed began raising interest rates from near zero last March. Separately, Fed governor Christopher Waller said he was optimistic that the Fed’s rate increases were slowing the economy. “And it might be a long fight, with interest rates higher for longer than some are currently expecting.”Their comments come a day after Fed Chair Jerome Powell said the labor market’s surprising strength underscores why bringing inflation down will take longer and require higher interest rates than many investors have been anticipating.

☆ U.S. Imports Rose in December, Partially Offsetting Weakening Global Trade
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-07 | by ( Harriet Torry | Jason Douglas | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

The trade deficit in goods and services was a seasonally adjusted $67.4 billion in December. U.S. imports rose in December as demand for consumer goods and autos picked up, partially offsetting a weakening in global trade late last year and widening the U.S. trade deficit by 10.5%. The trade deficit in goods and services was a seasonally adjusted $67.4 billion in December, the Commerce Department said Tuesday, up from a revised $61 billion November.

☆ U.S. Trade Deficit Hit Record in 2022
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-07 | by ( Harriet Torry | Jason Douglas | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

A wider trade deficit is consistent with a U.S. economy growing faster than other parts of the world. The U.S. posted its largest trade deficit on record last year, as global demand weakened amid high inflation, climbing interest rates, disruptions due to the Ukraine war and the pandemic’s continued effects. America’s imports exceeded its exports by $948.1 billion in 2022, up 12.2% from 2021, the Commerce Department said Tuesday.

☆ Child Care Hasn’t Recovered From Covid, Keeping Many Parents at Home
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-06 | by ( Harriet Torry | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

The high cost and limited availability of child care is keeping some parents out of the labor force when unemployment is at its lowest rate in more than half a century. There were about 58,000 fewer daycare workers in the U.S. last month compared with February 2020, just before the pandemic took hold, according to the Labor Department, even though the broader labor market has recovered all lost jobs.

☆ U.S. Retail Sales Fell 1.1% in December
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-18 | by ( Harriet Torry | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

☆ December Retail Sales Report to Show How Consumers Weathered Holiday Season
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-18 | by ( Harriet Torry | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

A report on December U.S. retail sales will show consumers’ appetite for spending on gifts, dining out and big-ticket purchases during the final month of the holiday season. High inflation and rising borrowing costs caused some households to pull back late last year, and retailers said the recently completed holiday shopping season turned out to be weaker than expected. Macy’s Inc. warned of softer sales, and Lululemon Athletica Inc. said its profit margins were squeezed as shoppers bought more items on sale. Broadly, discounting became more commonplace.

☆ U.S. Trade Deficit Narrowed Sharply in November as Global Demand Cooled
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-05 | by ( Harriet Torry | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Container cranes stood idle at the Port of Los Angeles in California in November. The U.S. trade deficit shrank in November at the steepest monthly rate in nearly 14 years, adding to signs of a global economic slowdown through the holiday season amid high inflation and climbing interest rates. America’s imports fell more than exports, causing the country’s deficit in trade of goods and services to narrow in November by 21% to a seasonally adjusted $61.51 billion, the Commerce Department said Thursday, compared with a $77.85 billion gap in October.

☆ November Retail Sales Report to Show Holiday Spending Trends as High Inflation Eased
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-15 | by ( Harriet Torry | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

A report on November U.S. retail sales will show consumer-spending trends on goods and dining out during the holiday season—and whether shoppers benefited from easing inflation. Retail sales, a measure of spending at stores, online and in restaurants, surged by a seasonally adjusted 1.3% in October, the Commerce Department said last month.

☆ November Retail Sales Fell in Biggest Drop in Nearly a Year
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-15 | by ( Harriet Torry | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

U.S. retail sales fell sharply in November as the holiday shopping season got under way, posting their biggest drop in nearly a year as inflation cooled. Sales at U.S. retail stores, online sellers, and restaurants fell by a seasonally-adjusted 0.6% in November from the previous month, the Commerce Department said Thursday. That was a slowdown from October’s robust 1.3% sales increase.

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