By MATT OTT, Associated Press Business Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. jobless claim applications jumped to their highest level in almost four years last week, the latest sign that the labor market is softening.

The number of Americans filing for unemployment benefits for the week ending Sept. 6 rose 27,000 to 263,000, the Labor Department reported Thursday. That’s the most filings since the week of Oct. 23, 2021 and well above the 231,000 new applications economists forecast.

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Weekly applications for jobless benefits are considered a proxy for layoffs and have mostly settled in a historically low range between 200,000 and 250,000 since the U.S. began to emerge from the COVID-19 pandemic nearly four years ago.

Despite last week’s increase, layoffs remain relatively low by historical measures and hiring has weakened, a trend that economists describe as “no hire, no fire.”

Earlier this week, the Bureau of Labor Statistics issued a massive preliminary revision of U.S. job gains for the 12 months ending in March, further evidence that the labor market has not been as strong as previously thought.

The BLS’s revised figures showed that U.S. employers added 911,000 fewer jobs than originally reported in the year ending in March 2025, with the biggest weakness coming from the leisure and hospitality sector, professional and business services and retail. The report showed that job gains were tapering long before President Donald Trump rolled out his far-reaching tariffs on U.S. trading partners in April.

The department issues the revisions every year, intending to better account for new businesses and ones that had gone out of business. Final revisions will come out in February 2026.

The updated figures came after the agency reported Friday that the economy generated just 22,000 jobs in August, well below the 80,000 economists were expecting.

Also last week, the government said that U.S. employers advertised 7.2 million job openings at the end of July, fewer than economists had forecast and the first time since April of 2021 that there were more unemployed Americans than job postings.

Last month’s grim July employment report, which showed job gains of just 73,000 and included huge downward revisions for June and May, sent financial markets spiraling and prompted Trump to fire the head of the agency that compiles the monthly data.

The various labor market reports have bolstered fears that Trump’s erratic economic policies, including the unpredictable taxes on imports, have created so much uncertainty that businesses are reluctant to hire.

Broader U.S. economic growth has weakened so far this year as many companies have pulled back on expansion projects amid the uncertainty surrounding the impacts of the tariffs. Growth slowed to about a 1.3% annual rate in the first half of the year, down from 2.5% in 2024.

The sluggishness in the job market is a key reason that Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell recently signaled that the central bank may cut its key interest rate at its meeting next week. A cut could reduce other borrowing costs in the economy, including mortgages, auto loans, and business borrowing.

While a rate cut could spur economic growth, economists fear it could push inflation even farther above the Fed’s target of 2%.

Thursday’s report showed that the four-week average of claims, which evens out some of the week-to-week volatility, rose by 9,750 to 240,500.

The total number of Americans collecting unemployment benefits for the previous week of Aug. 30 was unchanged at 1.94 million.

By CHRISTOPHER RUGABER, Associated Press Economics Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) — Inflation rose last month as the price of gas, groceries, hotel rooms and airfares rose, along with the cost of clothes and used cars.

Consumer prices increased 2.9% in August from a year earlier, the Labor Department said Tuesday, up from 2.7% the previous month and the biggest increase since January. Excluding the volatile food and energy categories, core prices rose 3.1%, the same as in July. Both figures are above the Federal Reserve’s 2% target.

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The reading is the last the Fed will receive before its key meeting next week, when policymakers are widely expected to cut their short-term rate to about 4.1% from 4.3%. Still, the new inflation data underscores the challenges the Fed is facing as it experiences relentless pressure from President Donald Trump to cut rates. Inflation remains stubborn while the job market is weakening, diverging trends that would require polar reactions from Federal Reserve policymakers to address.

Hiring has slowed sharply in recent months and was lower than previously estimated last year. The unemployment rate ticked up in August to a still-low 4.3%. And weekly unemployment claims rose sharply last week, the government also reported Thursday, a sign layoffs may be picking up.

Typically the Fed would cut its key rate when unemployment rose to spur more spending and growth. Yet it would do the opposite and raise rates — or at least keep them unchanged — in the face of rising inflation. Last month, Chair Jerome Powell signaled that Fed officials are increasingly concerned about jobs. Yet stubbornly high inflation could keep the Fed from cutting very quickly.

On a monthly basis, overall inflation accelerated, as prices rose 0.4% from July to August, faster than the 0.2% pace the previous month. Core prices rose 0.3% for the second straight month.

Gas prices jumped 1.9% just from July to August, the biggest monthly increase since a 4% rise in December. Grocery prices climbed 0.6%, pushed higher by more expensive tomatoes, apples, and beef. The cost of travel soared, with air fares rising 5.9% just from July to August and hotel room prices rising 2.3%. Rental costs also increased, rising 0.4%, faster than the previous month.

The impact of tariffs appeared to be mixed, with many imported goods rising in price but modestly. Clothing costs rose 0.5% just last month, though they are still just slightly more expensive than a year ago. Furniture costs rose 0.3% and are 4.7% higher than a year earlier. Appliance costs also rose from July to August, after falling the previous month.

The inflation data arrives at the same time that Trump has sought to fire Fed governor Lisa Cook as part of an effort to assert more control over the Fed. Yet late Tuesday, a court said the firing was illegal and ruled that Cook could keep her job while the dispute played out in the courts.

By KIM TONG-HYUNG and HYUNG-JIN KIM, Associated Press

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — South Korea’s president said Thursday that Korean companies will likely hesitate to make further investments in the United States unless Washington improves its visa system for their employees, as U.S. authorities released hundreds of workers who were detained from a Georgia factory site last week.

In a news conference marking 100 days in office, Lee Jae Myung called for improvements in the U.S. visa system as he spoke about the Sept. 4 immigration raid that resulted in the arrest of more than 300 South Korean workers at a battery factory under construction at Hyundai’s sprawling auto plant west of Savannah.

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South Korea’s Foreign Ministry later confirmed that U.S. authorities have released the 330 detainees – 316 of them Koreans – and that they were being transported by buses to Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson airport where they will board a charter flight scheduled to arrive in South Korea on Friday afternoon. The group also includes 10 Chinese nationals, three Japanese nationals and one Indonesian.

The massive roundup and U.S. authorities’ release of video showing some workers being chained and taken away, sparked widespread anger and a sense of betrayal in South Korea. The raid came less than two weeks after a summit between U.S. President Donald Trump and Lee, and just weeks after the countries reached a July agreement that spared South Korea from the Trump administration’s highest tariffs — but only after Seoul pledged $350 billion in new U.S. investments, against the backdrop of a decaying job market at home.

Lawmakers from both Lee’s liberal Democratic Party and the conservative opposition decried the detentions as outrageous and heavy-handed, while South Korea’s biggest newspaper compared the raid to a “rabbit hunt” executed by U.S. immigration authorities in a zeal to meet an alleged White House goal of 3,000 arrests a day.

During the news conference, Lee said South Korean and U.S. officials are discussing a possible improvement to the U.S. visa system, adding that under the current system South Korean companies “can’t help hesitating a lot” about making direct investments in the U.S.

Lee: ‘It’s not like these are long-term workers’

U.S. authorities said some of the detained workers had illegally crossed the U.S. border, while others entered legally but had expired visas or entered on visa waivers that prohibited them from working.

But South Korean officials expressed frustration that Washington has yet to act on Seoul’s yearslong demand to ensure a visa system to accommodate skilled Korean workers, though it has been pressing South Korea to expand U.S. industrial investments.

This image from video provided by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement via DVIDS shows manufacturing plant employees waiting to have their legs shackled at the Hyundai Motor Group’s electric vehicle plant, Thursday, Sept. 4, 2025, in Ellabell, Ga. (Corey Bullard/U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement via AP)

South Korean companies have been mostly relying on short-term visitor visas or Electronic System for Travel Authorization to send workers who are needed to launch manufacturing sites and handle other setup tasks, a practice that had been largely tolerated for years.

Lee said that whether Washington establishes a visa system allowing South Korean companies to send skilled workers to industrial sites will have a “major impact” on future South Korean investments in America.

“It’s not like these are long-term workers. When you build a factory or install equipment at a factory, you need technicians, but the United States doesn’t have that workforce and yet they won’t issue visas to let our people stay and do the work,” he said.

“If that’s not possible, then establishing a local factory in the United States will either come with severe disadvantages or become very difficult for our companies. They will wonder whether they should even do it,” Lee added.

Lee said the raid showed a “cultural difference” between the two countries in how they handle immigration issues.

“In South Korea, we see Americans coming on tourist visas to teach English at private cram schools — they do it all the time, and we don’t think much of it, it’s just something you accept,” Lee said.

“But the United States clearly doesn’t see things that way. On top of that, U.S. immigration authorities pledge to strictly forbid illegal immigration and employment and carry out deportations in various aggressive ways, and our people happened to be caught in one of those cases,” he added.

South Korea, US agree on working group to settle visa issues

Following a meeting with U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio in Washington, South Korean Foreign Minister Cho Hyun said Wednesday that U.S. officials have agreed to allow the workers detained in Georgia to later return to finish their work at the site. He added that the countries agreed to set up a joint working group for discussions on creating a new visa category to make it easier for South Korean companies to send their staff to work in the United States.

Before leaving for the U.S. on Monday, Cho said more South Korean workers in the U.S. could be vulnerable to future crackdowns if the visa issue isn’t resolved, but said Seoul does not yet have an estimate of how many might be at risk.

The Georgia battery plant is one of more than 20 major industrial sites that South Korean companies are currently building in the United States. They include other battery factories in Georgia and several other states, a semiconductor plant in Texas, and a shipbuilding project in Philadelphia, a sector Trump has frequently highlighted in relation to South Korea.

Min Jeonghun, a professor at South Korea’s National Diplomatic Academy, said it’s chiefly up to the United States to resolve the issue, either through legislation or by taking administrative steps to expand short-term work visas for training purposes.

Without an update in U.S. visa policies, Min said, “Korean companies will no longer be able to send their workers to the United States, causing inevitable delays in the expansion of facilities and other production activities, and the harm will boomerang back to the U.S. economy.”

“Most people associate occupational therapy with post-injury rehabilitation. But Occupational Therapy (OT) addresses something more fundamental: helping people master basic activities of daily living.”

An participant in an occupational therapy session at one of Project Renewal’s (Courtesy of Project Renewal)

Homelessness defies simple solutions. As an assemblymember representing the west side of Manhattan and the CEO of one of the city’s largest homeless services organizations, we grapple with this complexity daily—how mental health and substance use disorders often interact to push stable housing further out of reach, creating a vicious cycle that plays out in our streets and subways.

But we’ve also witnessed something promising in our community. Project Renewal has quietly developed and tested occupational therapy programs that address the daily living skills essential for housing stability, from medication management to emotional regulation and job interview preparation. 

Most people associate occupational therapy with post-injury rehabilitation. But OT addresses something more fundamental: helping people master basic activities of daily living. Occupational therapists assess functional skills and identify barriers to tasks like taking medication consistently, managing emotions, or preparing for job interviews.

As a career path, OT is more accessible than many health professions, typically requiring three years or less of postgraduate education. Project Renewal has built this workforce from the ground up, training 500 OT interns annually across more than a dozen colleges. Many remain to work in the city.

These homegrown employees now fill Project Renewal’s ranks—20 occupational therapists across 15 locations, serving more than 1,500 New Yorkers with histories of homelessness. OT is versatile enough to deploy alongside mobile medical care, meeting homeless New Yorkers directly on the streets.

This approach represents one of the few low-barrier, high-impact interventions for both behavioral health and substance use that providers have successfully scaled. Project Renewal’s programming serves as the test case, with promising results across their entire continuum of care.

Project Renewal’s mobile clinics reach New Yorkers living in public spaces, a population few agencies can access. Integrating occupational therapy proves crucial for connecting unhoused individuals to broader care networks. Someone seeking wound care or a flu shot can be referred to an OT for assessment and connection to other providers, beginning their journey toward housing stability.

Emergency shelters serve recently unhoused individuals, many with untreated behavioral health and substance use issues. Here, OTs ensure shelters don’t become revolving doors back to the street. They quickly assess residents’ needs and connect them to appropriate care.

An OT recognizing opioid withdrawal symptoms can immediately refer a new resident to treatment. Without this intervention, that person might return to the streets seeking relief from withdrawal’s devastating effects.

OTs also work directly on substance use disorders. A study of Project Renewal’s eight-week substance use treatment program at a men’s shelter showed encouraging results. Participants worked with OTs to identify personal strengths and weaknesses, use calendar tools for healthy routines, and recognize triggers for substance use. Most participants showed improved recovery outcomes after completion.

After establishing consistency at shelters, residents move to transitional housing—supportive, temporary units for those not yet ready for independent living. Project Renewal embeds services that prepare residents for permanent housing.

The Clinton residence in Midtown provides 57 apartments for adults with behavioral health diagnoses. On-site occupational therapy helps patients manage mental illness, ensuring they attend psychiatric appointments and follow treatment plans. OTs also support key milestones toward self-sufficiency, from job interview preparation to housing application assistance.

OT is embedded at all five Project Renewal permanent housing sites, tailored to residents’ unique needs, whether stemming from homelessness histories, mental illness, or aging.

At Geffner House for older adults, OT often involves group activities: music, art, writing, cooking, and brain games. This programming simultaneously combats social isolation while strengthening functional skills from working memory to digital dexterity. These independence-sustaining services have grown increasingly important as homelessness among older New Yorkers has risen.

Across this care spectrum, the picture becomes clear. On streets and in shelters, OT connects recently unhoused people with acute needs to vital services. In transitional housing, OT prepares residents for stability. In permanent residences, OT fortifies resilience. At each stage, OT addresses underlying causes of housing instability while connecting clients to care systems.

Occupational therapy alone cannot eliminate mental illness, addiction, or homelessness. It must work within well-resourced support networks spanning substance treatment, psychiatry, and social services. But as Project Renewal has demonstrated that this efficient, replicable model addresses critical needs and underlying causes of housing instability.

As policymakers and program leaders confront these persistent challenges, this approach merits our attention and investment. Addressing New York’s homelessness demands evidence-based interventions that tackle root causes. Occupational therapy represents one such tool, tested and ready for broader implementation across our homeless services system.

Tony Simone represents New York’s 75th Assembly District in Manhattan. Eric Rosenbaum is CEO of Project Renewal.

The post Opinion: A Powerful Tool to Address the Homelessness Crisis, Waiting for its Big Moment appeared first on City Limits.