Financial Mindset

“Those who do not learn history are doomed to repeat it.” So said George Santayana , the Spanish-American philosopher who was a star Harvard professor before resettling in Europe and becoming an influential public intellectual. Santayana’s writings served as a guiding light during some of the darkest days of two World Wars and the near cataclysm of the mid-20th century—a fate that none other than Ray Dalio sees repeating itself in the near future. So maybe it’s time for a quick history lesson about the first couple industrial revolutions, with the labor force going through what leaders such as Nvidia’s Jensen Huang have described as another one: the AI boom. In the early 1800s, as inventions like the Spinning Jenny and the steam engine reshaped Britain and soon the world, old mills were suddenly able to produce more goods than ever. Productivity soared in a way that historians are still grappling with measuring. Meanwhile, worker pay remained stagnant for more than 50 years—a phenom...

One could argue that last week’s surprisingly robust jobs report has made Jerome Powell’s job harder, as it defies the narrative economists had widely believed when it came to the slowing pace of the economy. On the other hand, some might argue that the Fed chairman’s exit from the top job at the central bank just got easier, because it may support a call for inaction by the rate-setting Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC). Prior to Wednesday, speculators had been fairly balanced in their view on whether a 25bps cut would come at the FOMC’s next meeting in March, giving it a probability of around 40%, per CME’s FedWatch barometer. But the jobs report , showing nonfarm payroll employment rose by 130,000 in January, blew those odds out of the water: They now indicate a more than 92% likelihood of a hold at the next meeting. That inverse relationship comes from the idea that the Fed will only continue to reduce the base rate if it needs to in relation to its mandate: Keeping i...

In today’s CEO Daily: Diane Brady reports on new threats to the loyalty economy. The big leadership story: Why corporate accountability for the Epstein files is so hard to come by. The markets: U.S. futures are trending lower after the holiday break. Plus: All the news and watercooler chat from Fortune . Good morning. Americans love their loyalty points. Almost three-quarters of them use a credit card that lets them earn rewards. And the income generated from issuing those points is critically important to many players in the Fortune 500, especially airlines, hotels, and merchants. Delta Air Lines alone reported a 6% increase in loyalty revenue last year, with co-brand income from Amex up 11% to $8.2 billion .  U.S. companies are expected to issue or redeem about $26 billion in points for customers this year. That doesn’t include the hundreds of billions of dollars in uncashed points that keep people tethered to their loyalty programs, despite devaluations, or perks t...

The way we teach students, from classroom structures to teaching methods and standardized instruction, has not changed much over human history. Despite schools, colleges and mass education becoming more important for social cohesion and economic development than ever, teaching has stayed remarkably consistent even as other sectors and institutions have been transformed by computers and smartphones. But now it’s the classroom’s turn to be revolutionized , driven by rapid advances in artificial intelligence. This transformation has the potential to reshape education as profoundly as the internet reshaped entire industries. If properly deployed, AI-powered education tools could deliver high-quality, personalized learning at a global scale. But realizing that potential will require a coordinated effort from educators, institutions, policymakers, and technology providers.  Around the world, education systems are stretched thin. In both wealthy and low-income countries, teachers are h...

The latest estimates from the Congressional Budget Office show that the Social Security trust will run out of money by fiscal year 2032, which starts on October 2031. That means anyone who wins a Senate seat in this year’s midterm elections will be in office when it’s time to fix the entitlement program’s finances. But it will be tempting for lawmakers to avoid making tough political choices like cutting payments or hiking taxes. Instead, they could decide to finance Social Security’s shortfall with more debt, though that risks swift economic consequences, according to economist Veronique de Rugy, a senior research fellow at George Mason University’s Mercatus Center. In a Creators Syndicate op-ed , she warned financial markets would immediately account for the additional borrowing. “What most people are missing is that, this time, the consequences may show up quickly,” de Rugy wrote. “Inflation may not wait for debt to pile up. It can arrive the moment Congress commits to that debt...

Asia’s health crisis is often framed as an inevitability: Aging populations, rising medical costs, a surge in lifestyle diseases, elderly patients needing care for longer. Rates of conditions like heart disease, cancer, diabetes and hypertension are climbing across the region, driven by insufficient exercise, poor diet, drinking, smoking, stress and pollution. These lifestyle diseases now account for roughly 80% of all diagnoses in Asia, a growing burden of morbidity that healthcare systems are struggling to keep pace with. Yet focusing on lifestyle diseases, and the choices behind them, overlooks the cultural pressures that shape how people think, feel, and behave long before they ever seek medical care. And it’s critical for those of us in the healthcare industry—particularly those of us concerned with keeping people healthy and curing them once they’re sick—to push back against these pressures. Across the region, health is being defined less by clinical advice and more by social e...

The K-shaped economy has dominated discourse lately, but the J-curve is entering the chat too amid debate over AI’s impact on productivity. The curve refers to the idea that general-purpose technologies like AI don’t produce immediate benefits. Instead, massive investment comes first, obscuring early gains. It’s only after this initial dip that productivity really takes off, resulting in the J shape. But for some, it’s not clear yet that the transformation is happening. Apollo Chief Economist Torsten Slok quipped that “ AI is everywhere except in the incoming macroeconomic data ,” recalling Robert Solow’s famous quote about the PC revolution. Slok added that employment, productivity and inflation stats are still not showing signs of the new technology. Meanwhile, profit margins and earnings forecasts for S&P 500 companies outside of the “Magnificent 7” also lack evidence of AI at work. “Maybe there is a J‑curve effect for AI, where it takes time for AI to show up in the macro da...