US economic worries mount as Trump implements tariffs, cuts workforce and freezes spending

President Donald Trump walks up the stairs of Air Force One at Joint Base Andrews, Md., Friday, March 7, 2025. Credit: AP/Luis M. Alvarez
With his flurry of tariffs, government layoffs and spending freezes, there are growing worries President Donald Trump may be doing more to harm the U.S. economy than to fix it.
The labor market remains healthy with a 4.1% unemployment rate and 151,000 jobs added in February, and Trump likes to point to investment commitments by Apple and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company to show that he's delivering results.
But Friday's employment report also found that the number of people stuck working part-time because of economic circumstances jumped by 460,000 last month. In the leisure and hospitality sectors that reflect consumers having extra money to spend, 16,000 jobs were lost. And the federal government reduced its payrolls by 10,000 in a potential harbinger of the alarm being sounded by the stock market, consumer confidence and other measures of where the economy is headed.
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