For months, the Fed has been warily watching the U.S. economy’s robust job gains out of concern that employers, desperate to hire, will keep boosting pay and, in turn, keep inflation elevated. But January’s blowout job growth coincided with an actual slowdown in wage growth.

Pay and benefits for America’s workers grew at a healthy but more gradual pace in the final three months of 2022, a third straight slowdown, which could help reassure the Federal Reserve that wage gains won’t fuel higher inflation.

All told, the national average has climbed by more than 9% since the end of last year — the biggest increase to start a year since 2009, according to Bespoke Investment Group.

In a span of less than 12 months, nearly all of the biggest cryptocurrency equivalent of a banks have failed spectacularly. Last week, Genesis filed Chapter 11, joining Voyager Digital, Celsius and BlockFi on the list of companies that have either filed for bankruptcy protection or gone out of business.

It is the company’s biggest-ever round of layoffs and adds to tens of thousands of other job losses recently announced by Microsoft, Amazon, Facebook parent Meta and other tech companies as they tighten their belts amid a darkening outlook for the industry. Just this month, there have been at least 48,000 job cuts announced by major companies in the sector.

The Treasury Department said in a letter to congressional leaders it has started taking “extraordinary measures” as the government has run up against its legal borrowing capacity of $31.381 trillion. An artificially imposed cap, the debt ceiling has been increased roughly 80 times since the 1960s.

The company said it secured $150 million in financing that will allow it keep its stores open and operations running. As of October, the Company had 761 total Party City stores and 149 temporary Halloween City stores.

The ongoing slowdown in wholesale price growth is adding to evidence that the worst bout of inflation in four decades is steadily easing, though it remains far above the Federal Reserve’s target of 2%.

What was once a cheap source of protein has become a luxury breakfast food. Egg prices have soared over the past year, as the worst avian flu outbreak in U.S. history has infected more than 57 million chickens.

A lingering bird flu outbreak, combined with soaring feed, fuel and labor costs, has led to U.S. egg prices more than doubling over the past year and hatched a lot of sticker shock on grocery aisles.

Yet the figures show there are nearly 1.8 jobs for every unemployed person, down from a peak of 2 but historically very high. Before the pandemic, there were usually more unemployed people than jobs.

Investors will be closely watching moves by central banks in coming months to fight inflation with higher interest rates, all the while bracing for the recession and higher unemployment that could result from those policies.

With less than two months until Election Day, Mayor Lori Lightfoot touts the $16.4 billion spending plan she crafted as a “stability budget” for a city enjoying a faster than expected recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic. Here’s what it does.

The benchmark index finished with a loss of 19.4% for 2022 — its worst loss since the financial crisis 14 years ago and a painful reversal for investors after the S&P 500 notched a gain of nearly 27% in 2021.

A look at the Chicago residential property market as we head into 2023 after a year of interest rate hikes. 

Bally’s Chicago casino is set to have 3,400 slots and 173 table games in addition to an exhibition hall, 500-room hotel, a 3,000-seat theater and 11 restaurants. The development will include a 2,100-square-foot park and walking path along the river and a three-level underground parking garage, according to the plans released by city officials.