Weekly newsletter September 19 to 23
September 19, 2022
September 20, 2022
Home values plunge in some U.S. cities as mortgage rates rise Some of the largest U.S. cities in the West have seen their home values plunge this summer, a trend that economists say favors house hunters. The typical home value dipped 0.3% nationwide from July to August and 0.1% from June to July, Zillow said in a report this week. It is the largest monthly decrease since 2011. Los Angeles, Sacramento, and San Francisco in California experienced some of the sharpest decreases, with each city recording a 3.2% or higher drop. Salt Lake City, Utah, and Seattle, Washington, also saw steep declines of 2.6%.
Photo: CHIP SOMODEVILLA/GETTY
Joe Biden Declares 'the Pandemic Is Over' While Discussing the Nation's Ongoing COVID Struggles President Joe Biden declared the end of the pandemic, after nearly three years since the CDC confirmed the first coronavirus case in the United States. "The pandemic is over," Biden said in an interview with CBS News' Scott Pelley that aired on 60 Minutes Sunday. "We still have a problem with COVID," the president continued. "We're still doing a lot of work on it. But the pandemic is over."
Residential real estate values are falling in those cities because they've "hit an affordability ceiling," Zillow senior economist Nicole Bachaud told CBS MoneyWatch, adding that "demand is pulling way back." The typical U.S. home is now valued at $356,054, according to Zillow. The real estate website also found that Birmingham, Alabama; Cincinnati, Ohio; Indianapolis, Indiana, and Louisville, Kentucky, saw home values rise by less than 1%.
Just last week, the World Health Organization reported a historic low in worldwide deaths, NBC News reported. The U.S. averages 478 COVIDrelated deaths a day — an increase from early July, when COVID deaths were at its lowest rate ever (168 daily deaths the week). "We have never been in a better position to end the pandemic," WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said at a briefing Wednesday, NBC News reported. "We are not there yet, but the end is in sight." "If you notice, no one's wearing masks. Everybody seems to be in pretty good shape. And so, I think it's changing," said Biden. "And I think this is a perfect example of it."
Photo: CBS News Source: https://people.com/politics/president-joe-biden-declares-the-pandemic-is-over/
Source: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/zillow-housing-market-home-prices-value/
September 21, 2022
September 22, 2022
"More people than ever" are surviving cancer in the U.S., study shows, as research and treatment see "unprecedented progress" Cancer has long been one of the leading causes of death in the U.S. But according to new research, the last decade has seen "unprecedented progress" – and now, more people than ever before in the nation are surviving the disease. Cancer is the No. 2 cause of death in the country, killing an estimated 602,350 people in 2020, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. But the annual report from the American Association for Cancer Research found that the U.S. cancer death rate has declined by 32% from 1991 to 2019 – a decrease that the group says saved 3.5 million lives. Photo: US News
Fed Hikes Rates, Sharply Lowers Economic Forecast The announcement means the Fed has a way to go with its tightening before it sees inflation falling significantly. In a widely expected move, the Federal Reserve raised interest rates by three-quarters of a point on Wednesday, as it tries to strangle inflation by tamping down economic demand.
"The U.S. cancer death rate is steadily declining, and more people than ever before are living longer and fuller lives after a cancer diagnosis," the report says. Researchers noted that the number of cancer survivors has increased by more than a million just in the past year, and that from 2016 to 2019, the rate of people surviving cancer has only accelerated. To prevent a step backward, the organization is asking for bipartisan support in prioritizing medical research, as well as increasing budgets for the National Institutes of Health and National Cancer Institute to be increased by $4.1 billion and $853 million, respectively.
The central bank also sharply downgraded its economic forecast, with its median expectation of growth in gross domestic product now at 0.2% for the year, down from 1.7% in June. Unemployment will reach 3.8% this year, up from 3.7% earlier, and 4.4% for each of the next two years. The Fed also raised inflation expectations to 5.4% this year from 5.2% in June, while also lifting its inflation forecast for 2023 to 2.8% from 2.6% and for 2024 to 2.3% from 2.2%. Fed Chairman Jerome Powell spoke after the announcement and while noting a slowdown in economic activity, particularly in housing and business investment, he said the labor remained “out of balance” with demand for workers outstripping supply. Markets sold off on the news, with the Dow Jones Industrial quickly falling more than 200 points. Photo: Darko Stojanovic
Source: https://www.usnews.com/news/economy/articles/2022-09-21/fed-hikes-ratessharply-lowers-economic-forecast
Source: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/cancer-cancer-rate-declining-us-studyunprecedented-progress/
September 23, 2022
Photo: US News
Economic Indicators Continue to Drop, Signaling Possible Recession A forward-looking measure of the U.S. economy fell again in August, with most components in negative territory, the Conference Board said on Thursday. The business organization’s leading economic index fell 0.3% for the month, following a 0.5% drop in July. It has now fallen by 2.7% in the past six months after a 1.7% gain in the prior six months. “The US LEI declined for a sixth consecutive month potentially signaling a recession,” Ataman Ozyildirim, senior director, economics, at the board. “Among the index’s components, only initial unemployment claims and the yield spread contributed positively over the last six months – and the contribution of the yield spread has narrowed recently.” On Thursday, the Labor Department reported that claims for weekly unemployment benefits rose slightly last week but are still in a range that reflects a strong labor market. Other components of the economy, notably the housing market, are buckling under the regime of higher interest rates the Fed has adopted. Also Thursday, mortgage rates hit their highest level since 2008, when the country was in the grips of the Great Recession. “For housing markets, higher borrowing costs are the very remedy the Fed is prescribing in order to cool demand and lower overheated prices,” said George Ratiu, manager of economic research at Realtor.com.
Source: https://www.usnews.com/news/economy/articles/2022-09-22/economic-indicators-continue-to-drop-signaling-possible-recession