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Private companies in June created positions at the fastest clip this year, indicating a thaw in the labor market as summer began.

A report released Tuesday by the University of San Diego still points to gains in the job market, new residential construction and an overall improving national economy as factors behind the region’s expansion. However, local publicly traded companies did not fare well in May and consumer confidence dipped locally for the first time in 15 months.

The challengers contend public-sector unions are effectively engaging in political lobbying when they negotiate contract terms with school boards and other government agencies. The plaintiffs say forced union contributions compel public employees to subsidize speech with which they disagree, in violation of their First Amendment rights.

About 30,000 teachers pay CTA’s “agency fees” without being members, but it’s believed that should the court end compulsory payment, as many as a third of its members would drop out, which could mean a $100 million loss of annual income.

Fiscal fourth-quarter results Wednesday from payroll-services firm Paychex Inc. PAYX 0.93 % will likely reflect the lackluster and inconsistent spring seen by many small businesses.

One point the report makes is worth considering for policymakers elsewhere in the United States. While labor organizers around the country along with most major Democratic politicians have said the federal minimum wage is too low, it seems clearly too high in Puerto Rico, at 77 percent of per capita income. That puts a lot of people with less education and fewer skills out of consideration for a job.

Merced County’s increase of 2,200 manufacturing jobs from January 2014 to January 2015 was 26.2 percent, far outstripping second-place Danville’s [IL] 14.9 percent.

Among eight major advanced economies, all but one — the United States — show gains in labor force participation over the past 15 years, according to a new study by Maximiliano Dvorkin and Hannah Shell of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis.

In addition to 1,000 jobs announced earlier this month, the news takes the company’s hiring roster to 2,000.

The latest data on U.S. economic output paints a less bleak picture of the economy coming out of the first quarter. But the U.S. appears poised to match last year’s less-than-impressive first half.

The legislation, passed 60-38, will give Mr. Obama “fast track” authority that allows him to submit trade deals to Congress for an up-or-down vote without amendments. Negotiators have said that process is crucial to completing the 12-nation trade deal with countries around the Pacific Ocean, known as the Trans-Pacific Partnership.

Employment, state GDP, labor-law and tax data from 2000 to the present yield two strong lessons. First, a business-friendly climate—market-oriented labor policies and lower taxes—is effective in raising the growth in a state’s gross domestic product and employment. Second, states that suffered the worst employment shocks in the 2007-09 recession had the most rapid postrecession employment growth. This suggests that the weak national recovery cannot be explained by the depth of the recession.

History also makes clear that better macroeconomic policies can drive growth. President Reagan’s agenda—tax cuts, regulatory reforms and support of sound monetary policy—are a prominent example. After the deep recession of 1981-82, real GDP growth averaged 4.8% in the next 23 quarters. President Kennedy’s personal income-tax rate cuts in the mid-1960s and President Clinton’s tax reductions on capital accompanied by budget restraint in the late 1990s offer other examples of pro-growth policy improvements.

Silicon Valley has pioneered the so-called sharing economy with apps that help individuals exchange goods and services. But a decision by California regulators threatens the car-hailing Uber and other sharing start-ups.

Such one-size-fits-all decrees send the message that anyone who doesn’t have, or even seek, a college degree is somehow a lesser person. And it shortchanges those kids who could be well-paid auto mechanics, machine tool operators or computer technicians – or could do countless other jobs that modern society needs done.