Opinion

    While Friday’s jobs report was strong, a look through the details of the report shows that the same people who won in President Barack Obama’s America are the ones winning in the early months of President Donald Trump’s. Without policy proposals, currently lacking from the White House or Congress, that specifically target the types of voters who elected ...

  One of the inescapable conclusions of the economic crisis that engulfed the world a decade ago was that the culture of banking needed to change. Allowing finance to regulate itself ended in spectacular failure, underwritten by the taxes of the masses who didn’t profit from the culture of risk-taking in those institutions. But the resignation this week of a ...

  Brexit was supposed to be about democracy: Those who wanted to leave the European Union argued that their rights were being trampled on by an unrepresentative EU bureaucracy. Now it’s the U.K. government that is paying insufficient attention to the interests of Brits — and it’s their unelected representatives in Parliament who are defending them. The Brexit referendum won ...

  US President Donald Trump’s revised travel ban faces scrutiny in courtrooms across the country. Several states and rights group have brought suits against Republican president’s executive order, supposedly a less draconian than the previous order issued on January 27, which met with deluge of opposition and was subsequently blocked by country’s federal courts. The revamped order bans all refugees ...

  Having been born into an Irish-American family in what was then a heavily Scots and Irish New Jersey town (Kearny), I somewhat irrationally associate Ireland with the past. But attention is suddenly turning to the future, as the political status of the two Irelands may be up for grabs, mostly because of Brexit. Although this may seem like a ...

  A strange thing is happening in Hong Hong’s publicly traded Chinese stocks. Chinese banks, roundly shunned by global investors, are winning the popularity contest among mainland investors buying through the Shenzhen-Hong Kong and Shanghai-Hong Kong stock connects. According to Goldman Sachs Group Inc., daily purchases of Hong Kong shares via the two links are up 41 percent this year, ...

  A friend recently asked me whether women’s entry into the workforce has been good for men. I couldn’t give him a clear answer, because it’s a complicated question. Overall, the answer is yes, but the change hasn’t been equally good for all men. Those who have successfully adapted their family structure and social norms to the new economic realities ...

  We are now deep in the era of political shocks. One electorate after another has expressed its anger with mainstream parties and technocratic elites by favouring political outsiders and know-nothing anti-incumbents. But what explains the appeal of demagogues once they start governing and reveal themselves to be exponents of chaos? The widespread disorder predicted last November, when Prime Minister ...

  Europe’s tale of two rescue funds is morphing into a worrying saga. The outlook for the region’s original crisis bailout vehicle, the European Financial Stability Fund (EFSF), to raise sufficient long-term funds to do its job is getting trickier. Despite last week being a pretty decent one for bond issuance, the EFSF stayed on the sidelines. Meanwhile, its more-popular ...

  Over the last decade, WikiLeaks has heedlessly published sensitive diplomatic cables, classified military files, secret trade documents and politically explosive emails. Last week, it dumped thousands of new files it says are from the Central Intelligence Agency. If authentic, as seems likely, it may prove the most destructive disclosure yet. Most of the new material relates to tools used ...