Bloomberg View News

Why People Overestimate the Risk of Black Swan Events

In his 2007 book “The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable,” finance writer Nassim Nicholas Taleb attempted to educate the public about the danger of rare, unusual events. This is obviously important in the world of finance — …

How Ruling That Drivers Are Employees Upends Uber Business Model

If you’re a freelance writer who occasionally sells articles to a website, are you actually an employee? If you live in California, I think the answer might be — yes? The California Labor commissioner has ruled that Uber drivers are …

How Uber, Tesler Are Disrupting Transportation Monopolies: Viewpoint

Question: What’s an automotive monopolist’s worst nightmare? Answer: Uber picks you up in a Tesla. Two big Silicon Valley companies are busy disrupting state-sponsored transportation monopolies. Uber is competing with locally regulated taxi companies, and Tesla wants to sell its …

Left and Right Are Both Wrong About Regulation: Viewpoint

In 1981, President Ronald Reagan instructed federal agencies that they could issue regulations only after demonstrating that their benefits justified their costs. With modest changes, Reagan’s successors, both Republican and Democratic, have continued to impose this requirement on agencies considering …