Delhi votes in test for Modi

Narendra Modi has personally campaigned on behalf of Bedi

Polling stations have opened in Delhi for state elections billed as the first real test of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi's popularity.
Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has fielded former policewoman Kiran Bedi as its pick for chief minister.
But polls suggest she is likely to lose to Arvind Kejriwal, an anti-corruption activist who heads his own party.
Modi won convincingly in last summer's general election, and has ridden a wave of popularity ever since.
Over 13 million people are eligible to vote at 12,000 polling centres in the state assembly elections.
Security is tight and more than 55,000 police and paramilitary have been deployed.
Official results for the 70-member state assembly are due on Tuesday.

Chief minister contenders: Arvind Kejriwal and Kiran Bedi
•    Both Kejriwal and Bedi are former civil servants - he worked in the revenue department while she was India's first woman police officer
•    Both won the prestigious Ramon Magsaysay award - Kejriwal for fighting corruption and Ms Bedi for prison reform
•    Both campaigned with anti-corruption activist Anna Hazare during his 2011 protest
In recent months, the BJP won a string of state assembly elections.
But correspondents say a tough fight awaits them in Delhi, where several surveys have put Kejriwal's Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) ahead of the others.
The Congress party, which ran the Indian capital for 15 years until 2013, is predicted to come a distant third.
Delhi has been without a government since Kejriwal, the former chief minister, resigned last February, angered that his anti-corruption bill was blocked.
Since then the state has been governed directly by the federal authorities.
Bedi and Kejriwal worked together during the anti-corruption campaign, led by social activist Anna Hazare, but the two have since developed an intense rivalry.
During weeks of hectic campaigning in Delhi, both candidates promised to bring in good governance, end corruption and make Delhi safe for women.
In the previous Delhi election held in December 2013, the BJP won the most seats but fell short of a majority, leaving the AAP - which came second - to form a coalition with the Congress party.
Kejriwal resigned on 14 February after 49 days in office, however, after opposition politicians blocked a bill that would have created an independent body with the power to investigate politicians and civil servants suspected of corruption. Delhi election in numbers
•    13.3 million voters; 12,083 polling stations
•    70 seats; 673 candidates, 63 of whom are women
•    65,791 election workers on duty

Job and Wage Gains as Americans Rejoin the Work Force

Job and Wage Gains as Americans Rejoin the Work Force

A worker on the roof of a construction project in Montclair

The economy barreled through the last three months with strong momentum, the Labor Department said Friday, as American employers added 257,000 jobs in January, wage growth rebounded and more people went looking for work in an improving labor market.

With new figures on the last two months of the year, 2014 turned out to be the strongest year for job gains since 1999. The government revised upward the already healthy figures for payroll gains in November and December, increasing their estimate by 147,000. All told, the economy added, on average, 260,000 jobs a month over the course of the year.

“This is the best employment report we’ve had in a long time,” said Guy Berger, United States economist at RBS. “The labor market looks like it’s in really good shape as we head into 2015.”

The Labor Department said on Friday that the unemployment rate inched up to 5.7 percent, from 5.6 percent. But even that apparent setback was mostly good news, as it was primarily because more Americans said they were encouraged enough by their job prospects to actively look for work.

Average hourly earnings rose 0.5 percent in January, the biggest monthly gain in more than six years, though it followed a disappointing drop in December. Over the last 12 months, wages advanced at a 2.2 percent pace, significantly ahead of the inflation rate.

The overall picture was so strong, Mr. Berger said, that the Federal Reserve might begin its long-awaited move to raise short-term interest rates in June, a step many economists had been expecting to be delayed until September.

“I still think it will be September, but the odds of a June increase have gone up somewhat,” Mr. Berger added. “The fact that the economy didn’t lose a step in January bolsters the case that inflation could hit the Fed’s target.”

Other experts echoed Mr. Berger’s take. “Employment growth is astonishingly strong,” said Ian Shepherdson, chief economist at Pantheon Macroeconomics, in a note to clients immediately after the 8:30 a.m. release. “With every indicator we follow screaming that payrolls will be very strong for the foreseeable future, wage pressures will intensify.”