The United States is home to more than 33 million businesses, the vast majority of which are small businesses, with millions being created (and others closing shop) every year. These businesses often rely on loans, provide the goods and services that keep the economy flowing, and sometimes even grow large enough to enter public markets or provide private investment opportunities. Explore key topics central to business and finance, from the role of the Federal Reserve to how initial public offerings work, how millions of American students finance higher education, and more.
Hours of research by our editors, distilled into minutes of clarity.
In so-called “equal treatment states,” where tipped workers are subject to the normal federal minimum wage or higher rather than the tipped minimum wage, the poverty rate is 11.1%.
The habit runs contrary to economic rationality: Why pay more for a good or service you have already received when it isn’t mandatory? Researchers found that people tip, in part, to avoid the psychological pain of not fitting in.
During Prohibition, restaurants lost significant revenue, given that they could no longer legally serve customers high-margin alcohol. As a result, many of these restaurants leaned more heavily on tips to ease the financial pressure of paying employees.
In 1938, the New Deal established a minimum wage for one-fifth of the labor force, with many sectors—including service workers—not covered. Today, although the subminimum wage of $2.13 an hour is enforced, a large portion of those paychecks go to taxes like Social Security and Medicare.
From the oldest operating McDonald's in the world to the farthest north, a photographer visited hundreds of the world's most popular restaurant chains over several years. He watched to see what the locals would order, bought food, took pictures of the food, and then ate it. He calls the work social anthropology, and compiled his images in a book titled the "McAtlas." See the photos here.
Tariffs have impacted the wine industry in Canada significantly, given that California winemakers are responsible of 80% of the country's wine supply.
Over the past 20 years, Apple stock generated an annualized total return of about 27.6%. Learn more about how those numbers came to be in this article.
That makes Connecticut the most competitive state in the country when it comes to joining the 1%. This map outlines how much it takes in the other states.
Gross domestic product estimates the value of goods and services produced in a country, typically through the expenditure method, which adds up spending by consumers, investors and governments with the value of exports. The top five economies are the US, China, Germany, Japan and India.
The music streaming company lost revenue for years as it sought to grow, but once it went public, investors pushed the company to expand into podcasts, cut costs, and prefer passive mood listening via algorithmic curation to increase value. Users have mixed feelings about using it.
