What if government data becomes untrustworthy?
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We got some data, economic, anecdotal, and otherwise. We got some statistics and changes there too. And we got another day in Utah from American Public Media.

This is Market Class.

We got some survey results this morning on what supply chain managers are thinking about everything from transportation to inventory management. And last, but definitely not least, warehousing. The Logistics Managers Index is what we're talking about. And it finds warehouse utilization has been growing this year as importers stockpile their stuff ahead of the Trump tariffs. Marketplace's Justin Ho starts us off.

Ocotillo Capital Partners in San Antonio, Texas, builds warehouses, mostly to serve cross-border trade. Traditionally, it's 99 percent northbound product that was made in Mexico and is being shipped to the U.S. side to then be distributed internationally.

Nick Dyer, the firm's principal, says his warehouses are seeing plenty of demand from existing clients trying to get product over the border ahead of any new tariffs. I think that was generally users that were filling any empty warehouse space that they already leased. But Dyer says clients haven't been that interested in renting more warehouse space because leases are typically three to five years long and clients are nervous about making that kind of commitment.

As a result, Dyer is holding off on a new warehousing project he had in the works. For us, we have to have that confidence that the tenants are going to be there after we've built the building and when we complete it, you know, 10, 12 months from now. Warehousing construction is down more than 20 percent from a couple years ago, according to the Census Bureau.

Thomas Goldsby is a professor of supply chain management at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. I think that warehouse operators have realized, well, we can try to build out an anticipation of what 2028 might look like, or we could just enjoy very high utilization, low vacancy rates, and let that final variable price come into play.

The Logistics Managers Index found that warehousing prices have been growing all year. Goldsby says that's another cost that'll find its way to consumers. I'm

I'm Justin Ho for Marketplace. We're going to get the beige book tomorrow. The Fed's report of anecdotal economic data comes out eight times a year. There is always interesting stuff in there, but a new analysis from the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas shows that since the pandemic, that anecdotal reporting has painted a more muted picture of economic growth than the hard data does. So given the aforementioned chaos in uncertain economic times like these,

What do you like, hard data or soft? Marketplace's Elizabeth Troval has this one.

GDP, unemployment, hard data is great at measuring the economy behind us. But Drake University's Sean Sevier says when we use it to make decisions about the future economy... It's almost like you're trying to drive the car by looking in a rearview mirror. So you can only see what happened in the past. You're trying to figure out what's on the road right now and what's on the road ahead of you. But you're looking in your rearview mirror to figure out, is your turn coming up?

That's where anecdotal information can be useful. Looking ahead, especially when economic conditions are changing, says Dallas Fed economist Leila Asani. Because when the economy is at a turning point, the anecdotal data often will signal those changes before you see it in the hard data. It's forward looking. It's available more frequently and earlier. Tadevick Sekbosian with Texas A&M says anecdotal data can be useful for predicting the future economy.

but it's also less quantifiable, objective, and reliable. It also is prone to other fallacies of human mind.

Right. That. So which is better? Rice University's John Diamond says, especially in shaky times like today, we really shouldn't have to choose. Hard data is bad because it's usually looking back. It can often, you know, lead you down the wrong path. But yet the uncertainty also makes small data more unreliable. He says in uncertain times, economists have to lean on both.

I'm Elizabeth Troval for Marketplace. On Wall Street today, traders apparently liked what they heard about job openings in this economy. They were up in April. So two were the major indices. Today, we will have the details when we do the numbers.

The technical appendix to the proposed fiscal year 2026 budget from the President of the United States runs 1,224 pages all in. So there is, as you might imagine, a lot in there. Of particular interest to us is a passage to be found on page 192, which reads in full, the President's budget proposes to reorganize the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Bureau of Economic Analysis, and the Census Bureau at the Department of Commerce. Now,

Obviously, there's not a lot of detail to be had in that one sentence. But if that consolidation does happen, it would be one of the biggest changes to the federal statistics system in decades. So we decided the conversation was in order. Laura Veldkamp is a professor of economics and finance at Columbia Business School. Welcome to the program. Thanks for coming on. Thank you. Happy to be here. So everybody just heard me read that little clause from the technical appendix. You certainly have seen it before. What did you think when you first heard about it?

This had me a little bit worried. This feels like a decrease in the amount of data collection from federal agencies in a way that could impact us in years to come. When you say a little bit worried, do you mean a little bit worried or do you mean a little bit worried?

I'd say pretty worried. Like a lot of governments that are trying to do not such good economic policy often try to meddle with the statistics around the same time. They're making pretty bad decisions with respect to the economy. So this has me pretty

I know what it would mean for me in my professional life if we could not trust the statistics coming out of the United States government. We would not be able to do what it is that we do, which is raise the economic intelligence of the American public. What would it mean for businesses and the gears of this economy?

So businesses really rely on real-time data to help them understand things like, should I be hiring more workers? Should I be planning a new investment or opening a new plant at this point? In countries and times when those data have been meddled with in various ways, companies stop using them and they end up a lot more uncertain. And so they make more mistakes and they have more waste and there's more cost and less efficiency.

It ends up being a real drag on the economy. You know, we have talked about on this program before private data and high frequency data as a way to supplement the government's data. Cannot replace it, though, right? All those all those private indicators.

Definitely not. The government has access to a lot of data that private firms and individuals don't. And so all these agencies that can see things like your tax records or that can mandate that companies report things to us in ways that a private company could never get other companies to reveal to them. So they have this tool to collect and aggregate lots more data.

Taking the government at its word here that they want to make data collection more efficient and improve services to the American taxpayer. Do you buy that at all?

No. The problem is that if you reduce data collection now, you'll lose that data forever. Right. We use data from the past to inform decisions about today. And so if we fail to collect some data today, we can never go back and go take a look again at what happened. So this is a really crucial sector of the economy. And it's really not a wise place to make budget cuts. With the caveat that this is a proposal, right, and there's a lot that's going to happen between now and the time this bill gets signed.

Um, what are you looking for next in terms of red flags, warnings, cautions, things that are just make the hair on the back of your neck stand up?

If measuring inflation was all in the hands of one small group of people, I'd be pretty worried. See, having multiple agencies measure something makes data manipulation pretty difficult. It's kind of like checks and balances in government, right? And so if politicians were to pressure one agency to try to release better statistics, like lower inflation numbers, it would be inconsistent with the numbers that came out from other agencies. And it would raise red flags to us and say, something's wrong here. This doesn't look right.

But if you don't have these multiple agencies to cross-check against each other, it's much easier to pressure just one group to release some statistics that are in your favor. And I think at this point, inflation is the most likely candidate for manipulation. I'd be naive not to point out here that checks and balances in the current federal government seem not to be happening.

That's true, but I'll take them where I can get them. At least we've got some left in the data agencies as currently configured. Laura Veldkamp at Columbia Business School. Professor, thanks for your time, ma'am. I appreciate it. My pleasure. Thank you. Coming up. The last four weeks, it's been hot. He is not talking temperatures, gang. But first, let's do the numbers.

Dow Industrials up 214 points today, a half percent, 42,519 for the blue chips. The Nasdaq gained 156 points, eight-tenths percent, 19,398. S&P 500 up 34 points, six-tenths percent, 59 and 70 there. A lot of anxiety about prices and tariffs among consumers. You and me. Met the Dollar General posted record sales this past quarter. Shares up 15 percent. Rival Dollar Tree reports earnings tomorrow. Bonds up

Up just a touch. Yield on the 10-year Tino rose to 4.45%. You're listening to Marketplace. This Marketplace podcast is supported by Greenlight. As a listener of Marketplace, you're likely already building smart money habits for you and your family, trying to instill important lessons on saving and spending and the economy overall and the younger folks in your life. But what about the older generation? Your parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles? As they age, they may need more support in managing their finances too.

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So here's a stat you might not have heard before. The state of Utah ranks near the top for new business applications per resident, about 180 per 10,000 people last year. And during our reporting in Utah County for our series, The Age of Work, we visited a building that kind of tells you everything you need to know about the relationship between culture and entrepreneurship and the economy here. I hub. I hub. I hub. I hub.

ADP Chief Economist Neela Richardson and I are standing in the lobby of an office building in Provo. It's the county seat. We've come to Utah County because ADP Research says it's got one of the youngest labor forces in the country. Right now, we're about a half a mile from the BYU campus, just up Freedom Boulevard. Hi, friends. Hey, how are you? Great. How are you? I'm Kai. Nice to see you. Kai. Corbin Church. Pleasure to meet you. Hi, Corbin. I'm Neela. Nice to meet you. Nice to meet you. Pleasure. Welcome to iHub. Thank you so much. Nice to have you with us. Welcome to Provo.

iHub is a nonprofit startup incubator that Corbin Church started just over a year ago. Tell us before we get really busy who you are and why you decided to start this. I'm a lifelong entrepreneur and iHub is my opportunity to give back.

Corbin started his first business at 13. It was a snow cone shack. He has started and sold a bunch of businesses over the years, windows and doors, women's fashion, shipping. He's also an adjunct professor at BYU, teaches entrepreneurship there. We're talking entrepreneurship in Utah County because as the American labor force gets older, we are losing the thing that has helped power this economy for the past hundred years, prime aged workers.

Utah County, with its unusually young labor force, looks different than the rest of the country. And even though there are things about the economy here that just can't be replicated elsewhere, there are lessons to be learned from Utah County's economy. We just walked into what's called the Founders Floor at iHub.

There are over 200 businesses working on this floor. All of which have their own little space with signage. Yep. Right. So lots of desks, lots of chairs and people, signs of all these different businesses. These are entrepreneurs working closely. There are no walls in this building except for the conference rooms. And the idea is collaboration.

Can you talk a little bit about the types of businesses that we're seeing? So I see Breath of Life, Sundial. Killer Spice, Serenity Soaps. You got it. So we are, as an incubator, we are industry agnostic. You have tech businesses, you have medical businesses, you have consumer good businesses. In here, you'll see everything.

About a third of the businesses that work here are consumer-facing. Another third make software. The rest are things like services and hardware. What is it about Provo and the demographics of this place that make it

so entrepreneurial and thus provide you a business model to do this. Yeah, it is an entrepreneurial Mecca. And what we have here is a subset of you guys have all had your doors knocked on by a pair of guys or a pair of gals with a white shirt and a black name badge. Those are LDS missionaries. At 18 and 19 years old, these people are going out in the world and they're doing something really difficult. I did it. I went to Sendai, Japan when I was 19 years old.

most difficult two years of my life. And then the other thing we have here that I'm going to add to this LDS missionary experience is summer sales associates. Remember Tyler Jackson, the real estate agent we talked to yesterday? He mentioned summer sales too as a way that young would-be homebuyers that he works with can make enough money to make a down payment while they are still in college. All these companies who have people knocking on your door during the summer, who do they want knocking on your door?

Return missionaries. And so they come here and they recruit their sales forces from here. Now, instead of selling Jesus, you're selling pest control or whatever. Those two exercises breed attributes of exceptional sales abilities, a resilience.

In its promotion materials, iHub sends to potential sponsors. They actually advertise rejection and sales experience from those missions as an attribute of the local workforce. You knock on a door, people are rude to you. When you get bit by a dog, you still have to keep knocking doors. Well, I want those people as entrepreneurs. Pick some of these folks that we can talk to. All right, let's do it. This will be fun. Hunter, may we interrupt you? Yes.

Hi, I'm Neela. Nice to meet you. Hi, Hunter. Kai Rizdal. Nice to see you. How are you? Nice to see you. Hunter Fields is 25. He and two other BYU graduates started a company called Launch late last year. It's a software platform for small businesses. He's got about 20 employees. That includes salespeople. How important is Provo and the people who live here to you being able to build this company? I'd say it's really important. So between Provo and Orem area right here, we've got like 60,000 college students.

And a lot of them have spent time in door-to-door sales. And there's a lot of entrepreneurial spirit here where people like the idea of being with a startup and working to build something and grow and understand that sales is a great opportunity. So it provides us access to a lot of people that are high caliber that are willing to work really hard.

A lot of these iHub founders and employees are still juggling school. College is kind of a bubble period. Yes, it is. And you work with a lot of college students. But the real economy makes a big difference to the entrepreneur. And we've seen a lot of macro uncertainty. How much of the conversations and the mentorship discussions are about the economy? The last four weeks, it's been hot. What's the biggest topic?

Where else can I manufacture my product? I can't afford China anymore. We were there the first week of May, before Trump's 90-day tariff pause with China. So rates at that time, upwards of 145%. One of my female entrepreneurs, she runs a company called House of Foils. And she wrote a check the other day for her duties for $70,000. That came out of her pocket.

That impacted her and her bottom line. It didn't faze China. But that's been the hot topic the past four weeks is where else can I manufacture my products? Some others, they'll be able to source near trade in Mexico or elsewhere. But for them, it's a product that has to be made in China. So America is not an option, Mr. Trump. It doesn't exist.

Otherwise, economically, we haven't seen that trickle down to our level, a slowdown in the economy. But that would be a big fear for entrepreneurs. What would you tell a young person who's facing exactly that scenario? Higher prices, perhaps a slowdown in the economy?

What would you tell them? What's the advice? You've got to keep going forward. The economy continues to go like this. We have our peaks and we have our valleys. It's never going to stop. The best advice is frugality. Frugality will get you through those tough times. We stopped at a couple more desks past a startup that sells flavor packets to add to soda. There was a beekeeping business run by twin brothers. Corbin? Yes? So you look around here? Yeah.

It's a lot of dudes, man. It is. You know, that's interesting. We have a good number in here, but not enough. Yeah. And my class is about 50-50. Why do so many men come out starting businesses and my ladies don't? I have many who do, and they're awesome.

About 80% of IHUB's founders are male. And that's not just an IHUB issue. According to the census, the women's labor force participation rate in Utah falls at age 25, right around the time a lot of women start having children. Let me ask you the cultural question, though, right? How much of that is the LDS tradition and culture of women in their place in society and men in their place? Yeah.

That's tough for me to answer. I don't know that it plays a big role. I think this is nationwide. I think this is bigger than that. It could play a role because in the LDS culture, there's a lot of women who choose their profession to be homemaker. I want to raise my children. And for those who do, you go because that's an admirable choice.

But a lot of those women run businesses from home. That bit right there, women running businesses from home, is where the intersection of culture and entrepreneurship here get kind of complicated. We were planning on just talking to Corbin and the young entrepreneurs at iHub that morning. But on the way out, we noticed a bunch of moms with babies and toddlers going to a different part of the building. It's like, Mommy, scary man. Scary man.

They were headed for a huge room off the lobby that iHub uses for events. That day, it was hosting a maker's market. I make jewelry. That's me. I started that before my oldest was born, so about 10 years ago.

That's Becky Bingham. In addition to selling her jewelry, she's a co-owner of this market with her brother Richard. This is called the Beehive Bazaar. We have been in Provo for 21 years. And essentially we feature local artisans who they have handmade goods, jewelry, clothing, food, etc. So it's the corollary to iHub, right? They do, you know, all kinds of different industries. You guys do makers and crafters and you incubate them, basically. Yeah, exactly. Exactly.

About 65 makers were selling their wares at the Beehive Bazaar the week we visited. How's business, as it were? It's been really good. Like Richard said, we've been operating for 21 years. We started in someone's house and have slowly grown over the years and moved all around Provo. We've worked towards purchasing our own building that will house the market, starting hopefully at the end of this year. No, thank you.

This business is well ahead of a lot of the startups at iHub. They've been operating for two decades, and they're moving into a 4,000-square-foot building where they're hoping to also host weddings and other events. We stopped in front of another jewelry vendor's table. The owner wasn't there.

But her picture was. Can you tell us a little bit about the women who typically form the businesses here? I see this great picture of a family. It's obviously a mother who is making the story, but could you say a little more about that? Yeah, I mean, I don't think there's any one type of woman that's, you know, starting her own kind of business, but we do see a lot of women that are stay-at-home moms that are looking to supplement their family's income or they've, you know, they're a creative person and they have a lot of really great ideas and this is a way...

to showcase them. Whether it's a software startup like Hunter Fields is running at iHub or a jewelry business like the Crafters at the Beehive Bazaar, people are starting businesses all over this county. The community celebrates that and supports it, which is what makes the economy here work.

One thing that we do at our show, you can see back there, we have a young crafter section, so we really like to foster future crafters and future makers. So my own kids have participated, and it's a great chance for parents to teach them about craftsmanship.

you know, expenses and revenue and profit margins and those kinds of things. So it's kind of a mini, a mini me incubator over there. So how young are your youngest crafters or what's the average age? They range, I would say as young as four and five, which is hilarious and darling. And then we go up to 17. So,

Had I known that Play-Doh could be like a business opportunity when I was four, my trajectory would have been very different. Oh, same. We had a four-year-old who made bracelets and her business name was Rainbow Sparkle Unicorn, I think. Really darn good. And she did well. She sold a lot of bracelets. Yeah. Utah County training some of its next-gen founders already at the age of four. Coming up tomorrow on our series, The Age of Work, how that culture scales up. ♪

This final note on the way out today. This afternoon, the president signed the order he promised last Friday, increasing steel and aluminum tariffs to 50 percent. That is a 50 percent tax on all steel and aluminum coming into this country just because the president said so.

Our digital and on-demand team includes Jordan Mangy, Dylan Mietenen, Janet Nguyen, Olga Oxman, Virginia K. Smith, and Tony Wagner. Francesca Levy is the executive director of digital and on-demand. And I'm Kai Risdahl. We will see you tomorrow, everybody. This is APM.

This Old House has been America's most trusted source for all things DIY and home improvement for decades. And now we're on the radio and on demand. I think you're breaking into this wall regardless. I was hoping you wouldn't say that. I need to go and get some whiskey, I think. I would get the whiskey for sure. Subscribe to This Old House Radio Hour from LAist Studios, wherever you get your podcasts.