Wall Street was set to open little changed on Thursday after data showed weekly jobless claims declined while nonfarm productivity was weaker than previously thought in the second quarter.
The number of Americans filing new claims for unemployment benefits fell last week, showing little sign of a pick-up in layoffs in the wake of a slump in business and consumer confidence.
President Barack Obama will throw down the gauntlet with a major speech before Congress on Sept. 8 that promises to be a defining moment for his term of office. Obama will establish the stakes for solving America's unemployment problem and likely politically live or die by the results. The move, expected to come with a controversial price tag, will determine whether Obama and Democrats or Boehner and Republicans can emerge from gridlock in a presidential election year with the stronger hand. ...
Just call it a tread water week for U.S. jobless claims, as they fell 12,000 last week to 409,000, the U.S. Labor Department announced Thursday, but the drop is a qualified one because some of the decline stemmed from the fact that initial claims from two weeks ago were revised up to 421,000 from the initially estimated 417,000.
New claims for unemployment benefits fell as expected last week, a government report showed on Thursday, showing little sign of a pick-up in layoffs in the wake of a slump in business and consumer confidence.
Factory activity worldwide stalled last month as new orders tumbled, heightening fears that the global economy may be heading for another recession and driving stock markets lower.
President Barack Obama has bowed to pressure from Republicans and moved the original date of his scheduled high-profile jobs speech. Obama had planned to deliver his major speech suggesting new jobs initiatives that could set the political agenda in Washington for the coming months on Sept. 7 -- but after a Republican request for a date change, it Will be on Sept. 8.
Factory activity worldwide stalled last month as new orders tumbled, a series of surveys showed on Thursday, heightening fears that the global economy may be heading for another recession.
Obama will speak to Congress about jobs, economy on Sept. 7.
The European Central Bank may have abandoned any hope it still harbored of being able to hike interest rates, but it may take more than a mild dose of recession for it to do a complete U-turn and start cutting rates again.
Unemployment in the U.S. has been stubbornly high and presents the largest single obstacle to the re-election hopes of Barack Obama. But joblessness among Americans who cannot yet vote – teenagers – are at levels that are both staggering and unprecedented. One labor economist tells IBTimes, “We have never experienced this amount of joblessness among teens.”
The pace of U.S. private sector job growth slowed in August for the second month in a row, but factory activity in the Chicago area continued to expand, suggesting the economy would dodge a recession.
Here are Indicators that the morale of the American consumer is at its lowest in years.
Despite tepid U.S. GDP growth, the U.S. job market has not collapsed, as the private sector added 91,000 jobs in August, ADP announced Wednesday.
Gold and silver prices Wednesday hovered near their previous day's closing prices as traders sorted through a mix of positive and negative economic news.
Japan and South Korea reported surprisingly weak July factory output on Wednesday as global electronics demand faded, exposing Asia's vulnerability to a worsening U.S. and European economic slowdown.
Brent crude hovered at $114 a barrel Wednesday, after posting six days of gains, on expectations the United States will act again to try and boost growth and increase demand for oil.
Asian stocks edged up Wednesday, poised to end a volatile month on a mildly stronger note, while the dollar struggled on heightened expectations that the U.S. Federal Reserve would do more to stimulate the economy.
President Barack Obama said on Tuesday there were a range of policy options available that could create up to a million new U.S. jobs, in remarks ahead of a major economic speech that he will deliver next week.
Forget the struggling economy. There's one U.S. industry -- Big Politics -- that is looking ahead to a record year in 2012.
The U.S. Federal Reserve considered a range of actions to help a struggling economy at its August meeting, including the unprecedented step of tying the interest rate policy outlook to a specific unemployment level.
Consumer confidence plunged in August to its lowest since the 2007-2009 recession, after a bruising battle over the budget slammed stock prices and pushed the nation to the brink of default.
