The U.S. labor market ended 2024 on a high note, with employers adding 256,000 jobs in December. This exceeded expectations and reflected confidence in economic stability. The unemployment rate dropped to 4.

U.S. stocks sold off on Friday, with the S&P 500 erasing its 2025 gains, after an upbeat jobs report stoked fresh inflation fears, reinforcing bets that the Federal Reserve will be cautious in cutting interest rates this year.

Rumors of the labor market’s imminent decline have been greatly exaggerated for some time. Barring an act of God over the next 10 days, Donald Trump will inherit a healthy domestic economy from Joe Biden; affording his second administration an early, and valuable, political advantage that few non-incumbents are granted.

Jobs data for December will add to ongoing mixed signals in the U.S. labor market. Analysts surveyed by Dow Jones expect 155,000 jobs added on the month, down from 227,000 in November, with the unemployment rate expected to have remained unchanged at 4.

Wall Street wiped out its entire post-election rally this week as mounting interest-rate fears were stoked by a red-hot labor market, surging inflation expectations and escalating geopolitical tensions ahead of Donald Trump‘s return to the White House.

Wall Street's main indexes were on track to open higher on Tuesday, as investors assessed softer-than-expected producer inflation to gauge the Federal Reserve's monetary policy trajectory this year. A Labor Department report showed the producer price index rose 3.

Wall Street's main indexes fell on Tuesday as investors turned their attention to upcoming inflation data and quarterly earnings reports, which are expected to provide insights into the health of the U.

Wall Street's main indexes surged on Wednesday, with the benchmark S&P 500 at a one-week high, propelled by lower-than-expected core inflation data for December and robust quarterly earnings from the biggest U.

Among a series of executive orders President Donald Trump signed this week, he ordered federal employees of the executive branch to return to in-person work full-time, instituted a hiring freeze for many federal positions, and established a Department of Government Efficiency.

The number of Americans filing new applications for unemployment benefits rose marginally last week, suggesting no deterioration in labor market conditions and reinforcing expectations that the Federal Reserve would not cut interest rates next week.

As U.S. President Donald Trump returns to the White House, it already seems clear that his second term will look little like his first. Many of Trump’s first-term appointments distanced themselves from his views and even denounced him.

Big changes are in store for federal workers who work remotely after Trump signed an executive order requiring RTO. Here's how the mandate might work.