KPMG Economics

Economic Coordinates

Explore analysis of key data indicators, such as job creation and the labor market, consumer spending, inflation, investment, housing and monetary policy. These combined data points are indicators of the overall health of the economy.

• Fed cuts as prices rise and economy slows
  Diane Swonk, chief economist at KPMG, noted that "some tariffs made their way into food prices. Food at home soared 0.5%, the hottest monthly increase since the height of pandemic inflation in June 2022." And bad news for coffee lovers: - prices surged by 3.6% in August alone, the fastest monthly pace since April 2011, and are up almost 21% from a year ago, "as the full effects of the 50% tariffs levied on Brazil last month work their way onto store shelves." Swonk notes that "typically, tariffs represent a one-time bump in price levels," which is how the Fed likely justified a rate cut despite the uptick in prices.
  September 22, 2025 | The Mercury News

• Fed Says Unemployment Has Edged Up But Remains Low
  Diane Swonk, chief economist, KPMG: First of all, it's really clear that Powell corralled the cats and assume that Waller and Bowman did not dissent in part because of the strong retail sales data, which also revealed inequality and something else that’s going on out there, and that is that spending on restaurants went up after adjusting for inflation and spending at grocery stores actually fell after adjusting for inflation in the retail sales numbers.
  September 18, 2025 | CNN

• Lone Dissent Shows Powell Kept Fed United Amid Trump Pressure
  Fed Chair Jerome Powell managed against the odds to forge a near-unanimous consensus at this week’s policy meeting, with new Governor Stephen Miran the only one to vote against the quarter-percentage-point interest-rate cut. Miran dissented in favor of a larger reduction — something the president has been demanding for months. But Fed Governors Christopher Waller and Michelle Bowman, both of whom lodged dovish dissents in July, refrained from doing so this time around. “It’s really clear that Powell corralled the cats,” Diane Swonk, the chief economist at KPMG, said on Bloomberg TV after the decision.
  September 17, 2025 | Bloomberg

• Who pays for tariffs?
  The import price index, which keeps track of the price of imports before tariffs are applied, comes out tomorrow. Some foreign exporters are cutting prices on their products to offset the impact of tariffs. Meagan Schoenberger of KPMG says that's a sign that many European exporters are concerned about losing market share to their American competitors.
  September 15, 2025 | NPR Marketplace

• Trump says there's 'no inflation.' But recent data shows prices are rising — partly due to his policies
  For instance, coffee prices surged by 3.6%, the largest one-month increase since 2011. Brazil is the top U.S. source of coffee, according to U.S. Department of Agriculture data. However, Brazilian imports – including coffee – began facing whopping 50% tariffs last month. Diane Swonk, chief economist at KPMG, predicts coffee prices "will easily exceed the record as the full effects of the 50% tariffs levied on Brazil last month work their way onto store shelves."
  September 12, 2025 | CNN.com

• Why rising Black unemployment is a warning sign for America's economy
  The unemployment rate for Black workers reached 7.5% in August — its highest level since October 2021 (7.6%) — and followed consecutive increases in June (6.8%) and July (7.2%). A rise in Black unemployment is often considered the "canary in the coal mine," foretelling a slowdown for the broader job market. "The most vulnerable people tend to get laid off first, and unfortunately, that tends to be Black Americans, and that's something that is very disturbing in and of itself," said Diane Swonk, chief economist at KPMG.
  September 8, 2025 | CNN

• Labor churn has come to a near standstill, says KPMG’s Diane Swonk
  Diane Swonk, KPMG chief economist, joins ‘Closing Bell Overtime’ to talk what the jobs numbers signal about the broader economy.
  September 5, 2025 | CNBC TV

• U.S. hiring significantly misses expectations as jobs market cools
  The U.S. economy added significantly fewer jobs than expected in August, government data showed on Friday. Overall, the figures confirm a slowdown in the labor market of the world’s biggest economy as businesses pull back on hiring while grappling with uncertainty sparked in large part by Trump’s fast-changing tariffs. U.S. job growth came in at 22,000 last month, down from July’s 79,000 figure, said the U.S. Department of Labor. The cooldown in hiring has been notable this year, with KPMG senior economist Kenneth Kim earlier telling AFP that “last year, the average payroll gain per month was 168,000.”
  September 5, 2025 | Agence France-Presse

• Here's why shipping costs are down
  The slowdown in shipping costs isn’t only a sign that importers have already purchased the goods they need. “That could be reflective of the fact that they’re anticipating that their buyers are going to have a lot less demand going into the rest of the year,” said Meagan Schoenberger, senior economist with KPMG. She said consumers have already been pulling back this year. “We’ve seen that in the GDP, that in the first half, there was a pretty large slowdown from the second half of last year,” Schoenberger said.
  September 4, 2025 | NPR Marketplace