Apologies if you were hoping for some good news to read while you sip your weekend latte—yesterday’s jobs report might require a triple shot to stomach it. Preliminary data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics shows that the US economy added 22,000 jobs in August, well below the 75,000 expected by economists.

And in another bad sign for the labor market, unemployment ticked up to 4.3% from 4.2%, putting it at its highest rate since 2021. New revisions to prior months’ job figures also raised red flags: While July’s numbers actually jumped from 73,000 jobs added to 79,000, June’s job numbers, which originally showed a job gain of 14,000, were updated to a loss of 13,000. This marks the first time that the US economy has lost jobs in nearly four years.

Some other concerning numbers:

• Workers aged 16–24 are now hovering at a 10.5% unemployment rate, double the national average and the highest it’s been since 2021. Some economists point to AI scooping up entry-level jobs in certain industries.
• Unemployment for Black workers continued to climb to 7.5% in August, up from 7.2% the month prior. This group has been especially hard-hit by federal layoffs.
• The manufacturing industry, one of the main areas President Trump is hoping to juice with his economic policies, has now lost 78,000 jobs this year, following August’s fourth consecutive month.

This was the first jobs report since Trump fired BLS commissioner Erika McEntarfer last month, claiming a disappointing jobs report was “rigged.” Economists and market experts worried the firing could jeopardize the agency’s political independence, but it is unlikely to have impacted the new report.

What’s next? Whether the August numbers are ultimately revised up or down, the June and July revisions paint a pretty clear picture of a stagnating job market, which raises concerns about a recession. That means Trump will likely finally get that Fed interest rate cut he’s been advocating for. Some analysts are even betting on a 50-basis-point cut.—MM

Hundreds arrested in immigration raid at Hyundai battery plant. Most of the 475 workers who were arrested at the Georgia factory, a joint venture between the automaker and battery company LG Energy Solution, were South Korean nationals. A US official said those arrested were not legally able to work in the US and called it “the largest single site enforcement operation in the history of Homeland Security investigations.” South Korea has raised concerns, and the arrests are likely to increase tensions between the US and South Korea, following intense tariff negotiations that ended with a 15% import tax on South Korean goods and a pledge by the country to invest $350 billion in the US.

Google fined $3.5b in EU ad-tech antitrust case. The European Union slapped the American search giant with its second-largest antitrust fine ever yesterday (the largest was also against Google), after its competition regulator found the company had unfairly favored its own advertising tech. The decision comes as President Trump has claimed the bloc discriminates against American companies in its tech regulation. In a Truth Social post yesterday, the president threatened a trade probe in order to “nullify the unfair penalties being charged to these Taxpaying American Companies.”

Anthropic to pay $1.5b to settle authors’ copyright claims. In the first major settlement by an AI company over training its model on copyrighted works, Anthropic has agreed to shell out $1.5 billion to resolve claims by authors that it downloaded pirated copies of their books for training. The settlement must still be approved by a judge, but if it had gone to trial and lost the case, Anthropic could have faced $1 trillion in damages to the authors of 7 million books, per Bloomberg. The deal comes as dozens of suits remain pending against Anthropic and its competitors in the AI space over the use of intellectual property to train their models.—AR

Tesla’s board is seeking the world’s biggest ever pay package for Elon Musk in order to keep him “motivated and focused on delivering for the company,” the board’s chair told CNBC yesterday. We are now going to complain loudly about feeling distracted and uninspired at work.

The pay plan would award Musk an additional 12% stake in Tesla, ultimately worth $1 trillion, if the company hits lofty milestones over the next decade. This would bring Musk’s total Tesla stake to 29%, granting his wish for more shareholder voting power. For Musk to get the full payday, Tesla would need to:

• Grow its value to $8.5 trillion. That’s roughly 8x the company’s current market cap.
• Send adjusted EBITDA shooting to $400 billion, 24x what it reported last year.
• Deliver millions more vehicles, boost self-driving subscriptions, and get 1 million robots and robotaxis, respectively, into circulation. Both robo divisions have lagged far behind Musk’s promises.

Less talky, more worky: Tesla’s board is scrambling to get Musk to show more commitment—many investors have lost faith in him after an X-fueled few years of political involvement that prompted backlash against the Tesla brand, worsening a broader sales slump.

Looking ahead…shareholders will vote on the package in November. It could get held up even if it’s approved—after an investor sued, a judge struck down Musk’s $56 billion compensation package from 2018, which he’s appealing.—ML