E.J. Antoni, President Donald Trump’s latest pick to lead the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), has ignited controversy in Washington and on Wall Street after publicly suggesting he may suspend the agency’s closely watched monthly jobs report over concerns about its accuracy and methodology. In an interview with Fox Business, Antoni said that until the report is “corrected,” the BLS “should suspend issuing the monthly job reports but keep publishing the more accurate, though less timely, quarterly data.”

The move comes in the wake of Trump’s abrupt firing of Erika McEntarfer, the previous BLS commissioner, following a report that revealed not only disappointing job growth for July, but sharp downward revisions for prior months.

In early August, the BLS reported that U.S. employers added only 73,000 jobs in July, a figure that fell far short of economists’ projections. More alarming were the downward revisions to the May and June numbers: The agency slashed its estimates by a combined 258,000 jobs, showing that less than 20,000 jobs were created in each of May and June.

Trump vented his frustrations on social media, alleging—without evidence—that the numbers were “rigged” to hurt his administration and the Republican Party. Hours later, he dismissed McEntarfer, who had been confirmed by the Senate in 2024 and had worked under both Democratic and Republican administrations.

Antoni’s call to halt monthly reports

The appointment of Antoni, chief economist at the Heritage Foundation and a vocal critic of BLS data methodologies, signaled a radical shift. In his Fox Business interview, Antoni argued the monthly jobs report is so unreliable it misleads major economic actors—from businesses to the Federal Reserve—who depend on accurate employment data to make decisions.

“How on earth are businesses supposed to plan—or how is the Fed supposed to conduct monetary policy—when they don’t know how many jobs are being added or lost in our economy?” he asked rhetorically. “It’s a serious problem that needs to be fixed immediately,” he said.

Antoni highlighted declining response rates to BLS employer surveys, now reportedly below 50%, as a central concern. He contends this has increased the likelihood of sampling errors and misestimations in the data, a problem exacerbated by recent downward revisions. He blamed declining response rates for the lack of accuracy in the numbers, disagreeing with Trump that the numbers were intentionally manipulated. Still, he insisted it needs to be fixed somehow. “Major decision-makers from Wall Street to D.C. rely on these numbers, and a lack of confidence in the data has far-reaching consequences,” he added.

Reaction and ramifications

Trump praised Antoni’s nomination, promising “honest and accurate” numbers as essential to restoring public trust. However, while some states—like Colorado—have temporarily suspended monthly jobs data publication due to quality concerns in the past, a potential nationwide pause would be unprecedented.

Antoni’s nomination is now likely to face even more heightened scrutiny in an expectedly contentious Senate confirmation process. As the economy teeters amid weak jobs growth and ongoing debates about government data reliability, all eyes are on the BLS and whether its monthly jobs report will remain a fixture in tracking the health of American employment.

For this story, Fortune used generative AI to help with an initial draft. An editor verified the accuracy of the information before publishing. 

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

© Yuri Gripas/Abaca/Bloomberg via Getty Images

• China’s youth unemployment is so high that Gen Zers are paying to pretend to work in faux offices across the country. As 14.5% of China’s young professionals are still unable to find a gig, they’re convening at hot spots run by “Pretend To Work Company”. It’s just one emerging trend among the nation’s unemployed—while other jobless Gen Z “rat people” are spending their days bed-rotting on their phones to pass the time. 

Gen Z graduates are stepping out of college with prestigious degrees, only to be met with a sluggish job market, making it feel nearly impossible to land a gig. The situation has gotten so bad in China that young professionals are even paying to work in a mock office to pass the time.

Young adults in China are paying between 30 and 50 yuan per day, or around $4.20 to $7, to sit in fake office set-ups across the country run by Pretend To Work Company. They’re hot spots for China’s jobless Gen Z to work on their own start-ups, apply to open roles, or simply sit around in the company of other struggling youth looking for an opportunity. The mock offices often provide computers for use, as well as free snacks, lunch, and drinks. 

These faux working locations are popping up in major cities including Shenzhen, Shanghai, Nanjing, Wuhan, Chengdu, and Kunming, according to reporting from the BBC. 

With China’s youth unemployment being sky-high at 14.5% for 16 to 24-year-olds, there are plenty of jobless professionals to commiserate with at these “pretend to work” locations. It may seem counterproductive for unemployed people to be spending their money feigning work at an office—but the spaces may be better at stimulating a new opportunity than job-seekers being isolated in their apartments, according to experts. 

“The phenomenon of pretending to work is now very common,” Christian Yao, senior lecturer at Victoria University of Wellington’s School of Management in New Zealand, told BBC. 

“Due to economic transformation and the mismatch between education and the job market, young people need these places to think about their next steps, or to do odd jobs as a transition…Pretend office companies are one of the transitional solutions.”

China’s Gen Z joblessness crisis: ‘Rat people’ and ‘lying flat’

China’s Gen Z professionals have had a hard time scoring jobs for years—and the pandemic only turbocharged the need for new opportunities. 

In 2023, the situation was so dire that China’s youth unemployment rate was estimated to be as high as 46.5%, according to Peking University’s professor of economics Zhang Dandan. After three months of record-high young joblessness that year, the Chinese government ceased running statistics on the issue altogether. The eye-popping unemployment rate included 16 million young Chinese workers who have taken themselves out of the labor force by “lying flat”—doing the bare minimum to get by, and not chasing high-powered careers. 

China’s government is also stepping in to change worrying youth joblessness rates; in 2011, the Ministry of Education cautioned that any college majors with employment under 60% for two years straight could be scrapped altogether. To ensure their disciplines don’t get shut down, some universities in China asked graduates to falsify their job status to keep the programs running.

“I think the actual state of youth unemployment in China could be worse than the data suggests, as colleges have incentives to inflate the employment rate,” Henry Gao, a law professor at Singapore Management University, told the SCMP in 2023. “There have been reports of colleges offering jobs to their own graduates just to paper over the data.”

While there are indications the unemployment rates are improving, being a jobless professional is so commonplace in China that young people are proudly wearing their unemployment as a badge of honor. 

Instead of “girl bossing,” out-of-work Gen Zers are calling themselves “rat people,” spending their days bed-rotting, scrolling on their phones, napping, and ordering take-out. It’s a social media trend that has swept Weibo, RedNote, and Douyin, as burned-out youth are exhausted by scant opportunities and crushed by hopelessness.

“This trend is more than Gen Z disengaging, it’s a quiet protest by young people responding to burnout, disillusionment and a job market that feels both punishing and uninviting,” Advita Patel, a confidence and career coach, and president of the Chartered Institute of Public Relations, told Fortune. “When you’re endlessly applying for jobs and being ghosted or rejected, it can be incredibly damaging to confidence and mental wellbeing.” 

Calling unemployed Gen Zers: Are you spending money for special services, or fake office set-ups, in your quest to land work? We’d love to hear your experience—please reach out at [email protected]

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

© koiguo / Getty Images

• As companies like JPMorgan Chase, Amazon, and Starbucks ramp up return-to-office plans, Gen Z may be their biggest ally. As the youngest generation of workers fights off loneliness and seeks career progression, they are the least likely to prefer working fully remote, according to a new survey. But that doesn’t mean they hate the idea of working from home altogether—like their millennial coworkers, they’d prefer a hybrid work schedule above all else. 

Gen Z and Jamie Dimon may not have much in common, but they can both relate on one thing at least: they are both not fans of fully-remote work.

Less than one-quarter of all Gen Z workers, just 23%, would prefer to work at home five days a week, according to a recently released survey by Gallup. That’s compared to 35% of millennials, Gen Xers and boomers who would prefer to WFH every day—crowning the newest members of the office the ones most eager to be at their cubicles.

Gen Z’s pro-office sentiment is likely to please Dimon, as the JPMorgan CEO  issued all his employees back into the office every weekday last spring. His reasoning: enhanced efficiency and creativity.

“You can’t learn working from your basement,” he told Bloomberg earlier this year. “…I think our employees will be happier over time.”

However, full RTO is a policy that doesn’t have much support. Even though Gen Z aren’t fans of remote working, they also don’t love the idea of working from the office day in, day out. Just 6% of Gen Z would want to work in-person every day of the week.

The most senior members of the office aren’t big fans either; only one in 10 boomers are in favor of being in the office every day—the highest proportion of any generation, the Gallup survey finds. Other age brackets are not far behind: 9% of Gen X and 4% of millennials approve of full RTO.

Meanwhile, clocking in from couches on Mondays and Fridays remains supreme; hybrid work remains the most popular among workers of all ages, with each yielding over 50% approval.

Why Gen Z aren’t fans of remote work

Gen Z’s disdain for being behind the screen all day at home may come at a surprise, considering they grew up as ‘screenagers,’ watching TV and using their chunky computers all day. It’s an affinity from childhood that has grown to the young professionals spending upwards of seven hours a day on their phones.

Among the workers who do work at home, they’re spending their job hours staring at  more screens. Over eight in 10 Gen Z workers admit they stream shows and movies while working from home, according to a survey by streaming TV service Tubi. However, this could just be another symptom of the generation’s feeling of loneliness.

After all, Gen Z are the loneliest of any age group; young workers are almost twice as likely as Gen Z, and nearly three times as likely as boomers to say they were lonely the day prior, according to separate Gallup research from last year. Despite the saved time and money that comes with working from their bedroom, the benefits of being with coworkers and making friends at work may be contributing to the generation’s inclination to work at the office. 

Building connections in the office can help drive future success

JPMorgan Chase is not alone in the push back to the office. Other companies, the likes of Amazon, Starbucks, and Google, have also reduced the flexibility of their workdays in recent months. 

“We are reestablishing our in-office culture because we do our best work when we’re together,” Starbucks CEO Brian Niccol wrote announcing the change this month. “We share ideas more effectively, creatively solve hard problems, and move much faster.”

Once past the frustration of having to set up childcare, pack lunches, and deal with office yappers—there can still be career benefits to chatting with coworkers beyond just a Zoom screen, like landing in-person mentors. One Gallup survey from 2023 found that employees with mentors are twice as likely to strongly agree that they have had opportunities to learn and grow at work in the last year. 

Moreover, simply showing up to the office could lead to faster internal career progression. Over 80% of chief executives have said employees who come into the office will be prioritized for assignments, raises, or promotions, according to a KPMG survey of 400 U.S.-based CEOs. As companies also seek to reduce their workforce in favor of AI, less seen remote workers could be the first to go.

At a time when fellow Gen Z college graduates are struggling to land jobs, those with roles may have reasoned that giving up the comfort of their home office to work in their corporate cubicle may be worth it in the long term.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

© Getty Images—MStudioImages

• Spirit Airlines warns it could be out of business within a year. In its latest earnings, the discount carrier said its financials needed to improve dramatically or it needed to find additional financing. Otherwise, “there is substantial doubt” it would survive.

Spirit Airlines has warned it could be grounded permanently if it’s financial results don’t improve and it’s unable to raise cash.

In its quarterly earnings report this week, the carrier, which emerged from bankruptcy just five months ago, said demand continues to be weak and market conditions are still problematic. As a result, it may find itself in default.

“Because of the uncertainty of successfully completing the initiatives to comply with the minimum liquidity covenants and of the outcome of discussions with Company stakeholders, management has concluded there is substantial doubt as to the Company’s ability to continue as a going concern within 12 months from the date these financial statements are issued,” Spirit said in the report.

Spirit was a leader in the low-cost carrier market, but has faced substantial headwinds in recent years. A failed takeover attempt by JetBlue last year led to the bankruptcy filing. Passenger tastes, meanwhile, have shifted, with less interest in discount airlines and have shown a greater affinity to upmarket products, such as paying for extra legroom in coach.

Less than three weeks ago, Spirit announced it would furlough 270 pilots on Nov. 1 and demote 140 from captain to first officer on Oct. 1. That was latest in a line of furloughs for Spirit. The airline let 186 pilots go in 2024 and about 330 in January of that year. In May of this year, it cut 250-350 employees.

Spirit emerged from Chapter 11 in March. Prior to that filing, made last October, Spirit had not posted an annual profit since before COVID. To attract higher-paying customers, the company has launched a business-class option and blocked off the middle seat.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

© Kevin Carter—Getty Images

• The Tesla Diner has cut back its menu options, two weeks after opening. Reports indicate there are now just five sandwiches on the menu and several items, such as Epic Bacon, were removed. Hourse appear to have been reduced as well.

Tesla’s foray into the restaurant business is starting to mirror its vehicle selection. 

Less than three weeks after opening, the charging station/restaurant has drastically scaled back its menu, removing several offerings. As of Aug. 5, reports Eater, there were just five sandwiches left on the menu, the same number of vehicles the company sells.

The number of sides has been similarly reduced to two, along with two flavors of pie, all of which are available to order from Tesla’s in-car infotainment system.

Gone are the market salad, the club sandwich, biscuits and red gravy, and hash-brown bites. Want a veggie burger? Nope. That’s history, too. And items that were formerly listed as “all-day breakfast” are now only served in the morning.

Epic Bacon, a bag of maple-glazed breakfast meat dusted with black pepper, is off the menu. So, too, are some fountain-drink options, like the Shirley Temple and Creamsicle.

What you can get now is a Tesla burger, hot dog, grilled cheese, tuna melt or a fried chicken sandwich. Also fries.

Tesla Diner chef Eric Greenspan told Eater the menu was scaled down because of “unprecedented demand” and it would be “forever evolving.”

Also evolving? The hours. Initially promoted as a 24/7 establishment, the Tesla Diner now operates from 6:00 a.m. until midnight, unless you’re charging or ordering from you Tesla. And there have been reports that non-Tesla owners were not allowed to charge their vehicles at the diner site.

Elon Musk has envisioned the Tesla Diner as something that could expand nationwide.

“If our retro-futuristic diner turns out well, which I think it will, @Tesla will establish these in major cities around the world, as well as at Supercharger sites on long distance routes,” Musk wrote on social media.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

© AaronP/Bauer-Griffin/GC Images

President Donald Trump escalated his campaign against Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell just about an hour after the latest release of inflation data, publicly threatening to sue him over the central bank’s headquarters renovation and repeating his call for immediate interest rate cuts. The confrontation comes as the Consumer Price Index report showed U.S. inflation in July was milder than expected, raising political pressure on the central bank to ease monetary policy. Complicating matters for the Fed, though, is “core” inflation, excluding volatile food and energy prices, was the highest it’s been in five months.

In a social media salvo Friday, Trump returned to his sharp critiques of the Fed chair. “Jerome ‘Too Late’ Powell must NOW lower the rate,” he wrote on Truth Social. Then Trump turned to the subject of his legal threat: Powell’s oversight of the Fed’s planned $2.5 billion renovation of its landmark Washington headquarters. Trump has repeatedly condemned the project, suggesting it amounts to “fraud” and is an unnecessary luxury.

“I think he’s terrible … But one thing I didn’t see him is a guy that needed a palace to live in,” Trump quipped in a recent interview, implying lavish spending at taxpayer expense. In July, White House budget chief Russell Vought formally accused Powell of deception over the renovation’s costs, followed soon afterward by Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent confirming a selection process was under way for Powell’s successor.

Despite legal experts widely agreeing the president cannot directly fire the Fed chair for policy disagreements, Trump has suggested cost overruns could constitute grounds for dismissal or a lawsuit, a firing “for cause.” The Supreme Court, in a May ruling, indicated Powell’s removal for policy reasons was not permitted under current law. The reason Trump wants Powell to lower interest rates doesn’t have anything to do with an office renovation—it’s about the many worrying signs related to the economy.

Intensifying Pressure for Lower Interest Rates

Trump’s attacks on Powell are fueled by the Fed’s refusal to substantially cut its benchmark interest rate, which remains at 4.25%–4.50% after a series of hikes in 2022 and 2023. Powell and the Fed have argued maintaining higher rates is necessary to keep lingering inflation in check, especially as the impacts of Trump’s tariffs and global trade disruptions are still being analyzed. Tuesday’s CPI report is ambiguous and could be read either way.

July’s inflation report did notably show a smaller-than-anticipated rise in consumer prices, emboldening Trump to double down on his calls.

“The damage [Powell] has done by always being Too Late is incalculable,” Trump added, before claiming, “Fortunately, the economy is sooo good that we’ve blown through Powell and the complacent Board.”

Trump has argued higher rates are stifling growth and hurting American homeowners and businesses and demanded drastic rate cuts of up to 3 percentage points—a move economists warn could risk unleashing new inflation if mishandled.

Trump’s economy is looking weaker than expected after the July jobs report included massive downward revisions for previous months, revealing an economy with anemic job creation of less than 20,000 in May and June. This prompted many Wall Street analysts to revise their opinions on the impact of Trump’s tariff regime on the economy, and on whether the economy is fated for a stagflationary mix of high inflation and low growth, a stock-market correction, or even a recession.

Several members of the Fed’s board, including some appointed by Trump (and floated as potential Powell successors), have publicly dissented from Powell’s stance, advocating for more aggressive rate cuts to mix monetary stimulus with the president’s expansionary trade and fiscal policies. But Powell has remained cautious, stressing the need for “a careful approach while observing inflation trends,” and highlighting risks tied to Trump’s trade agenda.

Political and Economic Fallout

The feud has raised widespread concern over the perceived independence of America’s central bank. Markets have shown volatility as rumors of Powell’s possible firing, or the board taking control from him, have circulated in Washington. Wall Street leaders and economists have warned politicizing Federal Reserve policy could undermine global confidence in U.S. economic management and lead to long-term instability.

Trump’s rhetoric, including name-calling and accusations of mismanagement, has fueled fears the delicate balance between elected officials and nonpartisan central bankers is at risk. Despite the friction, Powell has indicated his intent to serve until his term ends in May 2026, as originally set.

For this story, Fortune used generative AI to help with an initial draft. An editor verified the accuracy of the information before publishing. 

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

© AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta

• July inflation data suggests the FOMC’s dual mandate may not be in as much of a pickle as economists had previously feared. CPI rose 0.2% month-on-month in July. It was 2.7% year-on-year, the same level as the month before. Core inflation edged up to 3.1%, however, keeping it above the Fed’s 2% target. Flatter headline inflation and falling energy prices bolstered expectations for a September rate cut, though analysts warned that sticky service costs and potential tariff impacts could limit further easing in 2025. Markets rallied on the data, but Fed officials are likely to remain focused on upcoming jobs reports before committing to additional cuts.

July’s inflation report went about as well as the Fed (and the White House) could have hoped for.

The Consumer Price Index (CPI) summary released Tuesday reported inflation notched up 0.2% in July, that’s down compared to the 0.3% increase in June. Over the past 12 months, this brings the headline inflation rate to 2.7%—admittedly still comfortably ahead of the Federal Reserve’s 2% target but the same level as it was in June.

Shelter was the primary factor for the overall rise, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) said, rising 0.2% in July. Meanwhile, key categories such as the food index were largely unchanged, with food at home falling 0.1% and food away from home rising 0.3%. Elsewhere, the energy index fell 1.1% while gasoline costs were also reduced by 2.2%.

Supporters of Trump 2.0 will use the relatively flat report as ammunition to urge U.S. Federal Reserve Jerome Powell to cut the base interest rate, arguing that tariffs are not (yet) proving as inflationary as many economists previously feared.

Indeed, President Trump wrote on Truth Social moments after the data was released: “Jerome ‘Too Late’ Powell must NOW lower the rate. Steve ‘Manouychin’ really gave me a ‘beauty’ when he pushed this loser. The damage he has done by always being Too Late is incalculable. Fortunately, the economy is sooo good that we’ve blown through Powell and the complacent board.”

When the White House announced its tariff regime, particularly following its “Liberation Day” announcements in April, analysts and investors feared the significant added costs to global trade would be passed to American consumers. Surveys indicate that this is the intention of the majority of businesses: To pass the increased levies on to the public, thus pushing up inflation.

But with various agreements with key partners now made, and delays with the likes of China to boot, economists are now beginning to wonder when (or if) the sharpest end of the tariff agenda will be felt.

The report is likely to have eased some of the friction members of the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) were readying themselves for. For many months, the FOMC had been warning it was mindful of the two sides of its mandate when making decisions about the base rate.

Those two sides are maximizing employment and keeping inflation to 2%. With a shocking and negative update on the labor market from earlier this month, a spiking inflation report for July would have put those two factors at even greater odds.

As it is, many analysts are seeing the inflation report as another tick in the box for a cut at the FOMC’s next meeting in September. After all, they believe it means Powell and the FOMC can breathe easier about tariffs and give the economy and employment market a boost by lowering interest.

At the opening bell investors certainly seemed to think so: The S&P 500 was up 0.65%, the Dow Jones up 0.6%, the Nasdaq up 0.76%.

However, while headline inflation stayed below 3%, core inflation (excluding the often volatile food and energy categories) rose to 3.1% over the past 12 months.

Seema Shah, chief global strategist at Principal Asset Management, wrote in a note seen by Fortune that July inflation data isn’t hot enough to “derail the Fed from cutting rates in September. There is some sign of tariff pass through to consumer prices but, at this stage, it is not significant enough to ring alarm bells.”

But Shah added that further cuts in 2025 are not a foregone conclusion: “The concern for the Fed is that with inventory run-down, the tariff-induced boost to inflation is likely to grow over the coming months, meaning that inflationary pressures are likely to pick up just as the Fed starts to resume rate cuts. Markets like today’s inflation print as it means the Fed can lower rates unheeded next month – rate cut decisions in October, December and beyond may well be more complicated.”

Don’t count your cuts

While Powell has been fending off criticism from the White House, analysts are warning against baking in further and significant cuts for the remainder of the year.

The FOMC have their next meeting in September, followed by two more in October and December, and one member, Michelle Bowman, has already confirmed she would be open to such a trajectory.

Indeed, UBS’s Ulrike Hoffmann-Burchardi, CIO Americas and global head of equities, wrote in a note to clients: “With overall inflation likely under control amid a slowing economy, our base case remains that the Fed will resume rate cuts at the September meeting and continue cutting for a total of 100bps.”

Indeed, CME’s FedWatch shows more than 94% of the market expect a cut at the next meeting.

But analysts are wary to be overly confident beyond the next meeting. Elyse Ausenbaugh, head of investment strategy at J.P. Morgan Wealth Management, wrote in a note to clients that while she was still expecting a 0.5% cut in rates by the end of the year, “It seems fair to say that the Fed could be considering a move in September, but I don’t think a cut at that meeting is as much of a given as market pricing is implying. We will get plenty of data between now and then that could give the Fed pause one more time before taking action in the fourth quarter.”

Michael Pearce, deputy chief U.S. economist at Oxford Economics, wrote in a note to Fortune that the details of the CPI report don’t even guarantee a September cut.

“The larger rise in core prices in July provides mixed evidence around the tariff boost to inflation. For the Federal Reserve, inflation is much further from its target than the unemployment rate, which is why we expect them to hold off rate cuts another few months. However, another weak set of jobs data in August would force their hand early,” Pearce wrote. “Core inflation edged up to 3.0% in July and we expect it will rise further to a peak of 3.8% by the end of the year as tariffs bleed through more fully to consumer prices.

“In our view, the upside risks to inflation will keep the majority of the FOMC preferring to sit on the sidelines for a few more months. The large downward revisions included in the July employment report heightened concerns around the labor market, and another weak report in August could tip the odds in favor of a September rate cut.”

Pearce was echoed by Bill Adams, chief economist for Comerica Bank, who said the Fed is now less likely to cut because the inflationary factors in the July report came from sticky service prices as opposed to tariff-related goods. Adams said: “Jobs data scheduled for release in early September will have more sway over the Fed’s next decision than this inflation report.”

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

Research confirmed what many workers had already suspected: Return-to-office mandates were often a thinly veiled headcount reduction. 

But while forcing workers to choose whether they love remote working more than being employed, a survey shows bosses aren’t following their own mandates. 

In fact, 93% of CEOs say they don’t go into the office full-time and have instead adopted flexible working patterns.

International Workplace Group’s survey of more than 500 U.K. chief executives reveals bosses are notably absent from the workplace—that is, despite a quarter believing that a return to the office full-time is a priority. Meanwhile, more than half of Fortune 100 desk workers have workplaces with fully in-office policies, according to new data from real estate company Jones Lang LaSalle Inc.

Although working from home makes employment more feasible for parents, pet owners, workers with disabilities, and those who can’t afford to live near the office, bosses have been calling staff back to their desks, often in the name of creativity and collaboration.

Yet only 7% of CEOs go into the office five days a week, according to IWG, compared with 64% for those with a salary below £30,000 ($38,000) who are expected to be in the workplace full-time.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, workers who have been stung by RTO mandates will likely be left reeling by the double standards of the findings—and CEOs know it. 

The research found two-thirds of respondents know they would lose talented people if they insisted on their employees being present in a central office every day, as nine in 10 work flexibly themselves. 

CEOs who don’t go to the office

Despite being notably absent from the workplace themselves, bosses have spent the best part of three years cracking down on office attendance. 

Last year, Dell gave its workers literal red flags for not swiping their badge enough. Amazon put an end to “coffee badging” by setting a minimum-hour obligation on in-office days.

Other businesses went one step further and explicitly told their workforce to commute into the office or find somewhere else to work. Patagonia gave some 90 staff members just three days to decide whether they would relocate close to the office or quit their jobs. 

Likewise, the gaming giant Roblox warned workers who can’t make it to the company’s physical office that they would have to find another job—as did the bosses at TikTok and Walmart. 

Then there’s Amazon’s CEO Andy Jassy, who warned workers that if they can’t commit to the company’s mandate, then “it’s probably not going to work out for you.”

CEOs want to avoid commuting, but so do employees

Why don’t CEOs want to work more from the office? For the same reason as most: IWG’s research shows they want to avoid a long commute. 

In reality, with inflation high but wages low, so too do unemployed Gen Z grads who are having to turn down job opportunities because they can’t afford the commute.

However, it’s those at the bottom end of the pay scale—who are most impacted by the costs associated with RTO mandates—who are also most likely to be asked to commute to the office.

While just 20% of businesses’ top-earners earning over £50,000 ($64,000) are expected to be in the office, this jumps to 64% for those with a salary below £30,000 ($38,000).

A version of this story originally published on Fortune.com on July 29, 2024

More on return-to-office:

• Employees are engaging in revenge RTO, but these small acts of defiance are the symptom of a bigger problem
• Forget about RTO—companies are getting distracted with mandates and screwing up these 5 core work practices
• More than 60% of workers have considered changing jobs due to rigid RTO policies and would take a pay cut for better flexible work options

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

© Luis Alvarez—Getty Images

Apple’s stock is down nearly 20% so far in 2025, losing more than $750 billion in market value and falling from its position as the world’s most valuable company, particularly as a result of investor disappointment around Apple’s artificial intelligence efforts, with the company’s “Apple Intelligence” suite failing to impress. This week, Apple has a fresh AI-related headache—but this time, it comes courtesy of world’s richest man Elon Musk, who’s threatening “immediate legal action” if the tech giant does not remove OpenAI’s ChatGPT from the top of its App Store rankings.

It all unfolded late Monday, when the billionaire Tesla CEO took to the social network he bought for $44 billion, X, to level pointed accusations at Apple and its App Store practices. Musk alleged that Apple’s ranking system “makes it impossible for any AI company besides OpenAI to reach #1 in the App Store,” claiming this amounts to a “clear antitrust violation” and vowing that his artificial intelligence startup, xAI, “will take immediate legal action.”

Battle over App Store rankings

At the heart of Musk’s complaint is Grok, the AI chatbot launched by his xAI startup as a direct competitor to ChatGPT. As of Tuesday morning, ChatGPT holds the coveted top spot among free apps in Apple’s App Store in the United States, while Grok sits at sixth. For context: Google’s Gemini chatbot trails far behind, ranking 57th. Musk alleges improper favoritism, especially given Apple’s high-profile partnership with OpenAI, announced in June 2024, that integrates ChatGPT more deeply with iPhones, iPads, and Macs.

“Apple is acting in a way that hinders any AI firm, other than OpenAI, from achieving the top position in the App Store, which constitutes a clear violation of antitrust laws,” Musk wrote in one post. He further questioned Apple’s editorial decisions: “Why do you decline to include either X or Grok in your ‘Must Have’ category when X holds the title of the world’s leading news app and Grok ranks fifth among all applications? Are you engaging in political maneuvering?”

Apple and OpenAI face growing scrutiny

Musk’s attack on Apple arrives in a climate of mounting regulatory scrutiny. Earlier this year, a U.S. judge found Apple in violation of a court order requiring changes to App Store competition rules, following a lawsuit by video game studio Epic Games. The European Union fined Apple €500 million in April for blocking app developers from steering users to cheaper outside offers, citing anti-competitive behavior. Apple is appealing the decision.

Apple has yet to publicly respond to Musk’s latest accusations.

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman quickly fired back at Musk’s claims. “This is a remarkable claim given what I have heard alleged that Elon does to manipulate X to benefit himself and his own companies and harm his competitors and people he doesn’t like,” Altman wrote on X, highlighting the sometimes cutthroat competition within the AI sector.

The broader stakes

While Musk asserts that Apple is locking out competitors, some industry observers have cast doubt on the claim. Notably, DeepSeek, an AI chatbot from China, managed to reach the top overall spot on the App Store back in January—months after Apple’s partnership with OpenAI was announced. Critics point out that Musk has yet to provide concrete evidence that Apple is actively manipulating rankings to disadvantage Grok or other rivals.

The fight between Musk and Apple reflects the high stakes in the race to dominate consumer AI platforms. With over 1 billion iPhone users worldwide, App Store rankings can make or break new technologies seeking widespread adoption. Musk has positioned Grok as a transparent and less censored alternative to ChatGPT, seeking to disrupt the existing market that he helped create when he co-founded OpenAI in 2015 before departing in 2018 over strategic disagreements.

The dispute marks an escalation in Musk’s broader campaign against big tech and perceived abuses of platform power, with potential implications for how digital marketplaces handle AI, app curation, and competition.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

© Brendan Smialowski / AFP—Getty Images

• Self-made multimillionaire Emma Grede has built billion-dollar brands with the Kardashians (including shapewear and clothing brand company Skims), sits on the board for the Obama Foundation, and has just teamed up with tennis champion Coco Gauff on a mentorship campaign with UPS. But while scaling businesses and mentoring others come naturally to her, Grede admits she needed a mentor moment of her own when it came to artificial intelligence. And that moment came courtesy of fellow Shark Tank investor Mark Cuban, Grede exclusively tells Fortune.

The British-born entrepreneur Emma Grede, best known as the founding partner of Kim Kardashian’s $4 billion shapewear empire Skims and the CEO of denim brand Good American, has built a reputation on spotting cultural shifts before they hit the mainstream. 

When her and Khloe Kardashian’s Good American denim line dropped, it made $1 million on day one, making it the biggest denim launch in apparel history. Grede has helped redefine inclusion in retail and became the first Black female investor on Shark Tank—all before turning 45.

Now she’s bringing that same playbook to small businesses through a new UPS campaign alongside tennis star Coco Gauff. The initiative sees Grede mentoring creators of emerging female-led brands and offering one-on-one coaching to help them scale. 

But while mentoring others comes naturally to her, Grede admits that when it came to AI, she was the one who needed a pep talk—and fellow Shark Tank star Mark Cuban was the one who gave her the push to come to grips with the new technology.

In an exclusive interview with Fortune, Grede talked about an episode of her hit podcast show Aspire that hadn’t aired yet, where the two sat down and compared their AI usage. 

“I was already kind of getting there, but if I’m really honest, that episode where we really delved into AI gave me a new urgency around how I use AI,” she recalled, adding that Cuban had a staggering 60 AI apps on his phone. “Yeah, he gave me a kick.”

As soon as the recording wrapped up, she said that she started looking into AI courses at the Wharton School and Harvard for this fall. “I need to figure this out, because I’m using AI like a 42-year-old woman,” Grede candidly admitted while laughing.

Grede gave her staff a cash bonus for using AI—long before she realized she was behind

Grede isn’t completely new to AI. In fact, she was ahead of the curve when it came to encouraging AI adoption within her companies.

“About two years ago I put a note out in my office giving a cash bonus to anyone that uses AI in their work,” she explained, adding that the incentive was a big hit—especially with the marketing and finance teams.

“It changed the office. It changed the way people presented their work. It changed the way people did their work.”  

But as her Gen Z and thirtysomething staff embraced experimenting with ChatGPT and other new AI launches at the time, Grede admitted that she perhaps leaned too heavily on them. It meant that until recently, she’s been using AI more as a search engine and leaving her staff to handle the rest.

“I was like, Emma, you need to sort that out.”

It comes as many other CEOs are scrambling to appoint AI leaders, future-proof their business, and brace for change.

Billionaire Microsoft cofounder Bill Gates says AI is moving at a speed that “surprises” even him and that even if workers learn how to use the latest tech tools, they may still find themselves out of a job. Meanwhile, an ex-Google exec says CEOs are currently too busy “celebrating” their efficiency gains to see they’re next on AI’s chopping board.

But she’s not using AI to make her more productive

As one of America’s richest self-made women—with a reported net worth of nearly $400 million and at least four major businesses to her name—Grede is clearly ruthlessly efficient. But in her eyes, AI isn’t about squeezing even more productivity from her day.

“I’m probably the most productive person in the world. I don’t know that I can be that more productive,” she said, noting that her time is mostly spent making high-stakes decisions—not executing tasks. 

“There’s no amount of AI that can help me with that.”

But where it can help, she said, is in making smarter strategic choices and reshaping how she leads. 

“I think it’s a reframing of how we’re going to do things,” Grede added. “So much of my job is about making really big bets and decisions. And so if I can put data in places to optimize that decision making, I think that that’s probably where I’m going to be using it most.

“When you start to think about my role as a merchant and as a planner, it’s really those things that I think are going to fundamentally shift.”

In her podcast episode with Cuban, which has since been released, the television personality and Dallas Mavericks owner had a stark warning for founders who don’t embrace AI: “You’re f–ked…That’s like saying, back in the day, ‘I don’t need to use a PC, I don’t need to use the internet. I don’t need a cell phone.’”

He added, “If you’re an entrepreneur, or want to be an entrepreneur, start playing with it to get a sense for how it works, how to prompt. It becomes like having an entire staff of 1,000 business professors.”

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

© Courtesy of Zeno

As AI chatbots like ChatGPT and Perplexity reshape how people search—siphoning queries away from Google—startups are racing to help brands stay visible in AI-generated responses. Profound, which claims it was the first to stake out this post-SEO space, today announced a $35 million Series B funding round led by Sequoia, with continued backing from venture capital firms Kleiner Perkins, Khosla Ventures, Saga VC, and South Park Commons. The new round brings its total funding to $58.5 million.

Since launching less than a year ago, the New York City-based company has signed Fortune 10 clients and hundreds more, though it could publicly name only a few, including Ramp, US Bank, Indeed, MongoDB, DocuSign, and Chime. Profound says 2,000 marketers from over 500 organizations now use its platform daily as brands race to secure their place in the AI-first internet. And the race is heating up: according to the Wall Street Journal, AI-powered chatbots now account for more than 5% of U.S. desktop search traffic—up from just 1.3% in early 2024.

Sequoia partner Anas Biad told Fortune the firm’s big bet is on cofounders James Cadwallader, a serial marketing entrepreneur, and Dylan Babbs, a former Uber software engineer. The two met at South Park Commons, a San Francisco community and early-stage fund founded in 2016 by Ruchi Sanghvi, Facebook’s first female engineer, and Aditya Agarwal, former Dropbox CTO. Sequoia views the rise of AI search as a once-in-a-generation platform shift for marketers—one it believes Profound is poised to lead by helping brands monitor how they and their competitors surface in AI-generated results and produce new content to keep pace.

“Their speed of execution was truly remarkable—in both the product they built and the customers they landed,” said Biad. “We only back founders who want to build generational companies. Their team is very ambitious and very aggressive.”

Cadwallader, who previously founded influencer marketing firm Kyra, has called the change a “Game of Thrones power shift” from decades of search engine optimization tactics to a new world of AI search. He said he became “obsessed” with Perplexity in early 2024. “It was so obvious to me that this was an inflection point—once you’ve used AI to search, you quickly understand why our children won’t be using [Google’s] blue links.”

But the shift is bigger than search, he emphasized: it will change the internet itself and become a boardroom-level problem for every marketer. If AI chatbots become the primary way people search, brands will lose direct visibility and control over how they appear to consumers online. That’s not just a marketing issue, he explained—it’s a business challenge that touches revenue, customer acquisition, competitive positioning, and brand identity.

Tackling it, he said, means more than monitoring AI output. It requires creating and optimizing content for a new audience: the bots themselves. “This is the first time ever you are creating content for bots,” said Cadwallader. “Brands are using Profound to create what humans would probably find boring—highly structured content that’s designed for bots to consume, like a game of telephone.”

Profound tracks how major AI models—from ChatGPT, Grok, and Meta’s LLaMA to Google’s Gemini and Microsoft Copilot—surface brand mentions. The company also supports DeepSeek. “We see huge differences across models, and that changes week over week or month over month,” Cadwallader said. “It’s almost like tracking a new species.”

The platform then uses advanced reasoning models, such as OpenAI’s o3 (and now GPT-5), to analyze those insights and generate recommendations, from gap analyses to suggested copy. Those recommendations might involve creating new content, optimizing web pages, producing social posts, or even targeting media outlets influencing AI-generated answers. “There will always be a human in the loop—it’s not about replacing marketers,” Cadwallader said. “But what used to take a team of ten, you can now do entirely within Profound.”

The challenge has already expanded beyond marketing. “It’s become a PR challenge, a content challenge, even a customer support challenge,” he said. “The models have opinions, and they reflect the internet’s opinions back to users.”

That makes Profound’s ambitions far bigger than SEO. Cadwallader envisions a future where transactions happen directly inside AI assistants—without a single click away—posing competitive threats even to giants like Amazon. “I’m inspired by Salesforce,” he said, pointing to the company’s early-2000s cloud software disruption. “It’s an example of just how big you can go.”

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

In 2026, US employers are expected to grant employees raises that are largely in line with what they’re receiving this year, according to a Payscale report released on Aug. 7.

Economic concerns drive smaller compensation budgets. The report, which draws on a survey of more than 1,500 Payscale clients conducted in May and June, finds respondents expect workers will see their base pay go up by 3.5% next year, on average, down just 0.1% from this year.

But for organizations planning to shrink their compensation budgets, economic concerns loom much larger than in previous years. Of the respondents who said their 2026 budget for salary increases is expected to be lower than their 2025 budget, nearly two-thirds (66%), said they were “concerned about future economic conditions or business performance,” up 17 percentage points from last year.

This isn’t necessarily surprising given the economic backdrop. Inflation rose by 2.7% in June, reaching its highest level since February, and the Trump administration recently imposed sweeping tariffs on trade partners, potentially hampering businesses’ appetite for hiring and raising worker wages.

These tough economic conditions have the potential to affect workers, too, noted Ruth Thomas, chief compensation strategist with Payscale. “It’s going to be a really challenging time,” she said. While data indicates wage growth now exceeds inflation, Payscale’s survey suggests workers “are still feeling a hangover from the high level of inflation that we had previously.” What’s more, she said, tariffs may affect how much employees are spending on goods.

How to handle a limited budget. When navigating discussions with employees who are seeing lower pay raises than previous years, Thomas recommended “setting the economic context for them,” and explaining how industry trends affect compensation budgets. As a result of pay transparency, “employees are a much more informed audience now, so you have to be ready to inform them,” she said.

She also encouraged organizations to use their budget for pay increases “discerningly” in light of the fact that it may be the lowest it’s been in several years. Rather than grant 3.5% raises across the board, employers should consider rewarding “key talent,” particularly if they’re in a sector with lower demand for labor, such as tech.

HR should consider “the talent that’s going to drive transformation in your business next year, because they’re going to be the key talent that you want to keep, and which is the talent that is most at risk in your business,” Thomas said.

This report was originally published by HR Brew.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

© Getty Images

Foot traffic fell 9% year over year at American Eagle stores for the week that began August 3, marking the second week of traffic declines since the retailer launched its controversial campaign featuring actor Sydney Sweeney, according to data from Pass_by provided exclusively to Retail Brew.

American Eagle launched its campaign, “Sydney Sweeney Has Great Jeans,” on July 23. For the first full week after the campaign, which began on July 27, its foot traffic declined 3.9% YoY. In both of the two full weeks preceding the campaign, its traffic increased over last year, up 5.9% on the week that began July 6 and 4.9% on the week that began July 13.

The latest week (from August 3 through August 9) saw foot-traffic declines among some of the retailer’s direct competitors for younger clothing shoppers, too, though not as steep as American Eagle’s 9% YoY drop. Abercrombie & Fitch experienced lower foot traffic (-3.3%), along with H&M (-4.9%), Gap (-2.8%), and Urban Outfitters (-2.7%), per Pass_by.

Correlation, as ever, is not causation, so there’s no telling if the Sweeney campaign has directly impacted American Eagle’s foot traffic.

Retail Brew asked American Eagle to comment on the foot-traffic data. We asked whether, according to its own data, traffic and sales have increased or decreased since the campaign launched. American Eagle did not respond.

As we reported previously, some have criticized the campaign for what they claim are eugenic undertones and for being oversexualized, while others, including The New York Post, dismissed the critics as a “crazed woke mob.” Vocal defenders of the campaign include President Donald Trump, Vice President JD Vance, and Senator Ted Cruz.

This report was originally published by Retail Brew.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

© Getty Images—Michael M. Santiago

Members of Gen Z entering the workforce, you’ve probably heard that the workplace is all about logic, data, and performance. That success comes to those who stay cool, stay sharp, and don’t let emotions get in the way. But here’s the truth, especially in today’s fast-paced, high-stakes environments: emotions run the show.

If you’ve ever felt your heart race after a Slack message, lost sleep over a meeting gone sideways, or ended the day utterly drained from pretending you’re “fine”—congrats, you’re human. And if you haven’t, something might actually be wrong. You’re not “too sensitive.” You’re emotionally alive in a workplace that rarely makes space for it. And if you’re part of the generation that’s been told to “bring your whole self to work,” only to feel punished for doing exactly that—you’re not imagining it. What sets successful professionals apart isn’t that they don’t feel, it’s that they work with their emotions, not for them.

Let me give you a few real-world examples.

Jerome was a rising star in sales—charismatic, persuasive, and always ahead of quota. Then he lost a big client. In the next pitch meeting, his frustration leaked through: flat tone, low energy, forced enthusiasm. The client picked up on it. Two deals were lost instead of one—not because of lack of talent, but because of unregulated emotion.

Or take Sofia. Brilliant problem-solver. Technically unmatched. But when teammates challenged her ideas, her irritation flared—a sharp comment here, an eye roll there. Pretty soon, people stopped contributing. The room got quiet. Deadlines slipped. Her genius didn’t matter anymore because no one wanted to work with her.

Here’s the takeaway: emotions affect performance and relationships, whether we acknowledge them or not. And the good news? You can learn to manage them like any other skill.

Why emotion regulation is the career skill nobody taught you

Emotions are not weaknesses to suppress. They’re data, helping you understand what matters, what’s working, and what’s not. But they’re not always instructions to act. The trick is knowing how to read the signal without blindly following it.

For example: • Excitement can spark innovation or lead to impulsive decisions. • Anxiety can motivate preparation or cause micromanagement and burnout. • Frustration can help you speak up or shut down collaboration.

What makes the difference is emotion regulation: the ability to pause, process, and choose a response that aligns with your goals and values—not just your immediate feelings.

This isn’t about faking calm or being emotionally robotic. It’s about developing emotion skills so your feelings fuel your performance instead of hijacking it.

And in a world that increasingly values transparency over perfection, regulating your emotions isn’t about hiding who you are—it’s about expressing yourself in ways that help you be heard, not dismissed.

The playbook: how to regulate emotions like a pro

I’ve spent two decades studying emotional intelligence and helping Fortune 500 companies, schools, and government agencies build healthier workplaces. Here’s the basic playbook high performers follow:

· Shift your mindset: Give yourself and others permission to feel. There are no bad emotions!

· Name it to tame it: Get precise with your emotions. You’re not just “stressed”—maybe you’re overwhelmed, anxious, frustrated, or feeling pressure.

· Reset your nervous system: Ground yourself with mindful breathing or a meditation practice.

· Shift your perspective before reacting; cognitive reframing turns friction into focus.

· Find your emotional allies: A trusted colleague can help you process and problem-solve.

· Care for your body: Sleep, nutrition, and exercise are the unsung heroes of regulation.

· Manage your time wisely: Schedule your well-being time. How would the best version of yourself schedule your time?

Using these strategies—even something as simple as a quick check-in between meetings—can stop a ripple of stress from turning into a tidal wave of burnout. That’s the power of emotional intelligence: it helps you show up as your best self, one regulated moment at a time.

For younger professionals especially—those navigating hybrid work, constant change, and systems still clinging to outdated norms—this is your edge. You already value emotional honesty. This gives you the tools to use it effectively.

A note about managers

If you’re early in your career, you may not feel empowered to shape your team’s emotional culture. But emotional intelligence isn’t just for people with titles. Anyone can model self-awareness and regulation. And you’ll be surprised how much your behavior influences others.

That said, emotionally skilled managers are game changers. They know the difference between disappointment and anger—and why it matters. Disappointment often stems from unmet expectations, while anger is usually about perceived injustice. Responding to each requires a different touch. Skilled leaders ask what’s going on before making assumptions. They stay present, listen without judgment, and model composure even in high-stress moments.

This is the power of co-regulation—when a team leader’s calm, attuned presence helps steady the emotions of everyone around them. It builds psychological safety and trust in the room. Emotionally intelligent managers don’t just regulate themselves; they help their teams do it too. They turn tense conversations into teachable moments, and difficult feedback into opportunities for growth.

They also hire for emotion skill—not just technical ability. A candidate who can recover from setbacks, handle conflict gracefully, and elevate team morale will outperform someone who looks perfect on paper but leaves a trail of burnout. Emotion regulation skill is what sustains collaboration, loyalty, creativity, and long-term performance—long after the hype fades.

Final advice: don’t leave your feelings at the door—learn to work with them

You’re entering a workplace that’s finally talking about burnout, mental health, and emotional well-being. That’s progress. But awareness isn’t enough. Skill is what changes things. And Gen Z is uniquely positioned to lead that shift. You’ve already challenged the myth that professionalism means emotional silence. Now it’s time to take the next step: emotional mastery.

If you want to thrive—not just survive—in your career, don’t just focus on your résumé. Invest in your emotion regulation toolkit. The difference between a great day and a disastrous one often comes down to how you handled one difficult feeling.

The research is clear: emotions aren’t the enemy of business—they’re the engine. High performers and high-performing organizations win not by ignoring emotions, but by managing them as strategically as budgets and timelines.

In today’s workplace, emotion regulation isn’t a perk—it’s a cultural advantage and a performance multiplier.

The opinions expressed in Fortune.com commentary pieces are solely the views of their authors and do not necessarily reflect the opinions and beliefs of Fortune.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

© Getty Images

WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. inflation was unchanged last month while a measure of underlying inflation rose to its highest level in five months, as tariffs have raised the cost of some imported goods while gas and procery prices cooled.

Consumer prices rose 2.7% in July from a year earlier, the Labor Department said Tuesday, the same as the previous month and up from a post-pandemic low of 2.3% in April. Excluding the volatile food and energy categories, core prices rose 3.1%, up from 2.9% in June.

The figures suggest that slowing cost growth for rents and cheaper gas are offsetting some of the impact of President Donald Trump’s sweeping tariffs. Tuesday’s figures likely reflect the 10% universal tariff Trump imposed in April, as well as higher duties on countries such as China and Canada.

Still, stubbornly high inflation puts the Federal Reserve in a difficult spot: Hiring slowed sharply in the spring, after Trump announced tariffs in April. The stalling out of job gains has boosted financial market expectations for an interest rate cut by the central bank.

Yet Fed chair Jerome Powell has warned that worsening inflation could keep the Fed on the sidelines — a stance that has enraged Trump, who has defied traditional norms of central bank independence and demanded lower borrowing costs.

Tuesday’s data arrives at a highly-charged moment for the Labor Department’s Bureau of Labor Statistics, which collects and publishes the inflation data. Trump fired Erika McEntarfer, then the head of BLS, after the Aug. 1 jobs report also showed sharply lower hiring for May and June than had previously been reported.

The president posted on social media Monday that he has picked E.J. Antoni, an economist at the conservative Heritage Foundation and a frequent critic of the jobs report, to replace McEntarfer.

“E.J. will ensure that the Numbers released are HONEST and ACCURATE,” Trump said on Truth Social.

Adding to the BLS’s turmoil is a government-wide hiring freeze that has forced it to cut back on the amount of data it collects for each inflation report, the agency has said. UBS economist Alan Detmeister estimates that BLS is now collecting about 18% fewer price quotes for the inflation report than it did a few months ago. He thinks the report will produce more volatile results, though averaged out over time, still reliable.

On a monthly basis, prices are expected to rise modestly, increasing just 0.2% from June to July and core prices rising 0.3%. Gas prices likely fell in July and grocery costs are expected to barely increase, muting overall inflation.

Signs of duties pushing up prices first emerged in the June inflation report released last month. Toy prices jumped 1.8% from May to June, after a 1.3% increase the previous month. Clothing prices rose 0.4% in June, while sporting goods leapt 1.8%.

Meanwhile, the average tariff level has climbed from about 2% before Trump’s inauguration to nearly 18%, the highest since the early 1930s, according to the Budget Lab at Yale. Most imports from the European Union and Japan now face duties of 15%, while goods from Taiwan pay 20% and Switzerland, 39%.

Other trends are helping keep inflation from rising more quickly. Price increases for apartment rents, for example, are steadily cooling after sharp spikes during the pandemic era. And prices for new cars have declined slightly in recent months, even after Trump slapped 25% duties on autos and auto parts.

So far, U.S. and overseas carmakers are paying the tariffs, though economists say they likely will pass them on to consumers soon. Car companies are also paying 50% import taxes on steel and aluminum and 30% on parts from China.

Ford has said it paid $800 million in tariffs in the second quarter, while General Motors shouldered $1.1 billion. Stellantis, the world’s fourth-largest carmaker and the maker of brands such as Chrysler, Dodge, and Jeep, has said it has paid $350 million in tariffs out of a $1.7 billion expected cost this year.

Consumers are likely to absorb more costs beyond the auto industry in the coming months, as Trump has begun to finalize many tariffs. Once businesses know what they will be paying, they are more likely to pass those costs to consumers, economists say.

Trump has insisted that overseas manufacturers will pay the tariffs by reducing their prices to offset the duties. Yet the pre-tariff prices of imports haven’t fallen much since the levies were put in place.

Economists at Goldman Sachs estimate that foreign manufacturers have absorbed just 14% of the duties through June, while 22% has been paid by consumers and 64% by U.S. companies. Based on previous patterns, however — such as Trump’s 2018 duties on washing machines — the economists expect that by this fall consumers will bear 67% of the burden, while foreign exporters pay 25% and U.S. companies handle just 8%.

Many large firms are still raising prices in response to the tariffs, including apparel makers Ralph Lauren and Under Armour, and eyewear company Warby Parker.

Consumer products giant Procter & Gamble, maker of Crest toothpaste, Tide detergent and Charmin toilet paper, said late last month that it would lift prices on about a quarter of its products by mid-single-digit percentages.

And cosmetics maker e.l.f. Beauty, which makes a majority of its products in China, said on Wednesday that it had raised prices by a dollar on its entire product assortment as of Aug. 1 because of tariff costs, the third price hike in its 21-year history.

“We tend to lead and then we will see how many more kind of follow us,” CEO Tarang Amin said on an earnings call Wednesday.

Matt Pavich, CEO of Revionics, a company that provides AI tools to large retailers to help them evaluate pricing decisions, says many companies are raising prices selectively to offset tariffs, rather than across the board.

“Up until now we haven’t seen a massive hit to consumers in retail prices,” Pavich said. “Now, they are going up, we’ve seen that.”

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

© Manuel Balce Ceneta—AP Photo

Last Thursday, OpenAI launched the latest version of its hyper-popular AI chatbot, ChatGPT. Sam Altman, OpenAI’s CEO, made some pretty big claims about GPT-5 during its unveiling.

“GPT-3 was sort of like talking to a high school student: There were flashes of brilliance, lots of annoyance, but people started to use it and get some value out of it,” he said. “With GPT-4, maybe it was like talking to a college student: real intelligence, real utility. But with GPT-5, now it’s like talking to an expert: a legitimate Ph.D-level expert in anything, any area you need, on demand that can help you with whatever your goals are.”

While OpenAI insists GPT-5 is the company’s best AI yet, with more expertise, more capability, and fewer hallucinations and mistakes compared to past models, users aren’t so convinced. Many of them were miffed that, upon release of GPT-5, OpenAI hid its other models, including its previous mainstream AI chatbot, GPT-4o. (It has since walked back this change.) But some ChatGPT users have also complained about GPT-5’s “cold” or “blunt” conversational style compared to earlier generations, with threads comparing it to an “overworked secretary.” Others have also pointed out the model’s stricter safety and refusal policies, despite improvements in transparency, and that other rivals including Anthropic’s Claude, Google’s Gemini, or Meta’s Llama are still better for certain workflows around live coding or customizable deployments.

If you count yourself as one of the masses underwhelmed with the advent of GPT-5, not to worry: We’ve highlighted several advantages GPT-5 has over other AI models; conversely, we’ve also outlined where other models shine in comparison to OpenAI’s latest and greatest.

What ChatGPT-5 can do that older models couldn’t

1. Unified, adaptive reasoning
In its GPT-5 unveiling, OpenAI emphasized how previous versions of ChatGPT required users to select distinct models for different tasks; one might choose “o3” for responses that demanded more research, time be damned, whereas “4o” could yield smart answers with very little downtime. The headline innovation with GPT-5, according to OpenAI, is that it claims to eliminate the need to choose one model over the other; OpenAI says GPT-5 is the best all-around option for both quick responses and deep thinking. OpenAI claims GPT-5 is particularly good at coding and math.

2. More accurate answers with fewer hallucinations
OpenAI says GPT-5 excels at extended reasoning, with dramatically reduced hallucination rates and improved accuracy. For example, HealthBench scores show up to 80% fewer factual errors in complex scenarios compared to earlier models, particularly GPT-o3, which was a model that would take a long time to respond but typically offered precise answers and few errors.

3. Rich personalization
GPT-5 introduces customizable personalities (Cynic, Robot, Listener, Nerd) and enhanced voice features, letting users tailor the chatbot’s tone, style, and conversational approach without resorting to prompt engineering. The user interface itself can now adapt color schemes and conversation settings. The voice model, according to OpenAI, sounds “incredibly natural” and can dynamically adjust speaking speed for language learning. Memory enhancements allow ChatGPT to learn about users over time and understand their goals. For paid users, it will soon have access to Gmail and Google Calendar, enabling it to plan schedules, integrate appointments, and manage emails, making it significantly more “useful and personal”.

4. Workflow Integration
GPT-5 supports direct integration with apps like Gmail and Google Calendar, which allows ChatGPT to access and manage schedules or emails on command. Businesses can also customize GPT-5 with proprietary data, making the AI feel more like a personalized digital assistant rather than a generic chatbot. In terms of doing actual work, OpenAI calls GPT-5 “the best coding model on the market today” and claims it can write an “entire computer program from scratch.” It can work autonomously for extended periods, and a “self-improvement loop” lets GPT-5 build projects while sending errors back to itself to iterate on its own code.

What other AI models can do that GPT-5 cannot

Despite its power and versatility, GPT-5 isn’t the only game in town:

Claude Opus 4.1, from Anthropic, is widely regarded to be the superior model for sustained autonomous coding and agentic workflows. Enterprise features like “Claude Code” support integrated code review and real-time security, offering specialized developer tools that GPT-5 lacks, at least right now. Claude also projects its “artifacts”—code visualizations—live within its integrated development environment (IDE), improving clarity for engineering teams, and Claude maintains artifacts locally so it can follow long-running tasks across sessions, which may surpass GPT-5’s current workflow persistence in some settings.

Google’s Gemini 2.5 Pro handles seamless video analysis with ease, which is still an emerging area for GPT-5, where its capabilities are still more limited. Gemini’s multimodal engine natively handles short video clips, diagrams, and complex visual reasoning, and demonstrates deep contextual understanding. It’s also great at getting real-time data from the internet, thanks to its ties to Google’s Search product. GPT-5, while brilliant, typically doesn’t do so well with breaking news or minute-by-minute market data.

Llama 3, from Meta, could be best for research environments and organizations with strict privacy needs since, unlike GPT-5’s closed API-driven approach, Llama is an open-source model, which offers developers full control over customization, security, and deployment. Llama 3 is also excellent at handling lengthy documents and multi-turn conversations, so users can deploy it on their own infrastructure. Llama being open-source also allows for faster experimentation and improvements.

Despite all the improvements OpenAI touts for ChatGPT-5, the AI arms race is still very much in full force. Anthropic, Google, and Meta are all keeping pace, especially when it comes to customization, coding, and breaking news. Of course, as with all things AI-related, it’s best to experiment with different models to find the right model, and workflow, that works best for you.

For this story, Fortune used generative AI to help with an initial draft. An editor verified the accuracy of the information before publishing. 

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

© Jonathan Raa / NurPhoto—Getty Images

With little fanfare but enormous implications, the Trump Administration is reportedly considering a five-year pilot program to allow Medicare and Medicaid to cover weight loss drugs when prescribed for patients with obesity and related conditions like cardiovascular disease. This decision by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), long sought by pharmaceutical companies and obesity advocates, is a watershed moment for access to care. It is also a harbinger of massive fraud.

The GLP-1 class of drugs, which includes brand names like Wegovy, Ozempic, and Mounjaro, has exploded in popularity due to its proven effectiveness in helping people lose weight. The drugs are also among the most expensive on the market, with prices exceeding $1,000 per month. These factors—clinical effectiveness, high costs, surging demand, and now an open spigot of government reimbursement—create an attractive target for abuse.

As lawyers who represent whistleblowers under the False Claims Act (FCA), we expect to enter a new era of fraud cases tied to these medications, with a stratospheric tab for taxpayers. The FCA allows private citizens to bring lawsuits on behalf of the government against those who submit false or fraudulent claims for payment—and GLP-1s are poised to generate exactly that kind of misconduct.

GLP-1s are uniquely susceptible to fraud. They promise rapid weight loss with minimal effort, and many people who fall just shy of CMS’ ultimate eligibility criteria will nonetheless be eager to obtain them, especially if they can do so at low cost through Medicare or Medicaid. What’s more, GLP-1s have massive demand—very few prescription drugs appeal to more than 70 percent of the population. Meeting that demand will take a massive infusion of taxpayer dollars: The government recently estimated that covering GLP-1 drugs for obesity would cost Medicare alone $35 billion from 2026 to 2034.

As a result, providers and clinics may stretch, bend, or outright fabricate diagnoses of obesity or cardiovascular disease to qualify patients for coverage. History tells us this will happen: upcoding, falsified documentation, and medically unnecessary prescribing are well-trodden paths in the annals of healthcare fraud.

Even more concerning is the competitive pressure among pharmaceutical giants to dominate this gold rush. GLP-1s are not interchangeable generics—these are branded, heavily marketed drugs from deep-pocketed global pharmaceutical companies. With the race for market share already on, we expect to see aggressive (and potentially illegal) tactics to induce providers to favor one drug over another, including kickbacks disguised as speaker fees, consulting contracts, and lavish events.

Manufacturers may also push off-label use of these drugs for patients without approved indications—a long-standing problem in pharma marketing that has led to multi-billion dollar FCA judgments in the past. The temptation to blur the lines will be strong, especially as GLP-1s are increasingly hailed not just as diabetes treatments or obesity drugs, but as miracle solutions for everything from heart health to addiction.

We also won’t be surprised to see abuse on the pharmacy and telehealth fronts. Compound pharmacies and online weight loss clinics are already booming thanks to GLP-1s, and some may bill the government for unapproved formulations or skirt required face-to-face evaluations. Expect scrutiny over whether prescribing practitioners are actually evaluating patients or merely rubber-stamping prescriptions based on thin records and virtual checkboxes.

None of this is hypothetical. In the last two decades, whistleblowers have exposed billions of dollars in healthcare fraud—including illegal kickbacks, unnecessary prescribing, off-label marketing, and fraudulent billing schemes—leading to recoveries for taxpayers and safer, more ethical care for patients.

To be sure, the worst-case scenario is not inevitable. CMS could design the pilot program with strong guardrails—tight eligibility verification, rigorous audit protocols, and real-time claims monitoring—to detect and deter abuse before it snowballs. The federal government has, in some areas, gotten better at deploying advanced data analytics to flag suspicious prescribing patterns and identify outlier providers. Drug manufacturers, aware of the scrutiny they already face under the FCA and anti-kickback laws, may tread more cautiously than in past scandals. And many clinicians will follow the rules faithfully, prescribing GLP-1s only to patients who meet clear medical criteria and benefit from them. Effective oversight, coupled with ethical medical practice, could make this expansion a boon to public health without becoming a bonanza for bad actors—but history suggests that such vigilance must be constant, not assumed.

The GLP-1 revolution is here. It may improve the lives of millions. But it will also test the integrity of our healthcare system. Now more than ever, Uncle Sam will be looking for courageous insiders to step forward to ensure that the promise to treat disease doesn’t become an opportunity to fleece taxpayers instead.

The opinions expressed in Fortune.com commentary pieces are solely the views of their authors and do not necessarily reflect the opinions and beliefs of Fortune.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

© Getty Images

President Donald Trump’stax and spending law will result in less income for the poorest Americans while sending money to the richest, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office reported Monday.

The CBO estimates that the 10% of poorest Americans will lose roughly $1,200 a year as they experience restrictions on government programs like Medicaid and food assistance, while the richest 10% of Americans will see their income increase by $13,600 from tax cuts. Overall, American households will see more income from the tax cuts in the legislation, including middle income households, but the largest benefit will go to the top 10% of earners.

The CBO’s report comes as lawmakers are away from Washington, many taking their messages about the bill to voters. Republicans muscled the legislation — deemed “the big, beautiful bill” by Trump — through Congress in July. Democrats all vehemently opposed the legislation, warning that its tax cuts and spending priorities would come at the expense of vital government aid programs and a ballooning national debt.

“This really is a big, beautiful bill for billionaires, but for the poor and the working class in this country, you are actually poorer,” said Rep. Brendan Boyle, the top Democrat on the House Budget Committee, in an MSNBC interview on Monday.

Changes to eligibility for government food assistance under the law will impact millions of Americans, the CBO found. Roughly 2.4 million people won’t be eligible for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program under new work requirements for many recipients. Low-income Americans could also see their income reduced through further restrictions on food aid and other types of assistance included in the law.

Already, more than 10 million Americans are expected to lose health insurance by 2034 due to changes to Medicaid under the law.

Following release of the report, Rep. Jason Smith, the Republican chair of the House Ways and Means Committee, said he took issue with CBO’s methodology, repeating criticism he has made in the past.

“CBO has a troubled track record of getting its estimates incorrect and, like Democrats, is biased in favor of more federal spending and higher taxes,” Smith said on social media. “Don’t buy it.”

Republicans have been eager to sell the upsides of the legislation — arguing that the tax cuts will spur economic growth — while they are on a monthlong summer break from Washington. But those who have held townhalls in their home districts have often been greeted by an earful from voters and activists.

“Tax the rich,” the crowd in Lincoln, Neb. chanted last week as Republican Rep. Michael Flood attempted to defend the bill.

Still, Trump has been undeterred.

“President Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill is putting America First like never before, delivering huge savings for hardworking families, boosting our economy, and securing our borders,” said White House deputy press secretary Abigail Jackson in a statement last week.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

© AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein

AOL’s dial-up internet is finally taking its last bow.

Yes, while perhaps a dinosaur by today’s digital standards, dial-up is still around. But AOL says it’s officially pulling the plug for its service on Sept. 30.

“AOL routinely evaluates its products and services and has decided to discontinue Dial-up Internet,” AOL wrote in a brief update on its support site — noting that dial-up and associated software “optimized for older operating systems” will soon be unavailable on AOL plans.

AOL, formerly America Online, introduced many households to the world wide web for the first time when its dial-up service launched decades ago, rising to prominence particularly in the 90s and early 2000s.

The creaky door to the internet was characterized by a once-ubiquitous series of beeps and buzzes heard over the phone used to connect your computer online — along with frustrations of being kicked off the web if anyone else at home needed the landline for another call, and an endless bombardment of CDs mailed out by AOL to advertise free trials.

Eventually, broadband and wireless offerings emerged and rose to dominance, doing away with dial-up’s quirks for most people accessing the internet today.

Still, a handful of consumers have continued to rely on internet services connected over telephone lines. In the U.S., according to Census Bureau data, an estimated 163,401 households were using dial-up alone to get online in 2023, representing just over 0.13% of all homes with internet subscriptions nationwide.

AOL was the largest dial-up internet provider for some time, but not the only one to emerge over the years. Some smaller internet providers continue to offer dial-up today. Regardless, the decline of dial-up has been a long time coming. And AOL shutting down its service arrives as other relics of the internet’s earlier days continue to disappear.

Microsoft retired video calling service Skype just earlier this year, for example — as well as Internet Explorer back in 2022. And in 2017, AOL discontinued its Instant Messenger — a chat platform that was once lauded as the biggest trend in online communication since email when it was founded in 1997, but later struggled to ward off rivals.

AOL itself is far from the dominant internet player it was decades ago — when, beyond dial-up and IMs, the company also became known for its “You’ve got mail” catchphrase that greeted users who checked their inboxes, as famously displayed in the 1998 film starring Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan by the same name.

Before it was America Online, AOL was founded as Quantum Computer Services in 1985. It soon rebranded and hit the public market in 1991. Near the height of the dot-com boom, AOL’s market value reached nearly $164 billion in 2000. But tumultuous years followed, and that valuation plummeted as the once-tech pioneer bounced between multiple owners. After a disastrous merger with Time Warner Inc., Verizon acquired AOL — which later sold AOL, along with Yahoo, to a private equity firm.

At the time Verzion announced that sale to in 2021, an anonymous source familiar with the transaction told CNBC that the number of AOL dial-up users was “in the low thousands,” down from 2.1 million when Verzion first moved to acquire AOL in 2015 — and far below peak demand seen back in the 90s and early 2000s. But beyond dial-up, AOL continues to offer its free email services, as well as subscriptions that advertise identity protection and other tech support.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

© AP Photo/Mark Lennihan, File

Good morning. In times of uncertainty, CFOs prioritize resilience.

That’s what Stephen Philipson, vice chair and head of wealth, corporate, commercial, and institutional banking at U.S. Bank, told me he’s hearing from finance chiefs. “Our CFO clients are cautious, but they’re not standing still.” Overall, CFOs are focused on optimizing liquidity, managing risk, and maintaining optionality in the current environment, he said.

“We’re seeing solid financing demand from companies for both upcoming liquidity needs and long-term growth drivers,” Philipson explained. In addition, there’s a noticeable uptick in working capital finance, which reflects a proactive stance on cash flow management.

Research points to trade policy and tariffs remaining a top concern for CFOs. But Philipson said much of their cautiousness is driven by three main issues: heightened anxiety around the tariffs, a weaker dollar, and rising working capital needs.

U.S.-based importers are facing higher costs due to the weakening dollar and new tariffs, prompting firms to seek more financing and unlock idle cash to meet rising working capital demands, he said.

Meanwhile, foreign exchange (FX) risk management is front and center. For example, he’s seeing more use of collars (an options strategy that protects against large losses) to hedge downside risk while preserving upside potential. “And many firms are shifting to pay foreign vendors in local currencies to meet supplier demands and reduce costs,” Philipson noted.

There’s also an uptick in receivables finance and supply chain finance usage. These tools help firms hold cash longer while enabling suppliers to get paid faster, he said.

“It’s been interesting to observe how middle-market firms are stepping up their risk-management efforts this year,” he said. Middle-market firms are increasingly looking to proactively mitigate risks like interest rates and FX, while large corporations—with robust treasury operations—continue to deploy hedging tools.

When asked about the M&A outlook, Philipson said momentum is building as we move into the second half of the year. “The bank loan and bond markets are offering attractive conditions, with credit spreads near historical tights,” he said. This indicates that investors see little extra risk in corporate debt, keeping borrowing costs low for companies.

“We’re seeing more mid-tier deals—larger than tuck-ins but not fully transformational—as companies grow more comfortable with policy and market dynamics,” Philipson said.

He continued, “We expect M&A activity to continue picking up as companies get increasingly comfortable with ‘certainty around continued uncertainty’—the idea that macro headlines are likely to persist and must be part of the calculus around strategic decisions.”

Sheryl Estrada
[email protected]

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

© Getty Images