Category: 3. Business

Airfares are surging again after a months-long slump as carriers trim flights to ease a capacity glut
- The latest consumer price index report showed airfares jumped 4% in July from the prior month, reversing a slump that began early this year. That’s as airlines are reducing the number of flights, easing a capacity glut, while demand has rebounded after President Donald Trump’s trade war slowed travel during the spring.
Supply and demand are coming back into balance in the airline industry, meaning airfares are shooting higher again after an extended downtrend.

The latest consumer price index report showed airfares jumped 4% in July from June, marking the first monthly increase since January.

For much of the peak travel season, consumers enjoyed lower prices. Airfares ticked down 0.1% in June and fell 2.7% in May from the prior month. But those days look to be over for now.

Airlines are trimming flights more aggressively than usual as the summer winds down. Domestic capacity among U.S. airlines has dropped 6% in August versus July, according to data from Cirium cited by CNBC.

That’s bigger than the cut of just over 4% during the same period a year ago as well as the 0.6% cut in 2023. And in the pre-COVID summer of 2019, capacity fell by 1.7% between July and August.

The strike at Air Canada could throw another wrench into capacity as the carrier suspends operations. Canada’s top airline operates around 700 flights per day.

Earlier this summer, airlines found themselves with too much capacity as their expectations at the start of the year for another travel boom slammed into President Donald Trump’s trade war in the spring.

After he unveiled much steeper-than-expected tariffs in April, demand for flights slowed as consumers turned cautious about the economy and their finances. To avoid flying empty planes, airlines slashed prices.

But Trump pulled back from his highest levies and signed several trade deals. With some uncertainty easing, airlines have reported that demand is rebounding. In fact, security screenings at airports in July and so far in August are up from a year ago.

“The world is less uncertain today than it was during the first six months of 2025 and that gives us confidence about a strong finish to the year,” United Airlines CEO Scott Kirby said last month.

Introducing the 2025 Fortune Global 500, the definitive ranking of the biggest companies in the world. Explore this year’s list.
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August 16, 2025
Tech leaders should focus on job creation, not worker displacement

Tech leaders should focus on job creation, not worker displacement

Image: Reuters

When ChatGPT stormed onto the scene in late 2022, the alarm bells rang loud. Philosophers and futurists demanded new rules to prevent humanity from sliding into chaos, wars and disorder.

Since then, a string of large language models and apps — Gemini, Grok, Perplexity, Meta AI — have caused fresh anxieties. Two years on, true artificial general intelligence is still a distant goal but the mixed results of widespread adoption of AI are already plain to see.

Change that was happening gradually is now happening swiftly. As veteran Wall Street Journal commentator Peggy Noonan wrote in a recent column, “The story is no longer ‘AI in coming decades will take a lot of jobs’ or ‘AI will take jobs sooner than we think.’ It is ‘AI is here and a quiet havoc has begun.”

Yet, for America’s AI titans, the motivation today seems less about building tools that create new jobs and more about accelerating human displacement while envisioning a vast social safety net as compensation.

A recent article in the Wall Street Journal titled “What Musk, Altman and Others Say About AI-Funded ‘Universal Basic Income’” stated: “Suddenly, an idea once seen as a socialist policy that would reward idleness is one of the AI boom’s hottest acronyms.”

According to the article, the consensus in Silicon Valley is that automation driven by AI is going to replace a lot of factory jobs and white-collar roles while generating billions in profits for AI companies. What tech leaders and gurus seem divided over is whether AI-funded universal basic income is the answer to the challenge of mass unemployment.

Of course, as the popular 1956 Doris Day song “Que Sera, Sera (Whatever Will Be, Will Be)” reminds us: “The future’s not ours to see … what will be, will be.”

Perhaps there is no need to worry excessively, as many a bleak prophecy in the past (for example, “The Population Bomb,” a book by Paul R. Ehrlich about the looming danger of overpopulation) failed to come to pass.

High-quality jobs give young people a reason to get up in the morning, a sense of fulfillment and a feeling of progress in their lives. We risk losing the essence of this in an idle society with universal basic income.

Arnab Neil Sengupta

Perhaps the “quiet havoc” of which Noonan spoke is a temporary phenomenon and US employment numbers will pick up, similar to the way in which the development of mainframe computers in the 1950s created entirely new occupations.

In any case, AI tycoons such as Elon Musk, Sam Altman and Marc Benioff ought to be thinking of ways in which AI can be used to create plentiful, professionally rewarding jobs instead of touting the introduction of universal basic income as inevitable. Not only would such income for Americans made redundant by AI be of little use to the rest of the world, it could be a recipe for trouble in the long term.

Jobs do not just pay wages, as the Silicon Valley titans surely know. Jobs circulate money throughout the economy, creating demand for goods and services, generating tax revenues and nurturing communities. A purely passive income scheme will not spur the same level of productive economic activity.

For many people, especially young adults, meaningful work is a core part of their identity. For young people in the Arab world, it is not an exaggeration to say a job equals purpose, self-worth and hope.

Employment in challenging roles builds skills, creativity and problem-solving capacities that are essential for adapting to future changes. High-quality jobs in particular give educated young people a sense of fulfillment and progress in their lives. This satisfaction would be at risk of being lost in an idle society.

The workplace is a powerful training ground. Before the advent of remote working, conversation and competition made busy offices incubators of great ideas.

In his memoir “City Room,” Arthur Gelb, the late American journalist, described the New York Times newsroom of the 1940s this way: “There was an overwhelming sense of purpose, fire and life: the clacking rhythm of typewriters, the throbbing of great machines in the composing room on the floor above, reporters shouting for copy boys to pick up their stories.”

Employment creates networks, encourages teamwork and accountability, and strengthens civic engagement. On the other hand, large-scale joblessness, especially among young people, produces social drift, weakens bonds, increases division, feeds unrest and erodes hope.

AI tycoons such as Elon Musk, Sam Altman and Marc Benioff ought to be thinking of ways in which AI can be used to generate plentiful, professionally rewarding jobs instead of touting the introduction of universal basic income as inevitable.

Arnab Neil Sengupta

No matter what term tech tycoons choose to apply to it — “universal extreme wealth,” “universal high income” or “universal basic income” — the dangers of financially rewarding idleness can scarcely be overstated.

In addition to the erosion of motivation and the work ethic, a guaranteed income without the expectation of contribution might lead to disconnection from skills-building and long-term planning. There is also the risk of social fragmentation and alienation. Without shared daily activities like work, people living off AI profits could become more isolated, lose touch with community norms, and fall into destructive habits or radicalized echo chambers.

None of this is an argument for a Luddite agenda resisting the adoption of a technology whose time has come. Even California socialists do not advocate turning back the clock — although, ultimately, robots rather than American workers might end up doing the heavy lifting of President Trump’s planned manufacturing renaissance.

If the technological displacement of human workers proves unstoppable, the pace and scale of AI-driven automation will undoubtedly make job creation in some sectors unviable. A universal basic income could at least ensure that people’s basic needs are met in a fully automated economy.

A guaranteed supplemental income could also reduce some of the economic insecurity and stress. It could provide a safety net that allows people to take entrepreneurial risks, retrain or transition to new industries without fear of destitution, potentially prompting innovation from the ground up.

In theory, the recipients of universal basic income would have the freedom to pursue non-market value creation. Thus, with their basic needs covered, people could focus on care-giving, volunteering, education, the creative arts or environmental projects that existing markets do not adequately reward, even though the wider society still benefits from them.

If the pros and cons of an AI-funded “universal high income” make it sound like a quixotic experiment in wealth generation — lowering costs for companies and then handing out part of the profits in a post-work future — that is because it indeed would be if tried.

Job-loss fears are real, but the remedy should not be worse than the disease. Ultimately, the responsibility of tech leaders is not to make mass idleness the new normal, but to harness AI in ways that expand human opportunity.

• Arnab Neil Sengupta is a senior editor at Arab News.

Disclaimer: Views expressed by writers in this section are their own and do not necessarily reflect Arab News’ point of view

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August 16, 2025
Outcomes of Below-Elbow Versus Above-Elbow Immobilization in the Management of a Partial Triangular Fibrocartilage Complex Tear Without Distal Radio-Ulnar Joint Disruption: A Retrospective Study

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August 16, 2025
Therapeutic Challenges in the Use of Chemotherapy and Cyclin-Dependent Kinase 4/6 Inhibitors in a Patient With Charcot-Marie-Tooth Disease and Breast Cancer

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August 16, 2025
Bessent says he’s not pushing Fed cuts, just touting models

U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said he isn’t calling for a series of interest-rate cuts from the Federal Reserve, just pointing out that models suggest a “neutral” rate would be about 1.5 percentage points lower.

“I didn’t tell the Fed what to do,” Bessent said Thursday in an interview on Fox Business, referring to his comments a day before about how the central bank “could go into a series of rate cuts here.”

Bessent said Thursday that “what I said was that to get to a neutral rate on interest, that that would be approximately a 150-basis-point cut.”

The so-called neutral rate is the level at which policy neither stimulates nor restricts the economy. Fed Chair Jerome Powell said July 30 that there are “a range of views of what the neutral rate is at this moment for our economy” and that his own estimate was that the current setting was “modestly restrictive.”

“I believe that there is room, if one believes in the neutral rate,” for a series of rate cuts, Bessent said. “I’m not calling for one. I didn’t call for one. I just said that a model of a neutral rate is approximately 150 basis points lower.”

The Fed last month kept its target range for the benchmark rate at 4.25% to 4.5%. The median estimate of the neutral rate among Fed officials over the long run is 3%. Powell and many of his colleagues have for months argued that more time was needed to assess any impact on inflation and inflation expectations from President Trump’s tariff hikes.

Trump has regularly criticized Powell for holding rates. Bessent, after taking the Treasury’s helm, said he would only address past Fed actions, not future ones, but later weighed in on what he thought markets were expecting monetary policymakers to do. This week, he has taken to referring to economic models, and has repeatedly suggested a 50-basis-point rate cut is possible at the Fed’s September meeting.

“It’s not really the role of the Treasury secretary to opine” on the neutral rate, said Julia Coronado, founder of the research firm MacroPolicy Perspectives and a former Fed economist. “The fact that the most senior economic official in the administration is saying these things publicly is direct, public pressure on what he wants the Fed to do.”

Former Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers, who served under Democratic President Clinton, said he was “surprised” to see Bessent’s remarks on Wednesday.

“Usually that kind of judgment is not made by administration officials, and I’m not sure it’s helpful for the administration to be publicly prescribing on monetary policy,” Summers said on Bloomberg Television’s Wall Street Week with David Westin.

Summers, a paid contributor to Bloomberg TV, also suggested that a measure of the neutral rate should incorporate the effects of large budget deficits and elevated demand for funds to pay for data centers — along with higher asset prices that reduce the flow of funds into savings. Against that backdrop, “you wouldn’t be prescribing a 175-basis-point cut in rates unless we see a recession.”

Interest-rate futures as of Thursday morning reflect bets that the Fed will cut rates by less than a cumulative 150 basis points by the end of next year. They also show slightly less confidence in a 25-basis-point reduction at the September meeting. The retreat came after a release on U.S. wholesale inflation showed those prices climbed by the most in three years.

Speaking to Bloomberg Television on Wednesday, Bessent said “if you look at any model” it suggests that “we should probably be 150, 175 basis points lower” on the Fed’s benchmark. He also said that officials might have cut rates if they’d been aware of the revised data on the labor market that came out a couple of days after the latest meeting. “I suspect we could have had rate cuts in June and July,” Bessent said.

“I don’t know what model he’s talking about,” said Jim Bianco, president of Bianco Research and a longtime Fed and Treasury watcher. “There is no model I’m aware of that says it should be that low,” he said of the Fed’s benchmark.

Other gauges of where the Fed should be, such as the Taylor rule, also aren’t arguing that the main rate should be 150 to 175 basis points lower than it is, Bianco said. He added that there have been many instances over the decades of “cajoling Fed chairs,” and they’re “welcome to offer their opinion,” but it shouldn’t change the central bank leader’s opinion.

Bessent repeated on Thursday that, given the context of the weaker jobs figures and not having cut rates the past couple of months, “perhaps a 50-basis-point cut in September was warranted.”

Two Fed district bank presidents said they’re not backing such a move at this point. San Francisco Fed President Mary Daly said in a Wall Street Journal interview Wednesday, “I just don’t see that. I don’t see the need to catch up.” St. Louis President Alberto Musalem said on CNBC on Thursday that a 50 basis-point cut would be “unsupported by the current state of the economy and the outlook for the economy.”

Flatley writes for Bloomberg.

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August 16, 2025
Air Canada grounds flights amid strike, government steps in

Air Canada suspended all operations Saturday morning after more than 10,000 flight attendants walked off the job over pay and scheduling disputes, prompting the Canadian government to step in.

Minister Patty Hajdu has directed the Canada Industrial Relations Board to impose binding arbitration, extending the existing contract until a new agreement is reached.

“This decision will help make sure that hundreds of thousands of Canadians and visitors to our country are not impacted because of canceled flights.” Hajdu said in a statement Saturday afternoon.

The strike has already upended travel plans worldwide at the height of the summer season.

The airline, Canada’s largest and the country’s flag carrier, estimates that with its roughly 700 daily flights suspended, some 130,000 customers will be impacted each day the walkout continues.

It’s unclear how long the strike will last or when a deal might be reached. Air Canada Chief Operating Officer Mark Nasr warned that even after an agreement, it could take up to a week to fully restart operations.

Air Canada is urging affected customers not to go to the airport unless they have a confirmed ticket on an airline other than Air Canada or Air Canada Rouge. Flights operated by Air Canada Express partners Jazz and PAL airlines are not impacted.

Passengers whose flights are canceled will be notified. Here’s what travelers need to know:

Request a refund or credit

Customers who booked an Air Canada flight on or before Aug. 15 for travel on Saturday or Sunday can cancel for a full refund of the unused portion of their ticket, regardless of fare type, through the company’s website or mobile app.

Travelers may also opt for a travel credit to use toward a future Air Canada booking.

For other travel dates, refundable ticket holders can request a full refund with no fees. Nonrefundable fares can be converted into credit for future travel.

Air Canada can rebook your flight

If you forgo a refund, Air Canada said it will attempt to rebook you, including with other carriers.

But the airline — which serves more than 180 airports in Canada, the United States and on six continents — warned that seats are extremely limited during the peak summer season.

“Available capacity on our airline and on other carriers is limited due to the summer travel peak, meaning the possibility of rebooking you within an acceptable timeframe is low,” Air Canada said in a news release on Saturday.

Passengers can also rebook their flights for dates between Aug. 21 and Sept. 12 at no additional cost.

Impact on other airlines

Air Canada is a member of the Star Alliance network, which includes 26 member airlines such as United and Lufthansa. This means travelers on partner airlines operating Air Canada flights could be affected.

United Airlines said in a statement that it is “working with customers to get them to their destinations and have issued a travel waiver to make sure they have the flexibility to manage their travel plans.”

Airport and agency response

The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey said that it is “fully prepared to support travelers and help minimize disruptions.”

“Airport staff will be on-site to assist passengers, and we are working closely with Air Canada and our terminal partners to ensure necessary resources are in place,” the agency said in a statement ahead of the strike.

The Port Authority advised that travelers check their flight status directly with Air Canada before heading to the airport and allow extra time for travel.

The U.S. Department of Transportation did not issue an official statement on Air Canada’s suspended operations and did not immediately return a request for comment.

Matt Lavietes

Matt Lavietes is a reporter for NBC News.

The Associated Press contributed.

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August 16, 2025
Meta plans fourth AI restructuring in six months, report says

Meta is planning its fourth overhaul of artificial intelligence efforts in six months, The Information reported on Friday, citing three people familiar with the matter.

The company is expected to divide its new AI unit, Superintelligence Labs, into four groups: a new “TBD Lab,” short for to be determined; a products team including the Meta AI assistant; an infrastructure team; and the Fundamental AI Research (FAIR) lab focused on long-term research, the report said, citing two people.

Meta did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Reuters could not independently verify the report.

Read More: Love, lies, and AI

As Silicon Valley’s AI contest intensifies, CEO Mark Zuckerberg is going all-in to fast-track work on artificial general intelligence — machines that can outthink humans — and help create new cash flows.

Meta recently reorganized the company’s AI efforts under Superintelligence Labs, a high-stakes push that followed senior staff departures and a poor reception for Meta’s latest open-source Llama 4 model.

The social media giant has tapped US bond giant PIMCO and alternative asset manager Blue Owl Capital (OWL.N), opens new tab to spearhead a $29 billion financing for its data center expansion in rural Louisiana, Reuters reported earlier this month.

Also Read: Leaked Meta document reveals chatbot rules allowing provocative, harmful content

In July, Zuckerberg said Meta would spend hundreds of billions of dollars to build several massive AI data centers.

The company raised the bottom end of its annual capital expenditures forecast by $2 billion, to a range of $66 billion to $72 billion last month.

Rising costs to build out data center infrastructure and employee compensation costs — as Meta has been poaching researchers with mega salaries — would push the 2026 expense growth rate above the pace in 2025, the company has said.

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August 16, 2025
Coordination of virulence factors and lifestyle transition in Pseudomonas aeruginosa through single-cell analysis
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