Opinion

Whole Foods is providing the world with a very interesting economics lesson. Immediately after Amazon bought the upscale grocery store chain, it cut prices substantially for many items on the shelves. As a result, sales have boomed by around 25 percent. Was the price cut a good move? Actually, the real lesson might be how little economics has to say. …

Last week was relatively eventful for bitcoin, the cryptocurrency that has been attracting growing attention from investors, speculators and regulators. Considerable price volatility was accentuated by reactions to commentary (some constructive and some less so) about a “disruptive technology” that responds to specific client needs, is here to stay, and will likely gain greater systemic influence, but is still early …

The political winds in Silicon Valley are shifting. As Bloomberg’s Eric Newcomer wrote on Friday, a spate of critical essays and surprising revelations have recently framed the big tech companies as all-powerful, unaccountable and primed for greater antitrust scrutiny. But if you want to get fully up to speed on the case against Big Tech, there are two new books …

How can news organizations avoid the trap that President Trump has laid for them in his attacks on the media as a one-sided “opposition party” that caters to anti-Trump elites and purveys “fake news” to readers and viewers? Part of the answer is simply for journalists to keep doing their jobs, aggressively and fairly. We’re not in the business of …

President Donald Trump has to decide what to do with an American who was fighting for IS, captured by Kurdish forces in Syria and handed over this week to the US military. The best solution is also the simplest: Charge him with material support for terrorism, convict him and lock him up in an appropriate US prison for many, many …

Economists of all political views breathed a sigh of relief and celebrated when Kevin Hassett was confirmed last week as chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers. Hassett, my former American Enterprise Institute colleague, is widely respected, as evidenced by a June letter of support for his nomination signed by 44 leading economists from both the left and right. The …

Aung San Suu Kyi, Myanmar’s iconic leader, is sacrificing her moral authority for political expediency. By failing to speak out against repression—and, more broadly, by not doing enough to help her country grow and prosper—she risks losing both her power and her reputation. Suu Kyi, whose years leading the resistance to the Burmese junta earned her the Nobel Peace Prize, …

President Donald Trump got elected on the strength of three words: Build the wall. He was more equivocal on Thursday, after cutting a loose deal with Democratic leaders to protect some undocumented immigrants: “We will build the wall later.” Trump’s deal-making has left Republicans unnerved, and some of his strongest backers worried that he’s backtracking on his most central campaign …

If you only read the headlines—or, say, my columns—you might be pessimistic about China’s economy. Recent news has been dominated by a crackdown on capital outflows, worries about rapid debt growth, and efforts to rein in a risky overseas investment binge. Yet ordinary Chinese are highly optimistic: The China Consumer Confidence Index hit 114.6 in July, a level not seen …

Byung-Yeon Kim, a professor at Seoul National University, began interviewing North Korean defectors seven years ago to learn more about their country’s economy. One wouldn’t have thought there was much to discover: Often described as “Stalinist,” the hermetic regime to the north seemed to preside over a crude, centrally planned system, with peasants toiling away for a pittance in collective …