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The second “Task Team” meeting of the Organization of Economic Cooperation & Development (OECD) formed to deliberate policy on end-of-life plastics trade within the OECD block of countries was held in Paris on December 2-4, but little progress was made. The OECD is described by many as the “rich countries club” – and it is...

The start of the New Year give us the opportunity to look back where we’ve been and chart out where we hope to be this time next year. Over the past few weeks, the Plastics Division has been active looking at and proposing revisions to policies that impact plastics recycling. The first on our list...

Reuters reports “Commodity traders and analysts are struggling to map out how China will reach the eye-popping amounts it is committing to buy from the United States under Phase 1 of their trade deal.” In New York, COMEX copper futures traded as high as $2.875 per pound today while NYMEX crude oil futures rose 0.5%...

The consensus forecast is that industrial production growth slowed to 0.1% in December from 1.1% in November, while the expectation is for mixed numbers on housing starts & building permits. On the trade front, the U.S. and China are expected to sign a “phase-one” trade deal on Wednesday, while China releases new data on GDP,...

Employment Total U.S. nonfarm payroll employment increased by 145,000 in December 2019.  For the entire year, 2.1 million workers were added to payrolls. The year before, 2018, 2.68 million workers were added to the workforce. The manufacturing sector realized a loss of 12,000 jobs in December 2019.  But for the entire year, 46,000 manufacturing jobs...