Skip to main content

The CEO of United Airlines is trying to reassure travelers that the airline is safe despite a series of recent incidents ranging from a panel falling off a plane to an engine fire. CEO Scott Kirby said Monday that United will review safety training for all employees. Kirby says the airline was already planning an extra day of training for pilots starting in May and changes in training curriculum for new mechanics. In a message to customers, Kirby says the recent incidents are reminders of the importance of safety. He says the flight issues are all unrelated, but they have grabbed United's attention.

Fabric and crafts retailer Joann has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, as consumers continue to cut back on discretionary spending and pandemic-era hobbies. The Hudson, Ohio-based company said that it expected to emerge from bankruptcy as early as the end of next month. Following this process, Joann will likley become privately-owned by certain lenders and industry parties, the company added — meaning its shares would no longer be listed on stock exchanges. Joann’s more than 800 stores and its website will continue to operate normally during the bankruptcy process, the company said, pointing to a deal it had struck with most of its shareholders for financial support.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is sharply protesting against growing criticism from top ally the United States over his leadership amid the war with Hamas. Netanyahu says U.S. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer's call for Israel to hold new a election is “wholly inappropriate." Netanyahu says an election would force Israel to stop fighting and paralyze the country for months. Meanwhile, warnings are growing against an Israeli assault on Gaza's southern city of Rafah after Netanyahu said it could be weeks away. More than half the enclave's population has sought shelter there. Gaza's Health Ministry says the war has killed more than 31,000 Palestinians.

The number of Americans applying for jobless benefits last week inched up but largely stayed at historically low levels as the labor market continues to thrive despite elevated interest rates. The Labor Department reported Thursday that filings for unemployment claims for the week ending March 9 ticked down by 1,000 to 209,000 from the previous week’s 208,000. Weekly unemployment claims are considered a proxy for the number of U.S. layoffs in a given week. They have remained at historically low levels since the pandemic purge of millions of jobs in the spring of 2020.

Community support is the bedrock of local journalism. If you aren't already among our loyal subscribers, please consider supporting our important work of covering Aiken County and beyond.

American shoppers picked up their spending a bit in February after pulling back the previous month. But last month’s gain was weaker than expected, and January’s decline was revised even lower, suggesting that consumers are becoming more cautious. Retail sales rose 0.6% last month after falling a revised 1.1% in January, dragged down in part by inclement weather, according to the Commerce Department’s report on Thursday. February’s number was also lifted in part by higher gas price and higher auto sales. Excluding sales from gas stations and auto dealers, sales were up 0.3%.

Deep inside mountain tunnels in Colombia where the heat is so intense it causes headaches, women with power tools are chipping away at boulders in search of gems. They have opened a difficult path for themselves in the emerald industry, a sector long dominated by men. Some once believed that if women worked in the mines, the emeralds would hide. Now female miners are pushing for the government to officially recognize them and to legalize a small number of women-owned mines. The work is hard, and the women are raising families, too. Striking it rich is rare. “But we continue to struggle,” one woman says.

A blood test for colon cancer performed well in a study, offering a new kind of screening. The blood test looks for cancer by checking for DNA fragments shed by tumor cells and precancerous growths. The research sponsored by the maker of the blood test was published Wednesday. The test missed some cancers and any abnormal result would need to be followed up with a colonoscopy. It's already for sale in the U.S. for $895, but has not been approved by federal regulators and most insurers do not cover it. The company anticipates an FDA decision this year.

New artificial intelligence tools are helping doctors communicate with their patients. Some tools answer messages and others take notes during exams. It’s been just 15 months since OpenAI released ChatGPT. Already thousands of doctors are using products based on similar large language models. Enthusiasts say these AI tools save doctors’ time and prevent burnout. They’re also shaking up the doctor-patient relationship, raising questions of trust, transparency, privacy and the future of human connection. AI tools can be prompted to be friendly, empathetic and informative. They can also make mistakes, so it's important that the human doctor stay in the loop.

Dollar Tree will close nearly 1,000 stores and swung to a surprise fourth quarter loss as the discount retailer took a related $1.07 billion goodwill impairment charge. Shares tumbled 15% before the opening bell Wednesday. Dollar Tree plans to close about 600 Family Dollar stores in the first half of this year and 370 Family Dollar and 30 Dollar Tree stores over the next several years. Dollar Tree acquired Family Dollar for more than $8 billion almost a decade ago after a bidding war with rival Dollar General, but it has had difficulty absorbing the chain.

Several U.S. discount retailers are recalling packages of ground cinnamon after health officials warned they were contaminated with high levels of lead. The amounts detected were far lower than the levels found in pouches of cinnamon applesauce that poisoned nearly 500 U.S. children. The Food and Drug Administration has not identified the source of the lead in the new recalls or the countries where the cinnamon originated. Lead in spices can cause health problems for adults and children with prolonged exposure.

Shares of Southwest are plunging as the airline said that it plans to reduce capacity and reevaluate its full-year financial outlook because of fewer expected aircraft deliveries from its supplier, Boeing. Southwest Airlines said in a regulatory filing that Boeing expects to deliver 46 737-8 planes this year. The company previously anticipated 79 737 Max aircraft deliveries, which included 58 737-8 planes. Southwest said that it now assumes there will be no 737-7 aircraft deliveries and continues to assume no -737-7 planes will be placed into service this year based on the current certification status with the Federal Aviation Administration.

Libraries across the U.S. are struggling to cover the cost of e-books, which have grown in popularity. Digital copies of books often cost libraries four or more times the price consumers pay. And unlike paper books, an e-book doesn't last. The libraries are only leasing their copies from digital publishing platforms. After a year or two, the e-books expire. Librarians in some states are pushing for legislation that would help lower their costs. Publishers are fighting these proposals, saying they undermine intellectual property rights.

Consumer prices in the United States picked up last month, a sign that inflation remains a persistent challenge for the Federal Reserve and for President Joe Biden’s re-election campaign, both of which are counting on a steady easing of price pressures this year. Prices rose 0.4% from January to February, a pickup from the previous month’s figure of 0.3%. Compared with 12 months earlier, consumer prices rose 3.2% last month, faster than January’s 3.1% annual pace. Excluding volatile food and energy prices, so called “core” prices also climbed 0.4% from January to February, matching the previous month’s increase and a faster pace than is consistent with the Fed’s 2% target.

Most electronic systems that take on some driving tasks for humans don’t adequately make sure drivers are paying attention, and they don’t issue strong enough warnings to make drivers behave. That's according a insurance industry study published Tuesday. Only one of 14 partially automated systems tested by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety performed well enough to get an overall “acceptable” rating. Two others were rated “marginal,” while the rest were labeled “poor.” No system received the top rating of “good.” The institute says it developed the new ratings to get automakers to follow standards including how closely they watch drivers and how fast the cars issue warnings if drivers aren’t paying attention.

America’s employers delivered another healthy month of hiring in February, adding a surprising 275,000 jobs and again showcasing the U.S. economy’s resilience in the face of high interest rates. Last month’s job growth marked an increase from a revised gain of 229,000 jobs in January. At the same time, the unemployment rate ticked up two-tenths of a point in February to 3.9%. Yet despite sharply lower inflation, a healthy job market and a record-high stock market, many Americans say they are unhappy with the state of the economy — a sentiment that is sure to weigh on President Joe Biden’s bid for re-election.

The Justice Department is stepping up its focus on artificial intelligence. Officials warn that companies and people who deliberately misuse AI technology to advance a white-collar crime like price fixing, fraud or market manipulation will be at risk for a harsher sentence. Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco told an American Bar Association conference in San Francisco on Thursday the Justice Department will take into account how well a company is managing the risks of AI technology each time it assesses a corporate compliance program. Such a program is a set of policies and procedures designed to detect misconduct and ensure executives and employees are following the law.

Chair Jerome Powell reinforced his belief that the Federal Reserve will cut its key interest rate this year but said it first wants to see more evidence that inflation is falling sustainably back to the Fed’s 2% target. Powell’s comments to a House committee largely echoed those he made at a news conference Jan. 31. Since then, government reports have shown that inflation picked up from December to January, and hiring accelerated. But Powell did not express concern about the inflation data. Instead, he noted that according to the Fed’s preferred gauge, inflation “has eased notably over the past year” even though it remains above the central bank’s target.

U.S. job openings barely changed in January but remained at a high level, suggesting that the American job market remains healthy. The Labor Department reported Wednesday that U.S. employers posted 8.86 million job vacancies in December, down slightly from 8.89 million in January and about in line with economists’ expectations. Layoffs fell modestly, but so did the number of Americans quitting their jobs — a sign of confidence they can find higher pay or better working conditions elsewhere.

A technical issue had caused widespread login issues for more than an hour across Meta’s Facebook, Instagram, Threads and Messenger platforms on Tuesday. Andy Stone, Meta’s head communications, acknowledged the issues on X, formerly known as Twitter, and said the company “resolved the issue as quickly as possible for everyone who was impacted, and we apologize for any inconvenience.”

Bitcoin briefly hit an all-time high Tuesday morning — with the world’s largest cryptocurrency surpassing $68,800, according to CoinMarketCap. That’s just above bitcoin’s previous record set in November 2021. The price of the volatile asset is up almost 200% from one year ago. Gains for bitcoin have piled up over recent months — largely due to the excitement leading up to and following regulatory approval of spot bitcoin exchange traded funds, or ETFs, earlier this year. Analysts credit the latest surge to the growing popularity of this new way to invest combined with building anticipation for a scheduled bitcoin “halving” next month.

The first over-the-counter birth control pill will be available in U.S. stores later this month. Manufacturer Perrigo said Monday that it has begun shipping the medication, called Opill, to major retailers and pharmacies. A one-month supply will cost about $20 and a three-month supply will cost around $50. The Food and Drug Administration last July said the once-a-day pill could be sold without a prescription. It will also be available online. The pill is a hormone-based contraceptive, similar to drugs used by millions of U.S. women for decades. Birth control pills are available without a prescription across much of South America, Asia and Africa.

An inflation gauge favored by the Federal Reserve increased in January, the latest sign that the slowdown in U.S. consumer price increases is occurring unevenly from month to month. Prices rose 0.3% from December to January, up from 0.1% in the previous month. But in a more encouraging sign, prices were up just 2.4% from a year earlier, down from a 2.6% annual pace in December. The year-over-year cooldown in inflation is sure to be welcomed by the White House as President Joe Biden seeks re-election. Still, even though average paychecks have outpaced inflation over the past year, many Americans remain frustrated that overall prices are still well above where they were before inflation erupted.

ChatGPT-maker OpenAI is looking to fuse its artificial intelligence systems into the bodies of humanoid robots as part of a new deal with robotics startup Figure. Sunnyvale, California-based Figure announced the partnership Thursday along with $675 million in venture capital funding from a group that includes Amazon founder Jeff Bezos as well as Microsoft, chipmaker Nvidia and the startup-funding divisions of Amazon, Intel and OpenAI. Figure is less than two years old and doesn’t have a commercial product but is persuading influential tech industry backers to support its vision of shipping billions of human-like robots to the world’s workplaces and homes.

The U.S. economy grew at a robust 3.2% annual pace from October through December, propelled by healthy consumer spending, the Commerce Department reported Wednesday in a slight downgrade from its initial estimate. The expansion in the nation’s gross domestic product — the economy’s total output of goods and services — was down from a red-hot 4.9% from July through September. The fourth-quarter GDP numbers were revised down from the 3.3% pace Commerce initially reported last month. U.S. growth has now topped 2% for six straight quarters, defying fears that high interest rates would tip the world’s largest economy into a recession,

Price increases for cars and trucks in the United States, which helped fuel inflation for nearly three years, are slowing and in some cases falling, helping cool overall inflation and giving frustrated Americans more hope of finding an affordable vehicle. Behind the price slowdown is a vastly expanded number of vehicles on dealer lots after years of severe shortages. With more autos available, the pressures that had sent prices surging have eased. Though inventories are still well below the levels that prevailed before the pandemic, the rising availability suggests that 2024 will be the most affordable year of the past five in which to buy a new car or truck.

Wendy’s says that it has no plans to increase prices during the busiest times at its restaurants. The burger chain clarified its stance on how it will approach pricing after various media reports said that the company was looking to test having the prices of its menu items fluctuate throughout the day based on demand. Wendy’s said that its digital menu boards “could allow us to change the menu offerings at different times of day and offer discounts and value offers to our customers more easily, particularly in the slower times of day.”

Macy’s will close 150 unproductive namesake stores over the next three years and 50 by the end of 2024, the department store operator said Tuesday after posting a fourth quarter loss and declining sales. As part of the strategy, Macy’s aims to upgrade its remaining 350 stores, with plans to add more sales people to fitting areas and shoe departments, while adding more visual displays like mannequins. At the same time the company signaled a pivot to luxury, which has fared better than its namesake stores. It said it would open 15 of its higher end Bloomingdale’s stores and 30 of its luxury Blue Mercury cosmetics locations.

Latvia’s government has extended restrictions on the entry of Russian citizens into the Baltic country until next year. Authorities cited Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine which officials say is “still posing a threat to the internal security of Latvia.” The Cabinet of Prime Minister Evika Siliņa decided Tuesday to lengthen the entry conditions on Russian citizens until March 4, 2025. The government said in a statement that Russian citizens will continue to be banned from entering Latvia for the purposes of tourism and leisure. But some Russians will be permitted to enter the European Union country including those with residence permits valid in Latvia or another EU member state.

Thousands of farmers are marching in Poland’s capital to protest European Union agricultural policies and imports of cheap food from neighboring Ukraine. The farmers want Poland’s border with Ukraine sealed to the imports of grain and other food products that they say are bringing down the prices farmers can get on the domestic market. They also want the Polish government to withdraw from the EU’s Green Deal, a plan meant to fight climate change and help the environment with measures that they say are too costly. The actions follow similar protests across Europe in recent weeks. In Spain, farmers cut off traffic on highways in northeast Catalonia, on the border with France.

American consumers are feeling less confident this month as concerns over a possible recession grew, despite most indicators pointing to a healthy U.S. economy. The Conference Board, a business research group, said Tuesday that its consumer confidence index fell to 106.7 from a revised 110.9 in January. Analysts had been forecasting that the index remained steady from January to February. The index measures both Americans’ assessment of current economic conditions and their outlook for the next six months. The index measuring Americans short-term expectations for income, business and the job market fell to 79.8 from 81.5 in January. A reading under 80 often signals an upcoming recession.

Wendy’s is looking to test having the prices of its menu items fluctuate throughout the day based on demand, implementing a strategy that has already taken hold with ride-sharing companies and ticket sellers. During a conference call earlier this month, Wendy’s CEO Kirk Tanner said that the Dublin, Ohio-based burger chain will start testing dynamic pricing, also known as surge pricing, as early as next year. Wendy’s also plans to invest about $20 million to launch digital menu boards at all of its U.S. company-run restaurants by the end of next year.

The scene in classrooms around the country is similar: Kids are on their phones, even when school rules forbid it. Teachers say they see students on Snapchat, listening to music and even watching Netflix in class, among countless other examples of how smartphones distract from teaching and learning. Increasingly, educators are speaking with one voice on the question of how to handle it: Ban phones during classes. A growing number of leaders at the state and federal levels have begun endorsing school cellphone bans and suggesting new ways to curb access to the devices.

Norfolk Southern wants its shareholders to back its current management team and strategy and reject a bid from a group of investors to take over the railroad. Norfolk Southern urged shareholders Monday to reject Ancora Holdings eight board nominees when it filed its proxy statement. The railroad also nominated two new board members of its own — a former Amtrak CEO and a former U.S. Senator — to offer fresh perspective without derailing its current plan. Ancora argues that Norfolk Southern hasn’t done nearly enough to improve its efficiency because its profits and operations continue to lag behind the other major freight railroads. So Ancora wants to hire former UPS executive Jim Barber and former CSX chief operating officer Jamie Boychuk to run the the railroad.

A private U.S. lunar lander is expected to stop working Tuesday, its mission cut short after landing sideways near the south pole of the moon. Intuitive Machines, the Houston company that built and flew the spacecraft, said Monday that sunlight will likely stop shining on the solar panels Tuesday morning. That’s two to three days short of the week or so that NASA and other customers had been counting on. Last Thursday, the lander became the first U.S. spacecraft to land on the moon in more than 50 years. Photos from a NASA satellite around the moon show it landed within a mile of its target.

A number of Americans are dealing with cellular outages on AT&T, Cricket Wireless, Verizon, T-Mobile and other service providers, according to data from Downdetector. AT&T had more than 58,000 outages midday, in locations including Houston, Atlanta and Chicago. Cricket Wireless had more than 9,000, the outage tracking website said Thursday. AT&T, who was hardest hit, is actively working to restore service to all of its customers.

Sales of previously occupied U.S. homes rose in January as homebuyers seized upon easing mortgage rates and a modest pickup in properties on the market. Existing home sales rose 3.1% last month from December to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 4 million, the National Association of Realtors said Thursday. That’s the strongest sales pace since August. The modest sales increase is an encouraging start for the housing market, which has been mired in a slump the past two years. Sales fell 1.7% compared with January last year, however. Existing home sales sank to a nearly 30-year low last year, tumbling 18.7% from 2022.

The number of Americans applying for jobless benefits fell to its lowest level in five weeks, even as more high-profile companies announce layoffs. Applications for unemployment benefits fell by 12,000 to 201,000 for the week ending Feb. 17, the Labor Department reported Thursday. In total, 1.86 million Americans were collecting jobless benefits during the week that ended Feb. 10, a cecrease of 27,000 from the previous week. Weekly unemployment claims are broadly viewed as representative of the number of U.S. layoffs in a given week. They have remained at historically low levels in recent years, despite efforts by the U.S. Federal Reserve to cool the economy.

President Joe Biden has signed an executive order and created a federal rule aimed at better securing the nation’s ports from potential cyberattacks. The administration is outlining Wednesday a set of cybersecurity regulations that port operators must comply with across the country, not unlike standardized safety regulations that seek to prevent injury or damage to people and infrastructure. The new requirements are part of the federal government’s focus on modernizing how critical infrastructure like power grids, ports and pipelines are protected. They are increasingly managed and controlled online but there is no set of nationwide standards that govern how operators should protect against potential attacks online.

Across the United States, chronic worker shortages have led many companies to invest in machines to do some of the work they can’t find people to do. They’ve also been training the workers they do have to use advanced technology so they can produce more with less. The result has been an unexpected productivity boom, which helps explain a great economic mystery: How has the world’s largest economy managed to remain so healthy, with brisk growth and low unemployment, despite brutally high interest rates that are intended to tame inflation but that typically cause a recession?

Scores of tractors have parked outside Greece’s parliament as thousands of farmers angry at high production costs shift their protests to Athens. One banner says that “Without us, you don’t eat." The farmers' demands are similar to those at farmer protests elsewhere in Europe. The center-right government has expressed sympathy but says budgetary constraints prevent it from meeting all their demands. Protesters want tax-free fuel, debt forgiveness, measures against foreign competition and speedier compensation for damage from natural disasters. In a show of solidarity, hundreds of students joined the farmers and protested government plans to end the state monopoly on university education.

Capital One Financial is betting that Americans will keep shopping and use a credit card to pay for their purchases at stores and on the internet. Capital One announced Monday that it would buy Discover Financial Services for $35 billion. The combination could potentially shake up the payments industry, which is largely dominated by Visa and Mastercard. The deal marries two of the largest credit card companies that aren’t banks first, like JPMorgan Chase and Citigroup. It also brings together two companies whose customers are largely similar: often Americans who are looking for cash back or modest travel rewards, compared to the premium credit cards dominated by American Express, Citi and Chase. .

Capital One Financial is buying Discover Financial Services for $35 billion, in a deal that would bring together two of the nation’s biggest lenders and credit card issuers. Discover Financial shareholders will receive Capital One shares valued at nearly $140, according to a news release issued by the companies Monday. Discover shares closed Friday trading at $110.49. Virginia-based Capital One was the 12th largest U.S. bank as of the third quarter. Illinois-based Discover was the 33rd biggest. Both banks have benefitted from Americans increasingly using their credit cards, but have also needed to set aside more money to guard against defaults.

Even seniors like virtual reality, whether it is flying in a plane, soaring over mountains or playing with puppies. That is the finding of a newly published Stanford University study that surveyed residents of 17 senior communities around the country after they experienced VR, usually for the first time. Seniors picked from virtual experiences such as parachuting, riding in a tank, watching stage performances, playing with puppies and kittens or visiting places like Paris or Egypt. Almost 80% of seniors reported having a more positive attitude after their VR session and almost 60% said they felt less isolated socially. Those who didn't like it tended to be those who don't like technology in general.

The European Union is looking into whether TikTok has broken the bloc’s strict new digital rules for cleaning up social media and keeping internet users safe. The EU said Monday that it has “opened formal proceedings to assess” whether TikTok has breached the Digital Services Act, which took effect last year. The commission is focusing on whether TikTok is doing enough to curb “systemic risks” stemming from its design. It said measures including age verification tools to stop minors from finding “inappopriate content” might not be enough. TikTok said it will work with experts and industry to keep young people on TikTok safe, and looks forward to explain this work to the Commission.”

For many students, the excitement of being accepted into their first-choice college is being tempered this year by a troublesome uncertainty over whether they’ll get the financial aid they need to attend. The financial aid decisions that usually go out with acceptance letters are being delayed because of a later-than-expected rollout of a revised federal financial aid application, the form that schools use to compute financial aid. Schools won’t get the information they need to award financial aid until next month, forcing them to adapt. Some have moved away from the popular May 1 deadline for students to accept their offers of admission.

DETROIT (AP) — Just five years ago, a price-conscious auto shopper in the United States could choose from among a dozen new small cars selling for under $20,000. Now, there's just one: The Mitsubishi Mirage. And even the Mirage appears headed for the scrap yard. At a time when Americans increasingly want pricey SUVs and trucks rather than small cars, the Mirage remains the lone new vehicle whose average sale price is under 20 grand — a figure that once marked a kind of unofficial threshold of affordability. With prices — new and used — having soared since the pandemic, $20,000 is no longer much of a starting point for a new car.

The red-and-white flags of opening weekend have come down but the pumps are still pristine and the pavement unstained: QuikTrip off Exit 5 in North Augusta opened Feb. 9. And the area immediately around the new QT holds huge potential for additional growth: Highland Springs is just a mile away, and 118 acres of vacant land across the street is held by prominent developers.