(The opinions expressed here are those of the author, a columnist for Reuters.) By Mark Miller CHICAGO (Reuters) – News flash: Members of Congress managed to walk and chew gum at the same time this week. In the midst of the impeachment furor, U.S. lawmakers ad... More »
NEW YORK (Reuters) – The United States may not have had a woman president quite yet, but on TV it certainly has. One of those was Mellie Grant, the character played by Bellamy Young on the Shonda Rhimes hit “Scandal” before it ended last year. Now one of the s... More »
BEIRUT (Reuters) – Tear gas engulfed central Beirut as security forces chased protesters near Lebanon’s parliament on Sunday in a second night of street clashes that wounded dozens of people. Protesters had returned despite a fierce crackdown by security force... More »
SYDNEY (Reuters) – Budget airline Jetstar is cutting domestic capacity by around 10% in January and weighing the sale of three Boeing 787-8 jets to counter industrial action by its pilots that the Australian carrier expects will cost it up to A$25 million ($17... More »
NEW YORK (Reuters) – It sounds counterintuitive, but members of Generation Z will have to focus on human connections if they want to compete with robots for the jobs of the future. Born after 1996 on the heels of the millennials, Gen Z is just entering the wor... More »
LONDON (Reuters) – Prime Minister Boris Johnson will welcome 109 new Conservative lawmakers to parliament on Monday, promising to honour his election pledges to get Brexit done as soon as possible and boost funding to the state health service. After winning a ... More »
PARIS (Reuters) – Four branches of France’s hardline CGT union, including railway and transport workers, threatened on Sunday to step up protests unless the government withdraws its pension reform proposal this week. In a major overhaul of France’s complex pen... More »
JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) – South African Airways (SAA) had to be placed on “business rescue” because there was no other viable and financially workable option to secure a credible future for the state-owned airline, President Cyril Ramaphosa said on Monday. SAA ... More »
LONDON (Reuters) – British Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s Conservative Party extended its lead over the Labour Party to 14 percentage points, up from 9 percentage points a week ago, an opinion poll by Survation for ITV’s Good Morning Britain showed on Monday. ... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A new analysis of where “innovation” jobs are being created in the United States paints a stark portrait of a divided economy where the industries seen as key to future growth cluster in a narrowing set of places. Divergence in job growt... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Friday’s booming U.S. jobs report should give the Federal Reserve all it needs to stick to its plan not to cut interest rates further in the near future, so when U.S. central bankers meet this week, most of the focus will be on their out... More »
SAO PAULO (Reuters) – Brazilian delivery app Loggi must formalize work relationships with its motorbike drivers and pay charities 30 million reais as a fine for not previously contracting the workers, according to a Sao Paolo court ruling released on Friday. A... More »
LONDON (Reuters) – British manufacturers cut jobs last month at the fastest rate since 2012, a survey showed on Monday, as pressures from Brexit and a global trade slowdown caused the sector’s longest decline since the financial crisis. The IHS Markit/CIPS man... More »
TOKYO (Reuters) – Japanese activists on Monday called for drastic steps by the government, companies and universities to stamp out sexual harassment of job-hunting students, a problem they said lurks in the shadows because victims fear speaking out. Although t... More »
LONDON (Reuters) – A wave of social unrest across developing countries this year has caught many investors off-guard and is challenging models designed to gauge political risk for investors, prompting some to pull money out. That has led to worries that a with... More »
BERLIN (Reuters) – Germany’s export-dependent manufacturing sector contracted at a slower pace for the second month in a row in November, a survey showed on Monday, as companies sounded optimistic about their future business. IHS Markit’s Purchasing Managers’ ... More »
HARARE (Reuters) – Zimbabwe state doctors who were fired for going on strike have rejected a government offer to return to work, their union said on Friday. The doctors went on strike on Sept.3 to protest against poor wages, in some cases less than US$100 a mo... More »
BRUSSELS/FRANKFURT (Reuters) – Euro zone inflation accelerated faster than expected in November on a rise in food and services prices, likely comforting European Central Bank policymakers even if some factors pushing up prices may be only temporary. The ECB ha... More »
HONG KONG (Reuters) – Here are comments from voters, politicians, activists and academics on Hong Kong’s district council elections, where pro-democracy candidates romped to a landslide and symbolic majority after residents turned out to vote in record numbers... More »
NEW YORK/BANGALORE (Reuters) – SoftBank Group Corp (9984.T) will this week launch a previously agreed tender offer for as much as $3 billion of WeWork shares, including up to $970 million owned by the office sharing company’s cofounder Adam Neumann, two people... More »
CHEVILLY-LARUE, France (Reuters) – When French doctor Christian Chenay saw his first patients in 1951, penicillin was state of the art. Now 98 years old, he is still working and opens his surgery in the Paris suburbs two mornings a week for patients, some of w... More »
CREWE, England (Reuters) – Jules Wilde has never voted for Britain’s Conservatives and would hate to do so at the Dec. 12 election, yet for the first time in his life, the 62-year-old carer is considering backing the governing party because of Brexit. Wrapped ... More »
LAS VEGAS (Reuters) – Retired letter carrier Leslie Maxwell Burton has a message for Democratic presidential contenders campaigning in the early voting state of Nevada this weekend: She will not vote for anyone who tries to take away her hard-won union health ... More »
ROME (Reuters) – ArcelorMittal (MT.AS) is drafting a plan to re-commit to the 2018 deal, under which it bought the troubled Ilva steel plant in southern Italy, on three conditions, Il Messaggero daily reported on Monday. After withdrawing from the contract, th... More »
SEATTLE (Reuters) – Seattle voters, in a rebuke to heavy corporate campaign spending by Amazon.com, have kept progressives firmly in control of their city council, reviving chances for a tax on big businesses that the tech giant helped fend off last year. Amaz... More »
NEW YORK (Reuters) – When Hartmut Braune comes to work in security communications at SAP, he never knows what emergency will land in his inbox. It is a challenging job, compounded by the fact that Braune also coordinates the company’s global Lighthouse Core Te... More »
NAIROBI/JOHANNESBURG/LONDON (Reuters) – As jihadists wreaked ever more havoc in the last two years, mining firms in Burkina Faso rolled out extra security measures, from barracks for government troops protecting them to safe rooms for workers behind barbed wir... More »
SEOUL (Reuters) – A South Korean service is offering free funerals – but only to the living. More than 25,000 people have participated in mass “living funeral” services at Hyowon Healing Center since it opened in 2012, hoping to improve their lives by simulati... More »
(Reuters) – McDonald’s Corp dismissed Chief Executive Steve Easterbrook over a recent consensual relationship with an employee, which the board determined violated company policy, the fast-food giant said on Sunday. The board found that Easterbrook, 52, who ha... More »
BOSTON (Reuters) – Fisher Investments founder Ken Fisher said there will be no lay-offs at his Washington state investment firm despite some $3 billion in withdrawals by pension funds and others over allegedly sexist remarks he made at an investor conference. ... More »
ROME (Reuters) – A right-wing coalition scored a net victory in a local election in the central Italian region of Umbria, official data from the Interior Ministry showed on Monday, giving a boost to Matteo Salvini’s League party. The vote in tiny Umbria, a tra... More »
NEW YORK (Reuters) – Artificial intelligence is approaching critical mass at the office, but humans are still likely to be necessary, according to a new study by executive development firm, Future Workplace, in partnership with Oracle. Future Workplace found a... More »
BEIRUT (Reuters) – Lebanese Prime Minister Saad al-Hariri agreed on Sunday a package of reforms with government partners to ease an economic crisis that has sparked protests aimed at ousting a ruling elite seen as riddled with corruption and cronyism. Official... More »
HONG KONG (Reuters) – UBS (UBSG.S) will cut up to 30 jobs in the major centres of Hong Kong, Singapore, Sydney and Tokyo after combining its global markets and banking businesses, a person with knowledge of the matter said. The job cuts at the Swiss bank start... More »
LONDON (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – U.S. astronauts Christina Koch and Jessica Meir will make history on Friday when they conduct the first ever all-female spacewalk to replace the power source on the International Space Station (ISS). The pair will exit the... More »
LONDON (Reuters) – Britain’s vast financial services industry will lose more jobs to Europe over the coming years because of Brexit, the City of London’s policy chief told Reuters, warning people not to be duped by the low number of job moves to the continent ... More »
(Reuters) – Shared office space company WeWork Companies Inc is leaning toward a near $5 billion financing package led by JPMorgan Chase & Co (JPM.N), instead of selling a controlling stake to Japan’s SoftBank Group Corp (9984.T), Bloomberg reported bloom.bg/2... More »
BOSTON (Reuters) – Boston Federal Reserve officials have a pretty good idea what helped the ailing industrial town of Lawrence, Massachusetts, start to make a turnaround, including a state takeover of the public school system and a focused effort to lift job o... More »
(Reuters) – HSBC Holdings Plc (HSBA.L) is planning to cut up to 10,000 jobs, more than 4% of its workforce, as interim Chief Executive Officer Noel Quinn seeks to reduce costs across the banking group, the Financial Times reported on Sunday. The plan represent... More »
DENVER (Reuters) – Kansas City Federal Reserve Bank President Esther George on Sunday rejected the notion that the U.S. central bank should cut interest rates to try to boost low inflation, which she said is largely a result of global forces that U.S. monetary... More »
DETROIT (Reuters) – Talks for a new four-year labor contract between General Motors Co (GM.N) and its striking workers took a “turn for the worse” on Sunday after the United Auto Workers rejected the largest U.S. automaker’s latest offer but the two sides were... More »
ZURICH/HONG KONG (Reuters) – The announcement by Julius Baer this week that it had hired five senior bankers from Credit Suisse underscores the challenge facing Chief Executive Tidjane Thiam as he seeks to reassure staff and investors in the wake of a spying s... More »
NEW YORK (Reuters) – Morgan Stanley (MS.N) and Bank of America Corp (BAC.N) are expanding the employee-benefits services they offer, hoping to gain market share in the dull-but-reliable business of managing wealth for companies and employees. The banks, which ... More »
BEIJING (Reuters) – Factory activity surveys in China pointed to slight improvement in September as domestic demand picked up, but analysts believe the gains will be short-lived as the property market cools and Sino-U.S. trade tensions remain elevated. Persist... More »
BEIJING(Reuters) – China’s factory activity unexpectedly expanded at the fastest pace in 19 months in September as plants ramped up production and new orders rose, a private business survey showed on Monday, suggesting a modest recovery in the manufacturing se... More »
GENEVA (Reuters) – The launch of Facebook’s Libra could be pushed back to tackle the regulatory concerns that have been raised around the world, the head of the organization set up to oversee the cryptocurrency told Reuters. Three months ago, Facebook (FB.O) a... More »
CHICAGO (Reuters) – (The opinions expressed here are those of the author, a columnist for Reuters.) Just a few years ago, Democratic politicians were debating whether to accept cuts to Social Security benefits. No more: the only Social Security reform debate w... More »
SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – The California State Senate voted on Tuesday to pass a bill that would make it much more difficult for gig economy companies like Uber Technologies Inc (UBER.N) and Lyft Inc (LYFT.O) to classify workers as independent contractors rath... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. lawmakers clashed on Tuesday over funding for President Donald Trump’s border wall and women’s reproductive health programs, flashpoints that could threaten funding to keep the federal government operating beyond this month. Last De... More »
LONDON (Reuters) – Prime Minister Boris Johnson remains determined to pull Britain out of the European Union on Oct. 31 come what may, his foreign minister said on Sunday. Johnson, who has lost his majority in parliament and has seen his bid to call an early n... More »
HONG KONG (Reuters) – Hundreds of Hong Kong university and school students swapped classes for democracy demonstrations on Monday, the latest act of defiance in an anti-government movement that has plunged the Chinese-ruled city into its biggest political cris... More »
MEXICO CITY (Reuters) – Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, in his first state of the union address on Sunday, doubled down on his approach to managing Latin America’s second-largest economy, saying the interests of private firms would be subordinat... More »
WEST ORANGE, N.J. (Reuters) – Megan Helsel, a kayaking wildlife specialist, has her dream job, and T’angelo Magee is making headway toward his, a commercial pilot. Both say work is central to their identity. Both are disabled. Americans with disabilities, phys... More »
MILAN (Reuters) – Italy’s prime minister said on Sunday he expected to finalize talks over a new government by Wednesday, as the 5-Star Movement and Democratic Party were in intense discussions during the weekend to hammer out a deal on a common agenda and Cab... More »
SAN FRANCISCO/WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A decline in economic activity in the U.S. Midwest, apparent in a little-noticed report on Friday from the Chicago Federal Reserve Bank, adds to evidence of slowing growth in factory-heavy corners of the country key to next... More »
ALGIERS (Reuters) – On the face of it, Algeria’s state-dominated economy has weathered six months of turmoil well, with flightloads of public sector workers heading abroad for holidays even as protesters who ousted the veteran president in April now target his... More »
BIARRITZ, France (Reuters) – Iran has an opportunity to come back into compliance with the nuclear deal and resume dialogue about its nuclear activities, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said on Monday. U.S. President Donald Trump said earlier he would mee... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Joe Walsh, a conservative former U.S. congressman turned talk show host, on Sunday became the second Republican to challenge President Donald Trump for the party’s 2020 White House nomination. Walsh criticized Trump, who has strong suppo... More »
LONDON (Reuters) – British working-age households are growing more cautious about making major purchases amid concerns about Brexit and a possible recession, a monthly consumer survey showed on Monday. The IHS Markit Household Finance Index dropped to a three-... More »
NEW YORK (Reuters) – Big companies are increasing incorporating virtual technology and care options into employee benefit plans to combat the rising healthcare costs that long been corporate America’s bugaboo, according to the annual survey of the National Bus... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – It has become a jarring and frequent contradiction. President Donald Trump blames the Federal Reserve for putting the U.S. economy at risk while data shows an economy in “reasonably good” shape, as the head of the central bank recently s... More »
NEW YORK (Reuters) – Last week’s announcement of more U.S. tariffs on Chinese goods may have undermined the prospects for small-cap stocks to rebound this year, even after a brief respite from the Federal Reserve’s recent interest-rate cut. Just a day after th... More »
MILAN (Reuters) – China’s Huawei Technologies will invest $3.1 billion in Italy over the next three years, the chief executive of the telecoms giant’s Italian unit, Thomas Miao, said on Monday. Speaking at an event in Milan, Miao said Huawei would add 1,000 jo... More »
(Reuters) – India’s slowing economic growth, water shortage and regulatory hurdles have taken its business sentiment in June to the lowest level since 2016, a survey by market research firm IHS Markit showed on Monday. The aggregate of private-sector companies... More »
BERLIN (Reuters) – More than 2,000 workers at seven Amazon (AMZN.O) sites across Germany have gone on strike over pay for at least two days, labor union Verdi said on Monday. The walkouts, under the motto ‘No more discount on our incomes”, started overnight an... More »
FRANKFURT/SYDNEY/HONG KONG (Reuters) – Deutsche Bank (DBKGn.DE) shares rose on Monday as it launched one of the biggest overhauls of its investment bank since the financial crisis by cutting 18,000 jobs around the world, starting the day with cuts in Asia. The... More »
ATHENS (Reuters) – Greece’s opposition conservatives returned to power with a landslide victory in snap elections on Sunday, and Prime Minister elect Kyriakos Mitsotakis said he had a clear mandate for change, pledging more investments and fewer taxes. The win... More »
(This June 28 story corrects Romaco’s nationality to German, not Italian, in paragraph 17) By Silvia Aloisi CITTÀ DI CASTELLO, Italy (Reuters) – Amazon’s new recruit comes from a medieval walled town in central Italy and can box and seal at least 600 items of ... More »
TOKYO/SEOUL (Reuters) – Japan will tighten curbs on exports of high-tech materials used in smartphone displays and chips to South Korea amid a growing dispute over South Koreans forced to work for Japanese firms during World War Two, the industry ministry said... More »
LONDON (Reuters) – Factory activity in the euro zone shrank faster last month than previously thought in a broad-based downturn, according to a survey on Monday that suggested there would be no quick turnaround. The downbeat data will likely add to calls for t... More »
TOKYO (Reuters) – Factory activity shrank in most Asian countries in June as the simmering U.S.-China trade conflict put further strains on the region’s manufacturing sector, keeping policymakers under pressure to deploy stronger steps to avert a global recess... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A now record-setting run of U.S. economic growth enters its 121st month on Monday, sustained by a decade of low interest rates and massive Federal Reserve intervention that helped put 22 million people back to work. But the real economic... More »
TOKYO (Reuters) – Japan plans to tighten restrictions on the export of high-tech material used in smartphones and chips to South Korea from July 4 in connection with a dispute over a South Korean ruling on war-time forced labor, the Sankei newspaper reported o... More »
As the U.S. population ages, the total annual cost of lost wages for unpaid family caregiving is on track to more than double, to reach $147 billion by 2050, a recent study suggests. The current economic cost of unpaid family care is about $67 billion and incl... More »
NEW YORK (Reuters) – No matter who you are or what you do, let me take a wild guess: You feel a little burned out right now. Was I right? If so, you are one of the two-thirds of Americans who report feeling burned out on the job, according to a recent Gallup p... More »
HONG KONG (Reuters) – Riot police surrounded Hong Kong’s parliament on Monday after authorities said they would go ahead with a proposed extradition law, which would allow suspects to be sent to mainland China, despite protests from an estimated crowd of more ... More »
(Reuters) – The head of the European Central Bank, Mario Draghi, steps down at the end of October and the 19 euro zone countries are now looking for his replacement. The shortlists of likely candidates are almost exclusively male. It is one of several top jobs... More »
MOSCOW, (Reuters) – Russian manufacturing activity contracted in May for the first time in nine months, the Markit purchasing managers’ index (PMI) showed on Monday, driven by a faster-than-expected decline in employment. The index’s headline reading fell to 4... More »
SYDNEY (Reuters) – Australian businesses reported a decent increase in profits for the first three months of the year, supported by surging iron ore prices while higher wages and inventories may have also helped prop up momentum in the slowing economy. Data fr... More »
SHANGHAI (Reuters) – The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) said on Monday curbs on employees of Huawei Technologies and its subsidiaries have been lifted, and they would be allowed to participate in a peer review process for its research... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The Great Recession ended a decade ago this month, but for the U.S. Federal Reserve the fallout has posed an era-defining choice: Either jolt Americans to expect higher inflation, or keep the printing press ready for the next economic sl... More »
NEW YORK (Reuters) – U.S. Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez took lunch orders, served pizza and rocked the cocktail shaker on Friday to promote increased wages for restaurant servers and other tipped workers. The New York Democrat and media sensation, wh... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. President Donald Trump announced on Saturday that a member of his legal team, Emmet Flood, will leave his post later this month after helping him handle the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election campaign. “Emm... More »
SEATTLE/ORLANDO, Fla. (Reuters) – Stratolaunch Systems Corporation, the space company founded by late billionaire and Microsoft Corp co-founder Paul Allen, is closing operations, cutting short ambitious plans to challenge traditional aerospace companies in a n... More »
TURIN, Italy/LONDON (Reuters) – Fiat Chrysler has been angling for a combination with another automaker for years, and its latest attempt – for a global tie-up with France’s Renault – could address some of the main weaknesses of both companies, sources say. Bu... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. President Donald Trump will pick former Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli as the head of the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, the Washington Post reported on Friday. Cuccinelli will replace L. Francis Cissna as the ... More »
PRAGUE (Reuters) – The Czech government will stick to plans for a 40 billion crown ($1.73 billion) central government budget deficit in 2020, unchanged from its 2019 target, Prime Minister Andrej Babis said as draft preparations near an end. The Czech Republic... More »
SYDNEY (Reuters) – Surprisingly retained by Australians in a national election over the weekend, Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s center-right government now needs to find a fast way out of a worrying slowdown in an economy that has been recession-free since 19... More »
KABUL (Reuters) – Minutes before Mena Mangal, a prominent Afghan journalist and parliamentary adviser, was shot dead by two men in Kabul, she had slammed the door of her parent’s home after reminding them to pay the neighborhood shopkeeper 15 Afghanis (20 cent... More »
LONDON (Reuters) – Britain’s economy risks damage if Brexit is delayed beyond its latest Oct. 31 deadline because companies would continue to hold back on investment, Bank of England deputy governor Ben Broadbent was quoted as saying on Monday. “It’s pretty cl... More »
NEW YORK (Reuters) – Like many transplants to Chicago, Chris Easton needed to adjust to winter after moving from Atlanta to take a job as a database engineer at the accounting firm EY. Among other work-life skills, Easton, 23, who is on the autism spectrum, le... More »
HONG KONG (Reuters) – Sequoia Capital China, widely viewed as a bellwether for Chinese tech investment, is set to lay off as much as 20 percent of investment staff as a slowdown in the country’s tech sector saps appetite for risk, said two people with knowledg... More »
JENA, Germany (Reuters) – From the 12th floor of Jenoptik’s headquarters, chief executive Stefan Traeger points to his laser factory and the university that provides it with talent. Welcome to “Optics Valley” – a role model for Germany’s East in a big year for... More »
NEW YORK (Reuters) – Federal Reserve policymakers have no reason to change U.S. interest rates anytime soon but will startle global markets by resuming rate hikes rather than pivoting to cuts, according to a leading Wall Street money manager. Scott Minerd, who... More »
NEW DELHI (Reuters) – After condemning the series of deadly bomb attacks on Sri Lankan churches and luxury hotels on Sunday that killed more than 200 people, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi told voters that they needed to elect him to a second term as only... More »
NEW YORK (Reuters) – It looks like something has to give in global markets. Stocks and bonds around the world have rallied atypically together since the start of the year, rewarding investors both bullish and bearish on the direction of global growth. The main... More »
(Reuters) – A joint venture between U.S. smartphone chipmaker Qualcomm Inc and China’s Guizhou province will shut down by the end of the month, The Information reported on Friday, citing employees at the venture. The joint venture, Huaxintong Semiconductor (HX... More »
(Reuters) – The major drivers of high U.S. corporate profit margins are unsustainable and “now under threat”, which will eventually result in much lower equity prices, Bridgewater Associates, the world’s largest hedge fund, said on Wednesday in a report. “Over... More »
NEW YORK (Reuters) – If an overflowing inbox is killing your productivity at the office, you are not alone. Well, maybe you are, but not in the way you think. A recent survey of more than 2,000 managers and employees in 10 different countries found that employ... More »
HONG KONG/BEIJING (Reuters) – Chinese tech giants are in the hunt for young, energetic staff to take the place, in some cases, of veteran managers. The companies deny that the moves, which are worrying some older employees, reflect any discrimination based on ... More »
