These official government inflation increases in 2014 — for 24 items that comprise a significant percentage of the household budget — incorporate “substitution” and “quality improvement” reductions made by the government. The actual increases, prior to these statistical manipulations, are higher.Food at home: 3.7%Food away from home: 3.0%Meat: 12.7%Fish and seafood: 5.6%Eggs: 10.7%Milk: 5.2%Fruits & vegetables: 4.1%Coffee: 4.2%Butter: 22.5%Natural gas:...

America’s appetite for war keeps growing. From the White House to Congress, from the Pentagon to defense secretaries past and present, old wars have been re-ignited, new ones started and the prospects for a perpetual state of war are being sold as the American way. Manipulated economies across the globe keep populations struggling to make ends meet — all while...

Every generation has its nostalgia. And businesses find a way to profit from it. But the need to look back intensifies when a culture is stressed, depressed, out of work, or otherwise discontent. The memories of our past help shape our society, breeding equal parts unoriginality and fleeting excitement for days gone by. But in 2015, a new challenge to...

As we enter 2015, the mystery continues. Why hasn’t a more inspiring generation of products and services for older people been created, marketed and raking in the big bucks? The market has never been more ripe for the taking. But marketers and product designers must switch their focus from creative marketing to creative aging to find the sweet spot from...

In the year ahead, the era of Selfie Journalism fully takes root. Reporters on the local, regional and state levels, in particular, will be judged more by their social media footprint than by the quality of their journalism. As traditional newspapers become fully digitally-driven and attempt to cover their markets with fewer resources, robust coverage of communities and the issues...

An unprecedented diversity of energy sources and players will come to market this year, reflecting the underlying, long-term trend of the world’s shift away from fossil fuels. A hundred years ago, coal was dominant. Since then, it’s been oil. But this year, energy markets will be marked by innovations that improve the value of traditional fuels even as those fuels...

Is there an independent anything these days? Small businesses crop up around the country only to be swallowed up by larger corporations, consolidating operations and increasing profitability. These corporations are swallowed up by even larger conglomerates, which do the same on an even larger level. Massive international trade deals are signed before the public is even aware of them and...

One of the fundamental tenets of capitalism is supply and demand. But what happens when there is too much supply and not enough demand? You get Price Wars. This holiday season, big chains were packing their stores with ridiculous deals at minimal mark-up under the assumption that this would stimulate demand for their product. But what if consumers simply didn’t...

Bankism is a financial Ponzi scheme fueled by government debt and cheap money. In Bankism, too-big-to-fail banks don’t rise or fall on their own merits. Instead, they get saved by governments that in turn force the public to pay for banks’ mistakes by imposing austerity measures and higher taxes upon them. Bankism has replaced capitalism as the prevailing economic system...

The Grand Manipulation is a new and dangerous trend. The manipulation of free economic markets worldwide is not a repeat of the past. The ability or, rather, the audacity of the US and other governments to manipulate the major financial markets is new. Governments and economists take their hats off to free markets. Yet, the markets are rigged, not free....