Category: Finance

Imagine you are searching for a new mattress online and find something surprising. The retailer displays an ad featuring a “Mattress Comfort Scale” running from 1 (soft) to 10 (firm), followed by the message that if your firmness preference is at either end, this mattress is not for you. Wait … what? A retailer telling […]

Digital disruption and the climate crisis are often framed as economic or social challenges. But they force crucial moral questions. Who will be held accountable for the human cost? What will it take to transform business culture so that those costs are not treated as inevitable and acceptable? In my view, the answers will shape […]

The Department of Justice’s decision to open a criminal investigation into Federal Reserve chair Jerome Powell has reignited concern over the independence of the central bank. In unusually blunt remarks, Powell described the unprecedented probe as part of a political attack by the White House over the Fed’s refusal to drastically cut interest rates, as […]

Small businesses are planning to hire fewer recent college graduates than they did in 2025, making it likely harder for this cohort to find entry-level jobs. In our recent national survey, we found that small businesses are 30% more likely than larger employers to say they are not hiring recent college graduates in 2026. About […]

The Denver Broncos announced in early September 2025 their plan to build a privately financed football stadium. The proposal received a lot of attention and praise. Across the five major sports leagues in the U.S. – the NBA, NHL, NFL, MLB and MLS – only 20% of facilities are privately owned. I’ve studied the intersection […]

At the 2026 Detroit Auto Show, the spotlight quietly shifted. Electric vehicles, once framed as the inevitable future of the industry, were no longer the centerpiece. Instead, automakers emphasized hybrids, updated gasoline models and incremental efficiency improvements. The show, held in January, reflected an industry recalibration happening in real time: Ford and General Motors had […]

In December 2025, the Trump administration accelerated the process of reclassifying marijuana from Schedule I to Schedule III under the Controlled Substances Act – a shift that would reduce restrictions and penalties associated with the drug. Under the move, medical and recreational marijuana would still remain illegal at the federal level. At the state level, […]

In the aftermath of the U.S. military strike that seized Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro on Jan. 3, 2026, the Trump administration has emphasized its desire for unfettered access to Venezuela’s oil more than conventional foreign policy objectives, such as combating drug trafficking or bolstering democracy and regional stability. During his first news conference after the […]

Once the world’s most populous nation, China is now among the many Asian countries struggling with anemic fertility rates. In an attempt to double the country’s rate of 1.0 children per woman, Beijing is reaching for a new tool: taxes on condoms, birth control pills and other contraceptives. As of Jan. 1, such items were […]

Since Jan. 20, 2025, the first day of his second term in office, President Donald Trump has slashed U.S. foreign aid spending. It began with a stop-work order that paused spending on everything from treating tropical diseases in Mali to providing nutrition support in Nepal. By early February 2025, billionaire Elon Musk announced that the […]