Holding space for uncertainty

Summary

Marketplace Podcast Episode Summary: "Holding Space for Uncertainty"

Release Date: December 3, 2024
Host: Kai Ryssdal
Podcast: Marketplace

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Introduction

In the December 3rd episode of "Marketplace," host Kai Ryssdal delves into the intricate landscape of the current U.S. economy, focusing on the pressing themes of interest rates, tariffs, and the labor market. The episode, titled "Holding Space for Uncertainty," navigates through the complexities businesses face amidst fluctuating economic policies and global trade dynamics, providing listeners with insightful analyses and firsthand accounts from industry experts.

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1. The Cost of Money: Interest Rates and Economic Uncertainty

Key Discussion:
The episode kicks off with a discussion on the prevailing uncertainty surrounding interest rates. Following the latest central bank meeting, expectations of a quarter-point rate cut have been overshadowed by significant ambiguity regarding future rate trajectories.

Notable Insights:

• Justin Ho highlights the reluctance of businesses, especially in manufacturing, to maneuver through uncertain financial waters:
  “High interest rates have made it harder for [pharmaceutical] clients to raise the money they need to research and develop drugs.” [02:40]

• Scott Paul, from the Alliance for American Manufacturing, underscores concerns about potential inflationary pressures stemming from possible tax cuts under the new administration:
  “Depending on how they’re structured, tax cuts potentially could put some upward pressure on inflation.” [03:00]

• Tim Fiore from the Institute for Supply Management notes that manufacturers are primarily focused on sales rather than interest rates at this juncture, as stable prices allow them to concentrate on maintaining demand:
  “Prices are pretty stable. And if prices become unstable and start to grow, then the Fed’s going to have to do what they’re there to do.” [04:14]

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2. Navigating Tariffs: The Uncertain Road Ahead

Key Interview: Gretchen Blau, Customs Brokerage Manager at Logistics Plus, Erie, Pennsylvania.

Discussion Points:

• Tariff Volatility: Businesses are grappling with the unpredictability of tariff implementations, with significant anxiety over potential increases, such as the feared 60% tariffs on imports from China, Canada, and Mexico.

• Supply Chain Adjustments: Logistics Plus is actively assisting clients in re-evaluating their supply chains to mitigate the impact of new tariffs, although precise details remain elusive until official announcements are made.

Notable Quotes:

• Gretchen Blau:
  “We don’t have any inside information. So we’re just kind of holding hands with our customers and letting them know the most likely targets, but not making any promises as to knowing.” [06:03]

• Kai Ryssdal:
  “Imagine for a minute that tariffs are literally your job.” [05:52]

• Blau on Support Measures:
  “We can help them look at different sourcing, where maybe the tariffs are low or non-existent.” [07:22]

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3. Inflation’s Hidden Impact: The Case of Apparel Manufacturing

Key Report: Kristen Schwab explores how rising costs in materials and labor are influencing clothing manufacturers to cut corners, affecting product quality while keeping consumer prices relatively stable.

Insights:

• Cost-Cutting Measures: Manufacturers are employing various strategies such as using lower-quality materials, implementing shrinkflation, and reducing product sizes to maintain profitability amidst soaring input costs.

• Consumer Perspective: While textile and apparel inputs have surged over 50% since 2020, consumer prices for apparel have only increased by 7%, creating a discrepancy that manufacturers bridge through quality reductions.

Notable Examples:

• Phyllis Savachko demonstrates how manufacturers reduce costs by simplifying stitching and using cheaper materials, potentially compromising product longevity and quality.
  “This is cheaper because… time is money.” [10:28]

• Jennifer Wang, a TikTok content creator, highlights poor manufacturing practices, emphasizing the balance between quality and cost: “I’m tired of buying sweaters that fell apart.” [13:45]

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4. Labor Market Dynamics: Rising Permanent Job Losses

Key Report: Stephanie Hughes discusses the latest labor market trends, focusing on the surge in permanent job losses and its implications for the economy.

Insights:

• Permanent Job Losers: October saw over 1.8 million permanent job losers, the highest since November 2021, signaling potential shifts in the labor market.

• Sector-Specific Impact: The tech industry remains particularly vulnerable, with significant layoffs; however, many displaced workers like Mia Trujillo remain optimistic about securing new positions.

Notable Quotes:

• Brad Hirschbein, Senior Economist at the Upjohn Institute:
  “We know that their unemployment rate is slightly higher than it was, but it’s still relatively low.” [19:08]

• Lonnie Golden, Professor of Economics at Penn State Abington:
  “If the labor market continues to add jobs at the rate it has been, then those job losers will be job winners soon enough.” [20:37]

• Mia Trujillo:
  “A lot has changed in technology even in the last year.” [20:43]

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5. Solar Energy and Tariffs: Balancing Cost and Domestic Manufacturing

Key Report: Henri Epp examines the Federal Government's recent tariffs on solar cell imports from Malaysia, Cambodia, Vietnam, and Thailand and their implications for the U.S. solar industry.

Insights:

• Economic Tension: Balancing the goal of affordable solar energy deployment with the desire to bolster domestic manufacturing presents significant challenges.

• Industry Response: While tariffs aim to protect U.S. manufacturers, they may inadvertently increase costs for solar installers and consumers, potentially hindering broader clean energy initiatives.

Notable Quotes:

• Noah Kaufman, Columbia University:
  “We want cheap solar because it will lead to faster deployment of solar.” [22:06]

• Mike Carr, Solar Energy Manufacturers for America Coalition:
  “These latest tariffs could lead foreign solar companies to just relocate again.” [23:10]

• Steve Sakala, Tufts University:
  “We should be deploying the most cost-effective solar, even if it’s imported.” [23:30]

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6. Economic Recovery Post-Hurricane Helene: The Struggle for Rent Relief

Key Report: Laura Hackett reports from Asheville, North Carolina, detailing the ongoing economic challenges following Hurricane Helene.

Insights:

• Disaster Impact: The hurricane caused extensive damage, resulting in significant economic strain as residents grapple with job losses and housing insecurity.

• Community Response: Local organizations, particularly churches like Grace Covenant Presbyterian Church, are spearheading efforts to provide urgent rent relief despite overwhelming demand and limited resources.

Notable Quotes:

• Marcia Mount Shoup, Pastor:
  “We are trying to take housing insecurity off the stress list.” [24:42]

• Patricia Cadell, Pisgah Legal Services:
  “Evictions can happen fast… the likelihood of them getting that money back is little to none because the tenants just don’t have it to pay.” [25:30]

• Representative Lindsay Prather:
  “We need rental assistance desperately.” [25:50]

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7. Closing Thoughts: Inflation Persistence

Final Note: The episode concludes with a poignant quote from Federal Reserve Board Governor Christopher Waller, likening the battle against inflation to an MMA fight:

“Overall, I feel like an MMA fighter who keeps getting inflation into chokeholds, waiting for it to tap out, yet it keeps slipping out of my grasp at the last minute. Let me assure you that submission is inevitable. Inflation isn’t getting out of the octagon.” [28:14]

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Conclusion

"Holding Space for Uncertainty" provides a comprehensive exploration of the multifaceted economic challenges facing businesses and individuals alike. From interest rate volatility and tariff-induced supply chain disruptions to the nuanced impacts of inflation on consumer goods and the critical state of the labor market, the episode underscores the pervasive sense of unpredictability in the current economic climate. Through expert interviews and on-the-ground reporting, "Marketplace" offers listeners a nuanced understanding of how these macroeconomic factors interplay, shaping the business environment and everyday lives.

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Notable Sponsors:

• Invest Puerto Rico: Promotes Puerto Rico as a hub for innovation and investment.
• Public.com: Encourages diverse investment opportunities with competitive yields.
• Gusto & Hydro: Offer business payroll solutions and home fitness equipment, respectively.
• VantageScore: Highlights rapid growth in credit scoring and financial inclusion.

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For more insights and updates on the economy and business news, tune into "Marketplace" hosted by Kai Ryssdal.

Transcript

[Justin Ho]

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[Kai Rysdal]

Three on the program today. Or you know, the big three of the moment anyway. Interest rates, tariffs and jobs. Coming at you from American Public Media. This is Marketplace in Los Angeles. I'm Kai Rysdal. It is Monday today, 2nd December. Good as always to have you along, everybody. We will hear elsewhere in the program today about the politics of this economy. Tariffs that is. And we will hear about the labor market in this economy. Jobs that is. But we begin with perhaps the most fundamental item in this economy right now, the cost of money. Interest rates, that is. And the general vibe at the moment. Well, not so much vibe, but the actual minutes from the most recent meeting of the central bank say that after a general expectation of a quarter percentage point cut this month, there's, and this is a quote, considerably more uncertainty about where rates are headed. You do not have to be a regular listener to this program to understand that businesses just do not care for uncertainty, especially in manufacturing. Marketplace's Justin Ho gets us going.

[Justin Ho]

One type of manufacturing that's been feeling the pinch of high interest rates is the pharmaceutical industry. There definitely has been a lull in their pipelines. That's Wayne Woodard, CEO of Argonaut Manufacturing Services, a company in Carlsbad, California, that manufactures drugs and diagnostic tests for other companies. Woodard says high interest rates have made it harder for his clients to raise the money they need to research and develop drugs. And as a result, they get forced to deal with having a smaller amount of capital to work with, ultimately making very tough decisions about what's in their pipeline. And while the Federal Reserve has begun to cut interest rates, I don't really think that people have yet been convinced that Fed policy is going to be continuing in the direction that it is. So who knows, right? We don't really know. That's because the Fed could change course if inflation picks up again. Scott Paul with the alliance for American Manufacturing says that is a concern. Depending on what the new Trump administration decides to do this coming year, tax cuts potentially could put some upward pressure on inflation, depending on how they're structured. Tariffs, depending on how they're structured, can impact prices somewhat or a lot. That said, manufacturers surveyed by the Institute for Supply Management last month said they were more concerned with selling products than with interest rates. ISM's Tim Fiore runs the survey. What the business community is saying here is that my order book has gotten.

[Kai Rysdal]

So weak that I need orders. If there's no demand, there's no reason for being.

[Justin Ho]

Fiore says manufacturers can afford to focus on sales right now because prices are pretty stable. And if prices become unstable and start to grow, then the Fed's going to have to do what they're there to do.

[Kai Rysdal]

And, and we'll deal with that when it happens.

[Justin Ho]

And since any potential tax cuts or tariffs would take some time to enact, Fiore says inflation probably won't pick up until at least the second half of next year. I'm Justin Ho for Marketplace Wall Street.

[Kai Rysdal]

Starting the first week of the last month of the year, betwixt and between. We'll have the details when we do the number. There is a certain Groundhog day quality to some of the economic policies President Elect Trump is promising, most particularly on tariffs. There will be some new ones, that much is clear. But exactly how high and on whom we can't quite know yet, despite what the president elect is saying. So imagine for a minute that tariffs are literally your job. And while you handled the first four years of a Trump presidency, this time might well be different. So we've gotten Gretchen Blau on the phone to discuss. She's the customs brokerage manager at Logistics plus in Erie, Pennsylvania. Gretchen, good to talk to you again.

[Justin Ho]

Thank you.

[Kai Rysdal]

Good to be here with the Understanding that tariff news changes, one might say, at the drop of a hat these days. What is the vibe at Logistics plus in Erie, Pennsylvania, given the news of late?

[Justin Ho]

Well, we've been getting a lot of phone calls and emails asking if we have any kind of information as to what the tariffs will be on commodities that people import. And long story short, we don't have any inside information. So we're just kind of, you know, holding hands with our customers and letting them know the most likely targets, but not making any promises as to knowing.

[Kai Rysdal]

What exactly will occur without being able to see their faces. I imagine the stress level amongst your customers is pretty high. Anybody who's importing anything into this country, right?

[Justin Ho]

Oh, for sure. And everyone that was importing from Mexico and Canada probably thought they were on the safe side. And that's not looking good either now. So 25% tariff for goods from China was left over from Trump's last administration. So that's kind of been part of normal life for everyone. But the 60% that could happen is scaring people a lot.

[Kai Rysdal]

Well, since you mentioned it, you know, you have, we have all done this before. You specifically were on the pointy end of the sword with tariffs last time. That must stand you in some kind of good stead with your clients come the 20th of January. You'll have some kind of, you know, background in this.

[Justin Ho]

Yeah, that's for sure. And, you know, we can help them look, we have offices all over the world, so we can help them look at different sourcing, where maybe the tariffs are low or non existent or it just kind of depends on how it goes. It's really unpredictable at this point and we're just doing our best to help walk people through it. Anyone that's asking for any kind of estimate on tariffs is being told this is the estimate for today. We can't predict what's going to happen in January, but here we are. I mean, we've been warning everyone trying to get the word out that it could be a new world for sourcing come January.

[Kai Rysdal]

Right, so you're helping people think through their supply chains, right?

[Justin Ho]

Yes, we've been helping with that all along for the tariffs and the forced labor and whatnot, where people have to check and see where things are in their supply chain, who is actually building those parts and whatnot. But it's gonna get a little bit stickier.

[Kai Rysdal]

Yeah. So just on the nuts and bolts of this thing, let's say on the afternoon of January 20, after he's sworn in, President Trump reinstates or Instates or does whatever he's gonna do with tariffs. Do you get, like, an email from the Commerce Department that says, okay, now it's 25% on everything? Or what happens?

[Justin Ho]

We actually get an alert from Customs and Border Protection. They send out what's happening with the computer system, what happens with trade policy, what, you know, like a myriad of subjects that affect us as customs brokers and importers and exporters. So we will get some sort of notice. Typically they wait until it's published in the Federal Register, but I think in this case, we might get a little.

[Kai Rysdal]

Bit better warning, which would be nice, right?

[Justin Ho]

Oh, yeah. Who would be?

[Kai Rysdal]

Gretchen Blau, Logistics plus in Erie, Pennsylvania, thinking about the next four years of her job. Gretchen, thanks a bunch. Appreciate your time.

[Justin Ho]

Thank you.

[Kai Rysdal]

Inflation isn't quite the problem it was a year or two ago. But if you peruse surveys of business owners or talk to them yourself, both of which we do here, you hear time and time again that the still rising cost of materials and labor is still top of mind. So as we know, companies have raised prices and worked to cut costs. For a fast food restaurant, that might mean replacing workers with kiosks. For a potato chip maker, that might mean putting fewer chips in the bag. Right. Clothing manufacturers are facing the same kind of challenges for businesses. Textile and apparel inputs are up more than 50%, 5 0% since the start of 2020. For consumers, though, the cost of apparel has risen just 7%. So how are clothing brands making up that gap? As Marketplace's Kristen Schwab reports, it usually comes down to quality.

[Justin Ho]

It's a Friday morning during the holiday shopping season at Macy's flagship store in Manhattan. The lights are twinkling, the wreaths are up, and the place is packed with tourists. I'm here with Phyllis Savachko from Stateless, a fashion consulting firm, and we're a little lost among the store's 11 floors. There's gotta be a map somewhere. I know, right? We are on women's contemporary fashion. Maybe we'll try this. We'll stroll around here. We're strolling around today because we're on a mission to take stock of the quality of clothing on the racks. Savachko grabs a red holiday sweater bedazzled with silver stones. For $99. She flips it inside out and inspects the stitching. The stones are all attached by a single strand of thread. And that is cheaper because can you imagine one person tying off 100 pieces individually? That would take more time. And of course, time is money. It's a shortcut. A shopper might not notice until one of the stone snags and all of them fall off. Savachko says. This is just one of many ways clothing manufacturers cut costs. Instead of taking time to sew in zippers and buttons, they'll use elastic waistbands instead of pricey natural fabrics like wool. They'll use synthetics like acrylic. But other tactics are less obvious. For instance, shrinkflation. It's not just cereal brands putting less cereal in the box. Shrinkflation happens in clothing too. So that size six that you used to wear might fit a little snugger because the specs might be a little bit smaller. If you ever think you've gained weight when you step in the dressing room, turns out it might just be gaslighting. There's actually less fabric. Saving on a few millimeters of material might sound insignificant, but multiply that by thousands of shirts and you've saved a lot. Sometimes cost cutting even influences fashion trends. Cropped sweaters why do you think crop sweaters are it's a sweater, but it's cropped now, so you've saved all that yarn now some brands will use these cost cutting measures more than others. An expensive designer label its shoppers aren't so sensitive to price increases. But Margaret Bishop at Parsons and the Fashion Institute of Technology says lower priced mass market stores, there are already pretty slim margins on those products. So there's not a lot of room for brands and retailers to absorb increased costs. It's why lower priced brands are more likely to decrease quality, a shift that's been happening for some time now. It's sort of a slow decline. But if you look at the fiber content of clothing labels, and if you've been doing that over time, you may notice some differences. Jennifer Wang has taken notice. She's a content creator with nearly 400,000 followers on TikTok, and she's known for going into stores and highlighting apparel that's well or poor, poorly made. Wang started making these videos because she was tired of buying sweaters that fell apart. You wash it once according to the wash instructions on the label, and then it kind of creates little balls on the surface, pills up and of course that leads to disappointment. Wang does have some sympathy for brands. She's learned it's not easy to balance quality and cost because she's currently designing her own clothing line using natural fabrics. I think that opened my eyes to a lot of the nuances of, you know, fabric compositions. You know, what I thought was possible before, now I know isn't Back at Macy's, Savachko gives me some tips for finding quality clothes. She picks up a cream colored skirt that's fully lined and has thick, wavy lace. First of all, it's got all this rounded seam. This is more costly because it's faster to go in a straight line. The fact that you've got gathering that's expensive because you've got excess fabric, clean finish, that's money, Savechko says for the quality, she'd expect the skirt to cost $20 more. The sticker price is 60 bucks. In New York, I'm Kristen Schwab for MarketPL.

[Kai Rysdal]

Coming up.

[Justin Ho]

And if the landlord isn't able to pay the mortgage on the property, it could go into foreclosure.

[Kai Rysdal]

Debts and bills don't just go away, you know. First, though, let's do the numbers. Dow Industrials off 128 points today, about 3. 10%. 44,782 for the blue chips. The NASDAQ gained 185 points. 1% ended things at 19,430. The S&P 500 found 14 points in the couch cushions, about a quarter percent. 6,047. It's only Monday, but I'll tell you what. The auto industry has already been having a week. Stellantis, which makes Jeeps and Chryslers, among other models, said its CEO will step down. The company cited different views of the chief executive and the board of directors. Shares slowed 6, 3, 10% its Volkswagen, which slipped 1%. Tens of thousands of workers at nine plants in Germany went on rest strike. That's in response to a $19 billion budget cut. And Hyundai recalled more than 226,000 vehicles, citing problems with the rear view mirror camera. Shares stalled five and a quarter percent today. You're listening to Marketplace.

[Justin Ho]

This Marketplace podcast is supported by Gusto. Let your employees know you've got their back by signing up for Gusto for payroll and HR. More than 300,000 small business owners use Gusto. They offer benefits like health insurance, employee onboarding and more. Get your payroll taxes filed, deductions calculated and your team paid fast. No more pain, just the joy of running your business. Get three months free when you go to Gusto.com marketplace that's Gusto.com marketplace. This marketplace podcast is supported by Hydro. There are few worse places on earth than a gym during the month of January. If Getting fit for 2025 is on your resolution list, don't let the chaotic gym crowds get in your way. Get an immersive full body workout all from the comfort of home with the Hydro Rower. Hydro is your go to for the ultimate full body workout. It's designed by rowers so you know it's going to get the job done all in 20 minutes. Also, Hydro has you covered with free standard shipping, a 30 day risk free trial and a one year warranty. Kick off the new year with a full body workout all from the comfort of home with Hydro. Head over to hydro.com and use code MARKETPLACE to save up to $475 off your Hydro Pro Rower. That's Hydro W.com code MARKETPLACE to save up to $475 hydro.com code MARKETPLACE VantageScore is the fastest growing and most predictive credit score used by 8 out of the 10 largest banks and over 34 banks, fintechs and other companies nationwide. VantageScore is mandated for use for mortgages funded by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. VantageScore drives financial inclusions by scoring approximately 33 million more consumers than competitive credit scores. VantageScore Good for credit credit for good.

[Kai Rysdal]

Learn more at VantageScore.com this is Marketplace. I'm Kai Rysdal. While the political news careens from topic of the moment to topic of the moment, we here in the world of business in the economy are focused this week on jobs. There is labor market data aplenty these five days, including the biggie, the November jobs report, which is going to be out with us on Friday. One line item in that data set that's going to be of particular note is the number of permanent job losers, people who weren't temporarily laid off but instead have been let go or laid off from a particular position, obviously permanently. In October, permanent job losers topped 1.8 million people. That's the highest it's been since November of 2021. Marketplace's Stephanie Hugh looks at what's going on there.

[Justin Ho]

Mia Trujillo has been working without a break for three decades now. Most recently that was at a big tech company. But earlier this year her whole team was laid off. I don't think anybody ever expects it to happen to them. Trujillo was able to treat the break as a kind of sabbatical. She traveled some, caught up on sleep, finished books. Instead of abandoning them partway through, she's planning to rev up her job search in January and hopes to land at a smaller tech company. You can kind of see your impact a little bit more directly on the work. The tech sector has been harder hit than others when it comes to layoffs, says Brad Hirschbein, a senior economist at the Upjohn Institute. But he says many of those tech workers are able to find new jobs. We know that their unemployment rate is slightly higher than it was, but it's still relatively low. Hirschbein also points out that the number of permanent job losers comes to just over 1% of the labor force. That's slightly higher than it was right after the pandemic, but it's also right about where it was in 2017 or 2007 or 1997, which were hardly bad years in the labor market. Also, when seasoning the October jobs report, it's probably good to add more salt than usual. There were strikes and storms that soured things for the month. I think it's a potentially worrisome trend if it continues for several more months. Lonnie Golden's a professor of economics at Penn State Abington. He says if the labor market continues to add jobs at the rate it has been, then those job losers will be job winners soon enough. But if it doesn't, Goldin says more of them could stay unemployed for a longer time. It can hurt workers earnings permanently and.

[Kai Rysdal]

Therefore undermine their spending and undermine the well being of a segment of our workforce.

[Justin Ho]

Tech worker Mia Trujillo says her job search will probably take longer than she'd like, and she's ready for the prep to be kind of intense this time around because, she says, a lot has changed in technology even in the last year. I'm Stephanie Hughes for Marketplace.

[Kai Rysdal]

I'm only a little bit kidding when I say we're going to start a pool here in the shop on how many times a week the word tariffs gets said on our air in the months and years to come. It will be, one supposes, a lot. Much of the recent news, of course, is of President Elect Trump's plans for across the board duties on imports from, for now, China, Canada and Mexico. But President Biden is still in office and he has imposed some new tariffs of his own aimed at boosting domestic solar manufacturing. On Friday, the White House announced new tariffs on solar cell manufacturers in Malaysia, Cambodia, Vietnam and Thailand, which as it happens are countries where a lot of Chinese solar manufacturers moved after they were targeted by earlier rounds of U.S. tariffs. And there are going to be implications for solar manufacturers and solar installers here. As Marketplace's Henri Epp reports, there's a.

[Justin Ho]

Tension at the heart of the federal government's policies around solar energy these days. Noah Kaufman at the center on Global Energy Policy at Columbia says, on the one hand, we want cheap solar because it will lead to faster deployment of solar, so we'll deploy clean energy faster. On the other hand, US leaders would like those solar panels and cells to be made in America. But for years it's been way cheaper to import them, which is why the US has repeatedly tried to raise import costs on Chinese solar, only to see manufacturing move elsewhere in Southeast Asia. Trade tends to be a game of whack a molecule. Mike Carr is head of the Solar Energy Manufacturers for America Coalition. He says these latest tariffs could lead foreign solar companies to just relocate again. But thanks to tax credits and other financial incentives from the Inflation Reduction act, he says, the domestic solar manufacturing industry is starting to get off the ground. We are talking about for the first time really in the history of solar, globally scaled factories being built here in the United States. But a lot of those factories are building solar panels, which are made up of cells which are mostly imported, says Alyssa Pearce, a solar supply chain analyst at Wood mackenzie. Because the tariff is on the solar cell, US Module manufacturers who are importing cells from those four countries will also face increased costs. Those costs will likely get passed along, making solar installation more expensive, says Steve Sakala, an associate professor at Tufts University. And the more expensive it is to do that, the fewer people are going to do it. And if we really want to tackle climate change, he argues, we should be deploying the most cost effective solar, even if it's imported. I'm Henry Apt for Marketplace.

[Kai Rysdal]

Asheville, North Carolina, is still picking up the pieces more than two months after Hurricane Helene hit. 103 people in that state were killed, says the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services. Tens of billions of dollars in damage. The storm knocked out water and power and Internet for weeks. Businesses closed. Something like 12,000 people filed for unemployment benefits. But amid all that destruction, economic life goes on. People still have to pay their bills, including rent. From Blue Ridge Public Radio, Laura Hackett has more on that.

[Justin Ho]

At Grace Covenant Presbyterian Church in Asheville, dozens of families are here to pick up supplies like blankets and baby food, and many are also lining up for rent assistance. Jefferson Bravo hasn't gotten a paycheck since Hurricane Helene devastated the region in late September. He's a handyman, and in the weeks after the storm he was focused on basic necessities like food and water for his family of four. Bravo says his savings are now mostly gone. A friend told him about the rent relief program, and so he applied. Today he's picking up a check for $1,100, enough to cover the month of rent he missed. We're really trying to respond to the crisis. That's church pastor Marcia Mount Shoup. A lot of our folks are service economy workers and they not work. So we are trying to take housing insecurity off the stress list. Her church is using private donations to get people rent relief as fast as possible. We're on a razor's edge. Every day. The church has given out more than $1 million in rent aid. Other groups are helping, too, but Mount Shoup says nobody can keep up. We have a stack this tall that we're working through. You know, we're behind because the amount is a lot. It's a lot. There is some relief coming from the local government, but red tape slows down the process, says Patricia Cadell, a real estate attorney at Pisgah Legal Services. It takes a lot of time to get the government funds and there's a lot more paperwork involved rather than whenever you are just asking for some resources from a local organization or a church. Caddell says evictions can happen fast. A lot of landlords are depending on their rental income as part of their income, and they have mortgages to pay, too. And if the landlord isn't able to pay the mortgage on the property, it could go into foreclosure. And an eviction doesn't necessarily mean a landlord will get paid. These landlords, they could file an eviction and remove the tenants from the property, but the likelihood of them getting that money back is little to none because the tenants just don't have it to pay. This dilemma isn't new. During the peak of the COVID pandemic, North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper signed an eviction moratorium, and both landlords and renters got hundreds of millions of dollars to help keep everyone housed. But that hasn't happened. In response to the hurricane, says State Representative Lindsay Prather, we need rental assistance desperately. The State has dedicated $1 million in rent assistance for the region, but that's split across 39 counties and is not yet available. There's a lot of talk and frustration about this in Asheville, including at Grace Covenant Church. Pastor Mount Shoup says the entire community has been hurt by this disaster. There's nobody here that wants to not pay landlords. We, we want everybody to be able to stay in business and get our economy back going. And she says if workers are pushed out of the community, that's only going to make the economy worse. In Asheville, I'm Laura Hackett for Market.

[Kai Rysdal]

This final note on the way out today, the Marketplace quote of the day goes to Federal Reserve Board Governor Christopher Waller, who in a speech today in Washington said this. And here I quote, overall, I feel like an MMA fighter who keeps getting inflation into chokeholds, waiting for it to tap out, yet it keeps slipping out of my grasp at the last minute. And he went on, let me assure you that submission is inevitable. Inflation isn't getting out of the octagon. Come on. Right. Our daily production team includes Andy Corbin, Nicholas Guillaume, Elise Hasan, Maria Hollenhorst, Sarah Leeson, Sean McHenry, and Sophia Terenzio. I'm Kai Rysdal. We will see you tomorrow, everybody.

[Justin Ho]

Foreign.

[Kai Rysdal]

This is apm.

[Justin Ho]

Hi. This is Mayumi from Long Beach, California. I love Marketplace and Kai. He really does a great job delivering important content that I benefit from. So I donated because it just seems like the natural thing to do. Join me by making a gift Marketplace [e-mail] donate.