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COY WIRE: Hello, everyone.
I hope you're off a great start to this little slice of heaven
we call Friday.
The weekend is upon us, but we're gearing up for one
more epic data this week.
So let's get 'er done.
I'm Coy Wire.
This is CNN 10, but we're down to just nine
minutes and 45 seconds left.
So let's go.
We start with the latest news on the Federal Reserve System--
the Central Banking System of the United States.
The Federal Reserve, or simply, the Fed,
performs five functions to help the US
economy operate optimally and keep
the US financial system stable.
But one of its most important functions
is analyzing financial markers in the US
like unemployment rates and inflation.
Inflation, which is an increase in the general price
of goods and services, has been high
for quite some time in America.
And despite its attempts to bring it down,
the Fed is seemingly having a really tough
time getting it to calm down.
One of the ways the Fed can bring inflation down
is to raise interest rates, making
it more expensive for people and businesses to borrow money.
So it essentially deters people from spending.
That, in theory, then brings the price of those goods
and services back down.
So with inflation still high, the Fed is considering raising
interest rates yet again.
And that would impact a lot of us,
and not just in the piggy bank.
Listen to this exchange between Senator Elizabeth Warren
and the Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell
when Warren asks Powell what could happen if they raised
those interest rates again.
ELIZABETH WARREN: Chair Powell, if you hit your projections,
do you know how many people who are currently working,
going about their lives, will lose their jobs?
JEROME POWELL: I don't--
I don't have that number in front of me.
I will say--
ELIZABETH WARREN: It's just a math problem.
JEROME POWELL: It's not an intended consequence.
ELIZABETH WARREN: Well, but it is.
And it's in your report.
And that would be about two million people
who would lose their jobs.
If you could speak directly to the two million
hardworking people who have decent jobs today,
who you're planning to get fired over the next year,
what would you say to them?
JEROME POWELL: I would explain to people
more broadly that inflation is extremely high.
And it's hurting the working people of this country badly.
COY WIRE: All right.
More now from our chief business correspondent
Christine Romans who does a great job of explaining how
interest rates impact spending and borrowing
in everyday households.
CHRISTINE ROMANS: This means something for every American
here, whether you're talking about your job,
or you're talking about all these ways
that higher interest rates are going to affect you.
And I want to just look at the mortgage market, for example.
30-year fixed rate mortgages are indirectly
tied to these Federal Reserve rate hikes.
And you've already seen mortgage rates rising here.
You're paying about $700 more a month in interest
on a typical mortgage today--
a new mortgage today-- than you would have if you had
gotten that mortgage last year.
On credit card interest rates-- those are at record highs here.
19% for a typical credit card interest
rate-- this bears repeating, you guys.
If you are putting money on a card and not paying it off,
you will spend a long time and a lot of money
to get out from underneath that debt.
So that's a really important part here too.
And now, in savings rates, you're seeing a little bit
money-- eventually, you might get a little bit more
by having your money in a certificate of deposit
or in a savings account.
That has lagged, I'm going to say, sadly.
But eventually, saving money because of these higher rates
could be a little more advantageous.
It's just not happening quite yet.
But you will feel higher rates in just about everything.
And the Fed is signaling higher rates for longer here.
And that's, really, one of the worries here.
The Fed only has that one big tool and that is
raising those interest rates.
They've done it eight times.
How come inflation is still above 6%?
How come the job market is still so strong?
How come consumers are still so flush with cash
and still spending so robustly?
You have underlying strength in this economy.
That means the Fed has to move harder
to get these interest rates higher so that they
can cool down the economy.
And that could throw the economy into a recession.
It's a very, very dangerous and delicate
balance that the Federal Reserve is trying to do.
And I think what we heard from the Fed chief yesterday
is that, this economy has been stronger than they thought.
It really has been.
And we're going to hear a lot more information
over the next week to 10 days that could, I think,
really rattle markets and rattle that confidence
in whether the Fed has done the right thing at the right time
here.
COY WIRE: OK, this weekend, most clocks in the US
will spring forward for the start of daylight saving time.
That means Sunday, March 12th at 2:00
AM, clocks in most US states will suddenly jump to 3:00 AM.
And not everyone's a fan of time changes, especially
when we lose an hour of sleep.
And there's this push by some to end daylight saving altogether.
The Sunshine Protection Act, a bill
aimed at eliminating those changing clocks in the US,
was passed in the Senate last year
by unanimous consent from both Republicans and Democrats.
But then it stalled in the House of Representatives.
This topic remains controversial.
Some believe making daylight saving time permanent would
help us avoid losing sleep and would
lead to brighter afternoons, making people more productive,
rested, and happier.
But some scientists suggest that bright mornings help people
wake up, be more alert, and that the dark nights
allow the body to trigger hormones that help us sleep.
Where do you stand?
Here's CNN meteorologist Jennifer Gray
who has more on the origins of the tradition.
JENNIFER GRAY: So why don't we change
the clocks ahead one hour in the spring
and back one hour in the fall?
Well, it's actually to reduce the electricity consumption by
extending the daylight hours.
In the US, we change our clocks at 2:00 AM on the second Sunday
in March.
That begins daylight saving time.
That's when we spring ahead.
On the first Sunday in November, we change our clocks at 2:00 AM
again.
That's actually just going back to standard time.
Believe it or not, this started with an idea
from Benjamin Franklin.
Franklin did write an essay suggesting that people could
use less candles if they got up early
and made better use of daylight.
In 1918, the Standard Time Act established
time zones and daylight saving time,
but not all states participate.
To this day, most of Arizona and all of Hawaii
do not change their clocks.
Over 70 countries across the world
observe daylight saving time with notable exceptions
of China and Japan.
In 2007, we actually changed the date
of when we set our clocks back an hour to the first week
in November.
This helped protect trick or treaters by giving
them an extra hour of daylight.
One of the other lines of thinking
was that we would have a better voter
turnout on election years.
Experts say, each time you change your clocks,
it's always a good idea to change those batteries
in your smoke detector, and always
look forward to fall when you get that extra hour of sleep.
COY WIRE: 10 second trivia--
what is the second highest mountain on Earth?
Mount Kilimanjaro, Denali, K2, or Matterhorn?
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Asia's K2 has a peak of over 28,000 feet,
making it less than 1,000 feet shorter than Mount Everest.
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And for today's story, getting that 10 out of 10, we're
heading to K2, widely considered--
did you know-- the most dangerous
mountain in the world.
But why climb when you can float to it?
Two pilots-- Horacio Llorens and Tom de Dorlodot
have become the first people to reach K2 by paragliding to it.
They did this back in July by spending four weeks
on a glacier in Kashmir, performing
several test flights toward the mountain to plot their course.
Eventually, they soared all the way up the face of the mountain
to nearly 25,000 feet.
One of the biggest challenges, though--
battling the cold weather.
It was colder than the polar bear's toenails
up there, hitting minus 30 at times.
And now onto my favorite part of the day.
We have a special shout out for Thomas Street Middle
School in Toronto, Canada.
We see you.
Keep in touch over the weekend.
I'm @coywire on Insta, Snapchat, and TikTok.
We're CNN 10 on YouTube.
I hope that you and everyone watching around the world
have a wonderful weekend.
Remember, you are more powerful than you know.
I'm Coy Wire.
We are CNN 10.
It's been a blessing to spend this week with you.
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