News

California regulators threw a lifeline Thursday to the struggling Ivanpah solar plant, which has failed to generate the electricity it is required to produce under contracts with PG&E Corp.

The jobless rate declined or held steady in all but nine states in the 12 months through January, the Labor Department said Monday. Nationally, the rate fell eight-tenths of a percentage point to 4.9% over the year. Of the states that saw their unemployment rates increase, most are closely tied economically to energy production.

The trade gap expanded 2.2% from the prior month to a seasonally adjusted $45.68 billion, the Commerce Department said Friday. That was wider than the deficit of $44.0 billion expected by economists The Wall Street Journal surveyed.

Growth in “labor quality,” a measure of the skill set of the average worker, has declined in the last few years, according to the report. In 2015, the growth in overall workforce skills contributed less than 0.1 percentage points to GDP growth, the smallest contribution of labor quality to growth since 1979. Michael Feroli, the author of the note, estimates that contribution will remain below 0.1 percentage points for the next few years.

Personal spending rose 0.5% in January from the prior month, the Commerce Department said on Friday, and Americans’ pretax earnings from salaries and investments increased at the same pace.

Unemployment rates in just 14 states had returned to or fallen below their 2007 averages in 2015: Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Ohio, Vermont and Wisconsin.

New orders for durable goods—manufactured products designed to last at least three years—rose in January following their worst annual performance since the recession. That improvement, alongside a pickup in a key gauge of business investment, could signal the sector may be preparing to turn a corner.

Popular culture portrays innovators in the U.S. as young college dropouts. A more accurate description is older, well-educated immigrants, according to a new study.

Only four states have black unemployment rates that are now lower than the national average for black workers: Texas, New York, New Jersey and Tennessee. Those states also had rates that were lower than the national average for black workers before the recession hit.

The White House released its annual Economic Report of the President on Monday, which summarizes the state of the economy and also provides insight to what’s on the mind of the president’s top economic advisers.

You would think the number of apprenticeships in the U.S. would have recovered since the recession.

Industrial production—a broad measure of everything made by manufacturers, mines and utilities—jumped 0.9% in January from a month earlier, the Federal Reserve said Wednesday.

U.S. consumers showed signs of strength in January, taking advantage of low oil prices to increase their spending and offering a welcome counterpoint to the gloom that has gripped investors and roiled markets since the start of the year.

Home-price growth accelerated late last year, according to a report released Wednesday by the National Association of Realtors, as a lack of supply continues to drive up prices despite cooling demand. . . The five most expensive markets in the county were San Jose, Calif., where the median existing family home price was $940,000, San Francisco at $781,600 and Honolulu at $716,600. . . “Homeownership continues to be out of reach for a number of qualified buyers in the top job-producing, but costliest, parts of the country—especially on the West Coast and parts of the South,” said Lawrence Yun, chief economist at NAR.

The U.S. labor market slowed substantially in January but unemployment hit an eight-year low, sending mixed signals for Federal Reserve officials as they assess whether the economy is strong enough for another interest-rate increase.