More hourly workers are getting a pay bump. Thank the new war for employees.

Why it matters: To meet the demand that's only expected to get more ferocious as reopening continues, companies are having to bid up to attract workers.

Disney's stock was down nearly 5% in after-hours trading Thursday after the entertainment giant said it brought in 103.6 million subscribers for Disney+ last quarter, versus the 109.3 million expected by Wall Street.

Why it matters: It's the first time Disney disappointed on subscriber growth since launching the service in November 2019. Disney+ grew very quickly in 2020. The company said in March it surpassed 100 million subscribers worldwide.

Amazon today announced plans to hire 75,000 more workers, most of whom will sign on after Jeff Bezos officially steps down as the tech giant's CEO.

Axios Re:Cap goes deeper with Brad Stone, author of a new book called "Amazon Unbound," about how Amazon may change, how he found the woman who voices Alexa and what Bezos will do next.

Women prefer remote work at a higher rate than men, according to a new study by the jobs platform FlexJobs.

By the numbers: About 68% of women said their preferred post-pandemic workplace would be remote, compared with 57% of men. And 80% of women ranked remote work as a top job benefit, compared with 69% of men.

Remember the massive fiscal crisis that was about to befall the states, unable to print their way out of the recession? Well, it's over before it even really began.

Driving the news: California's catastrophic $54 billion anticipated budget deficit has become a $75 billion budget surplus over this fiscal year and next.

Every year, Axios and Harris Poll gauge the reputation of the most visible brands in America — part of which is a survey of how ethical companies are perceived to be.

The big picture: Pfizer, unsurprisingly, has led the gainers over the course of the pandemic, seeing its ethics score rise from 58.9 in 2019 to 77.4 in 2021.

More than 700 barges are stranded on the Mississippi River after inspectors discovered a large crack in a bridge near Memphis, Tennessee, Bloomberg reports.

Why it matters: The blockage, which closes off the biggest route for U.S. agriculture exports when at its busiest, comes as President Biden is pushing Congress to pass his $2 trillion American Jobs Plan, which seeks to improve the country's infrastructure.

The transition from fast-growing crypto service provider to mature multi-billion-dollar public company is not an easy one.

Why it matters: Coinbase is the first big company to make that transition, and has already changed dramatically as a result.

Microsoft is testing a better way to sell its Xbox Series X and S consoles in an attempt to make the process of buying a next-gen gaming machine less ridiculous.

Why it matters: Six months since their release, the new Xbox and rival PlayStation 5 remain extremely difficult to find, and shoppers have had few options but to frantically refresh online retail websites.

Actor and filmmaker Eva Longoria Bastón is lending her name to help bring mental health services to farmworkers in the U.S.

What's happening: A new program called "Healing Voices," launching this month in California and Florida, will study the needs of 100 farmworkers and determine how to bring more services to workers in the fields.

Alex Rodriguez and former Walmart e-commerce boss Marc Lore have formed a venture capital firm called Vision/Capital/People (VCP).

Why it matters: The strategy, not the people. VCP plans to build a concentrated portfolio, acquiring between 40% and 80% stakes in startups. It's antithetical to VC conventional wisdom, particularly at the earlier stages when success is tough to guarantee.

Pennsylvania's $64 billion teachers pension fund is under fire for misstating its investment returns.

Why it matters: The dispute impacts whether or not around 100,000 active Pennsylvania teachers need to increase their annual pension contributions.

Major U.S. sports leagues took a $13+ billion revenue hit in 2020, but that didn't stop the world's top athletes from earning historic sums of money.

Driving the news: A record four athletes earned more than $100 million in the past year, per Forbes' 2021 calculations, which includes endorsement deals, business ventures and salaries.

Buzzer, a mobile platform that wants to reinvent how fans consume live sports, has signed deals with three sports leagues — the NBA, NHL and PGA Tour — in the last several weeks.

• In addition, the startup has hired Shirin Malkani, the former senior VP of global media distribution for the NBA, as its chief commercial officer.
• Malkani, who helped broker the NBA's TV deals with ESPN and Turner, is an important hire for Buzzer as it navigates the complex world of live sports rights.

McDonald's on Thursday announced it will be increasing hourly wages for current employees at company-owned restaurants, with entry-level staff eligible to earn up to $17.

Why it matters: The company said it hopes the move will attract new applicants as it looks to hire 10,000 new employees ahead of the "busy summer season."

Hertz was the original meme stock we couldn’t make sense of. A Robinhood-fueled stock frenzy after the car rental giant's May 2020 bankruptcy filing spawned finger-wagging and ridicule — but it turns out the day traders were right.

What's new: Hertz's latest bankruptcy plan, in which Knighthead Capital Management and Certares Management will buy the company for $7.4 billion, calls for equity holders to receive about $8 per share, Bloomberg reported Wednesday.

Multiple indicators now show how pent-up travel demand is playing out, as the U.S. exits lockdown mode.

Why it matters: Close to half of all Americans have had at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine, enabling a growing economic recovery in the hard-hit travel and leisure sectors.

Stephen and Ayesha Curry are joining the advisory council for Goldman Sachs' One Million Black Women initiative, Axios is first to report.

Why it matters: The initiative has committed to invest more than $10 billion in Black women over the next 10 years. It comes as banks and large companies are increasingly putting money behind rhetoric about advancing racial equity.

Mayo Clinic and Kaiser Permanente announced Thursday they've teamed up to scale the use of hospital care in patients' homes, starting with a shared investment in Boston-based company called Medically Home Group.

Why it matters: After seeing hospital capacity strained to the max amid the pandemic along with the simultaneous rise of telehealth, more patients could find themselves getting acute care in their own beds in the future.

America's affections have shifted away from the companies that helped us manage pandemic life and toward the vaccine manufacturers that are helping to end it.

Driving the news: Moderna and Pfizer shot up the ranks this year in the Axios/Harris 100, our annual survey of corporate reputations. Moderna is Americans' third-favorite company this year, and Pfizer came in at seventh — up from No. 61 a year ago.

This survey is the result of a partnership between Axios and Harris Poll to gauge the reputation of the most visible brands in America, based on 20 years of Harris Poll research. From the Patagonia to SpaceX, here's how this year's class stacks up.

Methodology: The Axios Harris Poll 100 is based on a survey of 42,935 Americans in a nationally representative sample conducted April 8-21, 2021. The two-step process starts fresh each year by surveying the public’s top-of-mind awareness of companies that either excel or falter in society.

• These 100 “most visible companies” are then ranked by a second group of Americans across the seven key dimensions of reputation to arrive at the ranking. If a company is not on the list, it did not reach a critical level of visibility to be measured.

Happiness. Weed. Robots. Water. Whatever the theme, there's probably an ETF promoting a basket of stocks related to it.

Why it matters: Thematic ETFs are an investment mania side effect. There's newfound retail investor interest in narrow exposure to hot corners of the stock market. More are launching to meet the moment.

Americans are leaning into companies that have strong political positions, in the wake of one of the country's most divisive election years.

Driving the news: New rankings from the Axios/Harris 100 poll — an annual survey to gauge the reputation of the most visible brands in the country — show that brands with clear partisan identifications are becoming more popular.

Boeing gained approval from the Federal Aviation Administration for a "fix" to an electrical issue that sidelined roughly 100 of its 737 MAX planes worldwide, Reuters first reported Wednesday night.

Why it matters: Wednesday's approval paves the way for a swift return of the flights that were removed from service early last month.

Apple has severed ties with recent hire Antonio García Martínez, a former Facebook employee and author of the book "Chaos Monkeys," Axios has learned, following an uproar from employees upset over García Martínez' past writings demeaning women and others.

Why it matters: Employees had circulated a petition Wednesday calling for Apple to explain its hiring of García Martínez. While petitions aren't uncommon at Google and some other companies, it is rare for Apple employees to organize publicly on any issue, let alone an individual hiring.

1. Health: Study: Over 99% of hospitalized COVID-19 patients were not vaccinated — Fall and winter COVID surge "unlikely" if people get vaccinated.
2. Politics: School boards are the next political battleground — Pelosi says members can remove masks when addressing the House.
3. Vaccines: "No evidence" that adapting vaccine to variants is necessary, BioNTech says — CDC panel endorses Pfizer vaccine for 12- to 15-year-olds — Novavax behind on manufacturing, dealing blow to global vaccination efforts.
4. Economy: The states ending federal pandemic unemployment benefits early.
5. World: Montana to give COVID-19 vaccines to Canadian truck drivers — Asia faces massive new COVID surge.
6. Variant tracker: Where different strains are spreading.