Business category, Page 112
A lavender haze: Businesses anticipate Taylor Swift windfall that could ‘blow Kenny Chesney out of the water’
Tia Muscarella is already leaning into the Taylor Swift phenomenon, and The Eras Tour is still a week away from its Pittsburgh stop. The North Shore Tavern, where Muscarella is the bar manager, has been featuring the specialty cocktail Lavender Haze, a concoction of butterfly pea blossom gin laced with...
Here’s the skinny on the diabetes drug Ozempic and its popularity as a weight loss wonder
For Diane Lang, the big push to focus on her health and weight came from her grandchildren. “I was exhausted,” she said. “When they would visit, I would just try to keep up with them. I want to run with them and play with them. I want to be here...
Bulls run again on Wall Street as S&P 500 climbs 20% above October lowVideo
NEW YORK — Stocks rose just enough Thursday for Wall Street to barrel into a new bull market as the S&P 500 keeps rallying off its low from last autumn. The index rose 0.6% to carry it 20% above a bottom hit in October. That means Wall Street’s main measure...
U.S. applications for jobless benefits highest since October 2021
The number of Americans applying for unemployment benefits last week rose to its highest level since October 2021, but the labor market remains one of the healthiest parts of the U.S. economy. The Labor Department reported Thursday that U.S. applications for jobless claims were 261,000 for the week ending June...
Merck sues federal government, calling plan to negotiate Medicare drug prices extortion
Merck is suing the federal government over a plan to negotiate Medicare drug prices, calling the program a sham equivalent to extortion. The drugmaker is seeking to halt the program, which was laid out in the Inflation Reduction Act and is expected to save taxpayers billions of dollars in the...
Breeze Airways adds flights between Pittsburgh and Maine
Maine’s many wonders, including Acadia National Park and lobster shacks along the Atlantic coastline, just got easier to reach for Pittsburghers. Low-cost carrier Breeze Airways announced last week that it has begun offering direct, nonstop flights between Pittsburgh International Airport and Portland, Maine. Round-trip flights will run twice a week,...
Your Apple iPhone will stop autocorrecting your ‘ducking’ swear words this fall
Your neighbors have really made you angry. You fire off a text to a friend using some salty language and the friend responds with a laughing emoji. You didn’t mean to tell her that your neighbors are making you “ducking” mad. There are no mallards in your yard. Coming this...
Homer City power plant closing won’t impact electric grid reliability, group says
The closure of the Homer City Generating Station — the largest coal-fired power plant in the state — will not adversely impact the power grid serving Pennsylvania and 12 other states, a regional electricity transmission organization said Tuesday. The Indiana County facility is scheduled to be decommissioned as of July...
Part of Hatfield’s Ferry power plant to be razed
The cooling towers at another closed coal-fired power plant in Southwestern Pennsylvania will be demolished Thursday morning. Two concrete hyperbolic cooling towers — one 500 feet tall and the other 550 feet tall — will be imploded at FirstEnergy Corp.’s former Hatfield’s Ferry Power Station along the Monongahela River in...
Dozens of dangerous rail crossings will be eliminated with $570 million in grants
OMAHA, Neb. — With the rail industry relying on longer and longer trains to cut costs, the Biden administration is handing out $570 million in grants to help eliminate many railroad crossings in 32 states. The grants announced Monday will contribute to building bridges or underpasses at the sites of...
USW petitions state labor board to unionize Pitt staffers
Monday’s petition by the United Steelworkers for a state-supervised election to unionize thousands of University of Pittsburgh staff is rooted in years of preparation, said Jesse Dubin, a program evaluator in Pitt’s school of pharmacy. Though the path to a vote could be complex and prolonged staff will benefit from...
Hundreds of journalists strike to demand leadership change at nation’s biggest newspaper chainVideo
NEW YORK — Journalists at two dozen local newspapers across the U.S. walked off the job Monday to demand an end to painful cost-cutting measures and a change of leadership at Gannett, the country’s biggest newspaper chain. The strike involves hundreds of journalists at newspapers in eight states, including the...
Apple unveils sleek, $3,500 ‘Vision Pro’ goggles
CUPERTINO, Calif. — Apple on Monday unveiled a long-rumored headset that will place its users between the virtual and real world, while also testing the technology trendsetter’s ability to popularize new-fangled devices after others failed to capture the public’s imagination. After years of speculation, Apple CEO Tim Cook hailed the...
Norfolk Southern is 1st railroad to give all workers sick time but all see progress in labor talks
OMAHA, Neb. — Norfolk Southern became the first major freight railroad with deals to provide paid sick time to all of its workers Monday, but the other railroads are making progress with nearly 60% of all rail workers securing this basic benefit since the start of the year. All of...
Crude prices are up after Saudi cuts, but energy prices way down from last year
Wall Street is relatively flat Monday following last week’s last surge propelled by U.S. jobs data that raised new questions about if or when a recession might arrive. Futures for the S&P 500 and the Dow Jones Industrial Average are essentially unchanged heading into a week with little new data...
Saudi Arabia is slashing oil supply. It could mean higher gas prices for U.S. drivers
FRANKFURT, Germany — Saudi Arabia will reduce how much oil it sends to the global economy, taking a unilateral step to prop up the sagging price of crude after two previous cuts to supply by major producing countries in the OPEC+ alliance failed to push oil higher. The Saudi cut...
Apple is expected to unveil a sleek, pricey headset. Is it the device VR has been looking for?
Apple appears poised to unveil a long-rumored headset that will place its users between the virtual and real world, while also testing the technology trendsetter’s ability to popularize new-fangled devices after others failed to capture the public’s imagination. After years of speculation, the stage is set for the widely anticipated...
Retiring from retirement: Whether for financial reasons or boredom, a growing number of older adults are rejoining the workforce
Michael Trenga was retired two days before he jumped back into the workforce. The decision was financially motivated. “I retired on a Friday and went back to work on a Monday,” said Trenga, 71, of Leechburg. “Without my job, I would have to cut back on a lot — not...
Pittsburgh-based Astrobotic partners with Jeff Bezos company to build a lunar lander
The lunar road back to the moon “lies right here, through the Keystone State,” NASA Deputy Administrator Pam Melroy said during a visit to Pittsburgh on Friday. Sixty-three Pennsylvania suppliers contributed to NASA’s Artemis mission, which aims to return humans to the moon and use that as a launching point...
Journalists to strike at the largest U.S. newspaper chain
Journalists across the U.S. will walk off their jobs next week at roughly two dozen newsrooms run by Gannett, the largest newspaper chain in the the country, their union said Thursday. The mostly one-day strike, which will start Monday, aims to protest Gannett’s leadership and cost-cutting measures imposed since its...
United Steelworkers seeking vote to unionize thousands of Pitt staff
The United Steelworkers said it intends to file paperwork Monday calling for a state-supervised labor election that could unionize more than 5,000 workers at the University of Pittsburgh’s main campus and four branches. The USW already represents about 3,000 full- and part-time faculty on Pitt’s main campus in Oakland and...
Know any airplane mechanics? A wave of retirements is leaving some U.S. industries desperate to hire
WASHINGTON — Kwasi Bandoh, a senior recruiter for an airline, stood before a group of aviation mechanic students at their graduation ceremony last month and congratulated them for all having jobs. As some of the students began nudging each other, Bandoh realized that perhaps not every one of them had...
U.S. safety agency to require automatic emergency braking on new vehicles and set tougher standards
WASHINGTON — The U.S. government’s auto safety agency plans to require that all new passenger cars and light trucks include potentially life-saving automatic emergency braking and meet stricter safety standards within three years. Wednesday’s announcement by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration represents the agency’s latest move toward regulating electronic...
FTC charges Amazon with privacy violations over Alexa and Ring cameras
WASHINGTON — Amazon will pay more than $30 million to settle alleged privacy violations involving its voice assistant Alexa and its doorbell camera Ring. The Federal Trade Commission voted to file charges in two separate cases Wednesday that could also force the company to delete certain data collected by its...
Conservatives call for boycott of Chick-fil-A for being ‘woke’
The latest target of conservative outcry is no longer Target. Hundreds of social media users took to Twitter on Wednesday to call for a boycott of Chick-fil-A over the diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) page on the restaurant’s website. “(T)hey Chose Go Woke, Go Broke,” Twitter user MAGA American Patriot...
