Staffing shortages at the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) are creating significant concerns about the quality of the market-moving inflation data, according to economists who spoke to the Wall Street Journal.

BLS is stretched thin: On President Trump’s first day back in office this year, he implemented a hiring freeze for federal employees, leaving the BLS shorthanded. A former BLS commissioner told the Associated Press that the agency has shed ~15% of its personnel this year, and is unable to collect consumer data in some locations like Lincoln, NE, and Buffalo, NY, as a result.

How they do it: Hundreds of enumerators go to brick-and-mortar stores across the US and document the prices of products. That information is then converted into the closely watched consumer price index (CPI). With fewer enumerators to go around, a method of (less) educated guessing called “different-cell imputation” was used twice as much in April as any month during the past five years, calling into question the long-term veracity of the data.

The value of the numbers

The inflation data is used for more than just punchlines about the cost of eggs—it’s integral to most Americans’ everyday lives.

• It guides the Federal Reserve’s decisions on interest rates, which have been a point of ongoing tension between Trump and Fed Chair Jerome Powell.
• It determines federal income tax brackets, cost-of-living adjustments for Social Security payouts, and sometimes wage agreements in the private sector.

Big picture: The BLS will issue its May jobs report this morning. Economists believe current numbers are still reliable, but are concerned about a “gradual erosion” in the trustworthiness of federal data due to the ongoing hiring freeze and the White House’s proposed budget cuts at statistical agencies, per the New York Times.—DL

Trump and Xi had a “very good phone call.” President Trump said he spoke to Chinese President Xi Jinping—the first time since Trump’s inauguration in January—for about 90 minutes yesterday, and agreed to meet in the near future for trade talks. According to Trump, the two addressed the issue of rare earth metals, which China stopped exporting in April in response to Trump’s tariffs, though Beijing’s readout of the phone call did not mention rare earths. Trump said the call focused on trade and did not delve into matters concerning Iran, Ukraine, or Russia. A day before the call, Trump posted on social media that he liked Xi but that the Chinese leader was “EXTREMELY HARD TO MAKE A DEAL WITH!!!”

Procter & Gamble is cutting 15% of its nonmanufacturing workforce. The company that makes half the products at your local CVS or Walgreens announced it’s eliminating 7,000 roles as part of a restructuring. P&G said the cuts aren’t a cost-cutting measure, though earlier this year the company admitted it was considering cutting costs after it reported a decline in sales and lowered its annual outlook due to consumer uncertainty. As part of the restructuring, P&G reportedly plans to exit some product categories.

Nintendo Switch 2 consoles are selling like hot cakes. If you’re reading this, that means you’re not playing your new Switch 2, which would put you in the minority in many friend groups. The highly anticipated handheld console officially launched yesterday, selling out instantly at Walmart and other stores for consumers who weren’t lucky enough to snag a preorder. Nintendo said it expects to sell 15 million devices by March 2026, though analysts believe the Japanese video game giant is undershooting estimates. It has sold more than 152 million units of the original Switch, which was released in 2017.—AE

In a unanimous decision, the Supreme Court ruled yesterday that a straight woman can bring a lawsuit against her employer for so-called reverse discrimination, opening the floodgates for similar lawsuits from people claiming bias because of traits like being white, male, or straight.

Some background: An Ohio woman named Marlean Ames, alleged her employer denied her a promotion and demoted her because she was straight. She claimed that both the promotion she applied for and the role she was booted from were given to underqualified gay people.

• The ruling resolves a split among federal appeals courts over whether or not members of majority groups needed to provide extra evidence of “background circumstances” to prove discrimination.
• The high court ruled that presenting extra evidence is an unfair barrier, so Ames can now pursue her discrimination lawsuit.

Big picture: The decision will make it easier for anti-DEI activists (who championed this case) to bring more reverse discrimination lawsuits to challenge corporate diversity initiatives, according to legal experts. Many such programs are already under fire in the current political climate, and Justice Clarence Thomas called them out in a 14-page concurring opinion, saying that some of the biggest companies have “overtly discriminated against those they deem members of so-called majority groups.”—MM

In a move that could take delivery workers’ jobs and confuse your dogs, Amazon is developing AI-powered humanoid robots that would “spring out” of its vans and deliver packages, The Information reported yesterday.

Welcome to the so-called “humanoid park.” According to the report (which Amazon hasn’t yet commented on):

• The tech giant is almost done building a café-sized, indoor obstacle course at one of its San Francisco offices, where it’ll train delivery bots before taking them on real-world “field trips.”
• Amazon wants its electric delivery vans to shuttle the humanoids around, so one of its 20,000+ Rivians is also in the “humanoid park” to help with testing.

Body reveal TBD: Amazon is building the software for its mechanical mail-carriers itself and plans to outsource a “variety” of other companies’ humanoids, including a popular $16,000 model from China-based Unitree, for tests this summer, per The Information. Amazon already uses bipedal bots in its warehouses, including one from Agility Robotics (pictured above) that was originally pitched for delivery work.

Zoom out: Amazon has also been developing self-driving cars since acquiring Zoox in 2020. It could be angling to ultimately automate the entire delivery process, from warehouse to doorstep, potentially threatening the jobs of hundreds of thousands of Amazon workers worldwide.—ML

Numbers out of Japan haven’t been this low since Masahiro Tanaka posted a 1.27 ERA for the Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles in 2013. The country’s birth rate is falling even faster than expected, hitting a new low last year, the Associated Press reported.

Per Japan’s health ministry, 686,061 babies were born in 2024, down by 5.7% from the prior year:

• That’s the first time the number of new births dropped below 700,000 in a year since records began in 1899, per the AP.
• It was the 16th straight year of decline.
• Japan’s fertility rate (the average number of babies a woman has in her lifetime) also fell last year to 1.15.

The shrinking (and aging) population is creating an economic crisis that Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba has called a “silent emergency.” Japan has tried to encourage more babymaking, but experts believe high costs of living and poor job prospects have dissuaded young professionals from becoming parents.

If the trend continues, Japan’s population of 124 million is expected to sink to 87 million by 2070.—AE

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