Student Loan Pain and Growing Payment Burdens

One of the most pressing economic issues facing Gen Z in the U.S. is the burden of student loan repayment. With the end of pandemic-era relief, many young borrowers have seen their monthly payments jump to averages of over $500, almost double the national average for all borrowers. This has created difficult trade-offs. Many Gen Zers report delaying major life milestones such as buying homes, starting families, or investing in retirement, as student loans absorb a large share of their income.

The consequences are not just financial but also psychological. Surveys show rising stress, anxiety, and regret over borrowing decisions, with many wishing they had taken on less debt or chosen different schools. Confidence in paying off these loans is low, with only a minority believing they will fully repay under current plans.

Economically, this translates into reduced consumption and savings, which weakens Gen Z’s ability to build wealth compared to previous generations. It also shapes labor market choices, as some graduates prioritize jobs with loan repayment benefits over entrepreneurial or riskier career paths. Widespread financial strain among younger Americans impacts housing demand, credit markets, and even political debates over loan forgiveness and education reform.

https://www.newsweek.com/student-loan-update-gen-z-hit-highest-payments-2098779?utm_source=chatgpt.com

It’s not just Chinese imports. Peak season freight trade bound for U.S. slows to a crawl

U.S.-bound freight has slowed sharply during what is normally peak shipping season, with Chinese exports to the U.S. down about 27% year-over-year for three straight weeks. The usual September–October rush ahead of China’s Golden Week is absent, as early 2025 frontloading, high trade-war tariffs, and retailer overstocking have left little freight to move. Key categories like furniture, toys, electronics, machinery, and plastics are seeing steep drops, leading to blank sailings, suspended Asia–U.S. routes, and higher container rates (about $1,000 more per 40-foot container). Analysts warn that import volumes at major U.S. ports will continue to decline through year-end, putting pressure on retailers, shipping lines, and the broader supply chain.

https://www.cnbc.com/2025/09/10/china-exports-imports-trade-war-freight-shipping.html

Economic pressure could bring Russia to negotiating table, Bessent says

On September 7, 2025, U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent appeared on NBC’s Meet the Press and warned that intensified economic measures—including more sanctions and imposing secondary tariffs on nations still importing Russian oil—if executed in coordination between the U.S. and the European Union, could cause the Russian economy to implode and force President Vladimir Putin to enter peace talks with Ukraine. Bessent underscored that the Trump administration is ready to escalate pressure, but emphasized that success hinges on unified transatlantic cooperation, pointing out that they are now in a critical race between “how long the Ukrainian military can hold up versus how long the Russian economy can hold up.” He also noted that while new sanctions on Russia and China have been withheld, tariffs on exports from India—another major Russian oil buyer—have been increased.

https://www.reuters.com/world/economic-pressure-could-bring-russia-negotiating-table-bessent-says-2025-09-07/?utm_source=chatgpt.com

Auto Industry Takes $12 Billion Hit From Trade War

President Trump’s tariffs have dramatically affected the auto industry, setbacks compared to the covid pandemic and predicted to worsen. We are seeing short-term effects currently, but car makers will have to make costly supply chain adjustments to compensate for the complex ever-changing policy from our administration, which will certainly have long-term effects. Automarkers are now under pressure to localize production in the U.S. While this may reduce tariff exposure, the cost to re-locate production plants will run over billions of dollars for companies such as GM, Toyota, and Honda. These costs can be attributed to shifting production capacity, retooling factories, and localizing supply chains, even as they face declining profits. Capital that was initially allocated to growth and expansion is being re-directed to off-set policy costs and decisions.

Automakers have reported nearly $12 billion in losses so far, with Toyota alone losing $3 billion and expecting profits to drop by 44%. GM estimates its costs at $4 to 5 billion, and overall, the top global automakers are projected to see profits fall by about 25% this year, the lowest since the pandemic. These numbers show just how much tariffs are straining the industry’s bottom line.

At the same time, tariffs are speeding up a change that was already happening in the car industry. Instead of making one type of car for the whole world, companies are starting to focus more on specific demands of each geographical location. For example, electric cars are becoming very popular in China and Europe, while trucks are still the big sellers in the U.S. This means carmakers have to spend more money to build different cars in different places, which makes things less efficient. But on the flip side, some spectators think that it could help the U.S. economy by creating more jobs and keeping production closer to home. 

Source: https://www.wsj.com/business/autos/auto-industry-trump-tariff-impact-955ca0bf?gaa_at=eafs&gaa_n=ASWzDAgJ27C_WslYIZjDKpLdQ_lw5kMpXHvEmrr6PAkXoV1Fzfeh3_TcnULuTIJaKD0%3D&gaa_ts=68bf8cbe&gaa_sig=DucktEfdneGE3q79U5w0-W67pn6BmIb9QvaDckBNOHE5avRYwvwnXT-DN4JBQVb1iQeQYSB-R8HKJILc0LU-ZQ%3D%3D

Worker confidence in finding a new job hits record low in New York Fed survey

  The big takeaway from this article is that people's confidence in the job market is at a historical low. A survey from the New York Fed found that people feel there's only a 44.9% chance of finding a new job if they were to lose their current one. This is the lowest that number has been since the survey started back in 2013! It's a huge change from a few years ago during what was called the "Great Resignation," when people were quitting their jobs at a record pace. Back then, as many as 4.5 million workers a month were quitting, but that number has now dropped to 3.2 million in July, a decrease of over 5% from 2024.

 People's expectations that the unemployment rate will be higher a year from now went up to 39.1%, which is a 1.7 percentage point increase from July. The job data from August indicated that only 22,000 new jobs were created, which is way below the expected 75,000. They even revised the numbers for June, showing a loss of 13,000 jobs, which was the first monthly drop since December 2020. The overall unemployment rate went up to 4.3%, and a broader measure of unemployment that includes discouraged workers climbed to 8.1%. All of this points to a slowdown in hiring, and it has caused workers to "job-hug" their current positions. What do you think this means for the Federal Reserve and interest rates?

source : 

https://www.cnbc.com/2025/09/08/worker-confidence-in-finding-a-new-job-hits-record-low-in-new-york-fed-survey.html

The UK borrowing costs hits their highest level and adds to pressure to Reeves

    The UK government's long-term borrowing costs has reached their highest level since 1998. Interest rates on these 30-year government bonds increased to 5.72%, which is making it more expensive for the government to borrow money. There are expectations that Chancellor Rachel Reeves will increase taxes in the Budget later this year. 

    There seems to be a short-term UK government debt as of Tuesday. The UK Debt Management Office had sold a record £14bn of 10-year bonds. The pound also fell more than 1% against the dollar and sterling fell against the dollar to $1.3388, which is the lowest level against the US currency since 7 August. While in the US, 30-year Treasury bond yields rose to their highest.

    The article states that geopolitical tensions, US President Donald Trump's trade policies and the upcoming confidence vote in the French government had led to borrowing costs for governments around the globe to go up. 

    I do not know much about it but it would be interesting to see how the vote in the French government pans out because I also saw in another article that the French government is basically collapsing.

    Chancellor Rachel Reeves promises not to raise taxes such as income tax, VAT or national insurance on "working people," but raises the question of what taxes Reeves could raise in the autumn Budget? 
There is a couple options:
1.) Extending the freeze on income tax thresholds, which is due to end in 2028
                  -Referred to as a "stealth tax"
                  -Over time as salaries rise, more people are dragged into paying higher rates
2.) Reforming property taxes
 

I am interested in seeing what Chancellor Rachel Reeves decides to do. 

Edser, T. E. &. N. (2025, September 2). UK borrowing costs hit 27-year high adding to pressure on Reeves. https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cy989njnq2wo

US Tariffs Show China's Increasing Reliance on External Markets

According to customs data, China's exports have increased 4.4% in August making this the lowest growth since February. This is missing the Reuters estimate of 5.0% by a large margin. Imports grew a shy 1.3% last month from a year ago, also missing the Reuters estimate of 3.0% by a large margin. Exports to the U.S. have dropped a vast 33% making it the largest drop in 6 months, similarly, imports from the U.S. have dropped 16% showing the lingering effects of the tariffs. Given these figures the U.S. still remains the largest trading partner with China, even with the recent lock in of 55% tariff on Chinese imports and 30% on Chinese duties on U.S. goods. 

These figures show the relationship between the two countries, highlighting China's large reliance on the U.S. as an importer of Chinese goods and inversely, the U.S. taking a large portion of China's exports, reaching values of $283 billion as of August. Considering all of the implications of the U.S. China trade dispute, China is still operating at a trade surplus of approximately $102 billion for August. This figure shows promise given it was forecasted at $99.2 billion. However, this is also a steep drop-off from June highs of $114 billion. This surplus can be attributed to China's efforts to rely on close foreign markets such as the European Union bloc, the Association of Southeast Asia, and African Markets. However, this increase in exporting to other foreign markets have yet to offset the steep drop-off from exports to the U.S. This push to go abroad has been ongoing for China has had relatively slow domestic markets that have been nudged by these U.S. tariffs. The policymakers of Beijing try to steer clear of sweeping stimuli such as excessive price-cutting shown in their "anti-involution" policies and have tried to rely on targeted credit and monetary measures. I am interested to see if China begins to rely a lot less on the U.S long term or if these trade disputes will reach an end soon and we will see a surge of Chinese exports to the U.S.

https://www.cnbc.com/2025/09/08/china-exports-growth-in-august-drops-missing-expectations-.html

Job openings data falls to levels rarely seen since pandemic

     The job openings in the U.S. has dropped to levels that we have not seen since covid-19 calling for fears in the labor market. The job openings and labor turnover showed reports of around 7.18 million listings in July, which has not been less than 7.2 million since the end of 2020. Economists expected it to be around 7.4 million which is a notable amount different from what it can to be. They now see this decline as a big turning point,  and is yet another data point underscoring how the job market is frozen making it difficult for anyone to get a job. Weekly jobless claims data will give us a better grasp on how bad this has already been affected everyone.  

    While people could view this as just a temporary fluctuation, I feel like this could be an early warning of a much deeper challenge with the future job market. Less openings will cause workers to face tougher competition and a lot less leverage when it would come to getting better pay or benefits. Whether this trend steady's go down or up, it'll be very interesting to see the affect it has on the job marker. I believe this will have a huge affect on college graduates with looking for jobs cause they'll have to compete with much more experienced workers. 

https://www.cnbc.com/2025/09/03/job-opening-data-falls-to-levels-rarely-seen-since-pandemic.html

Tariffs and Rising Rates Put the Brakes on Job Creation

  In the U.S, employers had 7.2 million job openings in July. Comparatively, that is down from the 7.4 million reported in June and also is the lowest since September of 2024. Rising interest rates and tariffs have seem to lessen the creation of jobs in the U.S. A report from the Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey showed the hiring of jobs has been slow and difficult all summer; partially due to the fact of Trump's new interest rates, import and export prices, etc. Regardless of the job opening slowdown, most business in the U.S. did a great job of evading a mass firings.

What could come next is the FED is now trying find a way to boost the job market by taking interest rates in September and cutting them. Key interest rates from the FED have kept borrowing costs somewhat high on all sorts of loans which has cooled down the creation of jobs and the economy. I am interested to see where this goes in the coming weeks and maybe years, obvisouly I am hoping to leave college and have job opportunities readily available. It is not encouraging to hear that jobs may not be the easiest get in this country in the current moment. Is it an exaggeration? Maybe, but I am interested to see how this all pans out with job openings, the FED, and tariffs. 

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/labor-market-lost-steam-tariffs-151626842.html

Did Trump Overstep Powers with Tariffs?

    The Supreme Court of the United States is currently viewing an appeal that was submitted by the Trump administration on September 3. The Trump administration reasoned that America would become a "poor nation" without the tariffs. It has been reported by the Department of Homeland Security reported that the reciprocal tariffs that first started going into place in April 2025 have totaled to $81.5 billion. 

    Treasury Secretary, Scott Bessent, said on "Meet the Press" that if the Supreme Court rules that Trump is overstepping his presidential powers in these tariffs that "about half the tariffs" would be refunded back to the people. Bessent is confident that that the Trump administration will win at the Supreme Court. Bessent also made clear that there are also many other options and "other legal authorities" to continue to implement tariffs even if Trump does not win this case. 

    The impact of these tariffs are starting to reveal themselves. Job openings are currently fewer than unemployed people and the unemployment rate is the highest it has been in the past four years at 4.3%. The goods sector has also taken a rough hit. Economist Joe Brusuelas said that Goods businesses have posted four straight months of declines since May. Earlier this year, major companies like Nike, Walmart and Hasbro warned that these tariffs would lead to price hikes.

It will be interesting to see what the SCOTUS rules and whether there will be refunds on Trump's extremely controversial tariffs.

Link to Article: https://www.cnn.com/2025/09/07/business/tariff-rebate-supreme-court-bessent