Here at Grid we spend a lot of time reading what the Internet has to say about business. Or, as journalists like to call it, “working.” Every Friday, we let you benefit from our diligence by collecting the most interesting and entertaining stuff we’ve encountered this week.
A new Gallup poll shows that the drinking preferences in America are changing. Beer, the long standing winner is slowly being replaced by wine and liquor. Rex Chekal
The pension crisis, as told with dry British wit
Every now and again, it takes an outside perspective to remind us how deeply ridiculous the situation in Springfield is. Thanks, Economist. Matt Present
The little known law that let’s cops take the property of innocent people
The New Yorker dives into the extreme new ways civil forfeiture laws are being used to fill the gaps in police department budgets. It also explains how the court system is getting clogged with case names such as “United States v. Approximately 64,695 Pounds of Shark Fins.” Sarah Collins
The Loneliness Loop: Why Feeling Sad Makes Us Shop and Shopping Makes Us Sad
Retail and psychology collide when the Atlantic explores how shopping may be good for the economy but not so much for the psyche. Madeline Skaggs
What happens when Goldman Sachs says someone is guilty
When Vanity Fair’s Michael Lewis writes, we read. Last week he posted this long piece about how the US Justice Department, at the behest of Goldman Sachs, railroaded computer programmer Sergey Aleynikov for stealing high-speed trading code from Goldman (after he was hired away by Chicago hedge fund Teza Technologies). Brandon Copple
The one “hippy dippy” technique LinkedIn’s CEO uses to make stocks jump 500 percent
I’d try it, but I might go crazy in that second hour. Meg Graham
Bloomberg Businessweek’s second annual “interview issue” is out Friday, and in it is an interesting Q&A with UPS CEO Scott Davis. Here’s a preview:
Q: How do you ship a live whale?
A: In a big container. Rex Chekal
