What's in a jobless claim?

A.I. Bubble? What A.I. Bubble? From American Public Media, this is Marketplace. In Los Angeles, I'm Kyle Rizdahl. It is Wednesday. Today, this one is the 11th of November. Good as it always is to have you along, everybody. You know, you probably as easily as I can tick off the names of the big names in artificial intelligence, right? Anthropic, set to go public maybe as soon as next week. Open AI, which brought A.I. into the mainstream with ChatGPT. The big hyperscalers, Amazon and Google and Microsoft. Well, it has been a shaky couple of weeks for that industry. Financial gravity seemed to kick in as markets started to worry about the stagnation. Staggering amounts of money those companies are borrowing. Worries that started and maybe ended today with a company not too many outside the industry had been aware of. Marketplace's Supriya Banishore gets us going. If you are Meta or Open AI or Microsoft and you need a data center, CoreWeave is one place you go. CoreWeave is the architect for the A.I. era. Brent Thill is a managing director at Jefferies. They're the general contractor that puts together the data. The data center, the power, the cooling, the chips, the rack. Investors look at CoreWeave as a bellwether for the country's entire A.I. build-out. And a few months ago, they started to have qualms. There's a lot of fear among investors that the A.I. trade is softening. Interest rates had been rising, making debt more expensive. Investors were demanding 15% interest on CoreWeave's bonds. And the recent election spelled friction ahead for new data centers. Luke Yang is a technology expert. Equity analyst at Morningstar. Investors are really questioning whether the company has taken on too much debt and whether the business model is sustainable over the long term. Yesterday, CoreWeave had some answers. And investors liked them. Revenue was up 168%. It wasn't going to issue more bonds at those crazy interest rates. And they've already built out a lot of data center infrastructure. Andy Spengros is executive managing director at JLL, which is a marketplace underwriter. They've gotten big chunks of capacity across the country and key markets. And we're down to less than 1% vacancy. So CoreWeave is in a seller's market. And feeling better about CoreWeave is making investors feel better about A.I.-related stocks in general. In New York, I'm Sabree Beneshour for Marketplace. That sigh of relief you heard on the Nasdaq today. The tech-heavy index up 1.6% was driven by that CoreWeave earnings report that Sabree was talking about. Ticker CRWV gained almost 20%. 25% on the day. We are going to turn now from A.I. to energy. And we're going to do it via the Polish energy conglomerate Orlin, which ended its long-term contract with Cutter Energy today. Yes, that is a tad more inside energy baseball than we tend to get. But hear me out on this one. Orlin canceled because Cutter can't deliver its obligated shipments of liquefied natural gas. See also the president's war with Iran and the squeeze on the Strait of Hormuz. Meanwhile, as Marketplace's Elizabeth Troval reports, the U.S. LNG business is doing just fine. The U.S. and Cutter are two of the world's biggest suppliers of LNG. And Cutter's loss when it comes to wartime disruptions could be the U.S.'s gain. Tom Tsang is with Texas Christian University. We have supply growth. We have facility growth. And there's already new business coming to U.S. LNG facilities. Last month, it was actually Cutter that signed multi-decade agreements to buy liquefied natural gas coming off the U.S. Gulf Coast. They want to buy supply from the U.S. And that's a way of holding on to the contracts that they have. The U.S. is well positioned to be a place where countries diversify their source of LNG, says Ken Medlock with Rice University. We look back five years from now, 10 years from now, we're going to see a very different global energy landscape. We're on the precipice of this. So get ready. It's going to be an interesting ride. Medlock says Canada and Latin America could also see new LNG contracts. But some countries may want to diversify away from LNG as a fuel source, says Anne-Sophie Corbeau with Columbia University. She recently spoke to folks in Asia. And it was very interesting in Thailand to hear people talking more about, OK, maybe we need to have more domestic gas production. Maybe we need to electrify more. Some countries may also turn towards more coal. And that's why she thinks the global LNG trade will grow, but could end up growing less than expected. I'm Elizabeth Troval for Marketplace. Wall Street today told you about the Nasdaq. Up was the vibe kind of all the way around. We will have the details when we do the numbers. The United States Department of Agriculture, I learned today, publishes a weekly crop progress report in which I read this morning that as of this past Sunday in the 18 agriculture intensive states covered by the report, 92 percent of the soybean crop has been harvested, 81 percent of the corn crop, which is a lot of corn. And I'm Elizabeth Troval. I'm Elizabeth Troval. Of course, got me thinking about the Iowa corn and soybean farmer that we know, April Hemes. All right, April, you ready? We're going to bang this thing out. You ready? You I got it. I'm ready. Let's rock and roll. All right. All right. So we'll start with the standard question. How's business? By which I mean, how is harvest? How you doing? Lots of crops in. Right. Yes, I got everything in on time. We just finished up about a week's worth of rain, which kind of kept a lot of people out. But I got everything in and I want to announce here and now I had the best harvest ever. Really? The best crops ever. Yes. And my husband goes, well, what does that mean? I said, it means I yielded my way out of poverty this year. Well, OK, but wait, hold on a minute. More yield means more crops go on the market. And as we've talked about many a time, you and your colleagues in the agriculture business are price takers, not price makers. So there's more product out there. Is that going to lower the bushel price? Well, Ben, you have to be careful. You have to be careful. You have to deal with USDA and their predictions. And they just came out with what they thought the yield was going to be and they lowered it. So the price went up 10 cents on corn per bushel and like 40 cents on soybeans yesterday, even though they up to the soybean yield prediction. So you tell me it's the government and it's markets, you know, we're on marketplace. You know, we in the ag world, you know, it goes on weather and markets and what the government says. So you know, right. Yeah. Let's let's talk about your inputs. I'm going to I'm going to use a four letter word here for for farmers. Diesel, right. I mean, how much did it cost you to fill up that combine I drove? It I was just reading an article. It was four dollars an acre more for soybeans and eight dollars an acre more for corn to harvest this year just for diesel alone. And my diesel guy showed up yesterday because when I go to the market, I'm like, oh, I'm going to go to the market. So empty. He doesn't like the wrath of April. But he I've I've known him all his life. But he said, yeah, we did have to ration. And none of the other prices are fertilizer hasn't gone down. Right. Right. Well, that's where I was going to go next. Right. Because, you know, it was elevated from the way you should be doing this interview elevated since since the war started. Right. Because of the choke points on LNG and all that jazz. Right. So fertilizer is OK. For you now or what? Have you bought next year's? Yes. Yes. I've already bought my nitrogen for next year and they just put my P and K, which is potash and phosphorus. And potash comes from Canada. Well, we tend to piss Canada off lately. And but then, you know, these tariffs keep going back and forth. Well, we're going to tariff that. Well, we're not. You know, we just need stability in our prices. What are we going to pay? So and and we all know that it's easy to go up and fall slowly. That's right. Yeah. Let me just pick up something you just said. All you want is stability. Seems to me you haven't had a whole lot of stability for a good long while now. And I guess I wonder what that's doing to you. You know, I'm sure you sit down with the spreadsheets at night and try to figure stuff out. Right. What's that doing to you? Yep. Yep. I just did that. I'm OK because I price things. You know, I watched my markets and I priced ahead. But I've heard a lot of guys say if it wasn't for the government payments, I wouldn't. I wouldn't be able to make any the ends meet this year. So as much as we hate those. I mean, I hate those. Well, look, I mean, all the farm. No, I totally get that. And all the farmers I talked to are basically like we want our markets back. We don't want the government. Right. Which gets me to the global trade part of this thing. And I have to ask you now about Brazil, obviously, which has become a huge source for China and also China and what they're buying. Yeah. And China And everybody, I'm glad you brought that up because every expert I've listened to has said, China will buy what they say they're gonna buy okay but we need them to buy more you know but you know farmers are resilient and we we find a way sometimes to work through it so all right well we'll call you in the spring see how planting is going all right sounds good good to talk to you bye the business model economics of the arts have always been challenging and arguably the hardest for the performing arts specifically for us today for classical music it's been a tough couple of weeks for some orchestras after years of running in the red the phoenix symphony furloughed all of its musicians at the beginning of the year and the end of the year and the end of the year and of this month community contributions brought them back just a couple of days ago and that happened not long after the nashville symphony suspended its season only to be saved by a 10 million dollar corporate lifeline from wpln in nashville blake farmer has more on the precarious state of classical in music city the symphony hall in downtown nashville was very close to going silent and ladies and gentlemen please greet your nashville symphony orchestra which is why the music has been so popular for so long and the music has been so popular for so long and the musicians got a standing ovation before they even took the stage for their first performance of the season in late september symphony management announced it would furlough all musicians indefinitely it was a total surprise says bassist joel reist it's infuriating and it's actually humiliating he and others were just worried about putting food on the table but in one week big tech saved the day while also buying a little goodwill oracle which is relocating its headquarters to the to tennessee covered the budget gap writing a 10 million dollar check that it called a strategic partnership oracle did not agree to an interview about what that partnership will look like in the short term it gets us through the season maestro leonard slatkin has directed orchestras in st louis detroit and washington dc nashville was to be his swan song but it may become his magnum opus if he finds an artistic path to financial sustainability he knows the emergency gift still remains a mystery to him and he's going to have to find a way to get it done requires tough decisions so this helps us to buy some time to make sure whatever it is that didn't work in the past is solved and move forward with a true restructuring plan the big question looming for this orchestra is whether it can afford its grand concert hall upkeep and management of a stone building the size of a city block is costly but its prime location has also proven problematic the skirmer horn as it's known was built 20 years ago in an area that badly needed revitalization now it's in the midst of a tourist hot spot which is not so hot for local patrons says colleen wheelahan it's a great place to see a concert there's just a ton of friction to get there concert goers at times have been stuck for hours trying to leave the parking garage but wheelahan who writes about classical music says parking's merely a convenient scapegoat the building itself has been holding back the symphony years ago key donor martha ingram even stepped in to assume the mortgage upon her death in august it came to light that the symphony has been unable to pay the interest wheelahan says living in the red has kept the symphony from being able to think about the future and build up its endowment yes i think this is all the same crisis that endowment is not where it should be yet and it it can get there the endowments of comparable orchestras dwarf nashville's by 10 times as for the patrons the very real threat of extinction has sparked self-reflection carrie brown raised her kids going to concerts one even played violin in college but her own patronage slipped a bit to only one concert a year i've loved the symphony and so this is really challenging me to step up and and make sure that you know they feel my support but even if crowds perk up ticket sales don't cover the costs in classical music for many orchestras feeling the pinch in this moment they're faced with making fundamental changes cutting recording and making music a part of their lives and making music a part of their lives and making moving musicians to part-time even selling assets former nashville symphony board member jim white says it's too late to simply double down on ticket sales and fundraising music is a beautiful art form in a cruel business while the decision shouldn't be cruel in their impact they are going to require some difficult choices and the sooner leaders make those choices white says the better it will be for saving our symphonies in nashville i'm blake farmer for marketplace coming up the learning curve has been pretty steep i mean that's the way it goes sometimes right first though let's do the numbers down dust rolls up 254 points on the day about a half percent 52 486 the nasdaq added 400 points that is one and six tenths percent as i said 25 466 the s&p 500 increased to the tune of 98 points about one and three tenths percent ended things at 76 and 19 core weave sabri was telling us about the ai cloud company nebius which competes with corby so its shares jump 15 and four tenths percent iron another rival in the ai cloud space saw shares gain five and six tenths of one percent on the day lng companies sure why not chenier energy that's an lng company based in the u.s saw shares rise three and three quarters percent competitor venture global saw shares rise five and one half of one percent you're listening to marketplace This is Marketplace. I'm Kyle Risdahl. We take you now back to 1969, September of that year specifically, which was the last time the number of people filing their initial claims for unemployment benefits was as low as it was this past week. 189,000, if you're curious, which you're just going to have to trust me on this one, is really, really low. The reality, of course, for the demographically aware among you, is that back then, 57-ish years ago, there were only about half as many people in the American labor force. many people in the american labor force that is half as many people who could even get laid off and file for unemployment marketplaces mitchell hartman takes it from there one reason economists tend to like jobless claims as an economic indicator is that there are administrative records an actual count of unemployment insurance applications submitted by laid off workers in every state reported less than a week after they're filed but what if today's super low level of jobless claims reflects the fact that there are so many people in the american labor force that they can't even get laid off but what if today's super low level of jobless claims reflects changes in the workforce and in the unemployment insurance system itself can jobless claims still be considered a reliable proxy for layoffs and unemployment in the economy then i pulled together a panel of labor market gurus to weigh in applications to the unemployment insurance system have become an increasingly difficult gauge to the health of the labor market the way that the program is working and states are managing it may mislead the labor market and the labor market may mislead the labor market about what's going on in the actual economy i don't think it's a reliable economic indicator anymore that was brandeis economist david weill former bls commissioner erica groshen and lastly michelle evermore at the national employment law project who further explains unemployment insurance tends to cover far fewer people than it ever has historically evermore says in many states less than 20 percent of unemployed people get jobless benefits decades ago that recipiency rate was closer to 35 or 40 percent she says big cutbacks in state programs began after the great recession when spending on unemployment insurance which is mostly funded by taxes on employers shot up and now not enough people have access it's not enough income replacement to bother in some places and people don't get it for long enough more than a dozen states have cut the maximum duration of coverage from 26 weeks to a year to as little as 12 and with more than a quarter of job seekers now unemployed for 27 weeks or more the highest rate of long-term unemployment since the pandemic more people are exhausting their benefits before finding a new job meanwhile fewer kinds of jobs are now covered by ui says brandeis's david weill author of the fissured workplace more and more workers find themselves either third party contracted through some intermediary or actually being considered independent contractors which means no one's your employer no employer paying into the system for you no unemployment benefits when your job goes away lindsay cameron a professor of management at the wharton school says a lot of low-wage workers and workers of color fit into this gray area without access to legal protections and safety net programs but she points out gig work can also offer replacement income after a job loss Instead of trying to get UI, which can be a psychological psychologically demoralizing experience, it's much easier to get on these e-bikes or e-scooters and do DoorDash deliveries, things that don't really require that many assets and can give you instant payout the same day. There are other reasons jobless claims are historically low right now, says Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody's Analytics. With the deportation crackdown, immigrants who get laid off might be hesitant to apply for government benefits. Plus, baby boom generation is retiring, so people lose their job and instead of filing for UI, they just retire. All in all, Zandi considers jobless claims a useful, if imperfect, labor market measure. Well, I use it. I do think it indicates that layoffs are low. Zandi says this is still not a particularly healthy job market. Hiring is weak, hours worked are down, wage growth is decelerating. But he doesn't think that means layoffs must be high as well. How missing masses of laid-off workers when we trust reports showing jobless claims at a 50-year low. I'm Mitchell Hartman for Marketplace. Of all the changes the pandemic brought to this economy, the whole remote work thing is probably the most significant, despite the best efforts by companies, big and small, to get people back to the office in person. Giving up the flexibility that comes with not having to actually be in an office is just too big of an ask for a whole lot of people. And that is the setup for today's installment of our series, Clocked Out, how leaving the corporate world can lead to some new opportunities. My name is Cassie Myers. I live in Arlington, Washington, and I am co-founder of a circuit board design company. I was working for an aerospace company designing circuit boards. Sometimes it feels like I'm doing a puzzle. It's fun. And I got a promotion, a big raise, and an agreement to work remotely. I, at that point, decided to move to my husband's family farm. And that worked out great. Then in, you know, January of 2025, when the government pulled everybody back in the office, my company followed suit. And I told them, "I'm not interested in that commute." And they said, "Well, can you stick around until we find your replacement?" So I stayed for another four months, but in that time, I found a client. And the day after I was let go from my regular job, I started working under my own business. The emotion building up to that was fear. You know, I may have found one client. Am I going to find another client? What if the work dries up? You know, and they don't have to give me work. But that fear is not reality. The first six months were a little rough. The learning curve has been pretty steep. Filing to start a business, doing all of the tax paperwork, running my own payroll. And I have a business partner. We are co-owners. So if we took on an employee, that's another learning curve that I have to figure out. So, right now, what I've got is pretty good. And I know that if I needed to, I could find another client if one ran out of work for me. I would consider going back full-time. I would consider going back full-time with the company. My second client actually asked me to do that. But this year, I am set to make more than I was as a direct employee. One of the things that I love about this is that my girls, they saw me start my own circuit board design contracting business. I like setting that example for them. So the learning curve has been steep, but the reward is worth it. Cassie Meyers, still doing circuit board design, just doing it for herself. Arlington, Washington is where she is. This series, you know, only works with your stories. Share them with us, if you would. Marketplace.org/clockedout. This final note on the way out today, in which United Airlines just ain't having it with AI personal assistants, the company said today it is not going to let agentic AI bots into its systems to book tickets for, you know, actual people. Amazon did the same thing a while ago, no buying via bot. I'll tell you, we'll just see how long they can hold out, right? Our media production team includes Brian Allison, John Foky, Montana Johnson, Drew Jostad, Gary O'Keefe, and Charlton Thorpe. Alex Simpson is the manager of media production and I'm Kai Risdahl. We will see you tomorrow, everybody. This is 8:00 p.m.