President Biden’s visit to a wind turbine factory in Colorado on Wednesday was as much a rebuke of his far-right opponents in Congress as it was an official stop to show off investments in clean energy and manufacturing. Mr. Biden toured the Pueblo factory of CS Wind, which lies in the district of Representative Lauren […]
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I’ll be glued to the TV on Thursday for the debate between Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida and Gov. Gavin Newsom of California on Fox News. (Not a plug.) It will pit a conservative Republican against a liberal Democrat, a one-time outfielder for Yale against a one-time pitcher for Santa Clara University, a fighter against […]
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The Biden administration has been trying to jump-start the domestic supply chain for electric vehicles so cleaner cars can be made in the United States. But the experience of one Texas company, whose plans to help make an all-American electric vehicle were upended by China, highlights the stakes involved as the administration finalizes rules governing […]
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Ten finance guys are drinking in a bar. Nine of them are Masters of the Universe — wheeler-dealers who make many millions of dollars every year. The tenth is what Gordon Gekko, in the movie “Wall Street,” called a “$400,000-a-year working Wall Street stiff.” Then the stiff leaves for a while, maybe to answer a […]
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The prediction was straightforward: A rapid rise in interest rates orchestrated by the Federal Reserve would confine consumer spending and corporate profits, sharply reducing hiring and cooling a red-hot economy. But it hasn’t worked out quite the way forecasters expected. Inflation has eased, but the biggest companies in the country have avoided the damage of […]
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It’s difficult for presidents to directly control inflation in the short term. But the White House has addressed a few specific costs that matter for families, by releasing oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve to contain surging oil prices in late 2022, for example. The Inflation Reduction Act reduced prescription drug prices under Medicare and […]
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The consumer is back — but for how long? Black Friday and today’s Cyber Monday shopping bonanzas hold outsize political significance this year with the retailing events emerging as key recession and inflation indicators. So far, so good. Bargain hunters turned out in force for Black Friday sales, and Cyber Monday is forecast to be […]
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Black Friday was once a hallmark celebration of American consumerism. Lately, it has lost some of its thunder. It’s true that shoppers looking for big discounts can still line up early at Macy’s or Best Buy on the day after Thanksgiving, in hopes of snagging a bargain. But for many, the bargain has already been […]
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Peter Coy: So, Binya, Americans seem very grumpy about the economy lately, despite what looks like some pretty good news. I bet a lot of people will be talking over Thanksgiving dinner about why that is. I think I have some ideas to chew on. Let me throw out one thing to start. One problem […]
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U.S. gasoline prices are plunging just in time for Thanksgiving, and with the OPEC Plus oil cartel in apparent disarray, they could be heading lower for Christmas. Lower prices at the pump have helped ease the inflation rate most of this year. But this week, they fell to levels not seen at this time of […]
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Gail Collins: Bret, I guess we should start with things we’re thankful for this year. Don’t suppose the imminent end of the political career of the dreadful Representative George Santos rises to the level of holiday cheer. So you go first. No fair counting family and friends. Bret Stephens: It’s a depressing world, Gail, so […]
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Look at economic data, and you’d think that young voters would be riding high right now. Unemployment remains low. Job opportunities are plentiful. Inequality is down, wage growth is finally beating inflation, and the economy has expanded rapidly this year. Look at TikTok, and you get a very different impression — one that seems more […]
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What’s happening in the economy now will have a big effect — perhaps, a decisive one — on the presidential election and control of Congress in 2024. To a remarkable extent, the economy is what matters to voters, so much so that one long-running election model relies on economic data to produce accurate predictions without […]
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President Biden said Thursday that the United States has “real differences with Beijing,” one day after he held an hourslong meeting with President Xi Jinping of China at a moment of deep tension between the two countries. Speaking to executives at the APEC summit in San Francisco, Mr. Biden noted that he and Mr. Xi […]
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Days ahead of the start of the holiday shopping season, several major retailers expressed caution about consumers during the busiest selling period of the year. Walmart, the largest retailer in the United States, said on Thursday that sales rose about 5 percent in its latest quarter, which ran through late October, versus the previous year. […]
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On Oct. 26, the Department of Commerce announced that gross domestic product had grown at an annual rate of 4.9 percent in the third quarter. This growth rate ran well above even optimistic forecasts, leading to what can only be called triumphalism from a White House dead-set on making “Bidenomics” a key to its 2024 […]
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The streets outside the San Francisco hotel where Chinese leader Xi Jinping addressed a crowd of American business executives Wednesday night were chaotic, echoing with police sirens and the chants of protesters. A woman had strapped herself to a pole 25 feet in the air in front of the hotel, yelling “Free Tibet!” as a […]
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Stocks soared on Tuesday, after an inflation reading raised hopes that the Federal Reserve’s campaign to slow inflation may have reached its limits. The S&P 500 rose 1.9 percent on Tuesday, while the Russell 2000 index of smaller companies’ stocks, which are more exposed to the ups and downs of the economy, climbed roughly 5 […]
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Inflation eased in October and price increases showed encouraging signs of slowing under the surface, according to fresh data released on Tuesday. The report provided the Federal Reserve with renewed evidence that its battle against rapid inflation is working — and likely reduced the need for further rate increases. The overall Consumer Price Index slowed […]
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If President Biden hopes to replicate his narrow victory in Arizona, he will need disillusioned voters like Alex Jumah. An immigrant from Iraq, Mr. Jumah leans conservative, but he said he voted for Mr. Biden because he could not stomach former President Trump’s anti-Muslim views. That was 2020. Since then, Mr. Jumah, 41, said, his […]
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The food we eat and the roads we drive on. Our health and safety. Our cultural heritage, natural environments and economic flourishing. Nearly every cherished aspect of American life is under growing threat from climate change and it is effectively too late to prevent many of the harms from worsening over the next decade, a […]
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For more than a quarter century, the fortunes of the United States and China were fused in a uniquely monumental joint venture. Americans treated China like the mother of all outlet stores, purchasing staggering quantities of low-priced factory goods. Major brands exploited China as the ultimate means of cutting costs, manufacturing their products in a […]
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The Biden administration has pulled back on plans to announce the conclusion of substantial portions of a new Asian-Pacific trade pact at an international meeting in San Francisco this week, after several top Democratic lawmakers threatened to oppose the deal, people familiar with the matter said. The White House had been aiming to announce that […]
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Since Tuesday’s big Democratic electoral victories, I’ve been seeing some speculation to the effect that the 2024 election may be marked by a reverse coattail effect: that President Biden, whose poll numbers have supposedly been weighed down by a bad economy, may be lifted up by local candidates who have been racking up wins over […]
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Well, this week has been an emotional roller coaster. On Sunday, a New York Times/Siena College poll showed President Biden behind Donald Trump in a bunch of battleground states, sending Democrats into a tizzy. Then on Tuesday, voters handed Democrats a string of election victories — the kind they have enjoyed in election after election […]
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The Biden administration has overhauled how the federal government assesses the costs and benefits of regulation and some government spending programs, clearing a path for more aggressive efforts to fight climate change and help the poor. Officials at the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, a branch of the Office of Management and […]
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President Biden’s signature climate law has stimulated a surge of investment in electric vehicle production across the country, including tens of billions of dollars on battery plants across the South and new assembly lines near the Great Lakes. Based on early evidence, it is succeeding at a goal that economists have long considered difficult and […]
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At an even more basic level, Mr. Trump doesn’t have to promise positive change so much as the chance to stiff-arm the current leadership. Plenty of protest voters may not be looking to punish Mr. Biden for a particular action, or inaction, so much as for their inchoate disenchantment with the way things are. The […]
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President Ronald Reagan rode a “Morning in America” message to a blowout re-election victory in 1984, based partly on warm feelings about his economic performance. Today’s economy is similar in many ways to Mr. Reagan’s as he entered that campaign, with one big difference: There is widespread voter angst over the incumbent’s economic stewardship. A […]
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Normally a 50 percent increase in sales is considered very good. But when the number of electric vehicles sold in the United States grew that much during the third quarter from a year earlier, it was a disappointment. Carmakers and analysts had expected more. Instead of celebrating, auto executives worried that demand for electric vehicles […]
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Where the economy is working (and where it isn’t) With a year to go before Election Day, polls increasingly show that American voters believe next year will be a rematch between President Biden and Donald Trump — with the former president in the lead in key battleground states despite his legal troubles (more on that […]
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