America’s government declares ‘war’ promiscuously — on poverty, on drugs, on cancer, etc. — except when actually going to war, which the nation has done often since it last declared war (on June 5, 1942, on Romania, Bulgaria and Hungary). But the incipient war du jour is being postponed. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin says the Trump administration is ‘putting the ...

The reaction to Target Corp.’s first-quarter earnings report on Wednesday is a near-perfect illustration of the enormous challenge many traditional retailers are up against in trying to satisfy Wall Street right now. By many measures, Target had a quite good quarter. Its comparable sales rose 3 percent over the same period last year, beating analysts’ expectations. That lift was powered ...

Eating too much added sugar has become one of the riskiest health behaviours in the modern world. None too soon, governments are waking up to the fact. Staggering under the burden of increasingly overweight populations, more than 30 countries have put new taxes on sugary beverages, most in just the past four years. This is good policy, and it needs ...