U.S. households ramped up their spending in July, providing reassurance that the economy’s decadelong expansion continued to roll despite slowing factory activity and global growth. Personal-consumption expenditures, a measure of household spending, increased a seasonally adjusted 0.6% in July from June, a pickup from the previous two months, the Commerce Department said Friday, continuing a […]
President Trump said U.S. companies were “hereby ordered” to start looking for alternatives to doing business in China after Beijing said it would impose tariffs on $75 billion worth of additional U.S. products. “Our Country has lost, stupidly, Trillions of Dollars with China over many years,” Mr. Trump wrote in a series of tweets. “They […]
Democrats dream of powering society entirely with wind and solar farms combined with massive batteries. Realizing this dream would require the biggest expansion in mining the world has seen and would produce huge quantities of waste. “Renewable energy” is a misnomer. Wind and solar machines and batteries are built from nonrenewable materials. And they wear […]
Rising homelessness in California has spurred a rodent boom and resurgence of medieval disease. So naturally Democrats in the state Legislature want to ban rat poison. Earlier this year a rat infestation in downtown Los Angeles near a homeless encampment led to an outbreak of typhus. CatsUSA Pest Control, which was hired to investigate, warned […]
U.S. mortgage rates have tumbled to their lowest level in nearly three years, but they are unlikely to provide much of a lift to the sluggish home-sales market. Economists said the rates could provide a modest boost to sales during the final months of this year, though few expect cheaper borrowing costs to reverse the […]
Worries about the health of the economy and increasingly uncertain trade relations between the U.S. and China will put further pressure on global oil demand in 2019, the International Energy Agency said Friday. In its closely watched oil-market report, the IEA downgraded its forecast for global oil-demand growth for the third time in four months, […]
Public pension plans fell short of their projected returns this year, adding to the burden on governments struggling to fund promised benefits to retired workers. Public plans with more than $1 billion in assets earned a median return of 6.79% for the year ended June 30, the lowest since 2016, according to Wilshire Trust Universe […]
President Trump raised the possibility that trade talks with China could break off again, sending stocks lower. In comments to reporters Friday, Mr. Trump indicated the U.S. was prepared for Beijing to back out of talks, which were tentatively set to take place in Washington next month. “We’ll see whether or not we keep our […]
The House of Representatives passed a bill Thursday that would more than double the federal minimum wage to $15 by 2025. The bill, which passed by a 231-199 margin, was sponsored by Rep. Bobby Scott (D., Va.) and was a compromise that progressive Democrats struck with more centrist members of the party. It is unlikely […]
U.S. inflation continued to recover in May from a sharp slowdown earlier this year, a trend that could ease the Federal Reserve’s worries about weak price pressures while potentially tempering investors’ hopes for an interest-rate cut next month. The Fed’s preferred inflation gauge, the price index for personal-consumption expenditures, rose a seasonally adjusted 0.16% in […]
Apple Inc. is manufacturing its new Mac Pro computer in China, according to people familiar with its plans, shifting abroad production of what had been its only major device assembled in the U.S. as trade tensions escalate between the Trump administration and Beijing. The tech giant has tapped contractor Quanta Computer Inc. to manufacture the […]
The Golden State is cursed with some of the finest weather and richest soil on earth. Its luminous skies and airy loam have been crucial to California’s transformation into our most populous and agriculturally most bountiful state. But capricious nature has withheld one essential resource needed to sustain this dizzying growth—water. In his sprawling, provocative […]
U.S. industrial production rose in May, a welcome sign of strength in the sector after a spate of weak readings this year. Industrial production, a measure of factory, mining and utility output, rose a seasonally adjusted 0.4% in May from the prior month, the Federal Reserve said Friday. Economists surveyed by The Wall Street Journal […]
California’s homeless population is going up despite billions of dollars in taxpayer-funded efforts, according to recently released data and officials. Homelessness jumped 12% and 16% from a year ago in the county and city of Los Angeles, respectively, according to figures released this week based on a count conducted in January. The tally showed 58,936 […]
Employers tapped the brakes on hiring in May, signaling companies are taking a more cautious approach at a time of cooling global growth and trade tensions and adding to other signs of a spring slowdown in the decadelong U.S. economic expansion. The economy added 75,000 jobs in May, marking the 104th straight month of gains, […]