🌎 Pyro-Mania

America’s job market is doing worse than expected

Queue the GIF of Squidward asking for spare change. The US economy added a mere 73,000 jobs in July, a far cry from the 110,000 economists had expected and the weakest monthly hiring figure since 2010 (outside the pandemic), per government data.

Running the numbers

The announcement followed Friday’s Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) jobs report, which showed healthcare drove most job gains in July. See the full report here.

• Healthcare alone added 55,000 positions, including 34,000 in ambulatory services and 16,000 in hospitals.

• Wage growth stayed strong, rising 3.9% year over year.

On the other hand, the US unemployment rate rose to 4.2%, in line with expectations, and the BLS made revisions that cut down job growth significantly:

• The agency reported the US added just 19,000 jobs in May and 14,000 in June, far below the levels needed to match population growth.

• The downgrade is a sharp decline from the initial estimates of 144,000 and 147,000 in May and June, respectively.

Officials explained the sharp downward adjustments were due to updated data and a standard recalculation of seasonal factors. See a breakdown on how revisions work here.

Why the weak numbers? Analysts say the hiring slowdown is due to rising business uncertainty, pointing to Trump’s new tariffs and tighter immigration rules, alongside cuts to the federal workforce.

The report was so bad the BLS director got fired: On Friday, hours after the numbers were published, President Trump fired BLS commissioner Erika McEntarfer, claiming the data had been manipulated. As of writing, no evidence has been presented to back the claim.

Wildfires are forming “fire clouds” that create their own weather

What, are we going to see a Sharknado next? Two massive wildfires blazing in Utah and Arizona are so intense that they’ve spawned towering pyrocumulus clouds, or “fire clouds,” that are visible for hundreds of miles.

What are fire clouds?

Pyrocumulus clouds develop as intense heat from wildfires pushes smoke and ash high into the sky, creating dense, gray plumes. Under the right conditions, they can grow into pyrocumulonimbus clouds:

• These formations are powerful fire-generated thunderstorms that produce strong winds and even their own weather patterns.

• By injecting intense winds and vertical air currents into wildfire zones, they create conditions that cause fires to spread extremely fast, producing dry lightning and even fire tornadoes (see explanation).

Pyrocumulonimbus clouds in the Dragon Bravo Fire near the Grand Canyon and the Monroe Canyon Fire in Utah have grown so intense that firefighters have been forced to retreat, leaving the firestorms uncontained.

Scorched Earth

For several days, fire clouds have been observed emboldening the raging wildfires, contributing to hazardous conditions and widespread destruction:

• The Dragon Bravo Fire has scorched over 164 square miles, making it the largest wildfire currently burning in the continental US. After burning since July 4, it is only around 9% contained.

• In Utah, the Monroe Canyon Fire has consumed around 75 square miles, prompting evacuations in several towns and cutting electricity. Containment is low at ~11%.

Looking ahead: The pyrocumulonimbus clouds continue to launch embers miles ahead, sparking new blazes and further complicating containment responses. Both fires have now been classified as "megafires,” as each has scorched more than 100,000 acres.

Will Congress finally be banned from stock trading?

RIP to the Twitter accounts that track Pelosi’s trades. A sweeping bipartisan effort to ban members of Congress from trading individual stocks is gaining traction in the House after being passed by the Senate last week.

The bill would prohibit all lawmakers, presidents, vice presidents, and their spouses from buying, selling, or owning stocks altogether.

Trading tie-up

The bill, commonly referred to as the “Pelosi Act” (see why), has advanced amid rising demands from both sides of the aisle to restore public confidence in Congress.

• The legislation would immediately prohibit trading, require the sale of holdings within 90 days, and order full divestment (see explanation) at the start of the next term.

Republican Sen. Josh Hawley, who introduced the bill, argued that the bill is crucial to stop lawmakers from profiting from insider information gained on the job.

• A 2022 New York Times analysis found nearly 20% of members of Congress traded stocks directly tied to areas they oversee.

When could it go into effect? The current draft applies the ban only to future terms, which ironically helped get enough support, but also sparked bipartisan backlash, with critics saying it undermines the bill’s credibility.

Could this even get passed? While the bill has gained more traction, it’s uncertain. Lawmakers from both parties remain divided over questions of fairness and how it would be enforced, which will likely shape the outcome of the upcoming House vote.

In partnership with Pacaso

Learn from this investor’s $100m mistake

In 2010, a Grammy-winning artist passed on investing $200K in an emerging real estate disruptor. That stake could be worth $100+ million today.

One year later, another real estate disruptor, Zillow, went public. This time, everyday investors had regrets, missing pre-IPO gains.

Now, a new real estate innovator, Pacaso – founded by a former Zillow exec – is disrupting a $1.3T market. And unlike the others, you can invest in Pacaso as a private company.

Pacaso’s co-ownership model has generated $1B+ in luxury home sales and service fees, earned $110M+ in gross profits to date, and received backing from the same VCs behind Uber, Venmo, and eBay. They even reserved the Nasdaq ticker PCSO.

Invest for $2.90/Share

_{Paid advertisement for Pacaso’s Regulation A offering. Read the offering circular at invest.pacaso.com. Reserving a ticker symbol is not a guarantee that the company will go public. Listing on the NASDAQ is subject to approvals.}

$250 million AI salaries are making the moon landing look cheap

But that’s nothing compared to a newsletter writer… right, guys? As tech giants continue to hire top AI talent, compensation packages for the positions have skyrocketed exponentially, shattering traditional pay records in scientific fields.

Top dollar talent

As the AI boom rages on, tech giants such as Meta, Google, Microsoft, Amazon, and Apple are engaged in an intense global talent war to secure top-tier AI researchers and engineers.

With such a limited supply of elite talent and competition so fierce, companies are opening their war chests, and new hires are certainly seeing their fair share:

• The most recent move came as Meta offered 24-year-old AI researcher Matt Deitke a compensation package worth $250 million over four years.

• The pay package includes $100 million upfront and came after Deitke initially declined a $125 million offer.

With salaries comparable to the world’s best sports stars (but without salary caps), it’s hard to get an idea of just how much top AI talent is going for. Let’s try to put it in perspective relative to other high earners:

• J. Robert Oppenheimer’s $10,000 salary for leading the Manhattan Project in the 1940s is worth just under $200,000 today, meaning Deitke will earn 327 times that amount in a single year.

• Speaking of salary caps, the four-year deal given to NBA superstar Steph Curry is worth $35 million less than Deitke’s.

• Even space pioneers like Neil Armstrong, whose salary today would be about $245,000 annually, fall vastly short in comparison.

Elite AI talent has become so valuable to Big Tech that top researchers are getting paid more than the most famous athletes, astronauts, and even the father of the atomic bomb.

Looking ahead: As the race to poach top AI minds grows even fiercer, eye-watering salaries like Deitke’s are likely to be dwarfed soon enough. Some reports suggest packages are already topping $300 million over multiple years.

Evidence mounts for the four-day workweek

I think I heard a resounding yes from my inbox. The largest trial of four-day workweeks to date found that reducing hours (without cutting pay) led to higher job satisfaction, lower burnout, and improved employee well-being.

A strengthened case

A recent six-month study led by Boston College tracked nearly 3,000 workers across 141 companies in six countries, including the US, UK, Canada, Ireland, Australia, and New Zealand.

• During the duration of the study, employees reduced their hours by 20%, from about 39 to 34 hours weekly, while keeping full pay.

• Companies in the trial had two months to reorganize their operations, which they did by cutting unnecessary meetings.

The results? Across the board, participants reported significantly less burnout, better mental health, improved physical well-being, higher job satisfaction, and more restful sleep compared to similar workers on standard schedules.

• More than 90% of the companies stuck with the four-day schedule, indicating it didn’t hurt profits or output.

The results mirror the UK’s largest four-day workweek trial in 2022, which involved 61 companies and 2,900 employees. In that study, 92% of employers kept the model, and revenues rose by an average of 1.4%.

There’s even more evidence: A separate UK study done this year, which involved 17 companies, showed that all opted to continue the shorter schedule after the trial ended. Many reported higher morale, lower burnout, increased revenue, and reduced sick days, making the four-day workweek look like an increasingly attractive business decision.

FAST FACTS
Catch up on this week’s weird news

School Shopping: As of the end of July, 67% of US back‑to‑school shoppers had already started spending on supplies, up from 55% last year and the highest proportion since the NRF began tracking the trend in 2018.

Surf’s Up: Last weekend, dogs ranging from Labs to Poodles competed at the World Dog Surfing Championships, with categories spanning weight classes and tandem events judged on style, endurance, and flair.

Flower Footage: The Smithsonian built a digital library featuring over 40 million microscope images of pollen from nearly 18,000 plant species, designed to fuel research across several industries.

Eventual Eruption: After being dormant for nearly 600 years, Russia’s Krasheninnikov volcano erupted over the weekend, sending an ash plume 20,000 feet into the sky (see video).

Long Lightning: A 2017 “megaflash” lightning bolt stretching 515 miles has been certified by the World Meteorological Organization as the longest single lightning flash ever recorded.