Thursday’s business headlines

INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — Here’s a look at Thursday’s business headlines with Jane King.

Weekly jobs report released

Jobless claims were a little bit higher than expected with 200,000 people filing. It is still historically low, but we expected 182,000.

Facebook plans to reduce hiring

Facebook plans to reduce hiring as revenue growth slows and inflation concerns increase.

Meta intends to stop or slow hiring for most midlevel and senior-level roles, after holding off on adding entry-level engineers in recent weeks, according to a person familiar the company’s plans.

Recruiters have started pausing their efforts to fill certain roles.

National average residential electricity rate up

The national average residential electricity rate was up 8 percent in January from a year earlier, the biggest annual increase in more than a decade.

In Florida, Hawaii, Illinois and New York, rates are up about 15 percent, according to the energy department’s latest figures.

Plastic waste recycling rate fell last year

The rate of plastic waste recycling in the United States fell to between 5%-6% in 2021.

Some countries stopped accepting U.S. waste exports and as plastic waste generation surged to new highs, according to environmental groups.

Per capita plastic waste in the U.S. went from 60 pounds per year in 1980 to 218 pounds in 2018 – a 263% total increase.

1-800-Flowers predicts strong Mother’s Day sales

The head of 1-800-Flowers says he expects people to spend on flowers for Mother’s Day even though they are more expensive this year.

Flower prices have gone up as it costs more to hire people to work and fuel expenses to get flowers to stores are rising.