It’s jobs day. Is the labor market finally cooling? We’ll have a special edition of this newsletter after the Labor Department releases its September employment report. First, this is Jeff Sparshott with the latest on the economy.

• Follow our main jobs-day story here and our live markets coverage here.

American workers quit 4.2 million jobs in August, but one type of employee appears to be getting cold feet about switching employers or quitting to take a career timeout: office workers. People with jobs classified as professional and business services, including those who work in occupations such as accounting, engineering, office administration, legal services and consulting, quit in far fewer numbers in August than they had in previous months, according to the latest federal data. Worries about slowdowns may temper workers’ confidence about how quickly they could find a new role, Kathryn Dill reports.

The 12% drop to 682,000 resignations in the professional sector was the biggest single-month decline since April 2020, Labor Department data show. At the same time, resignations soared among lower-wage workers: The 956,000 August resignations in leisure and hospitality are the most recorded in a single month, according to records that go back to 2000.

U.S. nonfarm payrolls are expected to increase by 275,000 in September and the unemployment rate is forecast to hold steady at 3.7%. Follow our coverage here. (8:30 a.m. ET)

U.S. wholesale inventories for August are expected to increase 1.2% from the prior month. (10 a.m. ET)

The Federal Reserve releases its August consumer credit report at 3 p.m. ET.

The Baker Hughes rig count is out at 1 p.m. ET.

Federal Reserve speakers: New York's John Williams on the economy and monetary policy at 10 a.m. ET, Minneapolis's Neel Kashkari on agriculture, food and inflation at 11 a.m. ET (livestream), and Atlanta's Raphael Bostic on Atlanta's wealth gap at 12 p.m. ET.

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New applications for unemployment benefits rose last week in the latest sign of a cooling labor market, although they remained close to prepandemic lows. Initial jobless claims, a proxy for layoffs, increased to a seasonally adjusted 219,000 last week from 190,000 the week before, the Labor Department said Thursday. That was the highest level since late August but close to the 2019 average of 218,000, Harriet Torry reports.

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A lot of Americans think they are through with Covid-19. But Covid isn’t yet through with them. Newly released figures from the Census Bureau, based on surveys conducted over a 13-day span in the middle of last month, show that an estimated two million people were out of work because they were either sick with Covid or caring for someone who was. That was down from 2.5 million in a survey conducted in late July and early August, but is still a lot of people. For the job market, that matters. Even with the Labor Department reporting this week that there was a drop in job openings last month, there are still a ton of vacancies that employers are trying to fill. Sick job seekers, and sick human-resources officers, makes hiring harder. It also matters for workplace productivity—having a rotating cast of employees out sick makes it harder to get things done. While it is reasonable to hope that Covid’s drag on the labor market will lessen over time, it might never entirely go away, Justin Lahart writes.

Federal Reserve officials on Thursday said stubborn inflation justified continued interest-rate increases. Fed governor Lisa Cook said the central bank will need to keep rates at restrictive levels “until we are confident that inflation is firmly on the path toward our 2% goal.” Fed governor Christopher Waller, speaking separately, said he still expects Fed officials to raise rates into early next year, even though they were starting to see signs of progress in their efforts to slow the economy to bring down inflation, Nick Timiraos reports.

OPEC’s decision to slash oil production has the U.S. considering responses that could include measures aimed at breaking the cartel’s hold on markets or limiting U.S. oil exports should shortages emerge. The cutback by the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and its Russia-led allies is the latest dilemma for President Biden, who has sought to transition the U.S. away from fossil fuels while at the same time keeping consumer prices in check. A long fall in gasoline prices has started to reverse, and this week’s OPEC decision to cut oil production by 2 million barrels a day threatens to push prices higher again just weeks before the Nov. 8 midterm elections, Timothy Puko and Benoît Morenne report.

• Chevron Faces Tough Job Restarting Venezuela’s Damaged Oil Fields (Read)

German factory output fell in August, driven by cutbacks in energy-intensive industries as costs surged following reductions in the supply of natural gas from Russia. With separate figures showing a sharp drop in new orders during the month, and retail sales also falling, the outlook is for further declines in one of the world’s industrial powerhouses as the global economic damage caused by the Kremlin’s decision to invade Ukraine continues to mount, Paul Hannon reports.

• EU Leaders Set to Clash Over Energy Prices at Prague Gathering (Read)

• Nord Stream Pipeline Probe Adds Weight to Sabotage Suspicions (Read)

The head of the International Monetary Fund said that the institution expects slower global economic growth next year and that policy makers must do more to reduce inflation to prevent long-lasting harm. The IMF will lower its 2023 growth forecast from its earlier estimate of 2.9% in a report to be released next week, said the fund’s Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva in a speech Thursday. She didn’t specify the new estimate, but said it would reflect a darkening outlook as soaring inflation cuts into people’s ability to spend. The IMF expects a global economic output loss of about $4 trillion between now and 2026, representing the size of the German economy, Yuka Hayashi reports.

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Real Time Economics comes to you from WSJ reporters and editors around the world. Today's issue was curated and edited by Jeff Sparshott (@jeffsparshott) and Greg Ip (@greg_ip) in Washington, D.C., and James Hookway (@JamesHookway) in London.

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