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Ron Lieber: Invest in the People You Love

If you’re emerging from the pandemic in better financial shape than before, ask yourself this: What will you spend to renew your bonds, and how will you do it?In early 2013, three years after the unexpected death of her husband, Chanel Reynolds posted a warning to those who had neglected the bonds that ought to matter most.She had started a website to help people avoid a predicament she had found herself in after he died. His will had an executor but didn’t have signatures, and she didn’t know many of his passwords. The resulting red tape seemed as if it would suffocate her.Her message to others, who might not know whom to put down in their will as a guardian for a child or an overseer of their estate, was this: “If you are at a loss for whom to name, get out there and tighten up your friends and family relationships. Find some better friends. Be a better friend. This is everything. This means everything.”As many of us stumbled toward the light these last few months, I kept returning to her entreaty. Americans who have been lucky enough to keep their jobs have saved more money this past year

May 2021 Jobs Report: U.S. Adds 559,000 to Payrolls

Employment is still far below prepandemic levels.Cumulative change in jobs since before the pandemic

AMC Stock Sale Raises $587 Million as Meme Traders Buy Shares

The theater chain altogether raised more than $1.2 billion in capital this quarter, thanks in part to Reddit traders, but cautioned that the stock could still sink.It was a conflicted sales pitch: We’re selling new shares of stock, but don’t buy them unless you can afford to lose all your money. Also, free popcorn.

Here Are The 5 Ways to Track the United States' Economic Recovery

The ebbing of the pandemic has brought price increases, supply bottlenecks and labor shortages. Key indicators will show whether it’s just a stage.This is a strange moment for the U.S. economy.Unemployment is still high, but companies are complaining they can’t find enough workers. Prices are shooting up for some goods and services, but not for others. Supply-chain bottlenecks are making it hard for homebuilders, automakers and other manufacturers to get the materials they need to ramp up production. A variety of indicators that normally move more or less together are right now telling vastly different stories about the state of the economy.Most forecasters, including policymakers at the Federal Reserve, expect the confusion to be short-lived. They see what amounts to a temporary mismatch between supply and demand, brought on by the relatively swift ebbing of the pandemic: Consumers, flush with stimulus cash and ready to re-engage with the world after a year of lockdowns, are eager to spend, but some businesses lack the staff and supplies they need to serve them. Once companies have had a chance to bring on workers and restock shelves — and people have begun to catch up on long-delayed hair appointments and family vacations —

Unemployment claims continue to show labor market progress.

Initial claims for state jobless benefits were little changed last week, the Labor Department reported Thursday.The weekly figure was about 425,000, an increase of 6,000 from the previous week. New claims for Pandemic Unemployment Assistance, a federally funded program for jobless freelancers, gig workers and others who do not ordinarily qualify for state benefits, totaled 76,000, a decline of 17,000 from the prior week. The figures are not seasonally adjusted. (On a seasonally adjusted basis, state claims totaled 385,000, a decline of 20,000.)New state claims remain high by historical levels but are less than half the level recorded as recently as early February. The benefit filings, something of a proxy for layoffs, have receded as businesses return to fuller operations, particularly in hard-hit industries like leisure and hospitality.The government will provide a more complete look at the employment market on Friday, when the monthly jobs report for May is released. Economists surveyed by Bloomberg estimate that employers added about 655,000 positions in the month, the median forecast shows.

United Airlines Wants to Bring Back Supersonic Air Travel

The airline, which plans to buy planes from Boom Supersonic, a start-up, could become the first to offer ultrafast commercial flights since the Concorde stopped flying in 2003.The era of supersonic commercial flights came to an end when the Concorde completed its last trip between New York and London in 2003, but the allure of ultrafast air travel never quite died out.

Activists Crashed Exxon’s Board, but Forcing Change Will Be Hard

The tension between climate goals and lifting Exxon Mobil’s profits could make it difficult for activists to make progress.The growing urgency to address climate change and concerns about the financial performance of Exxon Mobil aligned this week to help activist investors place two directors on the company’s board.But it is not clear if the activists can deliver on their dual goals — reducing the emissions that are warming the planet and lifting the profits and stock price of Exxon. The potential tensions between those objectives could doom the investor effort to transform the company and the oil industry.Getting Exxon, a behemoth company with $265 billion in revenue in 2019 and oil and gas fields around the world, to switch to cleaner energy will be a yearslong and difficult process. It is unlikely to produce quick returns and could sap profits for a while as the company spends a small fortune to retool itself.And the biggest investment firms, which lent critical support to the activists and control a lot of Exxon’s stock, may be too timid to keep the pressure on company executives and board members who are determined to resist big changes.The manifesto put together by Engine No. 1, the

Biden's Plan: President to Propose $6 Trillion Budget to Boost Middle Class, Infrastructure

The president’s plans to invest in infrastructure, education, health care and more would push federal spending to its highest sustained levels since World War II.WASHINGTON — President Biden will propose a $6 trillion budget on Friday that would take the United States to its highest sustained levels of federal spending since World War II, while running deficits above $1.3 trillion throughout the next decade.

The WarnerMedia-Discovery deal could have gone very differently.

After its $100 billion deal to buy Time Warner, and spending millions more to fight a Justice Department lawsuit that delayed the deal, AT&T wants a do-over. This reversal culminated in the announcement last week that it would spin off WarnerMedia, as the former Time Warner is now known, to merge with the reality-TV giant Discovery.In the three short years since AT&T closed the deal to buy Time Warner, AT&T radically upended the business by cutting staff, angering the talent and firing executives and becoming something of a Hollywood villain. Some of WarnerMedia’s most successful executives, including Richard Plepler of HBO, left or were pushed out. The company cut more than 2,000 jobs.It could have been different if a phone call in 2016 had come just a few weeks earlier, according to the DealBook newsletter. In October that year, shortly before Time Warner and AT&T first announced their deal, Robert A. Iger, the chief executive of the Walt Disney Company at the time, placed a call to Jeffrey Bewkes, the head of Time Warner, according to two people familiar with those details.The Disney leader asked Mr. Bewkes if he’d be interested in a possible merger. It was too late, Mr.

Lordstown Motors halves the number of vehicles it will make in 2021.

Lordstown Motors, a start-up aiming to make electric pickup trucks, said on Monday that it would “at best” make just 50 percent of the vehicles it had previously hoped to this year.Lordstown gained attention because it purchased an auto plant in Lordstown, Ohio, that General Motors had closed. It was also once hailed by former President Donald Trump for saving manufacturing jobs.The company, which said Monday it was on track to start production in September, became a publicly traded company last year by merging with a special purpose acquisition vehicle, a company set up with cash from investors and a stock listing. Several other electric vehicle and related businesses have gone public through similar mergers in recent months taking advantage of investors desire to find the next Tesla.Lordstown, which is being investigated by the Securities and Exchange Commission, said it lost $125 million in the first quarter of 2021, but ended the period with $587 million in cash.After the news of its production outlook was released, Lordstown’s stock fell about 8 percent in after-hours trading, to just under $9. The stock briefly traded at about $30 last year.