Barriers to equality are posing threats to democracy in the U.S. as the country remains segregated along racial lines and child poverty worsens, says a study examining the nation 50 years after the release ...
Following strong growth last year, business spending on equipment has fallen for the second straight month, according to a new report, while a separate one shows new home sales in the U.S. have slipped again.
The drop in business investment during January was revealed in a preliminary Commerce Department report released Tuesday. It showed new orders for manufactured durable goods, items designed to last three years or more, fell 3.7% in January from December, the biggest drop in six months.
The decline was led by a 10% falloff in the volatile new transportation orders category. When they are removed, the overall decline was just 0.3%.
Despite the drop in new orders, shipments of durable goods increased 0.2% in January from December, the eighth gain in the past nine months.
When durable goods orders in January are compared to the same time a year earlier, they are 8.9% higher while shipments have gained 8.2%.
What's troubling is that new orders for nondefense capital goods minus aircraft, a proxy for business investments, fell 0.2% in January following a December drop of 0.6%. This is the first time these orders have declined for two straight months since May 2016.
According to Reuters, this followed numbers that showed business spending on equipment increased at its fastest pace in more than three years in the fourth quarter of 2017, contributing to the economy's 2.6% annualized growth pace during the final three months of the year.
Analysts at BMO Capital Markets said this and other recent reports showed the U.S. economy is a bit softer in the first quarter of the year when compared to the final quarter of 2017, but they noted the period has some seasonal quirkiness and tends to be weaker. This could result in the Federal Reserve holding off on an expected hike in interest rates when the central ...Read the rest of this story
The Latest on the aftermath of the mass shooting at a high school in Parkland, Florida (all times local): 9:35 a.m. Prosecutors and defense lawyers for Florida school shooting suspect Nikolas Cruz have ...
MONTREAL/NEW YORK (Reuters) - Jet Blue Airways Corp met with Canadian planemaker Bombardier Inc and also had plans to meet with Brazil's Embraer SA this month, according to an internal email reviewed by Reuters, in a signal that talks are picking up for the U.S. airline's closely watched sales campaign. Low-cost carrier JetBlue has previously said it is weighing whether to replace its fleet of about 60, 100-seater E-190 jets, in a campaign pitting Bombardier's CSeries against its Brazilian rival's latest model, the E190-E2. JetBlue officials also met Bombardier Chief Executive Alain Bellemare at the company's Montreal-area plant on Monday, said an industry source, confirming earlier media reports.
General Electric Co. Chief Executive John Flannery sent a stern warning to those who have lost faith in the company, saying people who bet against GE's resolve and passion do so “at their own peril.”
Photo of 2018 Ford F-250 courtesy of XL Hybrids.
">XL Hybrids will offer an electrified 2018 Ford F-250 pickup to commercial and municipal fleets that will be unveiled at NTEA's Work Truck Show in Indianapolis in early March, the company announced.
The battery-electric hybrid F-250 will be equipped with the vehicle modifier's XLH hybrid drive system that's expected to increase fuel economy by 25% and significantly reduce carbon-dioxide emissions.
Production of the hybrid F-250 conversions will begin in March. The Work Truck Show is set for March 6 to 9 in Indianapolis.
XL Hybrids will also make its technology available on more F-150 pickups, by adding SuperCrew models. The company now offers F-150s with its XLP plug-in hybrid electric system that improves fuel economy by 50%, according to the company.
"Ford trucks are in high demand by XL's fleet customers, so we developed our hybrid-electric upfit solutions for both the F-150 and F-250 pickup to support needs for power, payload, as well as better fuel economy,” said Clay Siegert, the company's chief operating officer.
XL Hybrids installs its XLH hybrid and XLP plug-in systems in several hours and uses Ford's ship-through process. The vehicle retains its factory warranty, and receives a three-year, 75,000-mile warranty from XL on the hybrid powertrain.
XLH and XLP will also include the XL Link cloud-based big data analytics system, which collects millions of operational data points and miles-per-gallon performance, carbon dioxide emissions reductions, and other key performance indicators.
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