News of the Day

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is cracking down on so-called paycheck advance programs, which have grown popular with workers in recent years.

Such programs, also known as earned wage access, allow workers to tap their paychecks before payday, often for a fee, according to the CFPB.

The CFPB proposed an interpretive rule on Thursday saying the programs — both those offered via employers and directly to users via fintech apps — are “consumer loans” subject to the Truth in Lending Act.

More than 7 million workers accessed about $22 billion in wages before payday in 2022, according to a CFPB analysis of employer-sponsored programs also published Thursday. The number of transactions jumped more than 90% from 2021 to 2022, the agency said.

If finalized as written, the rule would require companies offering paycheck advances to make additional disclosures to users, helping borrowers make more informed decisions, the CFPB said.

Perhaps most important, costs or fees incurred by consumers to access their paychecks early would need to be expressed as an annual percentage rate, or APR, akin to credit card interest rates, according to legal experts.

The typical earned-wage-access user pays fees that amount to a 109.5% APR, despite the service often being marketed as a “free or low-cost solution,” according to the CFPB.

Retail sales were unchanged in June from May, after being revised upward to a 0.3% increase in May, according to the Commerce Department report Tuesday. Last month, April sales were revised downward — a 0.2% decline, from unchanged. Sales rose 0.6% in March and 0.9% in February. That comes after sales fell 1.1% in January, dragged down in part by inclement weather.

Sales at gas stations and auto dealerships weighed down the figure. Excluding gas prices and auto sales, retail sales rose 0.8%. Sales at gas stations were down 0.3%, while business at auto stores fell 0.2%, as dealerships were disrupted by a multiday outage after cyberattacks on a software supplier.

The snapshot offers only a partial look at consumer spending and doesn’t include many services, including travel and hotel lodges. But the lone services category – restaurants – registered an uptick of 0.3%.

Elsewhere, plenty of areas were strong. Online sales rose 1.9%, while clothing and accessories store sales rose 0.6%. Department stores posted a 0.6% increase. Stores selling building materials and garden supplies rose 1.4%.

The return of Obama-era net neutrality rules is temporarily halted through the beginning of next month, according to a court of appeals order released Friday.  The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit put a temporary stay until August 5 on the rules the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) voted to restore in April.

The temporary halt put in place comes after multiple broadband providers filed a motion in favor of a stay on the FCC’s restored rules.

Net neutrality rules aim to bar broadband providers from blocking or throttling internet traffic to some websites and speed up access to others that pay extra fees.

The rules were put in place under former President Obama in 2015, but the Trump administration repealed them in 2017.

Supporters of net neutrality, like Democratic FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel, say the rules help to ensure a fair and open internet. But critics such as Republican FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr argue the rules expand government control over the internet to solve a problem that has not been as pervasive as supporters of the rules warned.

The Labor Department said Friday that its producer price index — which tracks inflation before it reaches consumers — rose 0.2% from May to June after being unchanged the month before. Excluding food and energy prices, which tend to bounce around from month to month, so-called core wholesale prices increased 0.4% from May and 3% from June 2023.

The June increase was attributed to a sharp rise in final demand services, specifically trade services margins, which soared 1.9% from May and offset lower energy prices and still-falling goods production prices. It’s the largest monthly increase for trade services since March 2022.

“The increase was broad-based among wholesalers and retailers of fuel, autos and other goods, but almost certainly is not the start of a resurgence in margins,” Ian Shepherdson, chairman and chief economist for Pantheon Macroeconomics, wrote in a note to clients on Friday. “The data are volatile and often revised a lot. Margins will come under increasing pressure as growth in consumers’ spending continues to slow.”

All five of Wisconsin’s major electric utilities are on pace to hit their carbon reduction goals by the end of the decade, according to a new draft report from the state’s utility regulator.

Every two years, the Public Service Commission of Wisconsin prepares the Strategic Energy Assessment, a report compiling information on electricity demand, the state’s energy mix, affordability and environmental impact. The new draft report is based on data utilities provided to state regulators in fall 2023 as well as historical data.

For Wisconsin Public Service, We Energies, Xcel Energy and Madison Gas and Electric, hitting their goals means reducing carbon dioxide emissions by 80 percent from 2005 levels by 2030. Alliant Energy, meanwhile, has a goal of a 50 percent reduction in emissions by 2030.

All five major utilities hope to achieve a 100 percent reduction in emissions from 2005 levels by 2050.

Coal continues to make up the largest share of Wisconsin’s energy generation, but it’s decreased significantly in recent years, according to the PSC draft report. Coal went from about 54 percent of the state’s energy generation in 2015 to 27 percent in 2022, the draft report said.

Natural gas, wind and solar have all grown in the same time frame. Natural gas went from 19 percent of the state’s energy generation to 26 percent, wind increased from 6 percent to 19 percent and solar increased from less than 0.1 percent to 3 percent.

By the end of the decade, the PSC’s draft report estimates 13 percent of the state’s energy generation will come from coal, 28 percent from natural gas, 24 percent from wind and 14 percent from solar.

The Labor Department on Thursday said that the consumer price index (CPI), a broad measure of how much everyday goods like gasoline, groceries and rent cost, dropped 0.1% in June from the previous month. It marked the first monthly decline since May 2020. Prices remain up 3% from the same time last year.

Another data point that measures underlying inflationary pressures within the economy also moderated last month. So-called core prices, which exclude the more volatile measurements of gasoline and food in order to better assess price growth trends, increased 0.1% in June. From the same time last year, the gauge climbed 3.3% — the lowest reading since April 2021.

The softer-than-expected report comes as Federal Reserve policymakers look for evidence that high inflation has been successfully tamed as they contemplate when to start cutting interest rates. Fed Chair Jerome Powell said during congressional testimony this week that more “good” inflation data would bolster the case for rate cuts this year.

“Incoming data for the first quarter of this year did not support such greater confidence. The most recent inflation readings, however, have shown some modest further progress, and more good data would strengthen our confidence that inflation is moving sustainably toward 2 percent,” he said.

Starting July 14, a First-Class Forever stamp is set to go from 68 cents to 73 cents. Because Forever stamps hold their value forever (as their name suggests), you can buy as many as you want at the current price, before they each get 5 cents more expensive. Any you already have at home will also still be valid after the price hike.

The USPS has been increasing rates of many of its mailing services repeatedly over the past few years. Just recently, in January 2024, the price of a Forever stamp went up by 2 cents.

The increases have all been incremental and small, but when totaled together they have driven up the price of a Forever stamp 33% since the start of 2021.

Other postage price changes set to take effect this week include:

More than 150 Republican lawmakers are calling on the Biden administration to rescind a rule that’s expected to make more of the nation’s truck fleet electric.

In a letter to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the House and Senate Republicans wrote that the rule will “disrupt the heavy-duty truck industry by forcing the broad adoption of heavy-duty zero emission vehicles on an extremely aggressive timeline.”

The rule in question, issued by the EPA in April, would be expected to make new sales of the nation’s heaviest trucks more than 20 percent electric around 2040.

The truck rules do not explicitly mandate a shift toward electric vehicles (EVs). Instead, they set average pollution limits for truckmakers, which are expected to push them toward electric and other lower-emitting technologies such as hybrids.

It’s not totally clear how they will comply. However, one scenario modeled by the EPA projects that in the year 2032, new sales of lighter heavy-duty trucks could be 60 percent electric, medium heavy-duty trucks could be 40 percent electric and heavy heavy-duty trucks could be 30 percent electric.

The Wisconsin Legislature’s Republican-controlled budget committee can’t legally block conservation projects initiated by Democratic Governor Tony Evers’ administration, the state Supreme Court ruled July 5.

The court ruled 6-1 that provisions that require the Joint Finance Committee to unilaterally block projects and land acquisitions funded with money from the Knowles-Nelson Stewardship Program violate the separation of powers between the legislative and executive branches.

The Legislature gave the executive branch the power to distribute stewardship money when it established the program, Justice Rebecca Bradley wrote in the majority opinion. Once that power was conferred, lawmakers lacked authority to reject decisions on how to spend the money short of rewriting spending laws, she wrote.

The Legislature created the stewardship program in 1989. The state Department of Natural Resources uses money from the program to fund grants to local governments and nongovernmental organizations for environmental projects. The gubernatorial cabinet agency also uses money from the program to acquire land for conservation and public use. The Legislature has currently authorized the agency to spend up to $33.2 million in each fiscal year through 2025-26 for land acquisition, according to court documents.

Republicans have long criticized the program, saying it prevents land from being developed and takes parcels off local tax rolls. The finance committee in April 2023 blocked the DNR’s plan to spend $15.5 million from the program to acquire a conservation easement on 56,000 acres of forest, which would have been the largest land conservation effort in Wisconsin history. Evers ended up going around the committee in January by securing federal money for the purchase.

The Governor sued in October, arguing that legislative committees controlled by a handful of Republicans have overstepped their constitutional authority.

Yesterday, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) released a proposed rule with the goal of protecting millions of workers from the significant health risks of extreme heat.

The proposed rule would require employers to develop an injury and illness prevention plan to control heat hazards in workplaces affected by excessive heat. Among other things, the plan would require employers to evaluate heat risks and — when heat increases risks to workers — implement requirements for drinking water, rest breaks and control of indoor heat. It would also require a plan to protect new or returning workers unaccustomed to working in high heat conditions.

Employers would also be required to provide training, have procedures to respond if a worker is experiencing signs and symptoms of a heat-related illness, and take immediate action to help a worker experiencing signs and symptoms of a heat emergency.

In the interim, OSHA continues to direct significant existing outreach and enforcement resources to educate employers and workers and hold businesses accountable for violations of the Occupational Safety and Health Act’s general duty clause, 29 U.S.C. § 654(a)(1) and other applicable regulations. Record-breaking temperatures across the nation have increased the risks people face on-the-job, especially in summer months.

The agency continues to conduct heat-related inspections under its National Emphasis Program – Outdoor and Indoor Heat-Related Hazards, launched in 2022. The program inspects workplaces with the highest exposures to heat-related hazards proactively to prevent workers from suffering injury, illness or death needlessly. Since the launch, OSHA has conducted more than 5,000 federal heat-related inspections.

In addition, the agency is prioritizing programmed inspections in agricultural industries that employ temporary, nonimmigrant H-2A workers for seasonal labor. These workers face unique vulnerabilities, including potential language barriers, less control over their living and working conditions, and possible lack of acclimatization, and are at high risk of hazardous heat exposure.