Government measures show that inflation, at 1.6% in January, is still below the Fed’s target of 2%. But commodity prices are soaring, and anyone who pays their household bills knows that food and energy prices are rising becaus…
It’s no surprise that consumer prices are rising — the prices of commodities from corn to cotton to copper are near record levels, thanks to shrinking supplies and rising demand worldwide. The question is whether the Fed will …
Two sets of labor statistics data, released this week, point to a divergence between the job-openings rate and the total number of employees on nonfarm payrolls. And that divergence may well serve as a leading indicator for the…
In January, job creation was anemic, yet unemployment plummeted. What gives? The answer lies in the quirky way the government decides who gets counted as part of the work force, who gets counted as officially unemployed and who…
New forecasts show that the worst may be over for the construction industry, which was hit harder by the Great Recession than any other sector, as construction projects slowly resume. Some 27% of construction firms say they pla…