Business category, Page 285
U.S. trade deficit jumps to 10-year high, including record gap with China
WASHINGTON — The U.S. trade deficit jumped nearly 19 percent in December, pushing the trade imbalance for all of 2018 to widen to a decade-long high of $621 billion. The gap with China on goods widened to an all-time record of $419.2 billion. The Commerce Department figures released Wednesday undermined...
Saint Vincent College in Unity hosting small business information session
The U.S. Small Business Administration is inviting local small-business owners to apply for its Emerging Leaders Initiative during an information session on March 12. The session at Saint Vincent College, Aurelius Hall, open from 10:30 a.m. to noon March 12, will give business owners an opportunity to learn more about...
Last car to roll off assembly line at Lordstown GM plant
LORDSTOWN, Ohio — A sprawling General Motors’ assembly plant near Youngstown will be idled on Wednesday after more than 50 years producing cars and other vehicles, a move that will eliminate nearly 1,700 hourly positions by months’ end. GM announced in December that Lordstown along with three plants in the...
Las Vegas bets on Elon Musk for tunnel transit system
LAS VEGAS — Entrepreneur Elon Musk’s dream of an express tunnel transit system could finally become a reality in Las Vegas after major setbacks in other cities. Las Vegas’ tourism agency announced Wednesday it is recommending that an enterprise backed by the divisive billionaire receive a contract to build and...
GM’s job cuts in Ohio show hot economy leaves parts of America behind
LORDSTOWN, Ohio — Scott Mezzapeso had to do something last month he never imagined: call his ex-wife and warn her that he might not be able to pay child support on time. Mezzapeso has a tattoo of his daughter on his left arm and rarely misses her high school softball...
Major brands avoid Trump even as he promotes them from the White House
In a scene likely worth millions of dollars in free advertising, President Trump displayed a spread of burgers from some of the country’s biggest fast-food chains inside the State Dining Room of the White House on Monday as hungry football players looked on. With cameras rolling, he offered a presidential...
Southwestern Pa. banks among Forbes’ ‘World’s Best’
Four banks based in Southwestern Pennsylvania are included among the 60 U.S. financial institutions that made Forbes magazine’s 2019 list of the World’s Best Banks. For this inaugural listing, the magazine partnered with research firm Statista, which surveyed more than 40,000 customers in order to rate banks in 23 countries...
Trader Joe’s customers (91,000 of them) petition store to reduce plastic packaging
Customers love Trader Joe’s for the company’s innovative products and affordable prices. All that plastic encasing cucumbers, peppers, tomatoes and cherries? Not so much. As of Tuesday, more than 91,000 people have signed a Change.org petition urging the Southern California-based chain to reduce its plastic packaging. “Trader Joe’s, I love...
Kraft Heinz keeps 5 test kitchens busy to stay relevant
GLENVIEW, Ill. — Robin Ross, director of culinary at Kraft Heinz, doesn’t need data to know how much consumer tastes have changed since processed food reigned supreme. When she was growing up, dinner often meant heating up a can of something on the stove, and when she was raising kids...
The federal deficit ballooned at start of new fiscal year, up 77 percent from a year before
WASHINGTON — The federal budget deficit ballooned rapidly in the first four months of the fiscal year amid falling tax revenue and higher spending, the Treasury Department said Tuesday, posing a new challenge for the White House and Congress and they prepare for a number of budget battles. The deficit...
Study examines how health consumers respond to surprise medical bills
WASHINGTON — When it comes to having a baby, that bundle of joy may bring an unexpected price tag that can affect parents’ future health care choices. At least that was the finding of a study published this week in Health Affairs. It examined how consumers respond to surprise medical...
Holiday season defines winners, losers in retail
NEW YORK — The 2018 holiday season turned out to be a mixed bag for retailers, with some of them defying a gloomy government report in December that raised concerns that shoppers were hunkering down everywhere. Retailers including Walmart, Target and Best Buy that have been responding faster to a...
Papa John’s, founder reach settlement agreement
Papa John’s has reached a settlement agreement with founder John Schnatter that will see him step down from the pizza chain’s board once an independent director that is mutually acceptable replaces him. If a new director isn’t named prior to Papa John’s 2019 annual shareholders meeting, Schnatter’s term will expire...
Target hits on all cylinders in the fourth quarter
MINNEAPOLIS — Strong online sales, traffic growth in newly remodeled stores and expanded delivery options pushed Target beyond most expectations in the crucial fourth quarter, when retailers ring up holiday sales. Target, which is fighting with Walmart as well as Amazon for online dominance, reported a 31 percent spike in...
John Dorfman: Omaha man wins Derby of Economic Forecasting
“What did everybody get wrong this year?” my wife asked me at breakfast Sunday. It was a good question. I’ve been running the Derby of Economic Forecasting Talent, or DEFT, more or less annually since 1999. Contestants must predict six economic variables — gross domestic product, inflation, the interest rate...
Truck driver shortage could impact prices of consumer goodsVideo
Despite a national truck driver shortage, commercial driver’s license schools in the area are seeing an uptick in enrollments, thanks to incentives such as higher wages and better benefits. But the push to mitigate the shortage could soon have an impact on the prices of consumer goods, said Kevin Steward,...
Evidence grows that Trump’s trade wars are hitting U.S. economy
WASHINGTON — President Trump regularly declares that he’s winning his trade wars. Yet evidence is growing that the U.S. economy is a net loser so far. In two separate papers published over the weekend, some of the world’s leading trade economists declared Trump’s tariffs to be the most consequential trade...
Qualcomm puts value of patents on line in first Apple jury trial
Qualcomm is putting the value of its patent portfolio on the line in a California courtroom in its hometown to try to make Apple pay for using technology the chipmaker credits for the iPhone’s commercial success. It’s the first time a U.S. jury will have a say in the two-year,...
Cheap prices will be the latest casualty of the trucker shortage
America’s trucker shortage is about to hit consumers right where it hurts: in the kitty litter. McDonald’s long-time distributor Martin-Brower Co. is raising delivery fees, imperiling low menu prices, and Procter & Gamble Co., Church & Dwight Co. and Hasbro Inc. are sounding the alarm that higher freight fees could...
EBay rethinking future of StubHub and classified business
NEW YORK — EBay said Friday that it is considering the sale or spin-off its ticket-reselling site StubHub and its classified ads business after a push from an activist investor. Back in January, Elliott Management said in a letter to the company in that it believed the e-commerce company would...
U.S. consumer spending fell sharp 0.5 percent in December
WASHINGTON — U.S. consumer spending tumbled 0.5 percent in December, the biggest decline in nine years. Meanwhile, incomes were rose sharply in December but edged down in January. The Commerce Department says the fall in consumer spending followed sizable gains of 0.7 percent in October and 0.6 percent in November....
Walmart to make ‘every effort’ to keep disabled greeters
After more than a week of backlash, Walmart is pledging to make “every effort” to find other roles for disabled workers who’d accused the retailer of targeting them as it prepares to eliminate the “people greeter” job at 1,000 stores. Greg Foran, president and CEO of Walmart’s U.S. stores, said...
Martha Stewart partners with Canadian cannabis firm
No, you’re not smoking something. Martha Stewart has entered the fast-growing — but still legally murky — cannabis market. The domestic diva who brought us hemp yarn is now partnering with Canada’s Canopy Growth Corp. to develop new products containing CBD, a compound derived from hemp and marijuana that doesn’t...
Elon Musk’s long-promised $35,000 Model 3 has finally arrived, Tesla says
A Tesla electric car that mainstream drivers can afford has finally arrived, Elon Musk’s automaker said Thursday, finally achieving a long-delayed promise that could help propel the upstart automaker into the American middle-class garage. Tesla’s Model 3 sedan, already the country’s best-selling electric car, will now be offered at a...
YouTube suspends comments on videos of kids to curb pedophiles
SAN FRANCISCO — YouTube said Thursday it will turn off comments on nearly all videos featuring kids — potentially affecting millions of posts on the site — after reports last week that pedophiles were leaving inappropriate comments on innocuous videos of children. The change comes as YouTube grapples with moderating...
