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Economy III (from 5-3-26)

  1. Economy.  “In Defense of the McDonald’s Cheeseburger.” By Faith Bottum. [It’s cheaper than it was in 1948, when gauged on a sandwich-per-hour basis.]  4-23-26
  2. Economy.  “A Dispiriting Airline Bailout.” [There’s no economic justification for saving Spirit Airlines.]  4-24-26
  3. Economy.  “Trump’s Research Cuts Play Into China’s Hands.” By Rahm Emanuel. [Democrats need to get back to basics and adopt policies that encourage faster economic growth.]   4-24-26
  4. Economy. “Donald Trump’s Economic Engineer.” By Mark Halperin. [The Treasury secretary looks ahead to the Beijing summit and discusses AI, energy, taxes, bank regulation and more.]   4-25-26
  5. Economy.  “The Credit Bubble Everybody’s Ignoring.”  By Allysia Finley. [Federally backed student loans and mortgages are seeing increased defaults. Taxpayers are on the hook.] 4-27-26
  6. Economy.  “Gambling by Another Name.” By Andy Kessler. [Prediction markets call it ‘contracts’ or ‘swaps,’ but it’s really old-fashioned betting.]    4-27-26
  7. Economy.  “AI Saves the Trump Economy.” [The tech investment boom helps to offset damage from tariffs.]   5-1-26
  8. Economy.  “Corporate Jargon Saved My Self-Esteem.” By Andrea Javor. [‘Let’s sunset the initiative,’ my boss told me. That was a lot easier to stomach than ‘You failed miserably.’]   5-1-26
  9. Economy.  “We’re Going to Miss Tim Cook.” By Andy Kessler. [Apple’s departing CEO helped bring billions out of poverty through globalization.]   5-4-26
  10. Economy.  “GameStop, eBay and the Bet on Debt.” [The $56 billion bid is another sign that the credit mania continues.]   5-5-26
  11. Economy.    “America Is in a Red State.” By William A. Galston.  [The national debt is now greater than the annual GDP, and it isn’t about to shrink.]   5-6-26
  12. Economy.  “The Lawsuits Will Continue Until Morale Improves.” By Cory L. Andrews. [A California court holds a pharmaceutical company can be found liable for not innovating quickly enough.]   5-6-26
  13. Economy. “The U.N. Will Make Airfares More Expensive.” By Brenda Shaffer. [Airlines will soon have to pay to offset their emissions.]   5-7-26
  14. Economy.  “Tim Cook, Apple’s Gold Mine Manager.” By Holman W. Jenkins, Jr. [There may never be another iPhone. There may never be a substitute for the device either.]   5-9-26
  15. Economy.  “The ‘Overproduction’ Excuse for Trump’s Tariffs.” By Ed Gresser.  [Boeing makes more jets than Americans buy, but that doesn’t mean it is acting as a trader predator.]    5-11-26
  16. Economy.  “Affordability Brainstorms, Good and Bad.” [Cutting the beef tariff is a good idea, but pausing the federal gas tax isn’t].   5-12-26
  17. Economy.  “Seattle Turns Hostile to the Great Businesses It Made.” By Howard Schultz. [Starbucks is moving jobs from Washington state to Tennessee, and it isn’t alone in looking elsewhere.]    5-12-26
  18. Economy.  “U.S. Airlines and Carmakers Need to Go Global.” By Clifford Winston. [Policies that insulate them from competition created the conditions that led to bailouts and bankruptcies.]   5-13-26
  19. Economy.  “Washington State’s Pension Raid.” By Jay Rogers. [A wisely managed retirement plan for cops and firemen is shaken down to shrink a deficit.]    5-16-26
  20. Economy.  “Rex Reed and the Legacy of American Openness.” By Peggy Noonan. [He was a self-made figure in show business, a nobody who became a somebody in a competitive field.]   5-16-26
  21. Economy.  “The Proxy Advisers Strike Back.” [ISS and Glass Lewis join New York to stop an Exxon move to Texas.]    5-19-26
  22. Economy.  “Why Everything Feels More Expensive.” By Roland Fryer. [Middle-class Americans have more income than they did 50 years ago, but the squeeze is real.]    5-19-26
  23. Economy.  “A Housing Bill to Hurt Housing.” [House Republicans improve a Senate bill, but not enough to save it.]    5-20-26
  24. Economy.  “You’re Probably Overinvested in Bonds.” By Robert C. Pozen.  [The usual advice is to hold only 60% of your assets in stock. If you’re wealthy, a 90/10 split is far better.]    5-22-26
  25. Economy. “America’s IPO Mini-Boom.” [Too bad SpaceX and others didn’t go public sooner, but they are a tribute to U.S. success.]    5-22-26
  26. Economy.  “What Investors Should Realize About Those AI IPO’s’ By Holman W. Jenkins, Jr. [It won’t be like owning internet stocks. Your senior partner will be the national-security state.]    5-23-26
  27. Economy.  “Jeff Bezos Earned His Fortune.” By Marian L. Tupy. [The Amazon founder’s innovations save customers 22 hours a year on average, giving them the gift of time.]   5-27-26
  28. Economy.  “A Bipartisan Housing Fiasco.”   [The new House bill will raise costs and give more power to regulators.]   5-27-26
  29. Economy.  “The Exxon Example for Corporations.” [The shareholder duty case for leaving states that punish business.]    6-2-26
  30. Economy.  “American Idle: The Work Ethic Goes Out of Style.” By Jason L. Riley.  [One in 3 working-age American men aren’t so much as looking for a job.]   6-3-26
  31. Economy.  “CEOs, Get Ready to Be Subpoenaed.” By Michael Zona. [If Democrats win, expect them to scrutinize your company’s dealings with the Trump administration.]   6-5-26
  32. Economy.  “The Jobs Apocalypse Will Have to Wait.” [A third good labor report in a row, but real wages aren’t growing.]   6-6-26
  33. Economy.  “ ’60 Minutes’ Becomes a Reality Show.” By Holman W. Jenkins, Jr. [The reality, in this case, is the need of companies to survive and get deals done in Donald Trump’s world.]   6-6-26
  34. Economy.  “We’re Preparing for the Wrong AI Labor Crisis.” By Stephen Lewarne. [Mass unemployment is unlikely. AI will reorganize the white-colar corporate workforce, not destroy it.]   6-6-26
  35. Economy.  “Delcy Rodriguez Invades My Home.” By Leopoldo Lopez. [This loss is personal, but it should also be a warning to investors.]   6-9-26
  36. Economy. “Why Teenagers Stopped Working in the Summer.” By Roland Fryer. [For the most part not because they couldn’t find work. They found better opportunities instead.]   6-10-26
  37. Economy.  “An Inflation Silver Lining.” [The energy shock is hitting consumers, but not yet overall prices.]   6-11-26
  38. Economy.  “Pensions, Fiduciaries and DEI.” By Jay Rogers.  [Investment managers who push or even countenance race preferences could be courting legal jeopardy.] 6-12-26
  39. Economy.  “Vindication for Young Elon Musk,”  By Jimmy Soni.  [In 2004, he told the Senate that open competition would transform the industry.]   6-12-26
  40. Economy. “Who Wants to Be a Trillionaire?’ [The Space X IPO is a credit to Elon Musk and American capitalism.]   6-13-26
  41. Economy.  “Mamdani vs. Bodegas.” By Faith Bottum.   6-18-26
  42. Economy.  “Chuck Schumer’s Chip Shortage.”  [A micron plant in New York is years behind schedule for all the reasons you’d expect.]   6-23-26
  43. Economy.  “Hamilton Inspires Trump’s Economic Statecraft.” By Scott Bessent. [Every nation ‘ought to endeavor to process within itself all the essentials of national supply.’]    6-24-26
  44. Economy.  “Voters Turn Against Minimum-Wage Hikes.” By Michael Saltsman. [Oklahomans reject a $15- an-hour initiative over affordability.]   6-25-26
  45. Economy.  “Trump’s Housing Blow-Up.”  [He’s right not to sign the housing bill, even if it is for the wrong reasons.]    6-25-26
  46. Economy.  “Hawaii Tries to Redefine ‘Corporation.”   6-29-26
  47. Economy.  “A Virginia Farm’s Lesson for America 250.” By Sierra Dawn McClain. [Worked by one family since the 1700’s, it has survived wars, industrialization and data center development.]   7-3-26
  48. Economy.  “How Government Spending Enriches the Wealthy.” By Vivek Ramaswamy. [Covid relief programs and easy Fed policy inflated the value of assets such as stocks and real estate.]   7-6-26
  49. Economy.  “Congress Risks a Key Trump Victory.” By William McGurn. [Deregulation may not be sexy, but it can be consequential for small businesses.]   7-7-26
  50. Economy.  “USMCA Uncertainty Is Bad for Business.” By An unrenewed deal enriches lobbyists and chills investment.]   7-7-26
  51. Economy.  “How Trump’s Tariffs Really ‘Work’ “  [He hails Toyota’s investment, but what about the job losses?]    7-10-26