Opinion

When I first began writing about economics in the early 1970s, I made a private vow that I would never use the word “depression” in describing the state of the economy. The economists and politicians who occasionally did so were, I thought, engaged in partisan hyperbole. Their game was to scare people into thinking the end of the world was ...

Venerable apparel retailer Brooks Brothers says it is “in the process of converting its New York, North Carolina and Massachusetts factories from manufacturing ties, shirts and suits to now making masks and gowns.” Michigan-based workwear maker Carhartt is shifting over to mask and gown production, too. In Houston, Gourmet Table Skirts & Linens, which normally sells to hotels and cruise ...

As coronavirus spreads across the US, epidemiologists and public health experts keep hitting one message: Stay home. Without social distancing, Covid-19 could kill nearly 2 million Americans — perhaps 17 times as many as there would be if everyone hunkers down. This is why, as of early April, the vast majority of Americans are living under shelter-at-home orders. But what ...

US employment continues to collapse, with a shocking 6.65 million new jobless claims reported yesterday. The Federal Reserve has predicted that the unemployment rate could reach 32% — considerably higher than at the depths of the Great Depression. Much of the US economy is based on local services and with people across the entire nation confined to their homes because ...

In the past week, four UK doctors have died from Covid-19; the youngest was 55. There will be more to come if the government doesn’t quickly resolve the shortages of personal protective equipment, or PPE, in hospitals and medical centers. The British Medical Association wasn’t being dramatic when it said that health workers treating Covid-19 patients face “life-threatening” shortages of ...

Donald Trump wasn’t alone in hoping everyone’s lives could get back to normal by Easter weekend. Retailers’ decisions to furlough hundreds of thousands of US retail workers underscore that store closures are set to go on for much longer than initially anticipated. Closings in many major markets around the world will remain in place through next weekend and beyond, wreaking ...

The federal government’s $2 trillion economic relief bill to help the nation cope with the fallout from the coronavirus pandemic has many excellent features. The amount of money is large — probably enough to cushion and sustain the economy for the next two months. To some extent, the bill addresses the needs of individuals, families, small businesses, big businesses, and ...

When America has recovered from the coronavirus crisis and people are back to work, Representative Adam Schiff thinks Congress should consider a 9/11-style independent commission to examine why the nation was so unprepared for the pandemic. Schiff, a California Democrat, told me in an interview that his staff has already started working on a discussion draft modeled after the 9/11 ...

What was once sacrosanct is no more. Apple Inc seems to have blinked. Bloomberg News reported on April 1 that Apple has relaxed its rules requiring a 30% cut for any content sold inside video apps on its iOS platform. The tech giant said its programme allows “premium subscription video” providers the ability to charge consumers directly using their own ...

The coronavirus crisis is still unfolding, but it’s not too soon to think about lasting financial impact and how to limit the fallout. One major financial crisis that may hit later this year or early in 2021 is the ever-looming collapse in state and local employee pension funds. Although the problem has been growing for decades, the virus may have ...