“Trump’s tariffs, framed as industrial policy to reindustrialize the country, protect workers, and lower prices. Instead, tariffs have quietly consumed much of the manufacturing sector’s profits. This is unsurprising. Most U.S. imports are inputs used to make American goods. Tariffs, therefore, are taxes on American manufacturing.
Empirical work by the Kiel Institute shows that foreign exporters absorb only a trivial share of the cost. Roughly 96 percent of the burden is passed to American buyers. U.S. households and businesses—not foreign firms—overwhelmingly covered the roughly $200 billion in customs revenue collected in 2025. Companies we import from responded not by cutting prices but by shipping fewer goods to the U.S. As Kiel economist Julian Hinz put it, the tariffs amounted to an “own goal” that raised costs, compressed profits, and weakened the very industries they were meant to protect.
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Tariffs did not restore competitiveness or pricing power. They jacked up costs and made American production less attractive at the margin.”
“In 2022, Seattle became one of the first cities in America to pass a minimum wage law for food delivery drivers. The law went into effect in 2024, and the results were nothing short of calamitous. Food orders plunged to unprecedented lows, delivery costs exploded, and driver earnings appeared to crater.
Now, new research on Seattle’s delivery driver minimum wage ordinance shows that the law had no long-term effect on driver wages. And yet, Seattle’s city council shows no signs of changing course, even with higher consumer costs and zero growth in driver pay.”
“The National Park Service (NPS) owns five golf courses across three properties in the nation’s capital: East Potomac Park Golf Course (home to three courses), Langston Golf Course, and Rock Creek Park Golf Course. If that seems like a weird thing for the federal government to do, you’re right—but it’s common in the D.C. area, where the NPS might also own your favorite concert venue or theater, parkways on your commute, your marina, or the park in the traffic circle a block from your office.
All that federal control means the president might suddenly take an interest in, and mess with, your favorite hobby.
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“National Links Trust has done everything it promised, and the Trump administration isn’t retaking control of D.C.’s public golf courses to make them nicer and more affordable for taxpayers,” according to sports business writer Joe Pompliano, who reviewed the lease. “They are doing it to create an upscale venue that can host a Ryder Cup, replacing the promise of affordable golf with prices most taxpayers cannot afford.”
In short, the government said it needed help fixing the golf courses. National Links Trust got a 50-year lease to do so. Government red tape made it hard to do the work quickly. Then the Trump administration had a shiny (possibly far-fetched) idea, blamed National Links Trust for not going fast enough, and cut off the lease. That’s not exactly going to encourage more nonprofits or private contractors to work with the administration, or possibly with the government in general.”
“Large institutional investors have gone from buying effectively zero single-family homes before the Great Recession to being responsible for a small but non-negligible percentage of home purchasers in recent years.
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any real federal effort to squeeze institutional investors out of the single-family housing market is bound to make shelter more expensive and less plentiful.
For all the political attention paid to larger institutional investors, they make up a small percentage of home purchasers and own an even smaller share of the country’s single-family homes.
According to The Wall Street Journal’s parsing of the data, investors were responsible for about 25 percent of single-family home purchases in the first quarter of 2024. That is up from 20 percent in 2016, and the increase is almost totally driven by larger investors who own upward of 100 homes.
Over the past few years, companies owning 1,000 or more homes have accounted for only about 1 percent of all single-family purchases, but in 2024, their purchases appear to have dropped to effectively zero.
Purchases by entities that own more than 10 homes have ranged from 2 percent to 6 percent in recent years. That means that the 20 percent or so of homes being bought by investors are predominantly being sold to smaller landlords who own 10 or fewer homes.
And the bulk of home sales (some 75–80 percent) continue to be owner-occupiers.
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An owner-occupier doesn’t need to argue with a landlord about replacing an old appliance. They don’t need to worry about a tenant not paying rent, damaging the property, or moving and leaving them with a vacancy to fill.
As such, owner-occupiers are willing to pay a higher purchase price for a home. Landlords who do have to absorb all the risks and costs of their business demand a higher offsetting yield from owning a home, says Erdmann, which means demanding a lower purchase price.
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The only growth in home production to be squeezed is from expanding build-to-rent construction. While politicians are interpreting this activity as homes taken from homeowners, they are, in fact new supply that would go away under any ban on institutional investors.”
“iRobot, the creator of Roomba, filed for bankruptcy on Sunday. If Amazon had been allowed to acquire the company in 2022, consumers likely would have enjoyed improved quality and lower prices. Now, thanks to antitrust regulators, iRobot will be acquired by a massive Chinese robot vacuum manufacturer, Shenzhen Picea Robotics, instead of American-owned Amazon.”
“We shouldn’t let government subsidies distort the market. U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick embraced this thinking with his June 2025 decision to drop the NTIA’s “fiber preference,” shifting the agency toward a technology-neutral, cost-driven framework. The policy emphasizes cost-effectiveness among technologies meeting speed and latency standards.
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In many areas, fiber expansion will continue to make sense, but if LEO-based broadband can offer high-quality internet connectivity virtually instantaneously and on the cheap to many in the targeted regions, why should the federal government stand in the way? After all, as Starlink celebrates its 8 million and counting user base, something largely accomplished absent heavy subsidization”
“The Trump administration unveiled a $12 billion aid package on Monday for farmers hurt by President Donald Trump’s tariffs and other economic challenges.”
“The timing of this loan makes the investment all the more questionable. As CNBC reports, “When asked why Constellation was receiving the loan now,” an Energy Department official said, “Constellation could have completed the project without help from the Energy Department. But the loan will help make electricity cheaper for consumers on the grid operated by PJM Interconnection, which serves more than 65 million people across 13 states.”
Wanting to reduce electricity rates may be a worthwhile goal—energy costs are outpacing inflation and are rising faster in some states with a higher concentration of data centers—but pouring public money into restarting nuclear power plants is not the best way to achieve this.”
“In theory, the CHIPS Act provided a mechanism for the federal government to retract the grant and get all or part of its money back should Intel fail to meet its obligations. It’s not clear whether the federal government would have exercised its option to take the money back, but it was an option—until Trump stepped in.
As the company flailed, Trump met with its CEO, Lip-Bu Tan. Trump first called for him to resign. Then in August, the Trump administration announced that the federal government would just take partial ownership of Intel. Essentially, the U.S. government would purchase a roughly 10 percent stake in the chipmaker, partially nationalizing the company. And funds from CHIPS would be used to do it.
Trump bragged about the deal, saying he planned to “do more of them.” The company’s stock price rose on the news, suggesting that investors liked it. But that’s probably because it was a good deal for the company, at taxpayer expense.
According to public financial filings, the federal government would disburse the remaining funds, about $6 billion, while clearing any obligations for the company to actually complete work on new domestic semiconductor fabs.
In exchange, the federal government would gain partial ownership—as well as all the financial risks stockholders usually have when they invest in companies. Those risks will now be borne by taxpayers.
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Trump gave Intel a federal bailout, removing the company’s public obligations and accountability while loading more financial risk onto the public.”