Employers freeze hiring, US clash over Medicaid-ICE data, City’s post-Guardiola era begins

US labour-market data pointed to a marked slowdown in hiring rather than a universal hiring freeze. Employers cut 23,000 jobs in July, while the number of vacancies fell to 7.36 million in June; private-sector payroll growth was also weak. Analysts described a low-hire, low-fire market: layoffs remained relatively limited, but firms appeared cautious about adding staff amid economic uncertainty. The figures should not be read as proof that every employer has stopped recruiting, since hiring varied substantially by sector and some surveys still reported recruitment plans.

A separate US dispute concerned the use of Medicaid enrollee information by immigration authorities. A federal court had permitted limited sharing of basic identifying information about people not lawfully resident in the country, while barring the transfer of detailed medical information and imposing conditions on the policy. States and privacy advocates continued to challenge the arrangements, particularly after reports that ICE had passed data it was not permitted to hold to Palantir. In football, Manchester City’s first competitive match following Pep Guardiola’s decade in charge ended in a 3–0 Community Shield defeat to Arsenal under new manager Enzo Maresca, providing an early, but not decisive, test for the club’s new era.