Europe's Inflation Problem

War-Induced Inflation Spike Looms Over Europe’s Economic Recovery
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/03/business/iran-oil-gas-europe-inflation-economy.html
Europe has been encouraged by better-than-expected economic growth. A disruption to energy supplies from the Middle East could knock it off course. 

Financial Sector Risks

Wall Street Faces Its Biggest Crisis of Confidence in Years
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/03/business/private-credit-crisis-blue-owl-capital.html
Lending troubles at Blue Owl Capital and other so-called private credit behemoths are setting off fears of a “bank run,” as one hedge fund put it.

They Built the Hottest Firm on Wall Street. Now They Have to Save It.
https://www.wsj.com/finance/investing/blue-owl-private-credit-downfall-b657a53a
Doug Ostrover and Marc Lipschultz made Blue Owl a private-credit behemoth with bets on software, AI and individual investors. It is starting to show cracks.
 
Retail investors shun private credit funds after Blue Owl gating
https://www.ft.com/content/ea11d307-73af-4403-840d-b47dffce9cd0
Fears mount that outflows may soon overwhelm inflows to some of largest players.
 
Blue Owl turmoil adds to strain in $2 trillion US private credit sector
https://www.reuters.com/business/finance/blue-owl-turmoil-adds-strain-2-trillion-us-private-credit-sector-2026-02-27/
 
Banks’ capital steroid use warrants extra scrutiny
https://www.reuters.com/commentary/breakingviews/banks-capital-steroid-use-warrants-extra-scrutiny-2026-03-02/
In athletics, performance-enhancing drugs aren't necessarily banned per se. It's sometimes a question of how often a substance is used, and in what dose. A similar principle applies to "risk transfer" deals, through which Western banks have flattered their equity ratios by shifting losses on 750 billion euros ($885 billion) of loans. It's a broadly safe piece of financial engineering. Yet the sector’s rapid growth and changing nature mean it’s time regulators and shareholders pushed for better disclosure. 

Gen Z Is Unprepared for the Workplace

A New Lost Generation: Why Gen Z Is Unprepared for the Workplace
https://www.wsj.com/lifestyle/careers/gen-z-worker-skills-294463f6
Young employees often don’t have the skills they need to navigate organizations. Leaders need to understand the problem, and how to fill the gaps. 

Is the US Addicted to War?

The United States Is Still Addicted to War
https://foreignpolicy.com/2026/03/02/trump-iran-war-united-states-addicted/
Why every U.S. president ends up in a major military campaign.
 
Trump Spent Years Denouncing U.S. Intervention. Now He’s Toppling Foreign Leaders.
https://www.wsj.com/politics/national-security/trump-iran-us-regime-change-a6f60e6b
The operation in Iran marked a sharp reversal for a president whose political rise was fueled by American fatigue with regime change.

The Perils of a Power Vacuum in Iran
https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/power-vacuum-in-iran-heightens-nuclear-threat-by-stephen-holmes-2026-03

The US sees regimes it can strike and concludes that striking them resolves the dangers they pose. But eliminating a visible adversary does not neutralize the underlying threat; it merely transforms that threat into something elusive, decentralized, unaccountable, and impossible to negotiate with or monitor.  

Colonization and Path Dependency

Abad, L., Maurer, N. The long shadow of history? the impact of colonial labor institutions on economic development in Peru. J Econ Growth 30, 521–565 (2025). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10887-024-09249-9
Abstract
We examine a canonical case of forced labor: the mita and the encomienda in colonial Peru. The mita was a labor draft designed to provide workers for mines, churches, and public works in colonial Peru and Bolivia. The encomienda granted a select group of Spanish settlers the right to extract labor and tribute from indigenous peoples. We examine the impact of forced labor using a dataset of 500 indigenous settlements scattered across modern-day Peru. We find that forced labor gravely impacted the Peruvian communities subjected to it, but the effects nearly dissipated before the end of the colonial period (1532-1811). We test for a possible “reversal of fortune” in the postcolonial period by looking at an array of variables for the 19th to the 21st centuries (literacy, access to land, road density, and luminosity) and find no significant differences. The results hold when we examine the mita and encomienda separately. The mechanisms that caused its impact to fade were migration, growing outside options for indigenous labor, and opposition from the Crown and new Spanish settlers who lacked access to forced labor. 

Dell, M. Persistence and transformation in economic development. Ind. Econ. Rev. 56, 285–311 (2021).
https://doi.org/10.1007/s41775-021-00122-9  
Abstract
Much work in economic history has been done to study patterns of development in the USA and Europe. However, insights from other areas and regions are also required to better inform policy today that helps elucidate how policy interacts with the broader historical and institutional context and how the effects of these policies unfold over time. In this light, the paper focuses on illustrations from previous works of the author on extractive colonial institutions and their persistent effects on development paths later on. The first example is of the Peruvian mining mita. Here, the natives of Peru were forced by the Spanish to work in silver mines. The study focusses on the persistence of differential land tenures and public goods provision. The second example, a joint work with Ben Olken, considers Java's cultivation system in the 19th century, where the Javanese were forced to produce sugar that was sold in the world market by the Dutch. It shows that the sugar factory areas of the 19th century are more industrialized today. They are richer with better infrastructure and education levels as compared to the nearby counterfactual locations.

The Treasury Trap

Iran war traps Treasuries investors in stagflationary oil dilemma
https://www.reuters.com/markets/iran-war-traps-treasuries-investors-stagflationary-oil-dilemma-2026-03-02/
U.S. Treasuries just clocked their best month in a year. But with war suddenly raging in the Middle East, investors must decide whether safe-haven demand will accelerate the bond market rally or if an inflationary surge in oil prices will send it screeching into reverse. 

Tariffs and Corruption

The Big Problem with Tariffs Isn’t the Rates. It’s the Corruption.
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/02/opinion/tariffs-trump-corruption.html