Money and Computing

Kristin Nord Writes: As a young widow of means my mother would restart her life again in midlife, packing up the contents of her house this time and relocating from Grosse Pointe to Bucks County, PA. I suspect she must have decided early on — as someone who had not suffered during The Great Depression — that she would volunteer rather than engage in a career for money. Yet she did so nonetheless for a rather astonishing 40 years at the little library in New Hope, PA. Some of the choices my mother and mother-in-law made were dictated by circumstance, but they came at a time when they might still have been discouraged from truly pursuing careers of their own. more »

14.2% of U.S. Small Businesses experienced an increase in operating revenues/sales/receipts in the last week, marking the fifth consecutive week of reported increases. 21.9% of U.S. Small Businesses have experienced little or no effect from the coronavirus pandemic, making it the largest estimate ever reported for this statistic. 9.5% of U.S. Small Businesses experienced an increase in the number of hours worked by paid employees in the last week. For responses collected 3/22 - 3/28, this statistic was 9.0%. 13.9% of U.S. Small Businesses have returned to their normal level of operations. 22.9% of U.S. Retail Trade small businesses experienced an increase in operating revenues in the last week, marking the first time on the SBPS that more companies reported an increase over a decrease, based on responses collected 3/29 – 4/4 more »

Jo Freeman writes: Georgia is a purple state. In the last sixty years, Georgia politics has become politically polarized and racially diverse. White Republican men hold the three highest state offices and the GOP has majorities in both legislative chambers. But, the highest ranking Democrat in the state is a Black woman. Six of the 16 members of Georgia’s Congressional delegation are Black; four are women. Only one is a white male Democrat. more »

"The consumer revolution of the mid-nineteenth century led to an explosion of available fashion goods at increasingly affordable prices. More middle- and even working-class women could buy industrially produced accessories; however, this accessibility created class tensions between the aspirational and those who had traditionally participated in luxury fashion... Social commentators judged women as extravagant or ruinous by the style of their hats, marked morality by the cleanliness of their gloves, and condemned by the vulgar color of their shoes. more »