Opinion

  Science fiction author William Gibson once observed that “The future is already here, it’s just not evenly distributed.” The same can said for alpha, or the ability of money managers to deliver market-beating returns. Reports of high fees and underperformance have long dogged the alternative investment world, mainly private-equity, venture-capital and especially hedge funds. Last year, returns were negative …

  Elaine Ou Yahoo has been getting a lot of attention lately for its failures to protect personal information. What’s perhaps more remarkable, though, is how little privacy American internet users demand. First came news that hackers stole personal data on more than 500 million Yahoo users. Now the company is dealing with reports that it helped the Justice Department …

  Ramesh Ponnuru Paul Ryan and Donald Trump have, let’s say, a complicated relationship. Ryan has told the congressional Republicans he leads that he will no longer defend Trump — not that he ever really did — and told them to feel free to disavow him. Trump fired off an angry tweet in response, taking Ryan to task on immigration, …

  Democracy, under siege in many parts of the world, received a serious blow in its homeland last week. In a series of jaw-dropping pronouncements, members of the Conservative British government asserted that some people were more equal than others. Home Secretary Amber Rudd proposed forcing companies to disclose how many foreign workers they employ, and threatened to “name and …

  In 1951, U.S. central bankers re-established their autonomy after almost two decades of taking orders from the Treasury Department with the Treasury-Federal Reserve Accord. In 1955-56, the German Bundesbank, which had its autonomy guaranteed in the country’s new constitution, successfully withstood a political assault from Chancellor Konrad Adenauer. In Stockholm, the governor of the Riksbank, Per Ã…sbrink, looked on …

  Remember how some Democrats were making a big deal about voting reforms earlier this year? They promised that if they won they would push for automatic voter registration, voting for ex-felons and better administration of elections. The good news for advocates of making voting easier is that the Democratic national platform wound up having a strong plank supporting reform. …

  German Chancellor Angela Merkel has realized it the hard way that the source of migration needs to be addressed. The jolt she received in the regional polls must have been a rude awakening for her. The outcome of the elections was reason enough for her to delve deeper into the refugee problem and go beyond the open-door policy. She …

Donald Trump’s threat in Sunday night’s presidential debate to appoint a special prosecutor to go after Hillary Clinton’s use of a private e-mail server is legally empty — but it’s genuinely dangerous nevertheless. Federal regulations give the appointment power to the attorney general, not the president, precisely to protect us against a president who uses the special prosecutor as a …

When I talk to friends in asset management, I often hear them express a deep, gnawing worry about low interest rates. Fears that low rates would spark inflation, or cause governments to default on their debt, seem to have receded. I don’t hear many people talk about a “bond bubble” anymore. But one big concern won’t go away — the …

  Noah Feldman A company puts out word that it’s hiring: recent college graduates only, no experienced salespeople need apply. That’s age discrimination, right? Not according to a ruling from a federal appeals court last week. Overturning a half-century of practice, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit held that job applicants can’t benefit from the disparate-impact provision …