Free Republic

The job market is booming for young people – but not those with college degrees. Are employers finally coming to realize that colleges these days mainly produce coddled, know-nothing, whiny, entitled brats? A recent analysis from Burning Glass Institute found that unemployment among those 22-34 years old without a college degree is lower than it’s been in decades, but those with college diplomas are having a much harder time finding work than before.

President Donald Trump is searching for ways to ease the affordability squeeze on American households, but nearly every proposal is colliding with another part of the economy.Beef relief risks hurting ranchers. Restricting fuel exports could distort energy markets. A proposed $5,000 payment to American adults would require congressional action and could add enormous new spending power to an economy where inflation remains above the Federal Reserve’s target.For investors, the bigger story is becoming clear: there may be no quick political fix for an affordability problem being driven at the same time by energy costs, interest rates, inflation and weak purchasing...

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump on Monday announced a new steel plant in southeast Iowa that he says will be the largest in the United States. The president hosted steel executives and several Iowa leaders Monday afternoon for the announcement at the White House. …. The mill is being built by Mesabi Metallics, a Minnesota company owned by India-based Essar Group. It's expected to create roughly 6,000 construction jobs and 1,750 permanent jobs in Iowa, with its first steel production in 2030. … The White House says it "will be fully vertically integrated in the U.S. (from iron mining through...

Speaking of South America, there’s a freedom revolution going on down there that is liberating and pro-growth. Many of our neighbors to the south are shrinking governments, opening markets, and prioritizing growth and stability. Argentina, Ecuador, Paraguay, Chile, Bolivia, Peru, and Colombia are governed by conservative leaders. Ironically, this is all happening as the Left in America moves toward South Americanesque socialist policies. Brazil, with its 214 million people, will decide next month if they will join this wave. Incumbent Lula da Silva, the “last man standing” among South America’s leftist leaders, is tied in polls with Flavio Bolsonaro, the...

President Donald Trump is set to announce Monday that a $15 billion steel mill billed as the largest ever built in the United States will go up in Iowa. White House officials said the Oval Office event is scheduled for 2 p.m. ET. Mesabi Metallics is expected to name the Iowa site at that briefing. The administration said the plant would be the first U.S. “mega-steel” facility constructed since the 1960s. Production is targeted to begin in 2030. Officials said the mill would turn out about 7.5 million tons of steel a year in its first phase and as much...

President Donald Trump is unveiling Monday plans for a massive steel plant in Iowa that the White House says will be the largest in American history and promises to bring 1,750 permanent jobs to the state. The roughly $15 billion steel plant is touted as a major new investment and evidence that Trump's economic agenda is bringing heavy manufacturing back to the U.S. with just over a month until the midterms. It will create between 5,000 and 6,000 construction jobs during its first phase. Trump is expected to make the announcement from the Oval Office at 2 p.m. alongside executives...

Apparently, Democrats’ internal polling suggests gas prices won’t be enough to sweep them into power in the Midterms. They may also suggest endlessly mouthing “affordability” isn’t that hot either, which is plausibly why AI, in development for many years, has suddenly become their newest source of imminent doom. Happily, for Americans, it appears AI hysteria isn’t going to work very well either. Americans seem to have learned from the COVID hoax. The other day, I paid $4.17 for gas. That didn’t make me happy, but I know it’s temporary. President Trump’s policies, based in reality and a solid understanding of...

WASHINGTON — Iran’s beleaguered economy will soon have “nothing to trade” in about two weeks after it makes its final oil deliveries, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent claimed. Bessent assessed that the Islamic Republic is becoming desperate to make a deal because of its collapsing economy, hastened by Operation Economic Outcast, and warned that its problems will get dramatically worse in two weeks. “I am confident, given that there’s only 15 million more barrels of Iranian oil on the water, that Iran will have nothing left to trade for anything,” Bessent told Fox News’ “Sunday Morning Futures.” “Probably within the next...

More Americans are spending their golden years in poverty. According to the newly released US Census Bureau report on poverty, household income reached a record high last year and the overall poverty rate fell. But the tale is the opposite for seniors. Poverty among Americans age 65 and older rose for the fifth consecutive year and has jumped roughly 45% since 2019 — the highest rate of any age group, an AARP Foundation analysis found. That translates to 10 million seniors living in poverty, up from 5.1 million seven years ago. "No other age group has seen that same pattern,...

Ever-higher costs to service mounting debt loads pose a major risk to governments around the world, economists have warned. Global debt rose by $10 trillion in the first half of the year to top $365 trillion, according to research published by the Institute of International Finance on Wednesday. State debts are rising as yields on medium- and long-term government bonds issued by a slew of the world’s biggest economies hit their highest levels in more than a decade — including in the U.S., Japan, France and the U.K. Rising yields reflect growing investor discomfort at rising interest rates, persistent energy...

Did you know that recently released Census Bureau statistics show the poverty rate in the United States fell to a record low in 2025? That's an extraordinary development, but it has so far not attracted a lot of media coverage and discussion. What about a big White House event featuring President Donald Trump touting a welcome decline in poverty and increase in income? There hasn't been one. "I dunno, but if I were president and the poverty rate dropped to the LOWEST RATE ON RECORD, I might make a big deal out of it — a lot bigger deal than...

“What the K-shaped economy gets right, what it exaggerates, and what believing the worst version is costing a generation.”The bottom half of American households owns about 2.5% of the nation’s wealth. That number is real, and it ought to bother you. However, that number is also higher than it was in 2019 and 2015, and roughly six times higher than the 0.4% low it hit in 2011. You will not read that in many places because it doesn’t “fit the narrative.”Unfortunately, the K-shaped economy headlines have settled into a single unvarying note, and after a while, people stop hearing anything...

The growth rate of real gross domestic product (GDP) is a key indicator of economic activity, but the official estimate is released with a delay. GDPNow forecasting model provides a "nowcast" of the official estimate prior to its release by estimating GDP growth using a methodology similar to the one used by the US Bureau of Economic Analysis.5.1%Third-Quarter GDPNow Estimate for 2026:Q3 Updated: September 17, 2026 Next update: September 25, 2026 *GDPNow is not an official forecast of the Atlanta Fed. Rather, it is best viewed as a running estimate of real GDP growth based on available economic data for...

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent must be feeling chafed. Last month, amid rapidly rising interest rates on federal debt, he announced that his department would double its typical longer-term bond buybacks, from $2 billion to $4 billion. The idea was that, by boosting demand for Treasuries, yields might come down and the government would be able to borrow additional money at lower cost. And yields did come down a little bit — for about a day. Then they shot right back up to where they began.

Nonfarm payrolls were expected to increase by 53,000 in August while the unemployment rate held at 4.1%, according to the Dow Jones consensus.

One thousand days is a long time in politics...When I wrote about Javier Milei’s first 100 days in office, Argentina was embarking on yet another attempt to break free from a cycle that had become painfully familiar: fiscal excess, monetary financing, inflation, capital controls and, eventually, crisis. Markets were optimistic, but they had been optimistic before. Argentina has a habit of disappointing even its most enthusiastic supporters.At the time, Milei inherited an economy in severe distress alongside a reform agenda that many viewed as politically impossible to implement. Today, as Argentina approaches the 1,000-day mark of his presidency, investors can...

President Trump laid out his plan Wednesday to help Republicans win 35 key midterm races in the final stretch before the fall elections. Beginning in October, a month before the critical Nov. 3 contests, the president plans to hit the campaign trail and host several tele-rallies as part of his push to keep the House and Senate in Republican hands, he explained in remarks to GOP lawmakers and administration officials at a White House Rose Garden dinner. “I’m going to take the final 30 days, maybe a little bit more than that, because it’s all about 35 races,” Trump said....

"Skills matter more than simply earning a degree" VOV.VN - Vietnam is moving to place greater emphasis on job skills, practical ability and adaptability rather than academic degrees, as a new government plan seeks to raise labour productivity and build a more modern and efficient labour market. Deputy Prime Minister Pham Thi Thanh Tra on August 30 signed a decision, issuing a plan to implement Conclusion 62 of the Party Central Committee Secretariat on improving national labour productivity alongside the development of a synchronised, modern and efficient labour market. The plan sets out eight groups of tasks and solutions aimed...

The Trump administration plans to charge US employers $103,265 in new fees to hire highly skilled foreign workers via the H-1B visa program - an eye-popping increase that comes amid the administration's broader hard-line immigration crackdown. The six-figure hike, proposed Monday by the Department of Homeland Security, would force employers to shoulder the extra $103,000 in costs for each H-1B recipient, in addition to other filing fees currently in place.

The buyback is a supply/​liquidity fix aimed at a problem that isn’t primarily about supply or liquidity. In other words, the Treasury is trying to reduce long-term rates by restricting the supply of those bonds. But their rates have been rising (prices falling) in response to the budget deficit, heavy overall government debt issuance, a rising term premium, and persistently above-target inflation. Moreover, the bond sell-off is global: Long-end yields hit multiyear highs in Germany, France, and Japan. This sell-off suggests that the United States alone cannot fix its rate problem because that problem is not unique to the US.