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Economy Tag

Germany is heading into a recession, a report released by Chancellor Angela Merkel's office said. The economists working at the Chancellor's office see Germany technically in a recession given the country's negative growth in two successive quarters, the German weekly Der Spiegel reported. Europe's largest economy is expected to contract between July and September, as it did in the second quarter.

China has decided to implement tariffs on $75 billion worth of U.S. goods as the U.S. plans to impose tariffs on $300 billion worth of Chinese products. These additional tariffs will cover almost all of the remaining U.S. products imported to China.

The economy added 164,000 jobs in July while unemployment held steady at 3.7%. Annual wage growth went up to 3.2%. Overall the report satisfied analysts and economists since it almost fell in line with expectations. It shows a healthy economy despite a slight slowdown.

The House of Representatives passed the Raise the wage Act, 231-199, that would raise the federal minimum wage to $15 from $7.25. The bill states it has to happen by 2025. While the left celebrates the news, the bill may never see the light of day in the Republican-controlled Senate.

The progressive push for higher minimum wage laws has had perfectly predictable results: lower-income people are most harmed, businesses switch to robots, businesses shutter, or as in the case of west coast Restaurants Unlimited, Inc., they simply file for bankruptcy. The chain closed six restaurants prior to filing.

A study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Center for Health Statistics found that women only gave birth to 3.79 million babies in 2018, which is a dip of 2%. We have not seen that low of a birth rate since the 1980s. The fertility rate, which they measure by "the number of births per 1,000 women ages 15 to 44," went down to 59%. That is the lowest percentage ever since the federal government began to keep track of those births.

Holy cow, what a drop off. The February jobs report shows the economy only added 20,000 jobs last month. Experts predicted 180,000 jobs. However, the unemployment rate fell to 3.8%.

Unions and Democrat politicians asked Amazon to come back to Long Island City, Queens, in an open letter in The New York Times. They wrote:
New Yorkers do not want to give up on the 25,000 permanent jobs, 11,000 union construction and maintenance jobs, and $28 billion in new tax revenues that Amazon was prepared to bring to our state. A clear majority of New Yorkers support this project and were disappointed by your decision not to proceed. We understand that becoming home to the world’s industry leader in e-commerce, logistics and web services would be a tremendous boost for our state’s technology industry, which is our fastest growing generator of new jobs. As representatives of a wide range of government, business, labor and community interests, we urge you to reconsider, so that we can move forward together.

The gross domestic product (GDP) in the last quarter of 2018 grew 2.6%, which exceeded expectations. This is the first time since President George W. Bush that we had four straight quarters with GDP growth 2% and up. Experts thought the GDP, "a broad measure of the goods and services produced across the U.S.," would land at 2.2%.

The economy added 304,000 jobs in January, the 100th month in a row with growth. Experts predicted only 107,000 jobs in January. Labor force participation (LFP) is the highest it's been since 2014 at 63.2%. Average hourly wages only grew by 0.1%, but overall it's up 3.2% from a year ago. The unemployment went up slightly from 3.9% to 4%.