All #World Stories

Two recent revisions imply that the U.S. economy is stronger than it seems. The labor market added more jobs than expected, and GDP growth was revised up.

Education has been a difficult industry to recruit for since COVID began. Now, several parts of the U.S. are facing teacher shortages.

July’s inflation numbers have sparked a debate within the economics world. Should inflation be discussed as a year over year change? Or month over month?

Retailers experienced steady sales in July, balanced by decreased spending at gasoline stations and increased spending at building supply stores.

Countries across the world are facing high inflation, economic fallout from a pandemic, and an energy crisis caused by the war in Ukraine.

Evidence of cracks in the jobs market are hard to find but recently many have been pointing to initial unemployment claims.

After months of rising prices, the inflation rate has eased slightly – up 8.5% in July from the year before, compared to June’s 9.1%

The July jobs report obliterated expectations, with 528,000 net new jobs. This marks a full employment recovery from the COVID-19 recession.

Pay is the most important factor when searching for a job. Salary transparency laws will help job seekers, but what's the impact on employers?

Over 2.7 million people were hired in the first half of 2022 – a shockingly good number. Yet there seems to be a chorus of negative economic news recently.

The Federal Reserve is set to hike interest rates again on Wednesday. Industries such as construction could see large employment impacts.

Recessions are a painful part of economic reality. Though hard to predict, following key indicators grants insights into possible downturns.

Employment in child day care services has yet to recover from the COVID-19 shock. Parents of young children are suffering – but recruiters can help.

Initial unemployment claims have been rising steadily from historic lows. Are recession fears beginning to sink into a strong labor market?

The consumer price index increased in June, up 9.1% from the year before and 1.3% from May. Broad-based increases contributed to this hike, and high energy prices persisted in driving the report. 

The Fed is happy to see strong payroll gains and moderating wage growth in the June jobs report. Payroll gains of 372,000 and the unemployment rate remaining at 3.6% is simply a great jobs report.

In the face of recession fears, the labor market is still historically tight, but signs of depressurization are beginning to show. The number of job openings in May was 11.3 million, down slightly from April’s number of 11.4 million.

Consumers continued to spend in May, with an increase of 2.1% from one year ago. The shift from goods spending to services spending, a trend we’ve been following, continued as well.

Bombarded by soaring energy prices and constant media commentary, consumers experienced record-low economic confidence in June. Their worries will not go unnoticed, for better or for worse.

The bottom 25% of earners are gaining wages at the highest rate since 1998. Gains made by first quartile earners are outpacing those of higher quartiles by at least a full percent. 

The current labor market is often described as "tight," and it may be hard to visualize what that really means. Considering the ratio of unemployed people to job openings gives a clearer picture of exactly how tight or slack the labor market is.

The Federal Reserve has just announced the highest interest rate hike since 1994.

Summer is upon us. School’s out, vacations are beginning, and people are ready to hit their favorite seasonal locales. However, facing a labor shortage, businesses might have a hard time keeping up this summer.

No, not yet. Higher worker pay isn’t the main culprit behind inflation, but some warning signs suggest that could be the case later this year.

The U.S. economy added a solid 390,000 net new jobs in May 2022. The unemployment rate remained unchanged at 3.6%, nearly a 50-year low.

Employers are still desperate for workers. Layoffs are rare, despite anecdotes to the contrary. Quitting remained elevated, but the “Great Resignation” isn’t getting worse (for now).

Determining how the economy is performing is surprisingly difficult. COVID-19 made economists' jobs even harder, requiring them to develop entirely new methods to measure trends in the labor market.

Demand for workers is about 60% above its pre-COVID level. The paradox is that while the U.K. labour market is extremely ‘tight’ – a good thing for workers – those same workers are suffering from a cost of living crisis.

How does economic growth happen? It’s a hard question to answer but economists have tried for centuries. Perhaps the most famous model came from MIT economist Robert Solow in 1956. The Solow growth model specifies three factors that fuel growth: productivity, capital, and labor. 

Despite ongoing conflict in Europe and the highest inflationary period since the early 1980’s, the US labor market continues to grow briskly.

It’s Teacher Appreciation Week, but some educators aren’t feeling so appreciated.

Prices are rising – fast. After nearly three decades of stable prices, the US economy is experiencing a surge of inflation.

It’s an emergency not just for the housing market but for the job market too.

Recruiting became less expensive in Q1 2022, despite it being a workers’ market.

Since the rise of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, it has been estimated that 50% of paid hours were done remotely, compared to just 5% pre-pandemic.

After the initial COVID shock to the US economy, the bounceback in job growth has been remarkable. There remains an unsatiated appetite to hire by US employers.

Quits rates are at an all time high, reaching 3.0% in November of 2021. Interpreting this trend has two camps: a cultural shift where people have a lower willingness to work, or a cyclic pattern exhibited during times of quick economic recovery.

In the period after a peak Omicron surge and before war broke out in Eastern Europe, the US labor market recovery accelerated, as hiring ramped up and more people returned to the labor force.

Employers face stiff competition for workers amid labour shortages.

The COVID recession that began in 2020 and the subsequent recovery through 2021 has been unlike anything in U.S. economic history.

The U.S. economy added a shocking 467,000 net new jobs in January 2022, far above expectations, despite the surge of Omicron cases that saw 15 million people get COVID last month.

Workers who want a job are getting them, but employer demand is slowing a bit from the frenetic pace of job gains earlier in 2021.

The U.S. created 531,000 net new jobs, and previous months’ numbers were revised upward.