Economy

The U.S. job market’s hot streak is over. Employers added only 142,000 jobs in August, the smallest gain in eight months, according to data release Friday by the U.S. Department of Labor. That ended six consecutive months of at least 200,000 hires. The average monthly job growth during the past …

Back-to-school purchases gave national retail sales a boost during the week that ended Saturday. Sales were up in 4.8 percent for that week compared with the last week of August 2013, according to the International Council of Shopping Centers and Goldman Sachs Weekly Chain Store Sales Index. Week-over-week sales were …

Some U.S. retailers must be wishing that the back-to-school season happened more than once a year. National sales during August were up 5.2 percent compared with August 2013, a healthy gain, according to data released Thursday by the International Council of Shopping Centers. Consumers who engaged in back-to-school shopping this …

Manufacturing in the Inland Empire continued to grow last month, but the pace of expansion in that sector is definitely slowing down. The purchasing managers index for Riverside and San Bernardino counties in August was 50.9, according to data released Tuesday by the Institute of Applied Research and Policy Analysis …

Year-over-year unemployment dropped in 348 of 372 metropolitan areas in the United States during July. During the same time, the jobless rate rose in 16 metropolitan areas and stayed the same in eight markets, according to report released Wednesday by the U.S. Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics. Put …

Between January 2011 and the end of last year, an estimated 4.3 million U.S. workers lost jobs they had held for at least three years, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. That was a decline from 6.1 million workers who suffered the same predicament between January 2009 through …