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    A Strong Jobs Report Suggests the Economy Is More Resilient Than We Thought

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    For months, the economy has been like a jigsaw with one mismatched piece: Consumer spending has been holding up and overall growth has been solid, but the job market has looked treacherously wobbly.As of Friday, the last piece of that puzzle is finally clicking into place.Fresh employment data for September showed that hiring picked up strongly, the unemployment rate dipped and wage growth came in strong — adding to a string of recent data pointing to economic resilience.And the incoming evidence points to a clear conclusion: The economy is robust.Data revisions released last week showed that growth has been stronger and incomes have been more solid than previously understood. Retail sales data are holding up. And now, employers appear to be meeting resilient consumer demand by continuing to expand their work forces.In fact, the report reinforced that by many measures, the job market is as healthy as it has ever been.The fresh data is good news for the Federal Reserve, for the White House and for Kamala Harris’s campaign as the vice president and Democratic nominee tries to make an economic case to voters ahead of the presidential election in November.It supports the idea that the economy either is headed for or has possibly already achieved a soft landing, in which inflation comes down without spurring economic pain in the process.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    The Pandemic Small Business Boom Is Still Helping to Fuel the Economy

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    Hector Xu was on track for a career in academia when the pandemic upended his plans.Tired of endless Zoom meetings and feeling cooped up in his Boston apartment, Mr. Xu decamped for New Hampshire, where he began taking lessons to fly helicopters. That led to a business idea, converting traditional helicopters into remotely piloted drones.Mr. Xu’s company, Rotor Technologies, now has nearly 40 employees — including his former flying instructor — and about $1 million in revenue this year, a figure it expects to increase twentyfold next year. Gov. Chris Sununu was present for the first test flight of one of its drones.“Covid hit, and it really changed my perspective,” Mr. Xu said. “You ended up spending most of your time in front of your computer rather than in the lab, rather than interacting with people, going to conferences. And I think it made me really yearn to do something that was more impactful in the real world.”Mr. Xu, 30, is part of what may be one of the pandemic’s most unexpected economic legacies: an entrepreneurial boom. Stuck at home with time — and, in many cases, cash — to burn, Americans started businesses at the fastest rate in decades.Piloting a test flight of a Rotor drone.Ian MacLellan for The New York TimesThe company now has nearly 40 employees.Ian MacLellan for The New York TimesWhat happened next might be even less expected: Those businesses thrived, overcoming supply chain disruptions, labor shortages, rapid inflation and the highest interest rates in decades.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    U.S. Faces Economic Turbulence Just as Recession Fears Eased

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    War in the Middle East, a strike by port workers and a devastating hurricane injected uncertainty into the U.S. economy.The United States economy is suddenly staring down new and potentially damaging crises, with tensions flaring in the Middle East and several states grappling with fallout from a devastating hurricane.The events hit just as American policymakers were gaining confidence that they had successfully tamed inflation without pushing the economy into a recession and as polls and consumer surveys suggested that Americans’ sour economic mood had begun to improve. But in just a week, new risks have emerged.The economy now faces the prospect of an oil price spike and the aftermath of a storm that could inflict more than $100 billion in damage upon large swaths of the Southeast. Economists have also been tracking potential consequences of a port workers’ strike, which was suspended on Thursday evening.“There’s new uncertainty,” said Joseph E. Gagnon, senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics. “If we lose oil output in the Middle East, if the ports are not functioning, then both are inflationary.”That uncertainty is arriving just weeks before a presidential election in which the economy — in particular, inflation — is one of the biggest factors on voters’ minds and less than a month after the Federal Reserve began cutting interest rates from more than a two-decade high. The central bank has gained confidence that inflation is coming back to its 2 percent goal, but has been wary about the labor market weakening.Even before the new risks emerged, the International Monetary Fund was projecting that the U.S. economy would slow next year.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Trump and Harris Want to Revive Manufacturing, but How Much Could They Actually Do?

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    The policy focus on the industry has changed from job quantity to job quality. And while federal incentives matter, local factors are more important.In recent weeks, the presidential candidates have been tussling over a familiar campaign issue in postindustrial America: how to reinvigorate manufacturing.Former President Donald J. Trump has proposed stiff tariffs on nearly all imports as a way of forcing foreign companies to make their goods in the United States, an escalation of a strategy that did not work during his term. “We’re going to take their factories,” Mr. Trump declared recently.Building on the Biden administration’s approach, Vice President Kamala Harris has promised tax credits and more apprenticeships to strengthen factory towns and invest in advanced technologies, ensuring they “are not just invented in America but built here.”In truth, no president can single-handedly control the growth of specific industries. Larger economic forces like recessions and exchange rates tend to play a much more powerful role. But some policies can help or hinder their progress.Over the last four years, policy and macroeconomic factors have combined to begin reshaping the manufacturing industry. While job growth has been flat for the past two years — as interest rates have clamped down on expansion and a strong dollar has dulled exports — shifts in the composition and location of it are underway beneath the surface.But first, a more fundamental question: Why do politicians care so much about manufacturing, anyway?Which manufacturing sectors have been growing fastest?Domestic output of semiconductors and other electrical components has expanded by 30 percent since the beginning of 2020. Other products, not as much.

    Notes: The semiconductor category includes other components. Source: Federal ReserveBy The New York TimesWhere manufacturing jobs have shifted since the pandemicBetween January 2020 and March 2024, the West Coast and Northeast have lost factory employment while many states in the Southeast have gained.

    Source: Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages, Labor DepartmentBy The New York TimesWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Biden Scrambles to Contain Economic and Political Fallout of Port Strike

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    The labor dispute has forced President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris into a complicated position just weeks before the election.President Biden urged the alliance representing port employers to present a fair offer to striking longshoremen on Tuesday as the White House scrambled to contain the economic and political fallout of the work stoppage at U.S. ports.“Collective bargaining is the best way for workers to get the pay and benefits they deserve,” Mr. Biden said in a statement. “Executive compensation has grown in line with those profits, and profits have been returned to shareholders at record rates. It’s only fair that workers, who put themselves at risk during the pandemic to keep ports open, see a meaningful increase in their wages as well.”The labor dispute between the roughly 45,000 workers and the port operators has forced Mr. Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris into a complicated position. A prolonged strike could send chills across the U.S. economy, creating shortages, layoffs and even higher prices for consumers just weeks before the presidential election.The strike began after a monthslong impasse between the longshoremen and the port operators. The workers had pushed for wage increases that exceeded what the group representing the operators had offered. The union is also fighting automation at its ports.Mr. Biden has said he would not use a federal labor law to force the workers back to work, despite pressure from Republicans to contain the potential economic pain.Invoking the almost 80-year-old law, known as the Taft-Hartley Act, could alienate unions and diminish crucial support among labor groups in battleground states like Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Michigan just before the presidential election.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    U.S. Raises New Concerns Over Chinese Lending Practices

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    A Treasury official will call for greater transparency over emergency currency “swap” loans to struggling countries by China’s central bank.The United States is raising new concerns about China’s practice of making emergency loans to debt-ridden countries, warning that a lack of transparency surrounding such financing can mask the fiscal predicaments facing fragile economies that have turned to China for help.A senior Treasury official, Brent Neiman, publicly aired concerns about the practice in a speech on Tuesday in which he urged the International Monetary Fund to push China for greater clarity about its lending terms. The Biden administration broached the issue directly with Chinese officials in Washington this year during a meeting of a recently created bilateral economic and financial working group.Chinese loans to countries already struggling to repay their debts are being made through China’s central bank using so-called swap agreements. These agreements allow countries to borrow Chinese renminbi and keep those funds in their central reserves while using the U.S. dollars that they hold to repay foreign debts.The financing is essentially a line of credit, in which a country swaps its own currency for renminbi and agrees to pay Beijing a high interest rate. The arrangement allows those countries to use their dollar reserves to finance trade or other government needs. They can also use the funds to pay debts owed to Chinese banks or to make purchases from China, creating even deeper ties to its economy.China has provided more than $200 billion in emergency financing in recent years. Chinese state media reported this year that the central bank had 31 currency swap agreements in force worth a combined $586 billion. Chinese currency loans tend to come with higher interest rates than those offered by the Federal Reserve or the I.M.F.Such currency loans do not always appear on the balance sheet of the borrowing nation, obscuring the extent of its liabilities. That lack of information can make it harder for other investors to know how deeply in debt a country is and has fueled criticism that the Chinese loans could leave the recipients worse off.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Port Strike Begins on East and Gulf Coasts

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    Members of the International Longshoremen’s Association walked out for the first time since 1977 in a standoff over wages, benefits and job security.For the first time in nearly 50 years, longshoremen on the East and Gulf Coasts went on strike Tuesday, a move that will cut off most trade through some of the busiest U.S. ports and could send a chill through the economy.Members of the International Longshoremen’s Association union, which represents roughly 45,000 workers, started setting up pickets after 11th-hour talks failed to avert a work stoppage.“Nothing’s going to move without us — nothing,” said Harold J. Daggett, the president of the union, addressing picketers outside a port terminal in Elizabeth, N.J., in a video posted early Tuesday to a union Facebook account.The United States Maritime Alliance, which represents port employers, declined to comment early Tuesday. The two sides were not able to agree on wage increases, and the use of new technology in the ports was a sticking point for the union.“We think they’re lowballing intentionally,” Leonard Riley, a longshoreman at the Port of Charleston in South Carolina, said on Tuesday. “We are going to be out until we have something to chew on.”Businesses now face a period of uncertainty. Trade experts say that a short strike would cause little lasting damage but that a weekslong stoppage could lead to shortages, higher prices and even layoffs.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    How the Port Strike Could Affect the Economy and Certain Products

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    Transportation and warehousing sectors are poised to first feel the pinch, with a broader economic fallout expected if the strike drags on.As dockworkers at East and Gulf Coast ports walk off the job, economists are bracing for the strike to reverberate across the American economy.The strike, a result of a monthslong impasse between the union representing roughly 45,000 longshoremen and port operators, began at 12:01 a.m. on Tuesday. It will halt almost all activity at some of the busiest ports in the United States, from Maine to Texas. The International Longshoremen’s Association is pushing for wage increases that exceed those offered by the United States Maritime Alliance, the port operators group.The president of the International Longshoremen’s Association said the workers were “making history” by walking off the job for the first time in nearly 50 years.Bryan Anselm for The New York TimesPresident Biden said on Sunday that he was not planning to invoke the Taft-Hartley Act, a nearly 80-year-old law, to force dockworkers back to work if they strike.A strike could cost the economy $4.5 billion to $7.5 billion, or a 0.1 percent hit to U.S. annualized gross domestic product, every week as truckers and other workers dependent on the ports are furloughed and manufacturers experience delivery delays, according to analysts at Oxford Economics. While those losses would be reversed once the strike was over, it would take a month to clear the backlog for each week of the strike, the analysts estimated.Here’s what else to know about the potential economic fallout of the strike.A strike could cost the economy $4.5 billion to $7.5 billion for every week of the work stoppage.Erin Schaff/The New York TimesWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More