Harriet Torry

1 week ago | wsj.com | Harriet Torry

While Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell generally has a pretty rosy view of the current labor market, he tells reporters that although there aren’t a lot of layoffs, “more concerning” is the fact that there isn’t a lot of job creation either. “If you’re out of work, it’s hard to find a job,” he says. “The U.S. economy has defied all kinds of forecasts for it to weaken,” Powell says as he wraps up his press conference. “Eventually it will, we don’t see signs of that now.”

3 weeks ago | wsj.com | Harriet Torry

The lion’s share of new jobs created in May came from just three sectors, according to the Labor Department’s monthly employment report. Health care: 62,000 new jobsSocial assistance: 16,000 new jobsLeisure and hospitality: 48,000 new jobs. Hiring meanwhile was broadly flat in most other industries, and federal government employment declined—it’s down by 59,000 since January. Demand for temporary help workers dropped too last month, a sign companies are turning more cautious on hiring.

4 weeks ago | wsj.com | Harriet Torry

Underlying demand in the U.S. economy grew less than previously thought in the three months through March, revised data showed Thursday. Final sales to private domestic purchases, a measure that tracks demand from businesses and consumers, rose at a 2.5% rate. The figure was down from an earlier estimate of 3%. The reading, in updated Commerce Department GDP data issued Thursday, was the weakest since mid-2023.

4 weeks ago | wsj.com | Harriet Torry

The U.S. economy's contraction during the first quarter was slightly less severe than initially thought, according to new government data. Gross domestic product, a broad measure of the goods and services produced across the U.S., contracted at a 0.2% seasonally and inflation-adjusted annual rate January through March, the Commerce Department said Thursday. The department estimated a month ago that first-quarter GDP contracted at a 0.3% rate.

1 month ago | wsj.com | Harriet Torry

Factory-gate prices fell unexpectedly last month, due to a decline in services prices. The producer-price index dropped by a seasonally adjusted 0.5% in April, the Labor Department said Thursday. It attributed the decline to a 0.7% drop in services prices, the largest pullback since the index began in December 2009, due to lower margins for trade services. The index for goods was unchanged. Economists polled by The Wall Street Journal had expected the overall index to rise by 0.3%.