Opinion

What lessons can be drawn from the first 100 days of Brexit? Fewer than one might wish. The chaos of recent months underlines the difficulty, and maybe the pointlessness, of even trying to make forecasts amid such uncertainty. For a start, the pandemic has overwhelmed the short-term results of quitting the EU. All those calculations of the effects on Britain’s ...

Last week, the UK’s opposition Labour Party broke its three-month silence over Brexit to accuse the government of hiding evidence by not publishing an economic impact assessment. Shadow Cabinet Office minister Rachel Reeves cited Office for Budget Responsibility estimates that leaving the European Union has reduced Britain’s gross domestic product by 0.5% in the first quarter of 2021 and will ...

In China, it’s good to be rich, but not too rich. Getting to the top of the billionaire rankings carries great risks. Just take a look at those who were once first among plutocrats. All got into trouble with Beijing — be they real estate developers or big tech bosses. Wang Jianlin, founder of commercial real estate Dalian Wanda Group ...

A disturbing sight has returned to the Northern Ireland cities of Belfast and Derry, reminding mainland Brits of the three decades from 1969 when riots and bouts of terrorism marked the sectarian strife of “the Troubles.” Almost every night since March 30, cars and coaches have been set alight, and youths — directed by loyalist paramilitary godfathers-turned-gangsters — have hurled ...

Janet Yellen has a potent message for the world and for folks at home weary of US commitments abroad: America isn’t done as a global force, if only because it’s primarily to the country’s own advantage. Whether the rest of the world is buying what she has to sell is a different question. While many foreign officials welcome the jolts ...

When Qualcomm Inc was handed a record penalty by China’s antitrust regulators in 2015, executives at the US chipmaker could have been forgiven for partying. Although they were on the hook for a $975 million fine, the ruling by the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) ended a yearlong investigation into the company and affirmed its technology-licensing business model. Proof ...

It’s not surprising that pharmacies are turning out to be fantastic at distributing Covid-19 vaccines. As Alex Tabarrok and I pointed out in February, they are literally everywhere — 86% of the US population lives within 5 miles of one. And they have significant experience in large-scale vaccine delivery, giving out 40-50 million flu vaccines annually. But the success of ...

Argentina is in a familiar place, buried in debt, unloved in the financial markets and at the mercy of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) — or is it the other way around? When a country owes $45 billion, the balance due on the IMF’s biggest rescue loan ever in 2018, it’s not so much in hock to its creditor as ...

The future of American democracy may be decided by what happens on the Mexican border this year. That is to say, if the large constituency fearful about migration is unconvinced that President Joe Biden’s administration is implementing credible policies to control it, Trumpism could resurge big-time, at the midterm elections and thereafter. Nor is this solely, or even principally, a ...

If President Joe Biden is planning to transform America’s infrastructure with the $2.25 trillion plan unveiled last week, he could do worse than learn from China. Its spending on roads, rails, bridges, metro systems and telecommunications and new cities since the 2008 financial crisis has transformed the country. A nation that opened its first true high-speed rail line between Beijing ...