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U.S. restaurant employment reached pre-pandemic levels in September for the first time in three-and-a-half years, according to a report released Friday, signaling a potentially broader recovery for the leisure and hospitality industry, Reuters reported. The number of Americans employed in food service increased by 61,000 in September from the prior month, Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) data released as part of the monthly U.S employment report showed. Food service and hospitality workers accounted for the majority of jobs added in the wider leisure and hospitality sector, which added 96,000 jobs last month. The gains in restaurant and bar employment last month were almost double the average of 37,000 jobs added monthly over the past year. Overall, American employers added 336,000 jobs in September, and the unemployment rate remained unchanged in September at 3.8%, the BLS reported.

General Motors Co. said a historic strike by the United Auto Workers has already cost $200 million in the first two weeks, prompting the company to secure credit as it braces for more losses, Bloomberg News reported. The union on Sept. 15 walked out of a Missouri plant that builds the company’s Chevy Colorado and GMC Canyon mid-size trucks. Sales of those two vehicles fell at least 10% in the quarter, according to GM. A week later, the strike expanded to include all of GM and Stellantis NV’s parts-distribution facilities in the U.S. A third assembly plant in Lansing, Michigan, was struck last week, stopping production of the Chevrolet Traverse and Buick Enclave crossover sport-utility vehicle models. GM on Wednesday announced that it’s setting up a $6 billion line of credit to shore up liquidity, a sign that it’s buckling in for a prolonged work stoppage. While talks with the UAW continue, GM is the only one of Detroit’s three legacy carmakers that has been targeted by the union for expanded walkouts in each of the past two weeks. Stellantis and Ford Motor Co. have each been spared once, which the union said was due to progress in their contract negotiations. GM’s total automotive liquidity stood at $38.9 billion as of June 30, so it’s not at risk of running out of money anytime soon. The Detroit-based company wants the 364-day revolving credit line, which will mature on Oct. 1 next year, to maintain operational flexibility.

The United Auto Workers strike against Detroit’s Big Three automakers is rapidly rippling outward to roil companies and workers far beyond the picket lines, the Washington Post reported. The strike to date includes only about 17 percent of the UAW’s 150,000 autoworker members, with the union ordering the rest to continue working for now. But Ford, General Motors and Stellantis have also temporarily laid off nearly 4,000 nonstriking workers whose plants depend on striking facilities — including another 400 laid off from Ford, according to a late Wednesday announcement. The spillover effects are hitting automotive suppliers hard, with some firms in Michigan and Ohio resorting to temporary layoffs and warning that bankruptcy looms if the strike carries on much longer. More than 3,000 supplier employees have been affected so far, a Washington Post tally shows, while an industry association says nearly 30 percent of its supplier members have resorted to layoffs.

IronNet, a once-promising cybersecurity startup founded by a former NSA director and funded by cyber and defense investors, has shuttered and laid off its remaining staff following its collapse, TechCrunch.com reported. In a regulatory filing published Friday, IronNet’s president and chief financial officer Cameron Pforr said the company had ceased all business activities as it prepares for chapter 7 bankruptcy, effectively liquidating the company’s remaining assets to pay its remaining debts. The Virginia-based IronNet was founded in 2014 by retired four-star general Keith Alexander, soon after he departed as the former director of the National Security Agency during the biggest leak (at the time) of government secrets by former contractor Edward Snowden. IronNet provided corporations and government agencies with technologies aimed at helping to defend against cyber threats, and using large datasets and analytics to automate threat intelligence. Its other products were designed to protect critical infrastructure.

General Motors and Ford Motor yesterday said that they are laying off another 500 workers at four Midwestern plants because of the impact on some of the facilities of the United Auto Workers strike in its 18th day, Reuters reported. Separately, the UAW confirmed it presented a new contract offer to GM on Monday. GM said it received the counterproposal "but significant gaps remain." The UAW also held a new round of bargaining with Chrysler-parent Stellantis. Ford on Monday said it was furloughing a total of 330 workers at its Chicago Stamping and Lima, Ohio Engine plants, while GM layoffs included 130 at its Parma, Ohio Metal Center and 34 at its Marion, Indiana Metal Center. The UAW on Friday struck GM's Lansing Delta Township assembly plant that makes the Buick Enclave and Chevrolet Traverse SUVs after previously striking at GM's Missouri assembly plant and 18 parts distribution centers.

First, the good news for office landlords: A post-Labor Day bump nudged return-to-office rates in mid-September to their highest level since the onset of the pandemic. Now the bad: Office attendance in big cities is still barely half of what it was in 2019, and company get-tough measures are proving largely ineffective at boosting that rate much higher, according to a Wall Street Journal reported. Indeed, a number of forces — from the prospect of more COVID-19 cases in the fall to a weakening economy — could push the return rate into reverse, property owners and city officials say. More than before, chief executives at blue-chip companies are stepping up efforts to fill their workspace. Facebook parent Meta Platforms, Amazon and JPMorgan Chase are among the companies that have recently vowed to get tougher on employees who don’t show up. In August, Meta told employees they could face disciplinary action if they regularly violate new workplace rules. But these actions haven’t yet moved the national return rate needle much, and a majority of companies remain content to allow employees to work at least part-time remotely despite the tough talk. Most employees go into offices during the middle of the week, but floors are sparsely populated on Mondays and Fridays. In Chicago, some September days had a return rate of over 66%. But it was below 30% on Fridays. In New York, it ranges from about 25% to 65%, according to Kastle Systems, which tracks security-card swipes. Overall, the average return rate in the 10 U.S. cities tracked by Kastle Systems matched the recent high of 50.4% of 2019 levels for the week ended Sept. 20, though it slid a little below half the following week.

The labor union for West Coast dockworkers filed for bankruptcy to fend off a judgment holding it liable for what a federal jury found to be illegal slowdowns and work stoppages at the Port of Portland in Oregon, WSJ Pro Bankruptcy reported. The International Longshore and Warehouse Union filed for chapter 11 protection in a San Francisco court to halt litigation brought by a former terminal operator of the Port of Portland that threatened to deplete the labor union’s cash reserves. The ILWU, which represents dockworkers at major U.S. ports in Los Angeles, Long Beach and Oakland, Calif., is fresh off ratifying a new, six-year contract for about 22,000 workers at 29 ports from California to Washington state to end a period of labor uncertainty for some of the nation’s busiest ports. The dockworkers union also has been facing a looming trial on claims that it illegally slowed down operations over several years at the Port of Portland, then operated by an affiliate of Philippines-based maritime company International Container Terminal Services Inc.

The United Automobile Workers union said yesterday that it planned to expand its strike against the big three Michigan automakers on Friday if negotiators failed to make substantial progress on new contracts, the New York Times reported. The union ordered workers to walk off the job nearly two weeks ago at three vehicle assembly plants — each owned by one of the companies, General Motors, Ford Motor and Stellantis, the parent of Chrysler and Jeep. Last Friday the union broadened the strike to include spare parts distribution centers owned by G.M. and Stellantis, saying it had made progress in its talks with Ford. U.A.W. President Shawn Fain is scheduled to update members in a video streamed live on Facebook on Friday morning. The union is seeking a substantial wage increase to make up for much smaller raises over the last decade. Each of the companies has offered to lift wages by roughly 20 percent over four years, about half of what the U.A.W. is seeking. The union has demanded other measures, including cost-of-living adjustments, the right to strike to protest plant closures, pensions for more workers and company-paid health care for retirees. The three plants that have been shut down by the strike include a G.M. factory in Wentzville, Mo., a Ford plant in Wayne, Mich., and a Stellantis complex in Toledo, Ohio. They make some of the manufacturers’ most profitable models, including the GMC Canyon pickup truck, the Ford Bronco sport-utility vehicle, and the Jeep Wrangler.

Soft Surroundings, the Creve Coeur-based retailer, has notified 181 headquarters employees that some will definitely lose their jobs while others might still keep their employment under a new owner, the St. Louis Business Journal reported. The retailer, which sells women’s clothes, beauty products, gifts and home décor, earlier this month said it plans to sell its direct-to-consumer assets to online retailer Coldwater Creek as part of a restructuring under a chapter 11 bankruptcy filing. If approved, the plan calls for shuttering the local retailer's brick-and-mortar stores. In a Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) Act notice received Monday by the state of Missouri, Soft Surroundings said that on Sept. 19 it notified all headquarters employees that if it's not successful in selling all or part of its business, it's likely the facility will close, "in which case all employees will be terminated." There also might be "additional layoffs" if the buyer doesn't take on all of the company's remaining workforce, officials told the state.

The Detroit automakers and the United Automobile Workers continued to negotiate on Saturday, company representatives said, a day after the union expanded strikes in a way that could curtail the supply of spare parts for vehicles made by General Motors and Stellantis, which owns Jeep and Ram, the New York Times reported. U.A.W. members walked off the job at G.M. and Stellantis parts distribution centers on Friday but spared Ford, saying the company had done more to meet its demands. “Our pressure on Ford is starting to pay off,” the U.A.W. told members Saturday. While there was no indication a deal with Ford was imminent, an agreement with the company could put pressure on the other two to offer similar terms and lead to a speedy end to the strike, analysts said. “The moment you get a deal with Ford that includes much or all of what the U.A.W. is looking for, that puts a lot of pressure on G.M. and Stellantis,” said Michael Duff, a professor at the Saint Louis University School of Law and a former attorney for the National Labor Relations Board. “They are putting them in a position of having to argue why they’re different, why they can’t give anything more.” A short strike would be good news for the economy. About 200,000 people work in auto manufacturing, according to the Alliance for Automotive Innovation, an industry group. That figure does not include jobs that are indirectly dependent on car making, which is several times higher.