Your Friday Evening Briefing

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/11/04/briefing/jobs-report-elon-musk-twitter-layoffs.html

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Good evening. Here’s the latest at the end of Friday.

1. The labor market remained robust in October, in the final glimpse at the state of the economy before the midterm elections.

U.S. employers added 261,000 jobs last month on a seasonally adjusted basis, according to new government data. The tally was strong despite higher interest rates, and in defiance of policymakers’ efforts to cool off the labor market and curb the highest rate of inflation in generations.

Hourly earnings climbed by 4.7 percent in the year through October — a sign that a strong labor market is giving them the ability to push for better pay. However, pay increases are not keeping up with inflation: The Consumer Price Index picked up by 8.2 percent in the year through September.

Both parties are trying to spin the report to match their messaging. Democrats highlighted the economy’s relative strength, while Republicans seized on the rise in unemployment by two-tenths of a percentage point, to 3.7 percent.

2. Suburban women could hold the key to next week’s midterm elections.

Female suburban voters — long inaccurately caricatured as “soccer moms” — are an important swing constituency in the midterm elections this year.

Times reporters spoke with more than a dozen women in swing regions to see what is motivating their vote. Many saw themselves as apolitical, yet shared a sense of pessimism about the direction of the country. Many also felt freedom itself was under threat — whether the freedom they sought was the right to abortion or the right to shield their children from what they considered objectionable ideas on gender and race.

In other politics news, Donald Trump is expected to announce his campaign for the 2024 presidential election soon after the midterms — possibly as soon as the week of Nov. 14 — according to people familiar with the planning.

3. Elon Musk began mass layoffs at Twitter.

Musk, who took over the social media company last week, began culling the 7,500-person work force this morning. Roughly half of the company’s workers have been fired, four people with knowledge of the matter said.

The layoffs came as Musk faces pressure to make Twitter, which has lost the business of several major advertisers since he took over, work financially. But the move has raised questions about whether the layoffs followed federal and state laws, which require companies to provide advance notice of mass layoffs.

In other tech news, experts are growing increasingly worried that TikTok is becoming a home for manipulated political videos and photos.

4. Russia is rushing its new conscripts to the battlefield.

The newly drafted troops are being funneled to the front line in Ukraine’s east, but so far the additional support has failed to gain the Russians any new ground, according to Western analysts.

With the influx of additional troops, Russian forces have tripled the intensity of attacks along some parts of the front, according to the commander of the Ukrainian military. But the casualty rates among the new conscripts appears to be high: Today the Ukrainian military said more than 800 Russian soldiers had been wounded or killed over the previous 24 hours.

In other news from the war, the Defense Department is setting up a new command to oversee how the U.S. trains and equips the Ukrainian military. And the Group of 7 nations said its members would work together to rebuild critical infrastructure in Ukraine to protect the country from Russian attacks.

5. Florida restricted doctors from providing gender treatments to minors.

The new standard of care prohibits doctors from prescribing puberty blockers and hormones, or performing surgery, until patients are 18 years old — unless they have already received treatment. Doctors who flout the rule risk losing their medical licenses.

The move makes Florida one of several states to restrict what’s known as gender-affirming care for adolescents — and the first to do so through its Board of Medicine, whose members were appointed by Gov. Ron DeSantis. That strategy circumvented the Republican-controlled State Legislature, which had twice declined to take up a bill that would restrict such treatment.

In other health news, a study by Pfizer suggests that its updated booster is nearly four times as good as its predecessor at boosting antibodies against the dominant version of the coronavirus for people over age 55.

6. The Nets suspended Kyrie Irving for an antisemitic social media post.

Irving, a guard, was suspended indefinitely in the fallout of his posts about an antisemitic film. Nets General Manager Sean Marks said that Irving’s apology — which came after the team said he initially refused to unequivocally say he has no antisemitic beliefs — was a “step in the right direction” but was “certainly not enough.” Before he can return to play, he will have to meet with Jewish leaders and with the team, Marks said.

More broadly, this fall has become increasingly worrisome for American Jews. The number of reported antisemitic incidents has been increasing, and today the F.B.I. said officials had located a man with “radical extremist views” who had issued threats against synagogues in New Jersey.

7. You can now hear Barbra Streisand’s star being born.

In the early 1960s at the Bon Soir, a small club in New York’s West Village, an 18-year-old Streisand wowed audiences and parlayed her gig there into a contract with Columbia Records, catapulting her career.

A low-quality recording of the run was never released, but modern-day techniques have now been used to restore the sound of the original show. The result, “Live at the Bon Soir,” out today, is a pristinely restored recording of three dozen songs from late November 1962.

“I didn’t realize, actually, that my vocals were that good till they played me the new one,” Streisand told Wesley Morris, our critic at large. “I thought, Oh my God. That girl can sing.”

8. Do you know how much the Christmas Elf at Macy’s is paid?

Starting this week, most companies in New York City are required to include salary ranges on job postings, offering a window into potential compensation not just for applicants but also the curious general public.

We took a look at some of New York’s most iconic jobs — taxi driver, a TV anchor, right fielder for the New York Yankees — and built a quiz to see how well you can guess the salaries.

9. Can A.I. write the perfect Thanksgiving recipe?

Computer systems driven by artificial intelligence can compose tweets and blog posts, create art, even generate computer code. So they should be able to produce flawless directions for a holiday menu — right? Our food reporter Priya Krishna decided to put that idea to the test, tasking one A.I. system with making several Thanksgiving dishes.

She told the system about the types of flavors she likes, and it produced recipes that seemed both plausible and intriguing: pumpkin spice chaat, naan stuffing and roasted turkey with a soy-ginger glaze. Then we had a panel of judges (four Times cooking columnists) try them and give their feedback.

For more reliable Thanksgiving meals, my colleague Margaux Laskey put together 28 holiday recipes that are cheap, easy and impressive.

10. And finally, a few tips to ease the end of daylight saving time.

Clocks in the U.S. and Canada will “fall back” an hour on Sunday morning, bringing more sunlight to the mornings and ushering in the familiar darkness of winter afternoons. Most Americans dislike the twice-yearly time reset, and lawmakers have passed legislation to end it. But so long as the practice persists, it is worth preparing for.

Experts recommend embracing the additional hour of sleep by getting up at the same time you normally would on a Sunday. You may also want to consider taking advantage of the morning light by shifting your workout to the morning and exercising outside, which can help you transition.

Have a restful (and slightly longer) weekend.

Brent Lewis compiled photos for this briefing.

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