American Rescue Plan (2021)

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    Factory Jobs Are Booming Like It’s the 1970s

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    U.S. manufacturing is experiencing a rebound, with companies adding workers amid high consumer demand for products.WASHINGTON — Ever since American manufacturing entered a long stretch of automation and outsourcing in the late 1970s, every recession has led to the loss of factory jobs that never returned. But the recovery from the pandemic recession has been different: American manufacturers have now added enough jobs to regain all that they shed — and then some.The resurgence has not been driven by companies bringing back factory jobs that had moved overseas, nor by the brawny industrial sectors and regions often evoked by President Biden, former President Donald J. Trump and other champions of manufacturing.Instead, the engines in this recovery include pharmaceutical plants, craft breweries and ice-cream makers. The newly created jobs are more likely to be located in the Mountain West and the Southeast than in the classic industrial strongholds of the Great Lakes.American manufacturers cut roughly 1.36 million jobs from February to April of 2020, as Covid-19 shut down much of the economy. As of August this year, manufacturers had added back about 1.43 million jobs, a net gain of 67,000 workers above prepandemic levels.Data suggest that the rebound is largely a product of the unique circumstances of the pandemic recession and recovery. Covid-19 crimped global supply chains, making domestic manufacturing more attractive to some companies. Federal stimulus spending helped to power a shift in Americans’ buying habits away from services like travel and restaurants and toward goods like cars and sofas, helping domestic factory production — and with it, job growth — to bounce back much faster than it did in the previous two recessions.Treasury Secretary Janet L. Yellen said that the recovery of manufacturing jobs was a result of the unique nature of the recession, which was induced by the pandemic, and the robust federal response, including legislation like the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan of 2021.“We had a huge shift away from services and into goods that spurred production and manufacturing and very rapid recovery in the U.S. economy,” Ms. Yellen told reporters during a trip to Detroit this month. The support for local economies and small businesses included in Mr. Biden’s rescue plan, she said, “has been tremendously helpful in restoring the health of the job market and given the shifting in spending patterns, I think that’s been to the benefit of manufacturing.”American manufacturers, like many industries, have struggled to find raw materials, component parts and skilled workers. And yet, they have continued to create jobs at a rate that has surprised even some longtime promoters of American factory employment.“We have 67,000 more workers today than we had in February 2020,” said Chad Moutray, the chief economist for the National Association of Manufacturers. “I didn’t think we would get there, to be honest with you.”In recessions over the last half century, factories have typically laid off a greater share of workers than other employers in the economy, and they have been slower to add jobs back in recoveries. Often, companies have used those economic inflection points to accelerate their pace of outsourcing jobs to foreign countries, where wages are significantly lower, and to invest in technology that replaces human workers.The State of Jobs in the United StatesEconomists have been surprised by recent strength in the labor market, as the Federal Reserve tries to engineer a slowdown and tame inflation.August Jobs Report: Job growth slowed in August but stayed solid, suggesting that the labor market recovery remains resilient, even as companies pull back on hiring.Job Market Trends: The labor market appears hot, but the supply of labor has fallen short, holding back the economy. Here is why.Gig Workers: Labor activists hoped President Biden would tackle gig worker issues aggressively. But a year and a half into his presidency, little has been done at the federal level.Black Employment: Black workers saw wages and employment rates go up in the wake of the pandemic. But as the Federal Reserve tries to tame inflation, those gains could be eroded.This time was different. Factory layoffs roughly matched those in the services sector in the depth of the pandemic recession. Economists attribute that break in the trend to many U.S. manufacturers being deemed “essential” during pandemic lockdowns, and the ensuing surge in demand for their products by Americans.Manufacturing jobs quickly rebounded in the spring of 2020, then began to climb at a much faster pace than has been typical for factory job creation in recent decades. Since June 2020, under both Mr. Trump and Mr. Biden, factories have added more than 30,000 jobs a month.Sectors that hemorrhaged employment in recent recessions have fared much better in this recovery. Furniture makers, who eliminated a third of their jobs in the 2008 financial crisis and its aftermath, have nearly returned to their prepandemic employment levels. So have textile mills, paper products companies and computer equipment makers.Manufacturers say the numbers could be even stronger, if not for their continued difficulties attracting and hiring skilled workers amid 3.7 percent unemployment.Fernando Torres, vice president of operations for Greene Tweed, a Pennsylvania-based manufacturer of materials and components used by the aerospace and semiconductor industries, said his company has had to become more flexible to attract new workers and offer more attractive salaries and benefits. He has been looking for employees with different backgrounds that the company can train to develop the skills to fill open jobs, and said that it has been hard to retain staff because competitors are aggressively trying to lure them away.But Mr. Torres said that Greene Tweed, which employs just fewer than 2,000 workers, did not plan to give up, considering the demand for his company’s products.“We are looking for lots of employees,” Mr. Torres said. “We are not looking at slowing down.”Chuck Wetherington, president of BTE Technologies, a manufacturer of medical devices based in Maryland, said that he was trying to expand his work force of around 40 by 10 percent. A lack of workers, he said, has become a bigger problem than supply chain disruptions.“Our backlog continues to grow,” Mr. Wetherington said at a National Association of Manufacturers briefing. “I just can’t find the employees.”Mr. Biden has pushed a variety of legislative initiatives to boost domestic manufacturing, including direct spending on infrastructure, tax credits and other subsidies for companies like battery makers and semiconductor factories, and new federal procurement requirements that benefit manufacturers located in the United States. Biden administration officials say those policies could play a decisive role in further encouraging factory job growth in the coming months and years, in hopes of continuing the expansion and possibly pushing factory employment back to pre-2008 levels.Other factors could help hasten more American manufacturing. Delayed deliveries, sky-high shipping prices and other supply chain issues during the pandemic have encouraged some chief executives to think about moving production closer to home. The average price to ship a 40-foot container internationally has fallen sharply in recent months, but it is still three times higher than it was before the pandemic, according to tracking by the freight booking platform Freightos.A container ship at the Port of Los Angeles. As Covid-19 crimped global supply chains, domestic manufacturing became more attractive to some companies.Stella Kalinina for The New York TimesBusinesses are also beginning to question the wisdom of producing so many goods in China, amid rising tensions between Washington and Beijing over trade and technology. The Chinese government’s insistence on a zero-Covid policy, despite the severe disruptions it has caused for the economy, has especially shaken many executives’ confidence in their ability to operate in China. Mr. Biden has also maintained many tariffs on Chinese imports imposed by Mr. Trump.“The pandemic response by China has definitely prompted more than a rethink on where to put new money. I think we are actually beginning to see action,” said Mary Lovely, a professor of economics at Syracuse University and a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics. How much of that investment came to the United States was unclear. “I don’t think anyone really knows,” she added.Ed Gresser, the vice president of trade and global markets at the Progressive Policy Institute, a left-leaning think tank, said that the United States had seen a noticeable uptick in new manufacturing establishments since 2019, especially in the pharmaceutical sector, which might be a response to the pandemic. Food and beverage establishments have also continued to grow.But while growth in the U.S. manufacturing sector was strong last year, so were imports of manufactured goods, Mr. Gresser said. That suggests, he said, that the growth of manufacturing probably reflects strong consumer demand in the United States through the pandemic, rather than a shift to production in the United States.While attitudes toward doing business in China have quickly soured, patterns of production have been slower to change. A survey of 117 leading companies released in August by the U.S. China Business Council found that business optimism had reached record lows, but U.S. corporations remained overwhelmingly profitable in China, which is still home to the world’s most expansive ecosystem of factories and a lucrative consumer market.Eight percent of the surveyed companies reported moving segments of their supply chain out of China to the United States in the past year, while another 16 percent had moved some operations to other countries. But 78 percent of the companies said they had not shifted any business away from China.The Biden administration is hopeful that new policies — including a manufacturing competitiveness law and a climate law the president signed this summer — will encourage more companies to leave China for the United States, particularly cutting-edge industries like clean energy and advanced computing.Brian Deese, the director of the National Economic Council, said in an interview that the laws were already changing the calculus for investment and job creation in the United States. In recent weeks, White House officials have promoted factory announcements from automakers, battery companies and others, directly linked to the climate bill.“One of the most striking things that we are seeing now,” Mr. Deese said, “is the number of companies — U.S. companies and global companies — that are committing to build and expand their manufacturing footprint in the United States, and doing so based on their view that not only did the pandemic highlight the need for more resilience in their supply chains, but that the United States is creating a policy environment that makes long term investment here in the United States more attractive.” More

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    Pandemic Aid Cut U.S. Poverty to New Low in 2021, Census Bureau Reports

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    A measure that accounts for all federal subsidies also showed a reduction of almost half in the number of children below the poverty level.A second year of emergency pandemic aid from the federal government drove poverty to the lowest level on record in 2021 and cut the number of poor children by nearly half, the Census Bureau reported on Tuesday.The poverty rate fell to 7.8 percent, down from 9.2 percent the previous year, according to the Supplemental Poverty Measure, a yardstick that includes wages, taxes and the fullest account of government aid. In addition, the share of children in poverty sank to another record low of 5.2 percent, down 4.5 percentage points from 2020, a sharp acceleration of a long-term trend. In large part, those changes reflect the trillions of stimulus dollars approved by Congress, culminating in the Democrats’ American Rescue Plan of March 2021, especially the expanded child tax credit, which temporarily provided an income guarantee to families with children.Real median household income reached $70,800, not significantly different from 2020, as increases in full-time employment were offset by rising inflation and decreases in unemployment insurance, which had been supplemented above normal levels through the summer of 2021. The “official” poverty rate, generally considered outdated because it omits hundreds of billions spent on programs like tax credits and housing assistance, also did not change significantly from the previous year.How Poverty Has DecreasedThe official poverty rate was 11.6 percent last year, but the supplemental rate — which accounts for the impact of government programs — fell to 7.8 percent.

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    Share of the population living in poverty
    The supplemental rate adjusts for geographic differences. It also includes wage income, taxes and the fullest account of government aid.Sources: Census Bureau; Columbia UniversityKarl RussellThis data covers a year that was profoundly influenced by a set of emergency programs that have largely expired. Since then, many families have again found themselves under financial strain.Progressives see the reduction in poverty — even if temporary — as evidence that the federal government has the power to give people a better standard of living and that it should continue to do so in the future.“Man, I’m just grinning ear to ear,” said Luke Shaefer, who runs a center on poverty at the University of Michigan and sees the expanded child tax credit as a blueprint for a permanent program. “Americans wonder if the government can shape successful policies that address poverty. This offers incontrovertible evidence that it can.”Inflation F.A.Q.Card 1 of 5What is inflation? More

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    Economic Aid, Once Plentiful, Falls Off at a Painful Moment

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    Food insecurity is rising again as relief provided by President Biden’s $1.9 trillion stimulus package wanes.PORTLAND, Ore. — For the better part of last year, the pandemic eased its grip on Oregon’s economy. Awash in federal assistance, including direct checks to individuals and parents, many of the state’s most vulnerable found it easier to afford food, housing and other daily staples.Most of that aid, which was designed to be a temporary bridge, has run out at a particularly bad moment. Oregon, like states across the nation, has seen its economy improve, but prices for everything from eggs to gas to rent have spiked. Demand is growing at food banks like William Temple House in Northwest Portland, where the line for necessities like bread, vegetables and toilet paper stretched two dozen people deep on a recent day.“I’m very worried, like I was in the first month of the pandemic, that we will run out of food,” said Susannah Morgan, who runs the Oregon Food Bank, which helps supply William Temple House and 1,400 other meal assistance sites.In March 2021, President Biden signed into law a $1.9 trillion aid package aimed at helping people stay afloat when the economy was still reeling from the coronavirus. In addition to direct checks, the package included rental assistance and other measures meant to prevent evictions. It ensured free school lunches and offered expanded food assistance through several programs.Those programs helped the U.S. economy recover far more quickly than many economists had expected, but they have run their course as prices soar at the fastest pace in 40 years. The Federal Reserve, in an attempt to tame inflation, is rapidly raising borrowing costs, slowing the economy’s growth and stoking fears of a recession. While the labor market remains remarkably strong, the Fed’s interest rate increases risk slamming the brakes on the economy and pushing millions of people out of work, which would hurt lower-wage workers and risk adding to evictions and food insecurity.Several factors have driven prices higher in the last year, including a shift in spending toward goods like couches and cars and away from services. Supply chain snarls, a buying frenzy in the housing market and an oil price spike surrounding the Russian invasion of Ukraine have also contributed. While gas prices have fallen in recent months, rent continues to rise, and food and other staples remain elevated.Another factor fueling inflation, at least in small part, is the stimulus spending that helped speed the economy’s recovery and keep people out of poverty. More money in people’s bank accounts translated into more consumer spending.While the extent to which the rescue package fed inflation remains a matter of disagreement, almost no one, in Washington or on the front lines of helping vulnerable people across the country, expects another round of federal aid even if the economy tips into a recession. Lawmakers have grown increasingly concerned that more stimulus could exacerbate rising prices.In the meantime, the progress that the Biden administration hailed in fighting poverty last year has faded. The national child poverty rate and the food hardship rate for families with children, which dipped in 2021, have both rebounded to their highest levels since December 2020, according to researchers at Columbia University’s Center on Poverty and Social Policy. Two in five Americans surveyed by the Census Bureau at the end of July said they had difficulty paying a usual household expense in the previous week, the highest rate in two years of the survey.What is happening at the William Temple House is emblematic of the economic situation. Demand for food is swelling again, and officials here blame rising prices and lost federal aid. The people seeking help come from a wide variety of backgrounds: parents, retirees struggling to stretch Social Security benefits, immigrants who speak Mandarin, college graduates with jobs.Inflation F.A.Q.Card 1 of 5Inflation F.A.Q.What is inflation? More

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    White House Struggles to Talk About Inflation, the ‘Problem From Hell’

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    Inflation is upending voter confidence and posing a glaring political liability that looms over the Biden administration’s major policy decisions.WASHINGTON — President Biden was at a private meeting discussing student debt forgiveness this year when, as happens uncomfortably often these days, the conversation came back to inflation.“He said with everything he does, Republicans are going to attack him and use the word ‘inflation,’” said Representative Tony Cárdenas, Democrat of California, referring to Mr. Biden’s meeting with the Congressional Hispanic Caucus in April. Mr. Cárdenas said Mr. Biden was aware he would be attacked over rising prices “no matter what issue we’re talking about.”The comment underscored how today’s rapid price increases, the fastest since the 1980s, pose a glaring political liability that looms over every major policy decision the White House makes — leaving Mr. Biden and his colleagues on the defensive as officials discover that there is no good way to talk to voters about inflation.The administration has at times splintered internally over how to discuss price increases and has revised its inflation-related message several times as talking points fail to resonate and new data comes in. Some Democrats in Congress have urged the White House to strike a different — and more proactive — tone ahead of the November midterm elections.But the reality the White House faces is a hard one: There is little politicians can do to quickly bring price increases to heel. Federal Reserve policy is the nation’s main solution to inflation, but the central bank tempers price gains by making money more expensive to borrow to cool off demand, a slow and potentially painful process for the economy.“For a president, inflation is the problem from hell — you can’t win,” said Elaine Kamarck, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and the founding director of the Center for Effective Public Management. “Because it’s so difficult economically, politically it is even worse: There’s nothing you can do in the short run to solve it.”Consumer prices increased by 8.3 percent in the year through April, and data this week is expected to show inflation at 8.2 percent in May. Inflation averaged 1.6 percent annual gains in the five years leading up to the pandemic, making today’s pace of increase painfully high by comparison. A gallon of gas, one of the most tangible household costs, hit an average of $4.92 this week. Consumer confidence has plummeted as families pay more for everyday purchases and as the Fed raises interest rates to cool the economy, which increases the risk of a recession.A gallon of gas surpassed $5 at a Sunoco station in Sloatsburg, N.Y., last month.An Rong Xu for The New York TimesThe White House has long realized that rising prices could sink Mr. Biden’s support, with that risk telegraphed in a series of confidential memos sent to Mr. Biden last year by one of his lead pollsters, John Anzalone. Inflation has only continued to fuel frustration among voters, according to a separate memo compiled by Mr. Anzalone’s team last month, which showed the president’s low approval rating on the economy rivaling only his approach to immigration.“Economic sentiment among the public remains poor, with most worried about both inflation and the possibility of a recession in the coming months,” according to the memo, dated May 20. The information was sent to “interested parties,” and it was not clear if the White House had received or reviewed the memo.The polling data shows that about eight in 10 Americans “consider the national economy to be in poor condition” and that “concerns are high about the potential for an economic recession in the near future.”Economic anxieties have been echoed by members of Congress, leading academics and pop culture standard bearers. “When y’all think they going to announce that we going into a recession?” Cardi B, the Grammy-winning rapper, wrote in a tweet that went viral this weekend.The White House knows it is in a tricky position, and the administration’s approach to explaining inflation has evolved over time. Officials spent the early stages of the current price burst largely describing price pressures as temporary.When it became clear that rising costs were lasting, administration officials began to diverge internally on how to frame that phenomenon. While it was clear that much of the upward pressure on prices came from supply chain shortages exacerbated by continued waves of the coronavirus, some of it also tied back to strong consumer demand. That big spending had been enabled, in part, by the government’s stimulus packages, including direct checks to households, expanded unemployment insurance and other benefits.Some economists in the White House have begun to emphasize that inflation was a trade-off: To the extent that Mr. Biden’s stimulus spending spurred more inflation, it also aided economic growth and a faster recovery.“Inflation is absolutely a problem, and it’s critical to address it,” Janet L. Yellen, the Treasury secretary, recently told members of Congress. “But I think at the same time, we should recognize how successful that plan was in leading to an economy where instead of having a large number of workers utterly unable to find jobs, exactly the opposite is true.”Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen has said she supports relaxing tariffs on Chinese goods to ease prices.Jason Andrew for The New York TimesBut the president’s more political aides have tended to sharply minimize that the March 2021 package, known as the American Rescue Plan, helped to goose inflation, even as they have claimed credit for strong economic growth.“Some have a curious obsession with exaggerating impact of the Rescue Plan while ignoring the degree high inflation is global,” Gene Sperling, a senior White House adviser overseeing the implementation of the stimulus package, wrote on Twitter last week, adding that the law “has had very marginal impact on inflation.”Brian Deese, the director of the National Economic Council, acknowledged in an interview last week that there were some disagreements among White House economic officials when it came to how to talk about and respond to inflation, but he portrayed that as a positive — and as something that is not leading to any kind of dysfunction.“If there wasn’t healthy disagreement, debate and people feeling comfortable bringing issues and ideas to the table, then I think we would be not serving the president and the public interest well,” he said.He also pushed back on the idea that the administration was deeply divided on the March 2021 package’s aftereffects, saying in a separate emailed comment that “there is agreement across the administration that many factors contributed to inflation, and that inflation has been driven by elevated demand and constrained supply across the globe.”How to portray the Biden administration’s stimulus spending is far from the only challenge the White House faces. As price increases last, Democrats have grappled with how to discuss their plans to combat them.The president and his top political aides have trotted out a few main talking points, including blaming President Vladimir V. Putin’s invasion of Ukraine for what Mr. Biden calls the “Putin price hike,” pointing to deficit reduction as a way to lower inflation and arguing that Republicans have a bad plan to deal with rising costs. Mr. Biden regularly acknowledges the pain that higher prices are causing and has emphasized that the problem of taming inflation rests largely with the Fed, an independent entity whose work he has promised not to interfere with.The administration has also highlighted that inflation is widespread globally, and that the United States is better off than many other nations.Student Loans: Key Things to KnowCard 1 of 4Corinthian Colleges. More

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    Persistent Inflation Puts Yellen in the Spotlight

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    WASHINGTON — At her confirmation hearing in early 2021, Treasury Secretary Janet L. Yellen told lawmakers that it was time to “act big” on a pandemic relief package, playing down concerns about deficits at a time of perpetually low interest rates and warning that inaction could mean widespread economic “scarring.”A year and a half later, prices are soaring and interest rates are marching higher. As a result, Ms. Yellen’s role in crafting and selling the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan, which Congress passed in March of last year, is being parsed amid an intensifying blame game to determine who is responsible for the highest rates of inflation in 40 years. After months of pinning rising prices on temporary supply chain problems that would dissipate, Ms. Yellen acknowledged last week that she had gotten it “wrong,” putting the Biden administration on the defensive and thrusting herself into the middle of a political storm.“I think I was wrong then about the path that inflation would take,” Ms. Yellen said in an interview with CNN, adding that the economy had faced unanticipated “shocks” that boosted food and energy prices.Republican lawmakers, who have spent months blaming President Biden and Democrats for rising prices, gleefully seized upon the admission as evidence that the administration had mismanaged the economy and should not be trusted to remain in political control.The Treasury Department has scrambled to clarify Ms. Yellen’s remarks, saying her acknowledgment that she misread inflation simply meant that she could not have foreseen developments such as the war in Ukraine, new variants of the coronavirus or lockdowns in China. After a book excerpt suggested Ms. Yellen favored a stimulus package smaller than the $1.9 trillion that Congress approved last year, the Treasury released a statement denying that she had urged more spending restraint.At this tenuous moment in her tenure, Ms. Yellen is expected to face tough questions on inflation when she testifies before the Senate Finance Committee on Tuesday and the House Ways and Means Committee on Wednesday. The hearings are ostensibly about the president’s budget request for the 2023 fiscal year, but Republicans are blaming Mr. Biden’s policies, including the $1.9 trillion stimulus package, for high prices for consumer products, and Ms. Yellen’s comments have given them grist to cast his first term as a failure.“How can Americans trust the Biden administration when the same people that were so wrong are still in charge?” said Tommy Pigott, rapid response director for the Republican National Committee.Understand Inflation and How It Impacts YouInflation 101: What is inflation, why is it up and whom does it hurt? Our guide explains it all.Measuring Inflation: Over the years economists have tweaked one of the government’s standard measures of inflation, the Consumer Price Index. What is behind the changes?Inflation Calculator: How you experience inflation can vary greatly depending on your spending habits. Answer these seven questions to estimate your personal inflation rate.Interest Rates: As it seeks to curb inflation, the Federal Reserve began raising interest rates for the first time since 2018. Here is what that means for inflation.The glare is particularly uncomfortable for Ms. Yellen, an economist and former chair of the Federal Reserve, who prides herself on giving straight answers and staying above the political fray.In recent weeks, Ms. Yellen has had to defend the Biden administration’s economic policies even as fault lines have emerged within the economic team. She has expressed reservations about the lack of progress in rolling back some of the Trump administration’s China tariffs, which she views as taxes on consumers that were “not strategic,” and she has been reluctant to support student debt forgiveness proposals, which could further fuel inflation if people have more money to spend.Over the weekend, Ms. Yellen came under fire again after an excerpt from a forthcoming biography of her indicated that she had sought unsuccessfully to pare down the pandemic aid bill because of inflation concerns. The Treasury Department released a rare Saturday statement from Ms. Yellen denying that she argued that the package was too big.“I never urged adoption of a smaller American Rescue Plan package,” she said, insisting that the funds have helped the United States economy weather the pandemic and the fallout from Russia’s war in Ukraine.Throughout the last year, Ms. Yellen has been an ardent public defender of the Biden administration’s economic agenda. She has clashed publicly at times with critics such as Lawrence H. Summers, a former Treasury secretary, who warned that too much stimulus could overheat the economy.For months, Ms. Yellen — and many other economists — talked about inflation as “transitory,” saying rising prices were the result of supply chain problems that would dissipate and “base effects,” which were making the monthly numbers look worse in comparison with prices that were depressed during the early days of the pandemic.By May of last year, Ms. Yellen appeared to acknowledge that the Biden administration’s spending proposals had the potential to overheat the economy. She noted at The Atlantic’s Future Economy Summit that the policies could spur growth and that the Fed might have to step in with “modest” interest rate increases if the economy revved up too much.“It may be that interest rates will have to rise somewhat to make sure that our economy doesn’t overheat, even though the additional spending is relatively small relative to the size of the economy,” Ms. Yellen said.But economic indicators still suggested that inflation remained under control through much of that spring. In an interview with The New York Times last June, Ms. Yellen said she believed that inflation expectations were in line with the Federal Reserve’s 2 percent target and that while wages were increasing, she did not see a “wage price spiral” on the horizon that could cause inflation to become entrenched.“We don’t want a situation of prolonged excess demand in the economy that leads to wage and price pressures that build and become endemic,” she said, adding that she did not see that happening.Inflation F.A.Q.Card 1 of 5What is inflation? More

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    Rapid Inflation, Lower Employment: How the U.S. Pandemic Response Measures Up

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    The United States spent more on its policy response than other advanced economies. Now economists are revisiting how that worked.The United States spent more aggressively to protect its economy from the pandemic than many global peers, a strategy that has helped to foment more rapid inflation — but also a faster economic rebound and brisk job gains.Now, though, America is grappling with what many economists see as an unsustainable worker shortage that threatens to keep inflation high and may necessitate a firm response by the Federal Reserve. Yet U.S. employment has not recovered as fully as in Europe and some other advanced economies. That reality is prodding some economists to ask: Was America’s spending spree worth it?As the Fed raises interest rates and economists increasingly warn that it may take at least a mild recession to bring inflation to heel, risks are mounting that America’s ambitious spending will end up with a checkered legacy. Rapid growth and a strong labor market rebound have been big wins, and economists across the ideological spectrum agree that some amount of spending was necessary to avoid a repeat of the painfully slow recovery that followed the previous recession. But the benefits of that faster recovery could be diminished as rising prices eat away at paychecks — and even more so if high inflation prods central bank policymakers set policy in a way that pushes up unemployment down the road.“I’m worried that we traded a temporary growth gain for permanently higher inflation,” said Jason Furman, an economist at Harvard University and a former economic official in the Obama administration. His concern, he said, is that “inflation could stay higher, or the Fed could control it by lowering output in the future.”The Biden administration has repeatedly argued that, to the extent the United States is seeing more inflation, the policy response to the pandemic also created a stronger economy.“We got a lot more growth, we got less child poverty, we got better household balance sheets, we have the strongest labor market by some metrics I’ve ever seen,” Jared Bernstein, an economic adviser to President Biden, said in an interview. “Were all of those accomplishments accompanied by heat on the price side? Yes, but some degree of that heat showed up in every advanced economy, and we wouldn’t trade that back for the historic recovery we helped to generate.”Inflation has picked up around the world, but price increases have been quicker in America than in many other wealthy nations.Consumer prices were up 9.8 percent in March from a year earlier, according to a measure of inflation that strips out owner-occupied housing to make it comparable across countries. That was faster than in Germany, where prices rose 7.6 percent in the same period; the United Kingdom, where they rose 7 percent; and other European countries. Other measures similarly show U.S. inflation outpacing that of its global peers.The Rise of InflationInflation has risen worldwide in the past year, but the increase has been fastest in the United States.

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    Change in consumer prices from a year earlier
    Note: Euro area and U.K. data are Harmonised Index of Consumer Prices. U.S. data is the Consumer Price Index excluding owners’ equivalent rent.Sources: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, O.E.C.D., EurostatBy The New York TimesThe comparatively large jump in prices in America owes at least partly to the nation’s ambitious spending. Research from the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco attributed about half of the nation’s 2021 annual price increase to the government’s spending response. The researchers estimated the number, which is imprecise, by measuring America’s inflation outcome compared with what happened in countries that spent less.“The size of the package was very large compared to any other country,” said Òscar Jordà, a co-author on the study.Understand Inflation in the U.S.Inflation 101: What is inflation, why is it up and whom does it hurt? Our guide explains it all.Your Questions, Answered: Times readers sent us their questions about rising prices. Top experts and economists weighed in.Interest Rates: As it seeks to curb inflation, the Federal Reserve announced that it was raising interest rates for the first time since 2018.How Americans Feel: We asked 2,200 people where they’ve noticed inflation. Many mentioned basic necessities, like food and gas.Supply Chain’s Role: A key factor in rising inflation is the continuing turmoil in the global supply chain. Here’s how the crisis unfolded.The Trump and then Biden administrations spent about $5 trillion on pandemic relief in 2020 and 2021 — far more as a share of the nation’s economy than what other advanced economies spent, based on a database compiled by the International Monetary Fund. Much of that money went directly to households in the form of stimulus checks, expanded unemployment insurance and tax credits for parents.Payments to households helped to fuel rapid consumer demand and quick economic growth — progress that has continued into 2022. A global economic outlook released by the International Monetary Fund last week showed that America’s economy is expected to expand by 3.7 percent this year, faster than the roughly 2 percent trend that prevailed before the pandemic and the 3.3 percent average expected across advanced economies this year.That comes on the heels of even more rapid 2021 growth. And as the U.S. economy has expanded so quickly, unemployment has plummeted. After spiking to 14.7 percent in early 2020, joblessness is now roughly back to the 50-year lows that prevailed prior the pandemic.That’s a victory that politicians have celebrated. “Our economy roared back faster than most predicted,” Mr. Biden said in his State of the Union address last month. A major report from the White House on April 14 noted that the United States has experienced a faster recovery than other advanced economies, as measured by gross domestic product, consumer spending and other indicators.The Rebound in SpendingConsumer spending has recovered more quickly in the United States, even after accounting for faster inflation.

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    Change in per capita household spending since fourth quarter of 2019
    Notes: Quarterly data, adjusted for inflationSource: O.E.C.D.By The New York TimesBut increasingly, at least when it comes to the job market, America’s achievement looks less unique.Unemployment in the United States jumped much higher at the outset of the pandemic in part because America’s policies did less to discourage layoffs than those in Europe. While many European governments paid companies to keep workers on their payrolls, the U.S. focused more on providing money directly to those who lost their jobs.Joblessness fell fast in the United States, too, but that was also true elsewhere. Many European countries, Canada and Australia are now back to or below their prepandemic unemployment rates, data reported by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development showed.And when it comes to the share of people who are actually working, the United States is lagging some of its global peers. The nation’s employment rate is hovering around 71.4 percent, still down slightly from nearly 71.8 percent before the pandemic began.By comparison, the eurozone countries, Canada and Australia have a higher employment rates than before the pandemic, and Japan’s employment rate has fully recovered.The Rebound in JobsEmployment rates fell further in the U.S. than in many peer countries, and have not yet returned to their prepandemic level.

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    Change in employment rate since fourth quarter of 2019
    Note: Quarterly data, ages 15 to 64Source: O.E.C.D.By The New York TimesEurope’s more complete employment recovery may partly reflect its different regulations and different approach to supporting workers during the pandemic, said Nick Bennenbroek, international economist at Wells Fargo. European aid programs effectively paid companies to keep people on the payroll even when they couldn’t go to work, while the United States supported workers directly through the unemployment insurance system.That relatively subtle difference had a major consequence: Because fewer Europeans were separated from employers, many flowed right back into their old jobs as the economy reopened. Meanwhile, pandemic layoffs touched off an era of soul-searching and job shuffling in the United States.“You didn’t have as much motivation to reconsider your assessment of your work-life situation,” Mr. Bennenbroek said. “What we initially saw in the U.S. was much more disruptive.”Inflation F.A.Q.Card 1 of 6What is inflation? More

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    As Biden Pleads for More Covid Aid, States Are Awash in Federal Dollars

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    States pushed back on a plan to take back some of their stimulus money to fund President Biden’s emergency spending request. Now Congress is trying to find other ways to offset the cost.FRANKFORT, Ky. — Gov. Andy Beshear has been toting oversize checks around his state in recent weeks, handing them out to city and county officials for desperately needed water improvements.The tiny city of Mortons Gap got $109,000 to bring running water to six families who do not have it. The people of Martin County, whose water has been too contaminated to drink since a coal slurry spill two decades ago, got $411,000. The checks bear Mr. Beshear’s signature, but the money comes from the federal government, part of a huge infusion of coronavirus relief aid that is helping to fuel record budget surpluses in Kentucky and many other states.Therein lies a Washington controversy. The funds, which Congress approved at a moment when the pandemic was still raging, are allowed to be used for far broader purposes than combating the virus, including water projects like those in Kentucky. Most states will get another round of “fiscal recovery funds” — part of President Biden’s $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan — next month.But in Washington, Mr. Biden is out of money to pay for the most basic means of protecting people during the pandemic — medications, vaccines, testing and reimbursement for care. Republicans have refused to sign off on new spending, citing the state recovery funds as an example of money that could be repurposed for urgent national priorities.“These states are awash in money — everybody from Kentucky to California,” said Scott Jennings, a former aide to Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Republican leader. “People are like: ‘We’ve printed all this money; we’ve sent it out. These states have these massive surpluses, and now you need more?’”Republicans were never fans of Mr. Biden’s rescue plan, which Democrats muscled through Congress without their support. Despite the many ways it is benefiting his state, Mr. McConnell once called it a “multitrillion-dollar, nontargeted Band-Aid” that would dump “another huge mountain of debt on our grandkids.”On Capitol Hill on Thursday, a day after Mr. Biden made a public appeal to Congress for more money, Senate Republicans and Democrats were nearing a deal on a $10 billion emergency aid package — less than half of Mr. Biden’s initial request. But they had not resolved crucial differences over the size and how to pay for it. Republicans want to use unspent money already approved by Congress, but the parties have been unable to agree on which programs should be tapped.Since the outset of the pandemic, the Trump and Biden administrations have injected $5 trillion into the American economy, including the rescue plan. With midterm elections approaching, the gush of federal stimulus spending will draw even greater scrutiny as Republicans accuse Democrats of wasting funds and fueling inflation, and demand a precise accounting of how the money has been spent.David Adkins, the executive director and chief executive of the Council of State Governments, said such questions were inevitable now that policymakers could catch their collective breath.“We have to lean into the notion that states are laboratories of democracy,” Mr. Adkins said. “Some of these things will fail; some of this money will not be spent well. But that is the nature of trying to navigate disruptive times.”The rescue plan set aside $195 billion to help states recover from the economic and health effects of the pandemic. When Mr. Biden made his initial aid request, senior lawmakers in both parties negotiated a plan to pay for it partly by taking back $7 billion from states, as part of a $1.5 trillion spending bill.Governors and rank-and-file Democrats balked, saying that to do so would disproportionately hurt the 31 states that have not yet gotten all their rescue funds, and the deal fell apart. Now it appears the state funds will be spared, though the fracas has cast a sharp spotlight on how the fiscal recovery funds are being spent.“I was never for giving this money to the states, but I was always of the belief that once you gave it to them, politics would not allow you to get it back,” Senator Roy Blunt of Missouri, the top Republican on the subcommittee that controls health spending, said in a recent interview.All told, the White House says 93 percent of the American Rescue Plan dollars that are currently available have been “legally obligated,” meaning they have either already been spent or are committed to being spent.Most states have either started spending their fiscal recovery funds, or have plans to do so. A recent analysis by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities found that while most states are still developing budgets for the upcoming fiscal year, states have already budgeted 78 percent of their fiscal recovery fund allocation.Kentucky, where Mr. Beshear, a Democrat, is promoting record job growth and economic boom times, ended 2021 with a record $1.1 billion surplus, and another surplus is expected this year. The state has already received $1.1 billion in federal funds and expects another $1 billion in May. It is spending the money on broadband, bolstering tourism and shoring up the unemployment insurance fund as well as coronavirus testing, in addition to water improvements.Martin County recently received $411,000 in federal stimulus funds to help pay for desperately needed water improvements.Maddie McGarvey for The New York Times“These dollars are too important and too transformational to get caught up in a partisan fight,” Mr. Beshear said in an interview, adding: “These are dollars that are helping us as we emerge from Covid. We’ve got a choice to limp out of the pandemic or sprint out of the pandemic, and cutting off this aid only hurts the people that need it.”Congress specified four broad purposes for the money: to respond to the pandemic’s health and economic impacts; to provide bonus pay to essential workers; to prevent cuts in public services; and to invest in sewer, water or broadband infrastructure. But states can also use the funds to replace lost revenues, which gives them great flexibility in spending the money.Arkansas, for instance, has awarded $374,000 to a rape crisis center; $6.3 million to the Arkansas Coalition Against Sexual Assault; and another $6.3 million to the Arkansas Alliance of Boys & Girls Clubs. But the bulk of the money has gone toward improving broadband access and addressing the needs of the health care system.“The Omicron variant came in, cases skyrocketed, hospitals filled up and so we had to utilize a significant amount of our ARPA money for expanding hospital space, home testing and other public health response,” said Gov. Asa Hutchinson, a Republican, using the acronym for the rescue plan. “So that’s obviously the first responsibility, and then we looked at these other needs.”Other states are using the money in ways that are only tangentially related to Covid-19, but that are permissible under guidelines issued by the Treasury Department.Alabama devoted $400 million of its allocation, or roughly one-fifth, to building two new prisons, despite a public outcry from advocates for racial justice and civil liberties. Florida devoted $2 billion, nearly one-quarter of its $8.8 billion allotment, to highway construction — a decision that has drawn criticism from the nonpartisan Florida Policy Institute.“The intended purpose of the American Rescue Plan Act dollars was to ensure that individuals and communities could recover from the pandemic, and I think in many ways there were better uses for this money,” said Esteban Leonardo Santis, the group’s tax and revenue analyst.Twenty states, including Kentucky, spent a total of $15 billion to build up their depleted unemployment insurance trust funds. Independent analysts say that is effectively a tax break for businesses, which otherwise may have had to make up for the lost revenues. But Mr. Beshear defended it, saying that Kentucky businesses stepped up during the pandemic. A local Toyota plant made face shields, and bourbon distillers manufactured hand sanitizer, he said.The governor’s Twitter feed is rife with photos of big checks and smiling city and county officials; he is running for re-election in 2023.“If there’s one thing a governor knows how to do, it’s drive around their state and hand out huge checks and cut big ribbons with oversized scissors,” Mr. Jennings said. “They’re like game show hosts out there.”Chris McDaniel, a Kentucky state senator, spent much of this week immersed in budget talks, including planning how to use Kentucky’s next tranche of fiscal recovery funds.Luke Sharrett for The New York TimesExperts say, and the White House acknowledges, that the fiscal recovery funds have helped create state budget surpluses. Gene B. Sperling, a senior adviser to the president who is overseeing the American Rescue Plan, said the surpluses were proof that Mr. Biden’s stimulus package was working — and this was no time to pare back.“Ensuring that states and localities have a cushion for some pretty serious bumps in the road is smart policy,” Mr. Sperling said, “and a lesson learned from what happened after the Great Recession.”But those surpluses are likely to be temporary, and how states are using them has played into the controversy over Covid relief funds. The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities says 14 states are using temporary budget surpluses “to call for costly and permanent tax cuts targeted more to wealthy people” — a move the center described as a “bad choice.”Here in Frankfort, the state capital, Kentucky lawmakers in a hurry to wrap up their 2022 legislative session were working on pushing through a hefty income tax cut this week. But a proposal to use the state’s budget surplus to give Kentuckians a tax rebate of up to $500 seemed unlikely to pass, said its author, State Senator Chris McDaniel, the appropriations committee chairman.Mr. McDaniel, a Republican, spent much of this week immersed in budget talks, including planning how to use Kentucky’s next tranche of fiscal recovery funds. Another $1 billion is coming, and despite some philosophical misgivings, he said he saw no reason not to spend it.“I believe firmly that it was too much money that came down,” Mr. McDaniel said. “But I also believe that Kentuckians will bear the tax burden eventually, just like everyone else down the line, and I am not going to disadvantage future Kentuckians out of a point of philosophical pride.”Emily Cochrane More

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    Covid Stimulus Money Brings Clashes Within Cities and Counties

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    Last June, a meeting of the Dutchess County Legislature in New York’s Hudson Valley quickly turned heated over how to spend some of the county’s $57 million in federal pandemic relief aid.For more than two hours, residents and Democratic lawmakers implored the Republican majority to address longstanding problems that the pandemic had exacerbated. They cited opioid abuse, poverty and food insecurity. Some pointed to decrepit sewer systems and inadequate high-speed internet. Democrats offered up amendments directing funds to addiction recovery and mental health services.In the end, the Legislature rebuffed their appeals. It voted 15 to 10 to devote $12.5 million to renovate a minor-league baseball stadium that’s home to the Hudson Valley Renegades, a Yankees affiliate.“Who created this plan? Some legislators?” asked Carole Pickering, a resident of Hyde Park. “These funds were intended to rescue our citizens to the extent possible, not to upgrade a baseball field.”“I think we should be a little bit ashamed,” Brennan Kearney, a Democrat in the Legislature, told her fellow lawmakers.Cities and counties across the United States have found themselves in the surprisingly uncomfortable position of deciding how best to spend a windfall of federal relief funds intended to help keep them afloat amid deadly waves of Covid-19 infections.The pandemic, which is showing signs of waning as it enters its third year, prompted the largest infusion of federal money into the U.S. economy since the New Deal. President Biden and former President Donald J. Trump got Congress to approve roughly $5 trillion to help support families, shop owners, unemployed workers, schools and businesses.Where $5 Trillion in Pandemic Stimulus Money WentIt is the largest government relief effort in recorded history, and two years after Covid-19 crisis began, money is still flowing to communities. Here’s where it went and how it was spent.A large portion of the aid went to state, local and tribal governments, many of which had projected revenue losses of as much as 20 percent at the pandemic’s onset. The largest chunk came from Mr. Biden’s $1.9 trillion recovery bill, the American Rescue Plan, which earmarked $350 billion. That money is just beginning to flow to communities, which have until 2026 to spend it.“We’ve sent you a whole hell of a lot of money,” Mr. Biden said during a meeting with the nation’s governors in January.In many cases, the money has become an unusually public and contentious marker of what matters most to a place — and who gets to make those decisions. The debates are sometimes partisan, but not always divided by ideology. They pit colleagues against each other, neighbors against neighbors, people who want infrastructure improvements against those who want to help people experiencing homelessness.“It’s both breathtaking in its magnitude but it still requires some hard and strategic choices,” said Brad Whitehead, who is a nonresident senior fellow at Brookings Metro, a metropolitan policy project, and advises cities on how to use their funds. “One of the difficulties for elected leaders is everyone has a claim and a thought for how these dollars should be used.”Poughkeepsie, N.Y., part of Dutchess County. At a meeting last summer, county residents implored leaders to use pandemic aid to address longstanding problems.Amir Hamja for The New York TimesA person who is homeless in Poughkeepsie. Homelessness and poverty were among the issues that residents said deserved funding.Amir Hamja for The New York TimesLocal governments were given broad discretion over how to use the money. In addition to addressing immediate health needs, they were allowed to make up for pandemic-related revenue losses from empty transit systems, tourist attractions and other areas that suffered financially.That money is often equivalent to a third or nearly half of a city’s annual budget. St. Louis, for instance, will receive $498 million, more than 40 percent of its 2021 budget of $1.1 billion. Cleveland, with a city budget of $1.8 billion, will get $511 million.But the relief comes with strings: Governments are prohibited from using the funds to subsidize tax cuts or to make up for pension shortfalls. And because the aid is essentially a one-time installment, it wouldn’t necessarily help cover salaries for new teachers or other recurring costs.Several states have sued the Biden administration over the tax cut restriction, claiming it violates state sovereignty. Some governments have refused to take the money over concerns that it would give the federal government power to control local decision-making.In Saginaw, Mich., the mayor formed a 15-person advisory group to recommend ways to spend the city’s $52 million allotment. Harrisburg, Pa., which received $49 million, has held public events seeking input from residents. Massillon, Ohio, identified the biggest source of public complaints — flooding and sanitation issues — and proposed using its $16 million share to address those areas.“We listened to the people, and we’re trying to make improvements for them,” said Kathy Catazaro-Perry, Massillon’s mayor. “Our city is old. We have a lot of areas that did not have storm drains, and so for us, this is going to be huge because we’re going to be able to rectify some of those older neighborhoods.”But many have found their communities mired in clashes over who has the power to spend the money.Poughkeepsie residents picked up free meals at the Family Partnership Center in February. The food was distributed through the Lunch Box, a program that provides hot meals in Dutchess County five days a week.Amir Hamja for The New York TimesIn New York’s Onondaga County, which includes Syracuse, legislators from both parties have been trying to claw back spending authority from the county executive, Ryan McMahon, a Republican.When the first half of the county’s $89 million stimulus share arrived last spring, Mr. McMahon placed it into an account that he controlled and began committing funds to projects, including a $1 million restaurant voucher program, $5 million in incentives for filmmakers to produce in the area and $25 million for a multisport complex featuring 10 synthetic turf fields.Lawmakers, who questioned why they were not being asked to vote on the spending, were told by the county attorney’s office that they had ceded that authority in December 2020 when they approved an emergency resolution that gave the county executive authority “to address budget issues specifically related to Covid-19 global pandemic.”Legislators argued that they had never intended for that control to extend beyond the immediate pandemic response.James Rowley, who was elected chair of the Onondaga County Legislature in January, hired a lawyer and spent $11,000 preparing a lawsuit to challenge Mr. McMahon.“We have the power of the purse,” Mr. Rowley, a Republican, said in an interview. “I didn’t want to set a precedent that gave the county executive power to spend county money.”Mr. McMahon did not respond to a request for comment. On Feb. 22, he sent a letter to the Legislature proposing that it regain control of the stimulus funds that had not yet been allocated.“I recognize your concern,” he wrote, noting that “our cooperative actions should comport with county charter principles of separation of powers.” An abandoned property in Poughkeepsie. One county legislator called the investment in the baseball stadium “a betrayal of our community.”Boarded-up buildings in Poughkeepsie. Local governments were given broad discretion in how the pandemic aid could be spent.The rush of money from the federal government is in part an attempt to avoid the mistakes of the last recession, when state and local governments cut spending and fired workers, prolonging America’s economic recovery. But analysts say it will take years to fully assess whether all the spending this time was successful. Critics argue that the overall $5 trillion effort has added to a ballooning federal deficit and helped propel rapid inflation. And many states report increasing revenue, and even surpluses, as the economy strengthens.The money has led to ideological fights over the role of the federal government.In January, dozens of residents crowded into a City Council meeting in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, where they demanded that the mayor and other officials turn down the city’s $8.6 million share of stimulus funds, saying it was a ruse by Washington to take control of the town.Residents booed and called the Council members “fascists.” Several referred to the money as a Trojan horse, lamenting that taking it would allow the federal government to impose restrictions on Idaho, including establishing vaccine checkpoints. Amid cries of “Recall!” one woman shouted repeatedly that “you have given up our sovereignty.”“Nobody wants this money,” Mark Salazar, a resident, said to applause. “I don’t want to be under the chains of the federal government. Nobody does.”The council eventually voted 5 to 1 to accept the funds, saying they would go toward expanding a police station and other areas.Dutchess County residents were similarly agitated, if less rowdy, at their June 14 meeting about the stadium. Guidance on using the funds issued by the Treasury Department specifically cited stadiums as “generally not reasonably proportional to addressing the negative economic impacts of the pandemic.”So why, those in attendance asked, was this happening?Marc Molinaro, the county executive, defended the spending, saying Dutchess County had identified $33 million in lost revenue as a result of the pandemic and that, according to the Biden administration’s guidance, stimulus funds could indeed go toward investing in things like the stadium.“It’s basically any structure, facility, thing you own as a government, you can invest these dollars in with broad latitude,” Mr. Molinaro said.In a recent interview, Mr. Molinaro said that because the funds were one-time money, the county needed to be careful not to create expenses that could not be paid for once the federal funds ran out.He added that investing in the stadium would produce an ongoing revenue stream for Dutchess County — money that he said would allow the government to pay for the types of programs that Democrats wanted.The investment, he said, “allows us to create 25 years of revenue that we can invest in the expansion of mental health services, homelessness and substance abuse.”That explanation has not mollified everyone.“I was just devastated that we spent the money that way,” Ms. Kearney, the Democratic legislator, said in an interview. “It was such a betrayal of our community. So grossly inappropriate and grossly tone deaf to the needs of the people in Dutchess who have suffered.” More