Alexander MacKay coleads the Pricing Lab at Harvard Business School, a research center devoted to studying how companies set prices. Since the pandemic, he has watched how businesses have become more willing to experiment with what they charge their customers. Big companies that had previously pushed through one standard price increase per year are now…
Typically, the esoteric inner workings of finance and the very public stakes of government spending are viewed as separate spheres. And bond trading is ordinarily a tidy arena driven by mechanical bets about where the economy and interest rates will be months or years from now. But those separations and that sense of order changed…
Surging interest rates and waning financing options threaten a “lost decade” for poor countries.
Federal Reserve officials left interest rates unchanged in their final policy decision of 2023 and forecast that they will cut borrowing costs three times in the coming year, a sign that the central bank is shifting toward the next phase in its fight against rapid inflation. Interest rates are set to a range of 5.25…
The Federal Reserve appears to be creeping closer to an outcome that its own staff economists viewed as unlikely just six months ago: lowering inflation back to a normal range without plunging the economy into a recession. Plenty could still go wrong. But inflation has come down notably in recent months — it is running…
Martin Guzman was a college freshman at La Universidad Nacional de La Plata, Argentina, in 2001 when a debt crisis prompted default, riots and a devastating depression. A dazed middle class suffered ruin, as the International Monetary Fund insisted that the government make misery-inducing budget cuts in exchange for a bailout. Watching Argentina unravel inspired…
American shoppers, burned by more than two years of rapid inflation, are getting some welcome relief this holiday season: Prices on many products are falling. Toys are almost 3 percent cheaper this Christmas than last, government data shows. Sports equipment is down nearly 2 percent. Bigger-ticket items are also showing price declines: Washing machines cost…
Cameron Ambrosy spent the first weekend of December going to 10 open houses — purely for research purposes. The 25-year-old in St. Paul, Minn., has a well-paying job and she and her husband are saving diligently, but she knows that it will be years before they can afford to buy. “It is much more of…
It’s too early to start celebrating. That’s the Federal Reserve’s sober message — though given half a chance, the markets won’t heed it. In a news conference on Wednesday, and in written statements after its latest policymaking meeting, the Fed did what it could to restrain Wall Street’s enthusiasm. “It’s far too early to declare…
In addition to Shopify, chatbots have come out over the past 12 months from Instacart, the delivery company; Mercari, a resale platform; Carrefour, a retailer; and Kering, which owns Gucci and Balenciaga. Walmart, Mastercard and Signet Jewelers are also testing chatbots, which may become publicly available as soon as next year. “In a way, it’s…
