Scott Horsley

Two members of the committee wanted to stand pat, while a third voted for a supersized half-point rate cut.

The central banks caught between worries about a softening job market, with unemployment climbing to 4.6 percent, and inflation that remains stubbornly above the Fed's 2 percent target.

Scott Horsley, NPR News, Washington.

2025 has been a good year for the stock market.

With just three trading days left this year, all the major indexes are up by double digits.

Crude oil prices rose more than a dollar a barrel, but a barrel of West Texas oil is still selling for less than $60, and gasoline prices continue to fall.

AAA says the average price of regular gas nationwide is now $2.83 a gallon.

December's gas prices were the lowest since 2020 during the pandemic.

The founder of Lululemon has launched a hostile effort to reshape the company's board of directors.

Founder Chip Wilson is still one of the company's biggest shareholders.

The value of those shares has fallen sharply this year, and Lululemon is on the lookout for a new CEO.

Scott Horsley, NPR News, Washington.

Even if prices aren't going up as fast as they once were, though, they're generally not coming down.

And that remains a headache for a lot of family budgets, as well as a political problem for the White House.

President Trump campaigned with a promise to lower prices, and his economic approval rating has dropped to just 36 percent in the latest NPR-PBS News-Marist poll.

The Labor Department says consumer prices in November were up 2.7 percent from a year ago.

That's a smaller annual increase than reported in September and cooler inflation than forecasters had expected.

Analysts cautioned, however, the numbers may have been skewed somewhat by the government shutdown, which prevented federal workers from conducting their usual price checks in October.

Prices for electricity and natural gas are up sharply from a year ago, which is likely to raise winter heating bills.

The report comes as polls show Americans are broadly concerned about the high cost of living.