Stand and Deliver.

Kamala Harris's big night.

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1. There’s a saying that economic expansions don’t die of old age: They’re murdered by the Federal Reserve. Fed Chair Jerome Powell has spent the past two years determined to beat inflation even if it resulted in recession. Now he’s on the brink of winning the battle without bringing down the economy, but the next few months will be crucial. If he succeeds and maneuvers the economy to a soft landing that brings inflation down without a big rise in unemployment, it’ll be a historic achievement worthy of the central banking Hall of Fame. If he fails, the economy will slide into recession anyway under the weight of higher interest rates—and he’ll have proved the old maxim about the Fed. Powell and his colleagues have signaled in recent weeks that they’re ready to start cutting rates when they next meet in September, with price pressures now easing but the jobs market cooling. That’s put attention on how fast officials should bring down rates from a two-decade high. For Powell, the last phase of the Fed’s inflation fight marks a make-or-break moment. How he plans his approach will loom over the central bank’s annual conference in Wyoming’s Grand Teton National Park this week, including during a widely anticipated speech tomorrow. (Source: wsj.com)

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2. The U.S. economy added far fewer jobs in 2023 and early 2024 than previously reported, a sign that cracks in the labor market are more severe — and began forming earlier — than initially believed. On Wednesday, the Labor Department said monthly payroll figures overstated job growth by roughly 818,000 in the 12 months that ended in March. That suggests employers added about 174,000 jobs per month during that period, down from the previously reported pace of about 242,000 jobs — a downward revision of about 28 percent. The revisions, which are preliminary, are part of an annual process in which monthly estimates, based on surveys, are reconciled with more accurate but less timely records from state unemployment offices. The updated numbers are the latest sign of vulnerability in the job market, which until recently had appeared rock solid despite months of high interest rates and economists’ warnings of an impending recession.  (Source: nytimes.com)

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3. Canada’s two main railroads earlier today locked out over 9,000 employees after they were unable to reach new labor deals with a Teamsters union, the start of a work stoppage that threatens to stanch hundreds of millions of dollars in daily cross-border trade and upend North American supply chains. The simultaneous moves by Canadian National Railway and Canadian Pacific Kansas City sent the country’s businesses and policymakers scrambling to limit the fallout, as they warned of serious harm to the world’s 10th-largest economy unless the railroads and the Teamsters Canada Rail Conference clinched new agreements. The companies had set a deadline of 12:01 a.m. Eastern time today. (Source: wsj.com)