The number of Americans claiming new unemployment benefits fell last week to the lowest level in nearly five decades. Initial jobless claims, a proxy for layoffs across the U.S., decreased by 8,000 to a seasonally adjusted 207,000 in the week ended July 14, the Labor Department said Thursday. This marks the lowest level for claims […]
If you’re looking for the most accurate view of economic growth, you won’t find it in the government’s top-line statistics. Last month the Bureau of Economic Analysis revised its estimate for the first quarter of 2018; the BEA now says gross domestic product grew 2%, annualized, down from the previous figure of 2.2%. This dramatically […]
Global Warming: Once more, science provides bad news for global warming alarmists. U.S. CO2 levels again declined during 2017, despite overall global output again rising. Credit U.S. fracking and the natural gas boom. But don’t worry: the hysteria won’t end. The new report, based on U.S. data, shows clearly the U.S. continuing downward trend. “The […]
A gauge of U.S. business prices rose broadly in June, driven in part by a rise in transportation costs that underscores the sector’s climbing labor expenses. The producer-price index, a measure of the prices businesses receive for their goods and services, rose a seasonally adjusted 0.3% in June from a month earlier, the Labor Department […]
U.S. consumer prices rose for a third straight month in June, eating away at modest wage gains and sending inflation to its highest rate in more than six years. The consumer-price index, which gauges what Americans pay for everything from veterinarian services to baby clothes, rose a seasonally adjusted 0.1% in June from the prior […]
American factory activity accelerated for the second straight month this summer, in part because manufacturers were scrambling to move goods ahead of threatened tariffs. The Institute for Supply Management on Monday said its manufacturing index rose to 60.2 in June from 58.7 in May. Numbers above 50 indicate activity is expanding across the manufacturing sector, […]
The number of Americans seeking Social Security disability benefits is plunging, a startling reversal of a decades-old trend that threatened the program’s solvency. It is the latest evidence of a stronger economy pulling people back into the job market or preventing workers from being sidelined in the first place. The drop is so significant that […]
Economic confidence among lower-income Americans has taken a recent leap, the latest evidence that benefits of the economic expansion are reaching a broader swath of workers. Sentiment among lower-income consumers still trails that of their higher-earning counterparts. But the gap has narrowed in recent months. In the University of Michigan’s consumer-sentiment index, confidence among households […]
California voters’ decision to reduce penalties for drug and property crimes in 2014 contributed to a jump in car burglaries, shoplifting and other theft, researchers reported. Larcenies increased about 9 percent by 2016, or about 135 more thefts per 100,000 residents than if tougher penalties had remained, according to results of a study by the […]
The U.S. had more job openings this spring than unemployed Americans. For the first time since such record-keeping began in 2000, the number of available positions exceeded the number of job seekers, the Labor Department said Tuesday, a shift that is rippling across the economy and affecting the behavior of employers and workers. U.S. job […]
However, as the latest data again confirm, the state’s rate of population growth has been declining. During the 1980s, thanks to high immigration and birth rates, California was expanding by 2-plus percent a year, adding 6 million residents in just 10 years. However, immigration, legal and illegal, is now a fraction of what it once […]
California has surpassed the United Kingdom to become the world’s fifth largest economy. Federal data released Friday show California’s gross domestic product rose by $127 billion from 2016 to 2017, surpassing $2.7 trillion. The UK’s economic output slightly shrunk over that time as it prepared to leave the European Union.
The U.S. trade gap narrowed sharply in March, partly reversing a widening in the deficit that followed hurricane-related disruptions late last summer. The international-trade deficit in goods and services shrank 15.2% from a month earlier to a seasonally adjusted $48.96 billion in March, the Commerce Department said Thursday. Economists surveyed by The Wall Street Journal […]
Unemployment in the U.S. has fallen to one of the lowest levels of the post-World War II era, the result of a historically long jobs expansion that shows little evidence of slowing. The jobless rate fell to 3.9% in April from 4.1% a month earlier, hitting the lowest level since December 2000, the Labor Department […]
The number of Americans applying for unemployment benefits fell to the lowest level since 1969, the latest sign the labor market is firming after years of steady job growth. Initial jobless claims, a measure of layoffs across the U.S., fell 24,000 to a seasonally adjusted 209,000 in the week through April 21, the Labor Department […]