Allison Schrager is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering economics. A senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, she is author of “Worth the Risk: The Seven Myths That Keep Us From Taking the Chances We Need to Take."
The Affordability Crisis Isn’t About Inflation
The latest inflation reading was a 3.6% increase in the price level.
If they act forcefully, policymakers risk a serious recession with little benefit. A recession today could be even worse for American households than the current inflation rate.
Allison Schrager Bloomberg November 9, 2026
American politicians must stop promising a bigger, European-style welfare state
When interest rates were near zero, debt felt free. A bigger government that promised safety and security for everyone seemed possible.
- America isn’t insulated from Europe’s great risk reckoning, with long-term rates settling around 5% in the US, and the budget gap being about 6% of the economy.
- American politicians must stop promising a bigger, European-style welfare state, and reform must involve shrinking benefits and tax increases on everyone, not just the wealthy.
- Hopefully, the US doesn’t end up with riots and looting, but people will be angry and rightly so. If you are promised security, you count on it and plan around it.
- Thinking you have a safe asset and losing it, or finding out it was not so safe after all, can be far more costly then never having it in the first place — as any financial crisis shows.
Allison Schrager Bloomberg 29 October 2026
Why Bowl Together When You Can Scroll Alone?
-Americans just don’t seem to want to bowl that much anymore. And it’s not just bowling. Demand for other social forms of leisure is on the decline, too.
A less social nation not only portends big economic shifts, so-called “third spaces” closing and businesses running into trouble, but also impacts our mental health and well-being, while robbing us of the connections that in the past led to fresh interests and professional opportunities.
Bowling was once popular as a family-friendly way to socialize. League membership reached some 10 million in its heyday in the 1970s. It’s now down to about a million.
As far back as 2000, Harvard University political scientist Robert D. Putnam wrote in his famous book Bowling Alone that the decline of bowling leagues represented a degradation of community and social capital. After years of further decline, leisure activities that involve neighbors, families and colleagues interacting now seem at existential risk.
Allison Schrager Bloomberg 4 October 2026
These retirement accounts were in many ways a triumph, mainly because they became popular right before one of the best stock runs in history. About 20% of Americans are now millionaires.
Even a growing economy has bear markets. And the question is how the changing nature of stock ownership will change the nature of bear markets.
The US now has a large, captive population of investors who not only own lots of stock no matter what happens, but they also buy more each month through their regular contributions to their retirement plans.
These investors are becoming a large share of the market. In the first quarter of 2026, some $32 trillion was invested in IRAs or defined-contribution plans.
This growth in retirement investors means more systemic risk, because if the stock market drops there is an economy-wide wealth shock that affects more than 60% of households.
If markets don’t recover, it leaves some poorer in retirement.
It also makes people feel poorer today because of the wealth effect. This could further depress demand and worsen a potential recession.
Allison Schrager Bloomberg 21 September 2026
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2026-09-21/passive-retirement-investing-raises-systemic-risk-for-us-markets
A college degree is supposed to signal qualities employers value, such as intelligence, judgment and an ability to work with others. A degree from an elite university is supposed to signal these qualities in abundance.
It was never an accurate signal — lots of people who don’t go to college possess these qualities, and lots of people who do go don’t — but in a noisy labor market, employers need some sort of screening mechanism, and for a century or more, higher education provided it.
Over the past few decades, however, elite schools have undermined the value of their signal. At first, going to such a school just meant you were from an elite family; it said little about your ability. Then...
There is a way to restore trust, one of the most valuable courses of study is a curriculum developed a century ago, commonly known as Philosophy, Politics and Economics, or PPE.
The PPE program is a course of study that has been offered at Oxford since the 1920s.
Allison Schrager är smartare än en femteklassare; Birkin bags“Je t’aime … moi non plus,”
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