Category: 3. Business

Note: Survey responses were collected from November 10 to November 20.

Firms Expect Smaller Rise in Own Prices and Steady Growth in Compensation Costs Relative to Last Quarter

For the fourth quarter of 2025 through the fourth quarter of 2026, the firms’ mean forecast for their own prices was for an increase of 2.6 percent, down from 3.3 percent last quarter. Firms expected compensation costs per employee to rise 3.3 percent over the same time period, unchanged from last quarter. The mean forecast for U.S. inflation was 3.6 percent, down from 4.7 percent last quarter.

 

Firms Expect Smaller Price Increases Compared with Their Current Price Growth

Looking back over the past year (the fourth quarter of 2024 to the fourth quarter of 2025), firms reported that the prices they received for their own goods and services rose 3.0 percent, little changed from the 2.9 percent they reported last quarter and higher than the 2.6 percent growth they expect over the next four quarters.

 

Firms Expect Lower U.S. Inflation Relative to Last Quarter’s Expectation

Firms’ median expectation for U.S. inflation declined to 3.0 percent from 3.3 percent, its second consecutive decrease and lowest reading in a year. The mean expectation also moved down, to 3.6 percent from 4.7 percent last quarter.

 

Long-Term Median Inflation Expectations Tick Up

For the longer run, firms’ median expectation of the average annual price increase that U.S. consumers will experience over the next 10 years moved up to 4.0 percent, following nine consecutive quarters at 3.0 percent. The mean expectation dropped to 6.1 percent from 9.3 percent, after rising in five consecutive quarters.

To see how reported and expected firm prices compare with U.S. CPI over time, see the PIES data explorer.

For more information on how PIES data compare with U.S. CPI as well as with other inflation forecasts, see
Introducing PIES.

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December 15, 2025

Highlighting its nationally recognized achievements in patient safety and quality, Hartford Hospital has been named a Top Teaching Hospital, now five years in a row, by The Leapfrog Group, a national watchdog organization for health care safety and quality. This award is widely acknowledged as one of the most competitive awards American hospitals can receive.

“This recognition, five years in a row, is one way to underscore the value of putting the patient at the center of everything we do,” said Cheryl Ficara, RN, MSN, NEA-BC, President of Hartford Hospital and Senior Vice President of Hartford HealthCare. “As a high reliability organization, we take error prevention very seriously. I commend our colleagues for upholding rigorous standards in every interaction and am proud of the critical work our team members do every day. This award highlights Hartford Hospital’s national standing as a place to receive and provide care.”

Only 73 hospitals in the country received the Top Teaching award this year.

The Leapfrog Group rates hospitals on how well they protect patients from preventable harm, including accidents, injuries and infections. The Leapfrog Top Teaching Hospital award is given to hospitals that publicly report their performance through the Leapfrog Hospital Survey and meet the high standards defined in the Top Hospitals methodology. This includes infection rates, maternity care and a hospital’s ability to prevent medication errors, among other standards. The rigorous standards are defined in each year’s Top Hospital Methodology.

To qualify for the distinction, hospitals must rank top among peers on the Leapfrog Hospital Survey, which assesses hospital performance on the highest standards for quality and patient safety, and achieve top performance in their category.

Earlier this month, IDEA Mississauga hosted a showcase celebrating the conclusion of EmpowHER Tech Launchpad, a 12-week program designed to help women-led tech companies grow their businesses and expand their market reach. The program is in partnership with York University’s YSpace. This is one of several initiatives the IDEA Mississauga hosts and facilitates to support local businesses in accelerating their growth path.

The event brought together founders, mentors, investors, and community partners to celebrate the entrepreneurs’ successful completion of the fall 2025 session. Over the past three months, participants received expert-led training, one-on-one mentorship, and investment readiness sessions to strengthen their strategies for long-term success.

The showcase, held at Mississauga City Hall’s C Banquets, featured inspiring pitches from companies developing solutions in B2B SaaS, Blockchain and Fintech, Consumer Packaged Goods (CPG) in the Food & Beverages sector and sustainability. Founders shared how the program helped them refine growth strategies, attract investors, and expand their workforce.

Success stories include LOCVM founded by Angelique Bernabe; Deal Bodies founded by Krys Lunardo and Trycycle Toys founded by Meghan Trivedi. All companies leveraged EmpowHER’s mentorship to launch solutions, pitch to investors and unlock business avenues across the GTA. Through the partnership between IDEA Mississauga and YSpace, the program helps build an inclusive tech sector rooted in innovation, resilience, and leadership.

For more details about future cohorts, program highlights, and participant stories, visit IDEA Mississauga’s EmpowHER Tech Launchpad webpage.

About IDEA Mississauga

IDEA Mississauga, powered by Invest Mississauga, brings together industry, government, education, and organizational leaders to help start-ups and scale-ups accelerate ideas and commercialize solutions. IDEA offers entrepreneurs a full suite of resources to support their growth, including tailored programs, services, and a strong network of mentors, partners, and talent. From start-up to scale-up, the IDEA team is dedicated to driving innovation and turning entrepreneurs’ ideas into reality.

About YSpace

YSpace is York University’s pan-university entrepreneurship and innovation hub supporting scale-ups, start-ups, and entrepreneurs from a variety of sectors and communities. YSpace’s programming spans from scaling innovative technologies through customer and investor capital to advancing agri-food businesses into mass retail. YSpace also focuses on diversity initiatives like ELLA powered by Desjardins for women-led businesses and Black Entrepreneurship Alliance (BEA) for Black-led businesses. Additionally, through the Start-Up Visa program, YSpace is building a robust ecosystem that drives positive change and empowers entrepreneurs to shape the future.

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Media contact

City of Mississauga Media Relations
media@mississauga.ca
905-615-3200, ext. 5232
TTY: 905-896-5151

Renewable energy and critical mineral supply chains are undergoing significant expansion driven by worsening climate change and environmental impacts and technological advancements, amid significant geographic concentration. These changes have implications for challenges and opportunities for decent work across regions and segments of the workforce.

As we look back on 2025, it’s clear that the internet as we know it is changing. Technology-enabled access to knowledge should be flourishing. Instead, information is being removed from the web or locked away in walled gardens. We are experiencing a crisis in the commons, driven in part by current AI development practices. New systems are emerging in response—from content monetization schemes and licensing agreements designed to protect large rightsholders, to the ongoing morass of lawsuits about how AI services are using content as data. We are in the midst of a major reconfiguration of how we share and reuse content on the web.

CC Signals: A Refresher

It is within this environment that we continue to develop CC signals. 

We introduced the CC signals concept last June during a live webinar, and further explored the motivation behind this work in our report From Human Content to Machine Data. We also shared the outcomes of our open feedback period following the CC signals kickoff. Since then, we’ve been experimenting in partnership with values-aligned stakeholders and developing pilot projects to test ideas raised by the community.

The goal of CC signals is to help creators and custodians of collections express how they want their content or data to be used in AI development in ways that uphold reciprocity, recognition, and sustainability. Today’s AI systems depend on vast amounts of human-created content, often collected without the awareness or involvement of those who made it. This has concentrated power and undermined trust in the social contract of the commons. 

CC signals responds by promoting community agency while preserving Creative Commons’ core commitment to access and openness. Ultimately, through CC signals and other interventions that infuse concepts of reciprocity in standards and practices, we envision an open internet where participation is equitable, creators are respected, and innovation advances the commons—not unchecked extraction.

CC Signals: Where Are We Now?

CC signals is an evolving, values-driven framework—currently being tested through a series of pilot efforts. Our strategy is to explore modular approaches across legal, technical, and normative dimensions to encourage responsible AI development practices. This allows CC signals to adapt as norms, technologies, and standards continue to evolve.  

At present, two key implementations are underway:

• Implementing CC signals on Mozilla Data Collective: We are working in partnership with our friends at Mozilla, looking at how implementation of CC signals would work on the Mozilla Data Collective platform, which is purpose-built to enable ethical dataset sharing and fair value exchange. Our plan is to test various ways of incorporating some measure of legal enforceability into CC signals. We also hope to use this as an opportunity to test which CC signal elements are most popular and impactful, and which ones have the biggest impact on AI developer behavior. 

• Adapting the CC signals contribution element in the RSL framework: Using the framework of the ecosystem contribution signal element, we are working with the RSL Collective to embed the notion of reciprocal contribution into this evolving standard. As a platform that will let rightsholders set machine-readable licensing terms for their content, integrating the contribution element ensures that standards such as RSL provide mechanisms for AI developers to contribute back to the commons at the collective or community level, not simply a one-to-one payment. 

Beyond CC signals itself, we are also exploring whether updates to CC’s license infrastructure could further strengthen and support the commons in the age of AI.  

Looking Ahead

We are actively seeking expressions of interest from dataset custodians who are interested in participating in the Mozilla Data Collective pilot project. If that’s you, we’d love to hear from you.  

We are also exploring sector-specific CC signals integrations, particularly within cultural heritage and science. 

Ultimately, CC signals are incarnations of what we want to see in the world—more recognition for authorship, sustainable commons communities, mutual commitments to shared resources. We are focused on building a vocabulary and vision for the values we think a successful commons needs to thrive. 

This work is resource-intensive. We need your support to ensure this work continues to be led by public interest organizations. Please donate today.

Posted 15 December 2025

One of the world’s biggest providers of educational services has been fined more than £2m for a range of serious breaches related to examination standards that could have affected tens of thousands of students.

Pearson, a FTSE 100-listed company, was hit by financial penalties of £750,000 for each of two cases and £505,000 for a third by Ofqual, the exams regulator. The cases concerned GCSE English language exams, A-level spoken Chinese and an online English proficiency test.

In the case of the English proficiency test, Pearson was fined £750,000 when it emerged that in 2023 it had allowed about 5% of candidates to take the test online at home, rather than at a secure centre.

This meant other people were able to sit the secure test on a student’s behalf, avoiding the remote invigilation safeguards Pearson had put in place. Although Pearson identified the incident and revoked 9,910 results, it admitted it should have identified the malpractice sooner and reported it to Ofqual.

The GCSE English breach concerned the risk of inconsistent grading standards. The A-level Chinese breach related to multiple issues with how questions were set and marked, meaning the assessments were inappropriately demanding for non-native speakers.

Amanda Swann, Ofqual’s executive director for delivery, said: “These fines reflect the serious nature of Pearson’s failures as well as our commitment to protecting students’ interests and maintaining public confidence in our qualifications system. Students must be able to trust that their results, and those of their peers taking the same qualifications, accurately reflect their performance, in line with appropriate standards. Students’ work must also be their own.

“This action is necessary to deter Pearson and other awarding organisations from similar failings in future.”

Pearson has now been fined seven times by Ofqual. Ofqual fined it £1.2m in 2022 for failures with reviews of marking arrangements between 2016 and 2019.

A statement from Pearson said: “We take responsibility for the issues that affected GCE A-level Chinese, GCSE English Language 2.0, and our legacy PTE Academic Online Test at different times between 2019 and 2023. Our actions at the time did not meet regulatory requirements or the high standards that learners and educators rightly expect from us.

“For each of these cases, we conducted a comprehensive review of our processes and have implemented robust improvements.”

President Kimo Ah Yun, Board of Trustees Chair Todd Adams, Trustee Ray Manista, two emeriti trustees and 33 Marquette alumni were named to BizTimes Milwaukee’s Wisconsin 275, a special publication that highlights the 275 most influential executives in different economic sectors throughout the state. 

President Ah Yun was elected the 25th president of Marquette in November 2024. He joined Marquette in 2016 as dean of the Diederich College of Communication, was named acting provost in 2018 and then permanent provost and executive vice president for academic affairs in 2019. 

Adams serves as chairman and CEO of Zurn Elkay Water Solutions, a Milwaukee-based supplier of clean water solutions for drinking water, hygiene and sustainable water management. He was elected to the Marquette University Board of Trustees in 2015, served as vice chair of the board from 2020 to 2023, and was elected chair of the board in 2023. 

Manista, Arts ’87, Law ’90, serves as executive vice president and chief legal and public affairs officer at Northwestern Mutual.

The emeriti trustees named to the list are Mary Ellen Stanek, Arts ’78, founder, managing director and chief investment officer emeritus of Baird Advisors and president of Baird Funds; and Anne Zizzo, Jour ’87, founder and CEO of Zizzo Group. 

Also earning selections to the list were Linda Gorens-Levey, executive in residence and instructor of practice of finance in the College of Business Administration, and David Anderson, who serves on the advisory board for Marquette’s commercial banking program. 

In addition to Manista, Stanek and Zizzo, the following alumni were honored:  

• JoAnne Anton, president and CEO of Herb Kohl Philanthropies 
• Rick Barrett, CEO of Barrett Lo Visionary Development 
• Joel Brennan, former president of the Great Milwaukee Committee 
• Christine Dahlhauser, managing principal – Wisconsin at Baker Tilly 
• Coreen Dicus-Johnson, president and CEO of Network Health 
• P.J. DiStefano, managing partner at Deloitte 
• Christopher Drees, president and CEO of Menasha Corp. 
• Chris Goller, executive vice president and co-head of corporate banking at PNC Financial Services Group Inc. 
• Brian Grossman, managing director – region manager of Wisconsin commercial banking at JPMorgan Chase 
• Laura Gutiérrez, CEO of the United Community Center 
• Nadiyah Johnson, founder and CEO of Jet Constellations 
• Tracy Johnson, CEO and president of Commercial Association of REALTORS Wisconsin 
• Chip Juedes, CEO of Fox World Travel Inc. 
• Rustin Keller, president and CEO of J. J. Keller & Associates Inc. 
• Joe Kirgues, co-founder of gener8tor 
• Mike Knapek, president and CEO of Yaskawa America Inc. 
• Dale Kooyenga, president of MMAC 
• David Kriete, president and CEO of Kriete Truck Centers 
• James Madlom, co-CEO of Mueller Communications 
• Teresa Mogensen, chair, president and CEO of ATC 
• Joel Plant, CEO of Frank Productions Inc. 
• Lori Richards, co-CEO of Mueller Communications 
• Joe Rock, office managing partner at KPMG 
• Jay Rothman, president of the Universities of Wisconsin 
• Annemarie Scobey-Polacheck, president and CEO of the United Performing Arts Fund 
• Jeff Snell, CEO of the Boys & Girls Clubs of Greater Milwaukee 
• Christine Specht, CEO of Cousins Subs 
• Mike Veum, president and CEO of IEWC 
• Jim Villa, CEO of NAIOP Wisconsin 
• Jeff Weyers, owner of Commercial Horizons 
• Craig Wiedemeier, president of Werner Electric Supply 
• Andrew Wronski, managing partner at Foley & Lardner LLP 
• Scott Yauck, founder, president and CEO of Cobalt Partners 

EU energy ministers discussed EU methane rules in their Council meeting in Brussels today, supporting the approach suggested by the Commission on a pragmatic implementation of the importer requirements and to endorse the compliance solutions identified in the Network of Competent Authorities, as confirmed in a ministerial statement. The Commission will rapidly develop criteria for further compliance solutions and clarifications as needed. 

Ministers welcomed the Commission’s steer so far, they committed to preventing risks to energy security such as disruption of supplies when applying national penalties and requested further guidance to ensure consistent implementation across the EU. 

Methane is the second most powerful greenhouse gas, responsible for about a third of global warming we experience today. Reducing methane emissions is one of the most efficient ways to fight climate change.

Today’s statement demonstrates strong support for implementation in a way that ensures predictability, market certainty and security of supply across the EU. The Commission will continue proactive work to facilitate implementation of the regulation in close cooperation with Member States, industry and trusted supply partners.

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