As the global pandemic rages on, we’ve been seeing a slew of tech companies consider making remote work an option for their employees even after covid. Now Spotify is on board: On Friday, the company announced the rollout of its Work From Anywhere program, which will give the thousands of Spotify employees around the globe the freedom to work wherever—and however—they’d like.
“We have been discussing the future of work and what it will look like for a couple of years, and have always concluded that globalization and digitalization are drivers for a more flexible workplace,” Spotify said in its announcement. “That is better for both the company and our people.”
The basic gist outlined on Spotify’s HR blog is this: With a manager’s approval, Spotify-ers can mix and match their schedules to work entirely from home, entirely from the office, or some combination of those two.
These employees will also be getting more flexibility when it comes to deciding where they’re working from. If someone who’s really jonesing for some office space happens to pick a locale that isn’t near one of the 48 different Spotify offices across more than a dozen countries, than the company will set them up with a membership for a coworking space somewhere nearby. That said, this isn’t permission to jet off just anywhere in the world—Spotify notes in its announcement that there are “some limitations” on where employees can go, just because of “time zone difficulties, and regional entity laws.”
“The ultimate goal of our new design approach is to ensure that employees have a place where they can focus, collaborate, and create—whether that’s at a desk, in a conference room, or in cafe spaces,” Spotify’s post explains.
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In explaining its rationale behind the new program, the company added that its employees’ effectiveness “can’t be measured by the number of hours people spend in an office,” and that “work isn’t something our people come to the office for, it’s something they do.”
While not every industry is able to offer this kind of flexibility, the tech sector has embraced the WFH lifestyle over the course of the pandemic. Earlier this week, for example, the cloud giant Salesforce announced a similar policy change to Spotify’s, giving its tens of thousands of employees the option to stay fully remote, fully in-office, or a mix of the two. This comes on the heels of other companies like Shopify, Twitter, and Square giving their employees the option to continue working remotely for as long as they’d prefer, even after their offices eventually reopen. There’s even an ongoing crowdsourced Github project tracking the constantly updating list of tech companies giving their employees the chance to work from home permanently. So far we’re at nine, but we wouldn’t be surprised if that list grows longer.
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The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) denied Amazon’s motion to delay a union election at one of its Alabama warehouses slated for Monday.
Last month, the e-commerce giant had filed a motion with the U.S. labor board to delay the vote and give the board more time to reconsider its earlier decision to hold the election by mail during a nearly two-month time span to have a “fair” election, despite the ongoing threat of the coronavirus.
AMAZON PUSHES FOR IN-PERSON UNIONIZING VOTE FOR ‘VALID, FAIR AND SUCCESSFUL ELECTION’
Starting Monday, employees at the Bessemer facility will have until March 29 to mail in their ballots.
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In November, employees at the Bessemer facility filed a petition with the NLRB saying they wanted to hold an election on forming a union to represent the 1,500 full- and part-time workers at the fulfillment center. The plan does not include drivers, seasonal employees, professional employees and others.
The employees are seeking to be represented by the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union.
“The purpose of us coming together with our co-workers to form a union is to have better working conditions, better pay, and to be treated with respect and dignity on the job,” read a website created in support of forming a union at the Alabama facility.
Their push for forming a union received support from Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., who said their efforts would mark a turning point for “every worker in America.”
However, Amazon previously argued that in-person voting is the best way to “approach to a valid, fair and successful election.” The company also said it would make “it easy for associates to verify and cast their vote.”
Amazon spokesperson Owen Torres told FOX Business that the company’s objective was to get as many employees as possible to vote and “we’re disappointed by the decision by the NLRB not to provide the most fair and effective format to achieve maximum employee participation.”
Torres argued that the labor board “recognizes that the employee participation rate for its own elections conducted with mail ballots is 20-30% lower than the participation rate for in-person voting.”
Torres also said that the company had “proposed a safe on-site election process validated by COVID-19 experts that would have empowered our associates to vote on their way to, during and from their already scheduled shifts.”
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Still, the NLRB had deemed that mail-in ballots were the “safest and most appropriate method of conducting an election in view of the extraordinary circumstances presented by the COVID-19 pandemic,” officials wrote in a notice.
Although the company said it respects their decision, Amazon said the warehouse has created thousands of full-time jobs in Bessemer since opening in March. The average pay is $15.30 per hour, including full health care, vision and dental insurance.
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“We respect our employees’ right to join or not join a labor union but we don’t believe this group represents the majority of our employees’ views,” Amazon spokeswoman Heather Knox said earlier this year.
The company will “continue to insist on measures for a fair election that allows for a majority of our employee voices to be heard,” Torres said.
At the same time, these companies are pushing to defend a controversial business model, one in which they treat their workers as independent contractors rather than employees who would be entitled to traditional benefits and protections such as workers’ compensation, unemployment insurance, family leave, sick leave, or the right to unionize.
“Right now we are at a crossroads,” said Shannon Liss-Riordan, a Boston-based labor attorney who has been challenging Uber and Lyft over worker classification through various lawsuits for seven years. “If he rises to the challenge, Marty Walsh can have one of the biggest impacts on labor in this country since Frances Perkins,” she said, referring to Franklin D. Roosevelt’s Labor Secretary, who was the chief architect behind the New Deal.
New industry, familiar issues
While Walsh has yet to delve extensively into the issue of app-based gig worker classification, labor experts and friends who’ve known him professionally throughout his career say they are encouraged by his background advocating for workers in the construction field, which has long dealt with the topic of misclassification.
“In construction, when contractors started reclassifying their workers from employees to independent contractors, it was just a scam to save money,” said Mark Erlich, a fellow at the Harvard Labor and Worklife Program who formerly served as Executive Secretary-Treasurer of the New England Regional Council of Carpenters and who has known Walsh for roughly 20 years. “What’s different now is it’s no longer [viewed as] a ‘scam,’ it’s [positioned by the companies] as beautiful scheme — a new conception of work in which you are your own boss, have flexibility scheduling — it is actually seen as desirable.”
The companies have long defended their business model, which was popularized by Uber during the last recession, claiming that workers have more flexibility when treated as independent contractors than employees. But there’s nothing preventing companies from offering flexibility to employees. Rather, it is a business decision — and one that critics say exploits workers in an effort to keep costs low for the companies.
In statements, a Lyft spokesperson said the company looks forward to working with Walsh and the new administration “to strengthen opportunities for app-based workers.” An Uber spokesperson echoed the sentiment, while stating it “supports efforts to ensure worker independence, while providing drivers and delivery people with new benefits and protections.”
Instacart and DoorDash pointed CNN Business to a spokesperson for the App-Based Work Alliance which is a coalition backed by Uber, Lyft, Instacart, DoorDash and Uber-owned Postmates.
“Our country’s independent workforce has been essential in helping our communities overcome the many challenges we’ve faced throughout this pandemic. We are looking forward to working with the Biden-Harris Administration, including the Secretary of Labor, to address the rapidly evolving needs of the 21st century workforce,” said Whitney Mitchell Brennan, a spokesperson for the App-Based Work Alliance in a statement to CNN Business. “We encourage Mayor Walsh to commit to promoting federal policies that will support the growing on-demand economy.”
Erlich said Walsh has “very strong instincts” about working people and working families. Walsh, the son of Irish immigrants, joined a union when he was 21 and later went on to earn his Bachelor’s degree while working as a legislator. For several years while in that role, he served as head of the Boston Metropolitan District Building Trades Council, an umbrella group of local unions, before becoming Boston’s mayor in 2014, a position he held when tapped by the Biden administration.
As mayor of Boston, Walsh made clear he saw a role for government in regulating gig companies, recently pushing for new fees on Uber and Lyft rides to encourage shared rides and decrease congestion. He’s also been critical of how services like DoorDash and Instacart are at times inaccessible to certain neighborhoods.
Representatives for Walsh and the White House did not respond to requests for comment. Walsh’s nomination as Labor Secretary is pending Senate approval. At his confirmation hearing Thursday, Walsh spoke of pivotal moments in his life — from having cancer as a child, to following in the footsteps of his father’s union job and recovering from addiction — that have informed how he views the work of the Department of Labor.
“Workers’ protection, equal access to good jobs, the right to join a union, continuing education and job training, access to mental health and substance use treatment. These are not just policies to me, I lived them,” Walsh said. “Millions of American families right now need them. I’ve spent my entire career at different levels fighting for them.”
Walsh wasn’t questioned about his stance on gig worker classification, but he did indicate some support for the PRO Act, legislation that was reintroduced by Democrats Thursday and would significantly alter existing labor law and make it easier for workers to unionize. “That is one step towards helping people organize freely. I do believe in the right of organizing. I do believe in the right of people being able to join a union, if they want to join the union. So, I certainly support that,” said Walsh.
The PRO Act would have implications for the gig economy, as it would implement an “ABC” test — which the gig companies fought against in California — for determining if a worker is an employee or contract worker, if passed.
Walsh’s Department of Labor can make a significant impact on worker classification not only by interpreting existing laws and using the office as a bully pulpit, but also through directing and coordinating enforcement action against employers who may not be following laws, according to labor experts.
Joanne Goldstein, who has known Walsh for 15 years through various jobs of hers such as the head of the Massachusetts Attorney General’s Fair Labor Division and as the state’s Secretary of Labor and Workforce Development, said he cares most about workers having access to social and economic safety nets.
“We had a number of situations where he’d approach me in my capacity to see what we could do in the context of the law to help workers have the wages, benefits, safety and training that workers deserve,” Goldstein told CNN Business.
Rethinking the Trump administration’s stance on independent contractors
Given the current economic downturn, the issue of gig worker classification may not be the first priority on Walsh’s list. But as Becki Smith, a director of work structures at the National Employment Law Project, notes, “It is urgent that they be very clear about their interpretation of the law very quickly.”
“The first order of business is going to be to erase Trump policies that very radically reinterpreted who among us gets access to basic legal protections,” Smith said. Much of that can be done administratively without changes in the federal law, Smith added.
The stance under former President Donald Trump’s Department of Labor favored employers, as relayed in a 2019 advisory memo and a rule squeezed in during the final days of the Trump administration. The latter clarified the standard of employment under the Fair Labor Standards Act, which establishes baseline standards like minimum wage and overtime for employees, to make it easier for companies to classify their workers as independent contractors.
Both Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris have signaled some opposition to the gig companies on this issue. They called for “no” votes on Prop 22, and campaigned on a platform that included putting “a stop to employers intentionally misclassifying their employees as independent contractors” and ensuring workers in the gig economy “receive the legal benefits and protections they deserve.”
Still, the coalition backed by Uber, Lyft, DoorDash and Instacart wasted no time in issuing a statement on Inauguration Day to congratulate Biden and Harris while pushing its agenda for “modern policies” that will give workers “access to benefits, while protecting their flexibility to earn independent income on their schedule.”
To really make a mark on the issue, Walsh will have to take on “the entrenched folks out of Silicon Valley,” said Erlich. Among that group are former Obama administration officials who are now in key roles at gig companies such as Lyft’s chief policy officer, Anthony Foxx, and Lyft board member Valerie Jarrett. Uber’s chief legal officer, Tony West, served in the Justice Department for the Clinton and Obama administrations and is Harris’ brother-in-law.
As Liss-Riordan, the Boston-based attorney, put it: “This could be an extremely significant position and there are a lot of people putting very high hopes in Marty that he does what needs to be done.”
Cumulative change in all jobs since before the pandemic
By Ella Koeze·Seasonally adjusted·Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics
The American economy produced little relief last month as the winter pandemic surge continued to stymie a rebound in the labor market. The weak showing comes in the midst of a fresh effort in Washington to provide a big infusion of aid to foster a recovery.
U.S. employers added 49,000 jobs in January, the Labor Department said Friday. The number reflected a disappointing month of hiring even as it provided hope of renewed economic momentum.
The unemployment rate fell to 6.3 percent, from 6.7 percent.
Unemployment rate
By Ella Koeze·Seasonally adjusted·Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics
The limited January gains followed an outright setback in December, when the economy shed jobs for the first time since April. December’s loss, originally stated at 140,000, was revised on Friday to 227,000. The gain for November was revised from 336,000 to 264,000.
There was a small victory in avoiding a second consecutive month of job losses, a prospect that some economists had feared given the one-two punch of rising coronavirus cases and waning federal aid.
“It is a positive sign that we got over those speed bumps and the wheels haven’t completely come off the car,” said Nick Bunker, head of research for the job site Indeed.
But Mr. Bunker said the gains were nothing to celebrate. The economy still has more than nine million fewer jobs than it did before the pandemic, and progress has slowed significantly since the summer.
“It’s not clear that this one month assuages those concerns,” he said. “A hundred thousand here, a hundred thousand there is steady progress, but it’s not the sort of gains we need to see.”
Looking to strengthen the recovery, President Biden and congressional Democrats have been pressing for a $1.9 trillion relief measure. The legislation took a step forward early Friday when the Senate narrowly passed a budget resolution that will next go to the House, where Democrats will not need Republican support to approve it.
Some Republicans have said a smaller package would suffice, and others have said it is too soon for another round of aid.
Nearly a year after the pandemic devastated the job market, many forecasters predict that the economy will strengthen from here on. The $900 billion federal relief package enacted in December is expected to bolster the economy, with more aid potentially on the way. The vaccination push, though slower than hoped, is paving the way for wider reopenings even as coronavirus mutations around the world make the rollout more urgent.
But the winter slowdown could leave lasting wounds. Though the economy has regained more than half of the 22 million jobs lost last spring, millions of people have been unemployed for a long period — potentially making it harder to rejoin the work force — or are no longer classified as unemployed because they have stopped looking for a job.
“It is difficult on a monthly basis to really see what the long-term impacts will be,” said Daniel Zhao, an economist with the career site Glassdoor. “But certainly the long-term economic scarring is something that is a huge concern for the recovery.”
Volunteers distribute donations at a food bank in Pflugerville, Tex., on Wednesday. Emergency aid programs are set to end in March.Credit…Ilana Panich-Linsman for The New York Times
As the pandemic recession drags on, more Americans are falling into long-term unemployment — a growing scourge that could threaten not just individual workers but the economic recovery as a whole.
More than four million people in January had been out of work for more than six months, the standard definition of long-term unemployment. That was up slightly from December and almost four times the number before the pandemic began.
The long-term jobless now account for nearly 40 percent of all unemployed workers, the biggest share since the aftermath of the recession of 2007-9. That doesn’t count people who have given up looking for jobs or who can’t work because of child care or other responsibilities.
The long-term jobless got a lifeline in December when Congress extended emergency programs that offer help to people whose regular benefits have expired. But another cliff is coming: Those programs are set to end in March, when there will almost certainly still be millions of people relying on them to pay rent and buy food.
Long-term unemployment continues to rise
Share of unemployed who have been out of work 27 weeks or longer
By Ella Koeze·Seasonally adjusted·Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics
“People still haven’t recovered from the December cliff, so they are just being kept in this constant cycle of panic,” said Stephanie Freed, a laid-off lighting designer who last year started an advocacy group for the unemployed.
Even with aid, however, the long-term jobless could face challenges that endure after the pandemic ends. Economic research has shown that when people are unemployed for extended periods, they have a harder time finding jobs. That — combined with businesses that have likewise faced a prolonged hibernation — could leave lasting economic damage.
“The longer a recession lasts, the more there can be permanent scarring,” said Beth Ann Bovino, the chief U.S. economist for S&P Global Ratings Services. “For those people who are long-term unemployed, those businesses that need to reopen, it takes time. It’s not like switching on and off the light bulb.”
The share of people working or looking for work remained depressed in January relative to its pre-pandemic level, underlining the labor market’s continued weakness.
The so-called labor force participation rate hovered at 61.4 percent last month, the Labor Department said on Friday, little changed from December and down from 63.3 percent in February 2020, just before the crisis took hold. The measure of work force attachment had slumped as low as 60.2 percent last April, and now it seems to have leveled off after rebounding only partway.
People who have left the labor force altogether have still not been replaced
Share of the working-age population who are in the labor force (employed, unemployed but looking for work or on temporary layoff)
By Ella Koeze·Seasonally adjusted·Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics
That so many people remain outside of the work force suggests there is more weakness in the labor market than implied by the slowly declining headline unemployment rate, which tracks only people who are actively applying for work. Continued shutdowns and health concerns could be keeping would-be job seekers on the sidelines.
“The third wave of the virus may have dissuaded some individuals from applying for jobs,” Spencer Hill at Goldman Sachs wrote in a note previewing the report.
For people in their prime working years, classified as 25 to 54 years old, labor force participation came in at 81.1 percent in January. That figure stood at 82.9 percent last February and fell to 79.8 percent during the worst part of the pandemic.
Economists and policymakers are closely watching measures of labor force attachment to gauge how far the job market is from full recovery. After the 2007-9 recession, participation for workers in their prime unexpectedly rebounded as some who were believed to have permanently dropped out of the job market began to look for jobs or take open positions.
“Clearly, we have a ways to go before we get back to the vibrant economy we had on the eve of the pandemic, when the unemployment rate stood at 3.5 percent and there were nearly 10 million more people on payrolls,” Charles Evans, the president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, said in a speech this week.
As of
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Source: Factset
U.S. markets
Stocks on Wall Street climbed for a fifth consecutive day on Friday, extending a rally that has brought the S&P 500 back up to record highs.
The gains continued even after government data showed that U.S. employers added just 49,000 jobs in January, a weak recovery from an outright setback in December. But the rally also reflected expectations for a new stimulus plan, which continues to advance in Congress.
The S&P 500 rose about half a percent, adding to a rally of more than 4 percent already this week. It has more than recovered from last week when a frenzy by retail traders in “meme stocks” unnerved markets, and this weeks showing is the market’s best since early November.
Oil prices have risen nearly 9 percent this week, the biggest jump since October. West Texas Intermediate futures were at $56.72 a barrel, while Brent crude, the European benchmark, approached $60 a barrel.
Robinhood, AMC and other meme stocks
GameStop was volatile, falling about 4 percent in early trading before snapping higher just minutes later. The shares have slid 84 percent this week. AMC Entertainment fell about 7 percent on Friday, also adding to a sharp decline.
Robinhood, the online trading app that enraged users when it restricted buying some of the most popular stocks, announced “there are currently no temporary limits” on buying shares.
Janet Yellen, the Treasury secretary, met with market regulators on Thursday to discuss the volatility; afterward, the Treasury Department issued a statement that said the markets’ “core infrastructure was resilient” and that the Securities and Exchange Commission should publish a study of what happened.
Europe
Most European stock indexes were higher on Friday, with Italy’s still leading the way, as investors expressed confidence in Mario Draghi, the former head of the European Central Bank, forming a new Italian government. The FTSE MIB in Italy has gained close to 7 percent this week, compared with a 3.3 percent gain in the Stoxx Europe 600 index.
Yields on 10-year British government bonds rose 5 basis points, or 0.05 percentage point, to 0.49 percent, the highest since March. Bond prices fell and the yields rose after the Bank of England said on Thursday that it wanted banks to be prepared for negative rates but it had no intention of introducing them imminently. The central bank said it expected the vaccine rollout to prompt a swift economic recovery later this year. The optimism has helped lift bond yields across Europe and the United States.
Asia
Among the winners in the meme-stock frenzy is the Koss family of Milwaukee. The Nasdaq-listed headphone maker that bears their name was swept up in the recent market frenzy, pushing the company’s share price up by nearly 2,000 percent in a matter of days. Koss, like other so-called meme stocks, was singled out by traders because it had attracted a lot of interest from short-sellers, which the buyers hoped to squeeze by bidding up the company’s shares.
Koss insiders sold some $44 million in stock this week, an amount worth more than the company’s entire market cap before crowds of retail traders sent its shares soaring. Michael J. Koss, the chief executive and son of the firm’s founder, sold shares worth more than $13 million, according to a regulatory disclosure. He was joined by other family members, executives and directors in paring their holdings.
The company, founded in 1958, was a pioneer in personal headsets, inventing the first stereo headphone. The company reported around $18 million in revenue in its latest fiscal year, with about a fifth of its sales going to Walmart. It employs just over 30 people directly, in addition to contracting with manufacturers in Asia.
Although executives at other companies at the center of the frenzy, namely GameStop and AMC, haven’t sold shares during the rally, there is nothing untoward legally about the move, provided that the insiders did not have access to private information about the rally. The Reddit-fueled surge in demand was largely conducted in the open, by investors cheering each other on via a public message board.
“As the stock goes up in price, whether it makes sense or not, the people on the end of the short sale suffer,” Craig Marcus, a partner at the law firm Ropes & Gray, told the DealBook newsletter. “People who hold the stock and have the opportunity to sell it and benefit from it, benefit from it.”
Kirin, one of Japan’s biggest breweries, announced on Friday that it would halt a joint venture in Myanmar after the coup earlier this week.
Beginning in 2015, the company set up two brewing companies in Myanmar, hoping to “contribute positively to the people and the economy of the country as it entered an important period of democratization,” Kirin said in a statement on Friday.
But in light of the coup, Kirin decided to exit its joint venture with Myanma Economic Holdings Public Company Limited, it said in the statement, citing the company’s connections to Myanmar’s military. It did not specify a time frame but said it was taking steps “as a matter of urgency.”
Kirin had been under pressure to cut ties with its partner in Myanmar after the release late last year of an Amnesty International report that said the Japanese brewer’s Burmese partner had directed payments to military units implicated in systematic violence against the Rohingya ethnic minority. The report’s allegations could not be independently verified.
In a statement, Amnesty International said Kirin’s decision showed it was “taking its human rights responsibilities in Myanmar seriously.”
Over 400 Japanese companies currently operate in Myanmar, according to data collected by Japan’s external trade agency.
A Kauishou billboard outside the company’s headquarters in Beijing. Its app has similar features to Periscope, Snapchat and Instagram.Credit…Wu Hong/EPA, via Shutterstock
Kuaishou, a short-video app, has captured the eyeballs of people across China. It has also caught the attention of stock pickers in Hong Kong, who nearly tripled the value of its shares in its public debut on Friday.
The app, which offers similar features to Periscope, Snapchat and Instagram, raised $5.4 billion and became the largest initial public offering by a Chinese internet company in Hong Kong. (Alibaba and other Chinese giants that are listed in Hong Kong brought in bigger hauls, but they debuted in New York before issuing secondary listings in Hong Kong.)
The company is now worth $160 billion, a valuation that surpasses that of Wells Fargo. More than 1.4 million individual retail investors in Hong Kong put in orders for Kuaishou shares ahead of its listing, according to a person with knowledge of the offering’s details, demonstrating the appetite for Chinese internet companies.
The video app has a large following outside of China’s high-rise metropolises. It is known for videos that focus on slice-of-life vignettes, often in rural areas. In a country that spends much of its waking hours online, Kuaishou has turned ordinary people like train conductors and welders into celebrities. It has also, at times, caught the attention of China’s censors.
Kuaishou’s fund-raising success is a vote of confidence for Hong Kong’s reputation as a top finance capital. Hong Kong is a part of China that operates under separate laws, but the city faces political uncertainty after a crackdown on a pro-democracy movement and the imposition of a national security law by Beijing.
The city has long served as a bridge between the world and mainland China, and for years has served as a home for multinational companies that relied on its legal protections and free flow of information, features that are not available on the mainland.
Beijing’s increasingly heavy hand in the city’s affairs has undermined some of these assumptions. The decision by Chinese regulators to pull the plug on the initial public offering of Ant Group just days ahead of its planned debut in November added to concerns about the risks of interference by Beijing.
Peloton said it would invest heavily to limit the delays in getting the equipment to customers that have plagued the company.Credit…Dolly Faibyshev for The New York Times
Peloton, the home fitness company, reported a jump in quarterly sales and profits on Thursday. But its stock price fell more than 8 percent in after-hours trading, as supply-chain issues continue to weigh on the company and as investors consider whether demand for its bikes and treadmills may fall as gyms reopen.
Peloton’s value has soared nearly sixfold to $46 billion over the past year as pandemic lockdowns made its internet-connected fitness equipment a hot commodity. But the company has struggled to get the bikes to customers because of supply-chain challenges and delivery delays.
Peloton reported $1.1 billion in revenue for the three months that ended in December, a 128 percent increase from a year earlier. It reported a net income of $64 million, compared with a net loss of $55 million a year earlier. Peloton now counts 4.4 million members, it said, including 1.67 million who own its fitness devices and subscribe to its streaming classes.
In a letter to shareholders, Peloton said port closures on the West Coast and other “Covid-related factors” continued to delay deliveries. In December, the company acquired Precor, a fitness company with factories in the United States. It has also begun production in a new factory in Taiwan.
Peloton also said it would invest $100 million to expedite deliveries and would ship equipment by air rather than sea, incurring costs that are 10 times higher than normal.
“These unprecedented measures are for these unprecedented times,” John Foley, Peloton’s chief executive, wrote in a letter to customers.
Credit…Jeenah Moon for The New York Times
And now for something completely unexpected: The New York Post recorded a profit for the first time in decades.
The colorful, pun-happy tabloid made money in the most recent quarter, its parent company, News Corp, said Thursday as part of its earnings report.
The Post, which was remade by Rupert Murdoch into the sensationalist, Fleet Street form he preferred, was famous within media circles for being a money-losing enterprise. But it afforded Mr. Murdoch a significant voice in American media. Its aggressive coverage of boldfaced names and intense focus on Wall Street made it a must-read among the powerful. And its financial losses, which at one point reached more than $40 million annually, were considered well worth the cost.
But the irony in The Post’s new profit milestone is that it comes at a time when the paper has arguably lost much of its sensationalist charm and no longer enjoys its reputation as a potent tabloid teaser.
Losses at Mr. Murdoch’s papers in Australia and Britain have forced News Corp to tighten belts at every division in the last few years. The Post also underwent deep cost cuts, laying off more than 20 staff members last year and announcing a leadership change in January. In October, some of the paper’s reporters revolted when they were asked to put their names to a dubious report tying Joseph R. Biden Jr. to his son Hunter’s lobbying activities abroad.
News Corp didn’t say exactly how much profit the paper made, but Robert Thomson, the chief executive, touted the moment and added, “Our task now is to ensure its long-term profitability.”
Mr. Murdoch’s other U.S. paper, The Wall Street Journal, continued to see strong financial results. The broadsheet had 3.22 million print and digital subscribers as of the end of December, a 19 percent jump over the previous year. Of that number, about 2.46 million were for digital-only customers, a 28 percent increase over the previous year, amounting to a gain of about 106,000 new digital customers for the period.
Dow Jones, which includes The Journal, the sister publication Barron’s, and Risk and Compliance, an expensive subscription product targeted primarily to banks and other big businesses, saw a 4 percent increase in revenue, to $446 million. Profit before taxes rose 43 percent to $109 million, a portion of which was driven by Risk and Compliance.
As at other papers, advertising revenue at Dow Jones, which includes The Journal, continued to fall, with a 29 percent decrease in print ads, but digital advertising rebounded, growing 29 percent over the previous year. Advertising decreased overall by 4 percent, the company said.
News Corp reported a 3 percent decline in its overall revenue, to $2.41 billion, and a pretax profit of $497 million for the three months ending in December, the company’s second fiscal quarter.
But the company’s biggest bright spot was at the book publisher HarperCollins, where revenue jumped 23 percent, to $544 million, as the division saw higher sales in every book category. News Corp recently lost its bid to Penguin Random House to buy the rival publisher Simon & Schuster.
Here’s Power-Up Baseball running in a forthcoming version of the MAME arcade emulator. Gif: Midway / Incredible Technologies / Video Game History Foundation
Midway’s NBA Jam and NFL Blitz are two of the greatest sports game franchises thanks to how they both provide fun, over-the-top experiences that require little knowledge of the pastime in question. The company would eventually set its sights on hockey, boxing, and even professional wrestling, but it never quite got around to releasing a baseball game in the same vein. Or did it?
Thanks to the Video Game History Foundation, we now have a first-hand look at (and ROM downloads for) Power-Up Baseball, which was in development by Midway and Incredible Technologies in the mid-1990s. After discovering a prototype for the game among the belongings of late developer Chris Oberth (whose work the organization is helping his family preserve), VGHF co-director Frank Cifaldi spoke to several former Midway and Incredible Technologies employees about what happened to Power-Up Baseball.
“[Power-Up Baseball] was supposed to be over-the-top and extreme and all those good things from the ‘90s,” art director Alan Noon told Cifaldi. “So, the initial art style that I went with was what was pretty trendy at the time with like, shattered fonts and lots of paint splashes and things like that. That kind of look and feel ran pretty much throughout the game.”
The main goal behind Power-Up Baseball was to give America’s favorite pastime its own NBA Jam, combining the digitized graphics and sense of humor that made Midway’s basketball game such a hit with Incredible Technologies’ trackball expertise. But while the special pitches and swings would have definitely set it apart from the rest of the crowd, baseball’s pace didn’t gel with the fast-paced arcade action the two studios envisioned for Power-Up Baseball as well as basketball had in NBA Jam.
“It was too long,” programmer Brian Smolik explained. “We shortened it down to maybe three innings or something like that. And at some point you could buy one inning at a time. And who’s gonna play one inning, right? It was great if you could be there for a whole game. But that was like the length of two or three [NBA Jam games], and that’s tough for anybody to sit through.”
Power-Up Baseball was tested locally in Chicago, with several cabinets being built and sent to various arcades, but there just wasn’t a market for it. The passion for the project was there, but the developers had overlooked one important factor: how well it would make money for operators. Sadly, Power-Up Baseball was canceled, and only now is it finally seeing the light of day thanks to the diligent work of video game historians.
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Be sure to check out the Video Game History Foundation’s full write-up on Power-Up Baseball for more details on how this recently unearthed project was created, not to mention all the requisite files to check it out for yourself. VGHF is offering full source code and ROM downloads for Power-Up Baseball, and even helped add support for the game to a forthcoming version of arcade emulator MAME. What a helpful bunch!
TOM: PANDEMIC UNEMPLOYMENT ASSISTANCE TYPICALLY GOES TO PEOPLE WHO ARE NOT USUALLY ELIGIBLE FOR UNEMPLOYMENT BENEFITS. THESE PEOPLE ARE USUALLY GIG WORKERS, FREELANCERS, OR SELF-EMPLOYED. PENNSYLVANIA SAYS PAYMENTS ARE NOW GOING OUT ONCE AGAIN FOLLOWING THE CARES ACT FUNDING EXTENSION. TO BEGIN FILING FOR THEY ADDITIONAL WEEKS, HAD TO YOUR ONLINE UNEMPLOYMENT DASHBOARD AND CLAIM THE ADDITIONAL WEEKS. YOU WILL BE ABLE TO FILE FOR JANUARY 2, JANUARY 9, JANUARY 16, AND JANUARY 23. YOU MUST FILE BY JANUARY 29. IF YOU MISS THE DEADLINE, YOU WILL NEED TO EMAIL UCPUA@PA.GOV. THE STATE SAYS IF YOU HAVE NOT FILED CLAIMS BEFORE AND ARE PLANNING TO DO SO FOR THE FIRST TIME IN 2021, YOU CANNOT FILE YET AND THE STATE WILL NOTIFY YOU WHEN YOU CAN. PENNSYLVANIA SAYS IT IS IN THE FINAL STAGES OF GETTING READY TO SEND OUT PAYMENTS FOR PANDEMIC EMERGENCY UNEMPLOYMENT COMPENSATION AS WELL. THE LABOR AND INDUSTRY DEPARTMENT SAYS YOU DO NOT NEED TO DO ANYTHING SPECIAL TO GET THE EXTRA $300 APPLIED TO UNEMPLOYMENT PAYMENTS AND THAT THE EXTRA MONEY IS GOING TO BE
Pennsylvania Department of Labor and Industry to resume unemployment payments for PUA program
Pandemic Unemployment Assistance program part of latest stimulus package
Updated: 7:39 PM EST Jan 24, 2021
The Pennsylvania Department of Labor and Industry says unemployment benefits will resume for residents making claims under the Pandemic Unemployment Assistance program.The PUA payments, which are part of the latest federal stimulus package, had been delayed for weeks as L&I worked to update their computer system to meet new federal requirements. It’s estimated that about 400,000 Pennsylvanians are relying on the PUA benefits. The Department of Labor and Industry released the following statement Friday, Jan. 22:”Today, Pennsylvania Department of Labor & Industry (L&I) Acting Secretary Jennifer Berrier announced that payments for the Pandemic Unemployment Assistance (PUA) program in the new federal CARES Act extension are resuming. “’Since the federal legislation for the new CARES Act extension was unveiled, L&I’s dedicated team has been working tirelessly to update our processing systems,’” said Berrier. “’We know that more than 400,000 Pennsylvanians and their families are relying on these PUA benefits to get through this terrible pandemic and have worked as quickly as possible to complete the implementation and resume payments.’” “Pandemic Unemployment Assistance (PUA) Program Extension “PUA assists workers who lost their jobs due to COVID-19 and are not typically eligible for other unemployment compensation programs. This includes gig workers, freelancers, and self-employed workers. “Important PUA program extension information for claimants follows. You can begin filing for the additional 11 claim weeks today, January 22. Follow the same process as before to log onto your dashboard and claim the additional weeks, which will be added to your account.You must file by January 29. If you miss this deadline, you will need to email ucpua@pa.gov to request backdating.You will be able to file for the weeks of January 2; 9; 16; and 23.If you no longer had claim weeks or did not file for the week ending December 26, 2020, for any reason, you MUST REOPEN your claim before you can proceed. To do this, log onto your dashboard and click on the link to reopen a claim.If you tried to open a new claim while the PUA program was inactive, you will have error codes that the UC staff must fix before you can proceed. Please be patient while we work quickly to resolve your issue. If you are a new, first-time PUA claimant opening a claim in 2021, you cannot yet file. We are still adding 2020 as a base wage year in the system and will notify you when you are able to file for benefits. You will automatically receive the extra $300 weekly Federal Pandemic Unemployment Compensation (FPUC) – you do not need to take any action to get this boost. “Claimants who have questions about their enrollment in PUA should email ucpua@pa.gov. “The original CARES Act programs, including Pandemic Emergency Unemployment Compensation (PEUC), expired the end of December 2020. L&I is in the final stages of the PEUC implementation and will be providing an update to those claimants very soon.”Department of Labor links for claimants Important Updates and News about the PUA Program Federal CARES Act Important L&I Updates Related to COVID-19 Report Unemployment Fraud and Identity Theft 2020 Tax Forms for Claimants
HARRISBURG, Pa. —
The Pennsylvania Department of Labor and Industry says unemployment benefits will resume for residents making claims under the Pandemic Unemployment Assistance program.
The PUA payments, which are part of the latest federal stimulus package, had been delayed for weeks as L&I worked to update their computer system to meet new federal requirements. It’s estimated that about 400,000 Pennsylvanians are relying on the PUA benefits.
The Department of Labor and Industry released the following statement Friday, Jan. 22:
“Today, Pennsylvania Department of Labor & Industry (L&I) Acting Secretary Jennifer Berrier announced that payments for the Pandemic Unemployment Assistance (PUA) program in the new federal CARES Act extension are resuming.
“’Since the federal legislation for the new CARES Act extension was unveiled, L&I’s dedicated team has been working tirelessly to update our processing systems,’” said Berrier. “’We know that more than 400,000 Pennsylvanians and their families are relying on these PUA benefits to get through this terrible pandemic and have worked as quickly as possible to complete the implementation and resume payments.’”
“Pandemic Unemployment Assistance (PUA) Program Extension
“PUA assists workers who lost their jobs due to COVID-19 and are not typically eligible for other unemployment compensation programs. This includes gig workers, freelancers, and self-employed workers.
“Important PUA program extension information for claimants follows.
You can begin filing for the additional 11 claim weeks today, January 22.
Follow the same process as before to log onto your dashboard and claim the additional weeks, which will be added to your account.
You must file by January 29. If you miss this deadline, you will need to email ucpua@pa.gov to request backdating.
You will be able to file for the weeks of January 2; 9; 16; and 23.
If you no longer had claim weeks or did not file for the week ending December 26, 2020, for any reason, you MUST REOPEN your claim before you can proceed. To do this, log onto your dashboard and click on the link to reopen a claim.
If you tried to open a new claim while the PUA program was inactive, you will have error codes that the UC staff must fix before you can proceed. Please be patient while we work quickly to resolve your issue.
If you are a new, first-time PUA claimant opening a claim in 2021, you cannot yet file. We are still adding 2020 as a base wage year in the system and will notify you when you are able to file for benefits.
You will automatically receive the extra $300 weekly Federal Pandemic Unemployment Compensation (FPUC) – you do not need to take any action to get this boost.
“Claimants who have questions about their enrollment in PUA should email ucpua@pa.gov.
“The original CARES Act programs, including Pandemic Emergency Unemployment Compensation (PEUC), expired the end of December 2020. L&I is in the final stages of the PEUC implementation and will be providing an update to those claimants very soon.”
