SSC News Desk Personal consumption grew 3.2 percent in the second quarter. Credit-card spending in July, excluding gasoline, was up 4.3 percent. By the headline numbers, the American consumer is holding. What is also holding is $18.8 trillion in total household debt — and the mechanisms generating that figure are becoming harder to look away…
The accounting shift could finance infrastructure, housing and business investment. Whether it strengthens the economy depends on what the government buys with the money. Bryson Davis | Social Storytellers Collective Britain’s Treasury is examining how to borrow billions more without abandoning the government’s existing fiscal rules. Chancellor John Healey said there was scope for faster and greater investment,…
Regional growth is real. So is the fact that new hiring does not automatically replace jobs erased by bankruptcies, closures and corporate restructuring. SSC News Desk | Social Storytellers Collective Houston added roughly 24,000 jobs during the first half of 2026. Nearly 20 employers also reported layoffs affecting 2,697 workers. Those numbers are not contradictory. They describe an economy expanding in…
The company’s own numbers contradict the reason usually given for layoffs like this one. That contradiction is the actual story. Zillow laid off more than 500 employees on Tuesday, about 7 percent of its global workforce, in what CEO Jeremy Wacksman called the company’s largest round of cuts this year, according to a company blog…
Every pandemic boomtown saw prices cool off. Only Austin built its way into a hangover this deep, this long. Austin’s home prices have fallen 14 to 24 percent from their May 2022 peak of roughly $552,000, depending on which dataset and geography you use, according to reporting by James Rodriguez for Business Insider. That range…
Over 1,600 workers have lost jobs in the Charlotte region so far in 2026. Most of the companies cutting them never said a word publicly. Part of Society, Economy & Wellness — examining how economic pressure reshapes labor, access, and everyday life. NEWS DESK | SOCIAL STORYTELLERS COLLECTIVE The Charlotte Observer’s Desiree Mathurin reported this…
Amazon, Walmart, FedEx and more than 20 other employers filed WARN notices for August. The labor market looks stable. The WARN data tells a different story. Part of Society, Economy & Wellness — examining how economic pressure reshapes labor, access, and everyday life. NEWS DESK | SOCIAL STORYTELLERS COLLECTIVE The Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification…
The public argument has fixed itself on replacement. Replacement is a standard almost no company will ever meet — and that’s exactly the point. Part of Society, Economy & Wellness — examining how economic pressure reshapes labor, access, and everyday life. NEWS DESK | SOCIAL STORYTELLERS COLLECTIVE Microsoft chief people officer Amy Coleman told employees…
The official statistics were designed to measure a labor market that no longer exists. Part of Society, Economy & Wellness — examining how economic pressure reshapes labor, access, and everyday life. NEWS DESK | SOCIAL STORYTELLERS COLLECTIVE Unemployment is low. Job openings are high. Wages, at least nominally, rose faster in the last few years…
Bloomberg reported Tuesday, citing a staff memo from CEO Ryan McInerney, that Visa will eliminate roughly 2,600 positions — about 7% of its workforce — with technology and product teams taking most of the reductions. The company announced the cuts hours before releasing fiscal third-quarter results showing net revenue of $11.6 billion, up 14% year…