Unemployment dropped another notch, from 3.6% to 3.5%, matching the more than 50-year low reached just before the pandemic took hold.

The coffee shop, located at Lincoln and Jersey avenues on the border of North Park and West Ridge, is located in the Lincoln Village shopping center. It’s now the sixth Chicago-area Starbucks to vote for unionization – and among more than 200 around the nation to unionize so far.

Rent prices rose 9.4% in 2022, according to data firm CoStar Group. In response, groups of local tenants are unionizing in hopes of pushing for an end to a rent control ban that was passed in 1997.

“We are thrilled to have witnessed one of the biggest jackpot wins in Mega Millions history,” Ohio Lottery Director Pat McDonald, currently serving as Lead Director for the Mega Millions Consortium, said in a statement on the lottery’s website. “We’re eager to find out who won and look forward to congratulating the winner soon!”

Economists are divided over whether a recession is looming. What’s clear is that economic uncertainty isn’t going away anytime soon. But there are steps you can take now to be ready for whatever is ahead.

The decline that the Commerce Department reported Thursday in the gross domestic product — the broadest gauge of the economy — followed a 1.6% annual drop from January through March. Consecutive quarters of falling GDP constitute one informal, though not definitive, indicator of a recession.

Growth appears to be sputtering, home sales are tumbling and economists warn of a potential recession ahead. But consumers are still spending, businesses keep posting profits and the economy keeps adding hundreds of thousands of jobs each month.

Your chance of winning the grand prize is minuscule, at one in 302.5 million. You have better odds of a smaller payoff, such as winning $1 million for matching five regular numbers but missing the Mega Ball. But even that is one in 12.6 million.

Many of the barriers erected by elected officials and civic leaders beginning in the 1930s to keep Black Chicagoans, Latino Chicagoans and White Chicagoans from living, working and playing in the same neighborhoods remain unchanged nearly a century later, according to a new study.

Summer travel is heating up. A survey commissioned by the American Hotel & Lodging Association shows that nearly 70% of Americans are planning to travel this summer. But what about tourism here in Chicago?

If you were planning to buy a new home, should you do it before rates rise again?  What if you need to upgrade your car? And is it good to pay off your credit card completely, or should you carry a small balance to boost your credit score?

U.S. Sen. Tammy Duckworth, alongside Sen. Dick Durbin, met with residents and members of March Fourth, a gun safety advocacy group, Tuesday to hear more about their experiences as well as discuss policy solutions.

Consumer prices soared 9.1% compared with a year earlier, the government said Wednesday, the biggest yearly increase since 1981, and up from an 8.6% jump in May. From May to June, prices rose 1.3%, another huge increase, after prices had surged 1% from April to May.

The first payments began to flow nearly nine months after the Chicago City Council approved the program’s funding as part of its 2022 budget.

Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s office will host three “budget engagement forums” on July 21, July 23 and July 30 to give Chicago residents a chance to “share their priorities regarding city services” and “have a dialogue” with the mayor, budget director and other city officials.

The average U.S. price of regular-grade gasoline plunged 19 cents over the past two weeks to $4.86 per gallon.