The Latest News about the economy

The U.S. is the most competitive economy in the world for the first time since former President Barack Obama took office in 2009, according to the World Economic Forum’s index published Tuesday.

The number of Americans claiming unemployment insurance fell unexpectedly last week after side effects from Hurricane Florence drove figures up.

Private sector employment increased by 230,000 jobs from August to September according to the September ADP Report.  The impressive jobs numbers come on the heels of a report that showed wages also rose last month. Mark Zandi, chief economist of Moody’s Analytics, said, “The job market continues to power forward. Employment gains are broad-based across industries and company sizes. At the current ...

High interest rates continued to put pressure on new vehicle sales in September, according to the car shopping experts at Edmunds. The annual percentage rate (APR) on new financed vehicles averaged 5.8 percent in September, compared to an average APR of 4.8 percent in September 2017 and 4.1 percent five years ago. Interest rates have stayed above 5 percent for eight months ...

Hourly wages increased again in September amid a tightening labor market. The Trump economy is red hot and it is putting pressure on the job market as more jobs are created than there are people to fill them. The increased competition for workers sent wages up 2.33% ($.61) in  September. The tight labor market continues to restrain job growth, while ...

Economic activity in the manufacturing sector expanded in September along with the overall economy, say the nation’s supply executives in the latest ISM Manufacturing report. The report was issued today by Timothy R. Fiore, CPSM, C.P.M., Chair of the Institute for Supply Management® (ISM®) Manufacturing Business Survey Committee: “The September PMI® registered 59.8 percent, a decrease of 1.5 percentage points from the August reading of 61.3 percent. ...

Consumer confidence increased in September, following a large improvement in August. The Index now stands at 138.4 (1985=100), up from 134.7 in August. The Present Situation Index improved marginally from 172.8 to 173.1, while the Expectations Index surged from 109.3 last month to 115.3 this month. “After a considerable improvement in August, Consumer Confidence increased further in September and hovers ...

Did you know that before you even wake up in the morning you are subsiding profits to Chinese companies? It has to do with how our country levies shipping costs for products shipped from China. The fact is, shipping costs for products shipped by China into the United States are tantamount to nothing. Without ever buying a single item online ...

Campus Reform’s Cabot Phillips asked young college students which president they believed deserved credit for the red-hot American economy just days after former President Barack Obama made a speech saying that it was all his doing. “When you hear how great the economy’s doing right now, let’s just remember when this recovery started,” Obama said in the speech. While working-class ...

Mid-sized businesses, representing roughly 40% of the U.S. economy and one-third of its workforce, registered the third consecutive quarter of record-high performance in the third quarter of 2018. Middle-market executives signaled a continuing robust forecast for the next six months, putting 2018 on pace to be the best year on record for the middle-market index. The RSM US Middle Market Business Index (MMBI), ...

The U.S. surpassed Saudi Arabia to become the world’s largest producer of crude oil, according to preliminary estimates from the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA).

One may recall the Obama statement, during his stagnant eight years of idly occupying the Oval Office, that the “new economy” which followed the downturn in 2008, will never replace the growth years of Reagan and Clinton and can’t possibly grow at a rate greater than one to two percent a year. Well the widely declaimed and insulted Donald Trump ...

Get A.F. Branco’s latest book “Make America Laugh Again: Vol. 2” HERE.