My back from SF morning train reads:
• America’s New Tax Mantra: ‘The IRS Isn’t Going to Catch Me’ Gut IRS staffing, watch tax compliance collapse. The battered Internal Revenue Service shed thousands of enforcement employees—and more taxpayers appear eager to cheat. This isn’t a surprise — it’s a choice, and the honest taxpayers pay for the cheaters. (Wall Street Journal) see also Our Tax System Should Make You Furious. A lot of us were doing our taxes in the final days leading up to it — not naming any names. But let’s start here: If you’re a normal person, what kind of taxes do you pay? (NY Times)
• ‘There is only one QQQ,’ prays Invesco. From the outside, it’s hard to shake the feeling that Nasdaq’s willingness to permit direct competitors to QQQ in the US is linked to the ETF’s new structure. (Financial Times)
• A New Kind of Hybrid Car Is About to Hit America’s Streets: Extended-range EVs are the automotive industry’s answer to range anxiety. It’s a pragmatic middle ground that might actually get America off gasoline faster than pure EVs ever could. (The Atlantic)
• The ‘Annoyance Economy’ Is More Than Just Annoying: The death by a thousand fees, subscriptions, and dark patterns is adding up to a real drag on household budgets. The annoyance is the business model. A new estimate puts the cost of dealing with robocalls, hidden fees and customer service chatbots that can’t solve most problems at $165 billion. (New York Times)
• How Iran has been studying lessons from the war in Ukraine: Military journals provide tantalising glimpses into what Tehran’s military thinks and its priorities, including drones. Tehran’s military journals reveal how closely it’s been watching drone and missile warfare. (FT Alphaville) see also How did the US run out of missiles in Iran? We spend $800-billion-a-year on defense—but the US stockpiles barely lasted through a six-week-war, and the stockpile still came up short. (Doomsday Scenario)
• Did Millennials or Boomers Have It Harder? We Went Searching for the Answer: What the data says about median income, home prices, student debt and more. (Wall Street Journal)
• The Effect of Deactivating Facebook and Instagram on Users’ Emotional State: Stanford paid 35,000 people to quit Facebook and Instagram for 6 weeks. Depression dropped. Anxiety dropped. Happiness went up. Women under 25 on Instagram saw the biggest gains. Just 6 weeks! Now imagine a full year. Working paper on the effect of deactivating Facebook and Instagram on users’ emotional state. (NBER; PDF at Stanford) see also This detox may erase 10 years of social media brain damage, researchers say: Studies show that taking even short breaks could reverse measures of cognitive decline. (Washington Post)
• The Dumbest Hack of the Year Exposed a Very Real Problem: A hijacked crosswalk announcement becomes an uncomfortable lesson in municipal cybersecurity. Last April, a hacker hijacked crosswalk announcements to mimic Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk. Records obtained by WIRED reveal how unprepared local authorities were. (Wired)
• 12 New Watches Industry Insiders Are Talking About: Standouts from Watches & Wonders, the leading industry fair, included releases from Patek Philippe, Cartier and more. (WSJ)
• Masters 2026: The scariest moment in Rory McIlroy’s win and 4 other revelations: Rory McIlroy press conferences are among the best in the sporting world because he’s an introspective athlete who listens, truly thinks about his answers before giving them, and when he wins, the joy and satisfaction are palpable. So it was yet another fascinating meeting the media on Sunday when the 36-year-old Ulsterman earned himself a second straight opportunity to chat about his victory in the Masters. (Golf Digest)
Be sure to check out our Masters in Business this week with Philippe Bouchaud, co‑founder, chair & head of research/chief scientist at Capital Fund Management (CFM). The $20 billion firm specializes in managed futures. He began his career in theoretical physics, was awarded the IBM Young Scientist Prize (1990) and the C.N.R.S. Silver Medal (1996), and has published over 300 scientific papers and several books in physics and finance.
What does it cost the IRS to collect taxes?
Source: USA Facts
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