BOSTON — More than 350,000 Massachusetts health care consumers will be receiving rebates from several major private health insurers under a state law requiring them to spend a majority of premiums on medical services.
That’s according to the Healey administration, which recently announced that a review by the state Division of Insurance determined that five of the state’s health insurance carriers had medical loss ratios lower than the required threshold and must return $75.6 million to ratepayers.
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Warren Buffett pictured at Dairy Queen, one of his favorite restaurants, in September 2010. Frederic J. Brown/AFP via Getty Images
Warren Buffett turns 95 years old today (Aug. 30). The billionaire investor’s diet, however, has never quite grown up. His devotion for Coca-Cola is well known, as is his fondness for ice cream, candy and hamburgers. Buffett has never tried to hide it. “I found everything I like to eat by the time I was six,” he told CNBC in a 2023 interview. “I mean, why should I fool around with all these other foods?”
The Berkshire Hathaway chairman has built one of the world’s largest fortunes. But when it comes to food, he keeps it simple. While other billionaires might celebrate a milestone birthday with a lavish meal, Buffett is more likely to be found at McDonald’s or a local Omaha steakhouse.
Here’s a look at some of the Oracle of Omaha’s favorite orders:
Gorat’s Steak House
Gorat’s is known as Warren Buffett’s favorite steakhouse. Photo by Mark Miller/The Washington Post via Getty Images
Buffett is such a loyal customer of Gorat’s Steak House in Omaha, Neb. that the restaurant has become a tourist attraction. Each May, during Berkshire Hathaway’s annual shareholder meeting, Buffett fans flood Gorat’s, generating as much as one to two months of sales in just a few days.
The menu ranges from $12 onion rings to a $99 lobster dinner. But most visitors stick to Buffett’s go-to: a rare T-bone steak with a double side of hash browns, a cherry Coke and, occasionally, a root beer float.
Smith & Wollensky
Smith & Wollensky hosted Buffet’s annual “Power Lunch” between 2000 and 2022. AFP via Getty Images
Steak, hash browns and a cherry Coke is also Buffett’s standard order at Smith & Wollenksy, the New York steakhouse that hosted his annual “Power Lunch” auctions between 2000 and 2022. Proceeds benefited the Glide Foundation, a San Francisco nonprofit. While winners paid just over $25,000 in the early years, bids regularly topped $1 million after 2008. The final lunch set a record at $19 million.
Some of those meals fell on Buffett’s birthday. In 2018, the restaurant marked his 88th with a Coca-Cola-themed cake. A year earlier, Smith & Wollensky had baked a dessert decorated with some of his favorite treats.
Piccolo Pete’s
Not every charity lunch took place at Smith & Wollensky. When guests wanted a quieter setting, Buffett often chose Omaha’s Piccolo Pete’s, an Italian steakhouse that closed in 2016. His go-to meals there were veal with lemon, chicken parmesan or, of course, steak.
It was at Piccolo Pete’s where hedge fund manager Ted Weschler dined with Buffett in 2010 and 2011 after bidding $5.2 million across two auctions. The lunches ultimately led to Weschler joining Berkshire Hathaway as an investment manager.
McDonald’s
Most mornings, Buffett swings by a McDonald’s drive-through on his way to work. His order rotates among three choices: two sausage patties for $2.61; a sausage, egg and cheese biscuit for $2.95; or a bacon, egg and cheese biscuit for $3.17. (Prices were as of 2017.)
In the 2017 documentary Becoming Warren Buffett, he revealed that his wife, Astrid Menks, places exact change in his car cup holder for whichever option he chooses. Buffett said he splurges based on the stock market’s mood: “When I’m not feeling quite so prosperous,” he explained, he opts for the cheapest $2.61 meal.
Dairy Queen
Warren Buffett (L) and Bill Gates (R) flip over their Dairy Queen Blizzard treats at the opening of a new branch in Beijing, China on Sept. 30, 2010. AFP via Getty Images
Buffett also has a special connection to Dairy Queen. Berkshire Hathaway acquired the chain in 1998 for $585 million, and Buffett has been a loyal customer ever since. He often visits Omaha locations with his great-grandchildren and typically orders vanilla ice cream topped with chocolate syrup and malted milk powder.
His loyalty has even led to unusual moments. In 2014, he tried to order Dairy Queen ice cream at The Four Seasons before settling for chocolate chip cookies.
Disclosure: Our goal is to feature products and services that we think you’ll find interesting and useful. If you purchase them, Entrepreneur may get a small share of the revenue from the sale from our commerce partners.
When world champions and proven leaders unite, investors pay attention.
As the former President of Topgolf, Troy Warfield helped transform golf from an exclusive pastime into a global entertainment empire worth billions. That’s why there’s arguably no better CEO to help Surf Lakes bring surfing to the 99% with their patented 360° wave technology.
Since most people don’t live near a beach, surf parks are a $65B market opportunity on the rise. And Surf Lakes is positioning itself as a global leader in the space. World surfing champions Tom Curren and Mark “Occy” Occhilupoare even joining as shareholders and ambassadors.
But the real opportunity is not just in the parks. Here’s how Surf Lakes is redefining the sport, and how you can share in their potential growth.
Millions of people want to surf, but 99% aren’t near a beach
Despite having an estimated 25 million to 35 million participants worldwide, surfing is still mostly limited to the coasts. Less than 1% of the global population lives near surfable waves. For everyone else, the ocean might as well be off-limits.
Surf Lakes solves that problem. Their tech produces 2,000 ocean-quality rides per hour across five skill levels, from beginners catching their first roller to pros training in barreling waves. The tech opens a huge opportunity in the surf park market.
Surfing is growing in popularity as we speak. The sport is now a permanent Olympic event, with 47 million viewers tuning in to the Paris 2024 competition in Brazil alone. Surf parks nearly doubled worldwide in 2024, as developers scramble to meet surging demand.
For perspective:
6,000+ ski resorts exist worldwide
38,000+ golf courses are operating
410M+ in global theme park attendance
Surf Lakes believes that the number of surf parks worldwide will reach the hundreds very quickly.
Multiple ways to profit from surfing
The Surf Lakes model isn’t just about ticket sales. Their wave tech opens the door to licensing fees and royalties from global partners, memberships and day passes for recurring revenue, competitions, training programs, food, beverage, retail, and more.
Each new park creates multiple, scalable income streams, just like Topgolf did with memberships, events, and hospitality.
Surf Lakes has already sold nine tech licenses across the U.S. and Australia. Their first full-scale commercial park is in the works. With industry legends and proven leadership behind them, they’re positioned as the technology provider of choice in a market just hitting critical mass.
Here’s how investors can be a part of it.
Get in at the start of Surf Lakes’ next chapter
For investors, Surf Lakes represents a unique chance to get in ahead of what could be the next global entertainment boom. With patented technology, their first park in the works, and licensing traction accelerating, this company has the potential to dominate.
That’s why surfing legends and proven business leaders are coming aboard. A-list celebrities are even chiming in—Chris Hemsworth, Hollywood actor and avid surfer, called Surf Lakes an “incredibly surreal experience.”
This is a paid advertisement for Surf Lakes’ Regulation CF offering. Please read the offering circular at https://invest.surflakes.com
When world champions and proven leaders unite, investors pay attention.
As the former President of Topgolf, Troy Warfield helped transform golf from an exclusive pastime into a global entertainment empire worth billions. That’s why there’s arguably no better CEO to help Surf Lakes bring surfing to the 99% with their patented 360° wave technology.
Since most people don’t live near a beach, surf parks are a $65B market opportunity on the rise. And Surf Lakes is positioning itself as a global leader in the space. World surfing champions Tom Curren and Mark “Occy” Occhilupoare even joining as shareholders and ambassadors.
High-integrity carbon and biodiversity markets are scaling fast, transforming natural capital into one of the century’s most powerful asset classes. Unsplash+
Natural capital, the planet’s stocks of soil, air, water and biodiversity, has shifted from the margins of philanthropy into the center of global finance. Once the concern of activists and campaigners, it is now emerging as a recognised asset class. As climate change, biodiversity loss and sustainability pressures mount, governments, corporations and investors are rethinking how to value and invest in ecosystems that underpin our economies.
This represents a profound paradigm shift: nature’s services are no longer just to be protected, but also priced, traded and embedded within financial systems. To understand how we reached this point, it’s worth tracing the origins of natural capital markets in early carbon trading systems, which laid the groundwork for today’s more sophisticated structures—and looking ahead to what the future may hold.
Early ventures to structured financial markets
The first formal natural capital investment frameworks emerged out of regulated carbon markets. The Kyoto Protocol (1997) established international carbon trading, and by 2005, the E.U. Emissions Trading System (E.U. ETS) became the world’s largest compliance market. Standardized allowances and credits represented one tonne of CO₂ equivalent (CO₂e) either avoided or removed from the atmosphere, making projects comparable and markets transparent.
Yet these early compliance systems were never designed to create truly investable products. They were blunt policy instruments focused on reducing emissions at the lowest cost. In practice, over-allocation and volatility led to price collapses, and the system often acted as a “licence to pollute,” permitting emitters to continue business as usual so long as they purchased allowances or credits.
In parallel, voluntary—or perhaps better described as private—carbon markets offered something more innovative: opportunities for companies or individuals to fund projects with positive environmental and increasingly social outcomes. This distinction between regulation-as-permission and voluntary action-as-restoration is central to the modern natural capital story.
Still, voluntary markets were fragmented and highly variable in pricing. In 2006, reforestation projects traded anywhere between £0.37 and £33.33 ($0.50 and $45) per tonne, while avoided deforestation and monoculture plantations commanded lower values. Early voluntary markets also faced significant integrity challenges. Project methodologies were inconsistent, verification standards varied widely and some credits were criticised for overstating emissions reductions or lacking additionality, meaning they might have happened without market funding. These early weaknesses highlighted the importance of robust standards, independent verification and transparency, lessons that continue to shape modern natural capital investment and the evolution of high-integrity carbon and biodiversity markets.
Meanwhile, the United States pioneered wetland and conservation banking, where developers purchase credits to offset habitat impacts. Today, this market has expanded to more than $100 billion in credit value and can be viewed as the early ancestor of the U.K.’s Biodiversity Net Gain market. While these systems created a mechanism for private capital to flow into conservation, they were restricted to specific habitats or species and designed around achieving “no net loss” rather than genuine biodiversity uplift, limiting the diversity of investment opportunities and potential for landscape-scale enhancement.
The acceleration of private natural capital markets
Natural capital markets are now scaling quickly. Growth is fueled by compliance mandates, corporate net-zero pledges and recognition that resilient, nature-based investments are essential in a changing climate. High-integrity credits from peatland restoration, reforestation and coastal ecosystems now command premium prices.
In 2024, U.K.-accredited credits averaged £26.85 tCO₂e for Woodland Carbon Code projects. By 2025, landmark deals—including Burges Salmon x Oxygen Conservation x WCC (£125 or $169 tCO₂e for up to 8,000 tonnes) and Arup x Nattergal x Wilder Carbon (£100 or $135 tCO₂e for up to 10,000 tonnes)—reset global benchmarks. Forward projections, including the Oxygen Carbon Curve, suggest that prices for the highest-integrity credits could reach £150 ($203) tCO₂e by 2030 and potentially £500 ($675) tCO₂e by 2050.
Major corporate buyers are accelerating global demand. Microsoft, now the largest purchaser of carbon-removal credits, has secured millions of tonnes to meet its 2030 carbon-positive goal. Stripe’s Frontier fund has committed over $300 million to remove over half a million tonnes of CO₂e, while JP Morgan has invested nearly $200 million into durable carbon removal solutions. Such transactions signal institutional-scale interest and reinforce natural capital’s credibility as an asset class.
Biodiversity net gain: the U.K. compliance catalyst
The Environment Act 2021 created the U.K.’s first compliance-driven biodiversity market by mandating a 10 percent Biodiversity Net Gain (BNG) for most developments from January 2024. This has spurred a growing supply chain of habitat banks and trading platforms, including Environment Bank, Gaia Marketplace and BNGx.
In its first year, mandatory BNG delivered strong signals of market activity:
Although only two percent of registered biodiversity units have been sold so far, forecasts suggest a $4 billion market by 2035. Pricing dynamics within BNG markets are also revealing. Common habitat units currently trade between £25,000 and £35,000 ($33,760 and $47,266) per unit, reflecting their broader availability. At the other end of the spectrum, the rarest units, particularly those linked to river and wetland restoration, are commanding extraordinary premiums, often exceeding £100,000 ($135,000) per unit. Their scarcity makes them both ecologically significant and highly attractive to investors seeking exposure to the most exclusive segment of the biodiversity market.
Innovation is also advancing quickly. The leading U.K. business in this space, CreditNature, has designed methodologies to baseline and measure biodiversity gains over time. These credits are increasingly viewed as the private-market equivalent of BNG, extending principles of standardization and integrity into wider ecosystem services.
Globally, demand for carbon and biodiversity natural capital credits is projected to reach between $37 and $49 billion annually by the early 2030s, with some forecasts suggesting voluntary biodiversity credits alone may be worth as much as $69 billion by 2050—underscoring the scale of opportunity.
The new frontier of natural capital
Natural capital is fast becoming one of the most compelling investment opportunities of the century. Once speculative, high-quality projects that restore ecosystems, sequester carbon and enhance biodiversity are now attracting large-scale institutional capital.
What began as a mechanism to channel private capital into environmental projects has matured into markets with robust governance, transparent measurement and increasing liquidity. The co-benefits—from cleaner air and water to healthier communities—enhance, rather than substitute, financial performance.
The U.K. is already setting the pace for global leadership in this transformation. With strong legal systems, advanced science and technology and transparent price-setting mechanisms, it is demonstrating how commercial success and ecological impact can be mutually reinforcing. Whether the challenge is climate change, biodiversity collapse or the search for diversified investment opportunities, the imperative is clear: act now. There has never been greater urgency—or greater opportunity.
Disclosure: Our goal is to feature products and services that we think you’ll find interesting and useful. If you purchase them, Entrepreneur may get a small share of the revenue from the sale from our commerce partners.
Anyone running their own business—or managing finances for one—you know how quickly bookkeeping can become a full-time job. Between tracking expenses, managing invoices, running payroll, and prepping for tax season, it adds up fast. That’s why many business owners turn to Intuit QuickBooks for accounting assistance, and right now, there’s a rare chance to get it without the usual subscription commitment.
For a limited time, you can grab Intuit QuickBooks Desktop Pro Plus 2024 for one Windows device with a lifetime license for $199.97 (regularly $699).
Why this version stands out
QuickBooks has long been a go-to for small to mid-size businesses, but in recent years, Intuit has leaned heavily into subscription pricing—making it harder to find versions that you can just pay for once and own. This lifetime license bucks that trend.
QuickBooks Desktop also appeals to those who prefer a local installation over cloud-based software. You’re not tied to an internet connection, and your data stays under your control. That’s particularly valuable if you handle sensitive financial records or work in industries with strict compliance needs.
Good fit for small-business owners and freelancers
Whether you’re managing a freelance design studio, a local coffee shop, or a growing consulting firm, this one-time purchase is a smart long-term investment. The software supports up to 100 different company files, which makes it versatile enough for those with multiple business ventures.
There’s no shortage of subscription services asking for your credit card every month, and fortunately, this isn’t one of them. If you’re ready to simplify your finances without adding to your overhead, this deal on QuickBooks Desktop Pro Plus 2024 might be one of the more practical decisions you make this year.
Anyone running their own business—or managing finances for one—you know how quickly bookkeeping can become a full-time job. Between tracking expenses, managing invoices, running payroll, and prepping for tax season, it adds up fast. That’s why many business owners turn to Intuit QuickBooks for accounting assistance, and right now, there’s a rare chance to get it without the usual subscription commitment.
For a limited time, you can grab Intuit QuickBooks Desktop Pro Plus 2024 for one Windows device with a lifetime license for $199.97 (regularly $699).
Stanford researchers found that early-career workers are facing the brunt of A.I.’s labor impacts. Wahyu Setyanto for Unsplash+
As if entering the workforce wasn’t daunting enough, the rise of generative A.I. is dampening the prospects of young workers across the U.S. Early-career workers aged 22 to 25 have experienced a 13 percent relative decline in employment across jobs most exposed to A.I., such as coding and customer service, according to a new Stanford study.
Concerns about A.I.-driven labor disruption have circulated since the 2022 launch of OpenAI’s ChatGPT. The analysis, conducted by Stanford Digital Economy Lab researchers Erik Brynjolfsson, Ruyu Chen and Bharat Chanda, is among the most comprehensive efforts to quantify the impact with data. The economists studied employment trends from late 2022 to July 2025 using datasets from ADP, the largest payroll software provider in the U.S. The datasets contained monthly and individual-level records for millions of workers at tens of thousands of companies.
“What really jumped out quickly as we were doing the analysis was we were seeing these big differences by age group,” Chandar told Observer. “That result was pretty striking.”
The researchers found a sharp decline in A.I.-exposed occupations for younger workers. For instance, employment for early-career software developers has dropped nearly 20 percent from its late 2022 peak, with similar declines across other computer and service clerk jobs. Jobs less exposed to A.I., such as nursing aides, have remained steady or even grown.
By contrast, more experienced workers have seen employment rise in these same fields in the past few years. Because generative A.I. tends to replace codified knowledge, the researchers suggest that “tacit knowledge,” or skills gained over years of experience, may shield older employees. Such expertise “might not be as accessible to A.I. models in their training process, because that might not be written down somewhere or it might not be codified nearly as much,” said Chandar.
The study also found that job losses are concentrated in roles where A.I. can fully automate tasks with little human input. In fields where A.I. augments work by helping employees learn, review or improve, employment has actually increased. “In the jobs where it’s most augmentative, we’re not seeing these employment declines and in fact, we’re seeing employment growth—even for the young workers,” said Chandar. Chandar and his co-authors used A.I. tools to assist with coding and proofreading during the study.
The report coincides with a shift in higher education away from A.I.-exposed fields. Enrollment in computer science, which quadrupled in the U.S. between 2005 and 2023, grew just 0.2 percent this year.
If history is any guide, these disruptions may eventually stabilize. Past technological shifts, such as the IT revolution, initially displaced workers but ultimately created new types of employment. “Historically, as work got replaced by new technologies, there was new work that was created,” said Chandar, who plans to continue tracking A.I.’s real-time employment impacts. “There are some ways in which A.I. is different from prior technology, some ways in which it’s similar—and we want to be tracking this on an ongoing basis.”
Buying a new car has never been more financially daunting. A 2025 analysis from Edmunds found that a record 19.3% of consumers who financed a new vehicle in the second quarter of 2025 committed to a monthly payment of $1,000 or more. That’s nearly one in five buyers taking on what was once considered an extreme car payment — driven by high interest rates and rising vehicle prices.
While it might be tempting to stretch your budget for the car you want, locking yourself into a high-cost loan can be a painful mistake. Before you sign, here are five common car-buying missteps to avoid.
1. Buying outside your means
There’s a difference between being able to buy something and being able to afford it wisely. With an average new vehicle transaction price of approximately $49,000, many buyers are truly stretching their budgets. It’s not uncommon to see buyers opt for extended 72-month or 84-month financing terms.
That shiny SUV might seem within reach thanks to flexible financing, but the long-term hit to your financial health could be considerable. Buying within your means — ideally targeting a loan term of no more than 60 months and keeping your car-related expenses under 15%-20% of your monthly take-home pay — is smart shopping in an era of rising interest rates and ever-increasing car prices.
2. Getting a dealership loan
One of the most costly and common mistakes car buyers make is waiting until they’re sitting in the dealership finance office to think about a loan. Dealerships may offer convenience, but their financing may include marked-up interest rates or hidden fees.
Instead, walk into the dealership with a preapproved loan offer from your bank, credit union or an online lender. According to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, this move can save buyers hundreds to thousands of dollars over the life of the loan. When you do this, the dealer can still try to beat the rate — and sometimes will. But now you’re negotiating from a position of strength, not desperation.
3. Trading in a car with negative equity
If you owe more on your current car than it’s worth — a situation known as negative equity — trading it in for a new vehicle can be a financial landmine. This commonly happens when people take out a six-year loan, trade in the vehicle after just three or four years, and carry the previous balance into the new vehicle. Rolling that deficit into a new loan just worsens the problem, guaranteeing that you’ll be underwater for even longer.
According to Edmunds, 28.2% of trade-ins in July 2025 involved negative equity, and the average amount buyers owed above the vehicle’s value was $6,902. That sets the stage for a vicious cycle, especially if buyers trade cars frequently or face unexpected job loss or repair costs. If you’re in this situation, consider keeping your car longer or making extra payments. If you can get a better rate, even refinancing can get you back to breakeven.
4. Not working with internet sales team first
Most major dealerships now have dedicated internet sales teams that exist to sell you a car quickly and often at better prices than you’ll get face-to-face. If you already know what make, model and trim you want, you can save hours — and hundreds or even thousands of dollars — by working with the internet sales department instead of walking onto the lot.
Sites such as Edmunds can help you compare pricing between multiple dealers, and many will show you real-time inventory, rebates and incentives. This lets you shop from the comfort of home and make dealers compete for your business. It also gives you a written quote you can bring with you — a powerful tool when negotiating.
5. Overlooking used car options
Buying new is tempting — it smells great, it’s under warranty, and no one else has touched it. But it’s not always the smartest financial move. Today’s certified pre-owned vehicles often come with extended factory warranties, undergo rigorous inspections, and cost thousands less than their new counterparts. The rapid depreciation of most new vehicles only worsens the picture. Most lose 20%–30% of their value in the first year alone, according to Edmunds. Avoiding that depreciation hit can save thousands.
Buying a new car is one of the biggest financial decisions most people make — second only to purchasing a home. Avoiding these five common mistakes won’t just save you money — it has the potential to help ensure your long-term financial security. Take your time and do your homework. The right deal isn’t just about the car — it’s about the life you want to live after you drive it off the lot.
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This story was provided to The Associated Press by the automotive website Edmunds. Josh Jacquot is a contributor at Edmunds.
Disclosure: Our goal is to feature products and services that we think you’ll find interesting and useful. If you purchase them, Entrepreneur may get a small share of the revenue from the sale from our commerce partners.
Running a business means your time is already stretched across strategy, operations, customers, and employees. The last thing most leaders want is to spend their nights buried in financial reports and stock charts. Sterling Stock Picker is a platform that is designed to take the complexity out of investing while still giving you smart, actionable insights.
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Running a business means your time is already stretched across strategy, operations, customers, and employees. The last thing most leaders want is to spend their nights buried in financial reports and stock charts. Sterling Stock Picker is a platform that is designed to take the complexity out of investing while still giving you smart, actionable insights.
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Hann Holdings Inc. has chosen to postpone its PHP 13 billion ($236 million) initial public offering (IPO). Prior to this decision, the company remained undeterred by the struggles facing the country’s brick-and-mortar casinos.
Hann Holdings Inc. Takes a Step Back
Hann stated that the decision was prompted by current market conditions and sentiment, which the company believes are not favorable for a successful offering that would accurately reflect its value and potential, nor deliver the best outcome for investors and stakeholders. The company further emphasized that the move does not indicate any change in its fundamentals or long-term outlook. These will remain strong and aligned with the strategic vision for the company, its operating subsidiary, and the broader group, Hann explained.
The company had intended to offer 500 million common shares at a maximum price of PHP 23.60 (approximately $0.41) each, with an additional 50 million secondary shares allocated for an overallotment option. Proceeds from the IPO were meant to fund the company’s expansion into the premium integrated resort and leisure market in Central Luzon.
The company expected to raise up to PHP 11.43 billion (approximately $199 million) from the offering, with the proceeds intended for capital expenditures, expansion, and general corporate purposes through its subsidiary, Hann Philippines Inc. News of Hann Holdings’s decision comes just a few weeks after the Philipnes’ Securities and Exchange Commission greenlit the company’s plans.
Hann Holdings Will Continue Expanding
Hann Holdings’ flagship development is the Hann Casino Resort, located in the Clark Freeport Zone in Pampanga. The property includes a gaming floor, luxury hotel brands such as Swissôtel and Clark Marriott, upscale retail outlets, and fine-dining restaurants.
The firm has outlined a strategy to strengthen its presence in Clark by expanding gaming capacity and introducing new non-gaming attractions. Planned additions include more food and beverage outlets, entertainment venues, and a retail complex featuring premium brands and upscale dining options.
The company also aims to diversify into online gaming; however, this initiative remains on hold pending clearer regulatory guidelines. This regulatory uncertainty underscores a key challenge for casino operators in the Philippines, where striking a balance between government oversight and industry growth continues to pose concerns for investors.
Despite the IPO delay, Hann reaffirmed its long-term growth strategy, stating that diversification across both gaming and non-gaming offerings will help attract a broader customer base.
Fed chair Jerome Powell delivered what will likely be his last speech at the Jackson Hole Economic Symposium today (Aug. 22). Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
Jerome Powell, chair of the U.S. Federal Reserve, subtly signaled that a September rate cut may be on the horizon during his address today (Aug. 22) at the Jackson Hole Economic Symposium in Wyoming. His remarks come as he faces the challenge of managing persistent inflation, cooling labor and mounting political pressure.
Traditionally, rising inflation would prompt rate hikes. But Powell suggested the labor market now poses the greater risk. While stopping short of explicitly endorsing a cut at next month’s Fed meeting, he hinted that a shift is likely. “The shifting balance of risks may warrant adjusting our policy stance,” he told the audience of economists.
The speech marked Powell’s final appearance at the high-profile symposium, where he has delivered the opening address for the past eight years. His term as Fed chair is set to end next May.
Powell’s comments landed at a sensitive moment for the U.S. economy. Inflation has stayed above the Fed’s 2 percent target for four years, ticking higher in recent months. July’s inflation read came in at 2.7 percent, while the core consumer price index (CPI), which excludes volatile food and energy costs, rose to 3.1 percent.
The Trump administration’s unpredictable tariff policy has exacerbated consumer price increases. “We expect those effects to accumulate over coming months,” said Powell, who noted that while levies will likely cause a “one-time” shift in price levels, the impact will filter through supply chains gradually rather than “all at once.”
Powell also highlighted weakness in the job market. July data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics revised employment figures for May and June down by a combined 258,000 jobs, while July itself added only 73,000. Powell described the labor market as being in a “curious kind of balance,” with slowdowns in both supply and demand for workers. He pointed to tighter immigration policies under President Donald Trump as a factor contributing to the slowdown.
Markets rallied on Powell’s signals that the Fed may cut rates soon. The Dow shot up 2 percent today, while the S&5 500 climbed nearly 1.6 percent. Bond yields fell, with the 10-year Treasuries declining by 7 basis points to 4.26 percent while the 2-year dropping 10 basis points to 3.69 percent, reflecting market anticipation of lower interest rates in the near future.
Powell underscores the Fed’s independence
Powell’s challenges aren’t only economic. He has faced repeated demands from Trump for rate cuts, sharp personal criticism, and even calls for his removal. This week, Trump extended his attacks to Fed governor Lisa Cook, urging her resignation on social media after she was accused of mortgage fraud by Federal Housing Finance Agency director Bill Pulte. Trump said today he would fire Cook if she does not step down.
Ousting Cook would further Trump’s push to reshape the Fed with allies who share his policy views. Last month, two Trump appointees, Christopher Wallen and Michelle Bowman, dissented from the Fed’s decision to hold interest rates steady, voting instead for a cut.
Though Powell avoided a direct defense of the Fed’s independence, he carefully underscored it. Monetary policy decisions, he said, will be made “based solely on their assessment of the data and its implications for the economic outlook and the balance of risks,” said Powell. “We will never deviate from that approach.”
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
Most people building with AI are chasing the same thing: viral chatbots, cool demos or the next trending wrapper. But I think the real money — the serious, unicorn-level money — is somewhere else entirely.
It’s in the stuff nobody wants to touch. Tedious, time-wasting, must-do tasks. The things you hate doing, but have to. That’s where the next wave of AI companies will emerge.
Painful > pretty
AI that makes you laugh is fun. AI that gets your taxes filed, your Visa sorted or your documents organized? That’s life-changing.
When I moved to the UK on a Global Talent visa, I couldn’t find a single tool to track my absence days — something crucial for maintaining legal status. So I built it myself. Not to show off. Just to solve a problem I was quietly freaking out about.
That’s the kind of “boring” problem most people overlook. But if it causes stress, repetition or fear — it’s valuable.
There’s more money in fixing one painful workflow than chasing 100 likes on a fancy AI-generated avatar.
The more annoying it is, the bigger the opportunity
Scheduling medical appointments. Submitting invoices. Picking wines from a 40-page restaurant list. These aren’t sexy problems. But they’re everywhere, and no one enjoys dealing with them.
I’ve built apps that take care of those exact scenarios. Some were simple side projects, but they solved problems that people repeatedly run into. That’s the magic formula.
The tools available now are ridiculous. With GPT-4o, Supabase, Vercel and Claude, I’ve launched entire products in a week — solo.
No designers. No backend engineers. Just a painful idea, an AI stack and a few cups of coffee.
I’m not the only one. I’ve seen one-person shops build apps that manage apartment leases, prep legal docs and even coach you through IVF. They’re quiet tools with unflashy interfaces, but they’re deeply useful.
If you’re a founder today, your MVP doesn’t need to be impressive — it just needs to make someone’s headache disappear.
Build for Tuesday, not for tech Twitter
Some of the smartest founders I know aren’t even trying to go viral. They’re building for Tuesdays — for that one problem that hits at 4:00 p.m. when you’re stuck in a bureaucratic loop and need someone (or something) to handle it for you.
And here’s the kicker: The more boring the problem, the less competition you’ll have. AI founders are still chasing novelty. That’s your advantage.
This article on overlooked metaverse jobs made a similar point: There’s a fortune in places people ignore.
Boring doesn’t mean small
If you told someone a decade ago that accounting automation or AI-powered scheduling tools would be billion-dollar companies, they’d probably laugh.
Now those tools run quietly in the background of almost every business.
The lesson: Don’t build for applause. Build for relief. If your product makes someone breathe easier, saves them time or reduces stress — they’ll pay for it.
Boring tools can still build billion-dollar companies
If you need proof, look at Expensify. It started by solving one thing: making expense reports less painful. It’s not exciting, not revolutionary — just useful. Nobody dreams about scanning receipts, but millions of people have to do it.
Now Expensify processes billions in transactions. All because it made one annoying task easier.
Same story with Calendly, which killed the back-and-forth of scheduling. DocuSign, which removed the pain of printing and scanning contracts. UiPath, which built a massive business by automating office tasks.
None of these were flashy, but they fixed something people deal with every day. That’s what makes them work.
If you’re building with AI, forget the hype. Look for the problems people quietly suffer through. The ones they never talk about publicly, but deal with constantly. That’s where the best ideas live.
Boring isn’t a weakness. Boring is a business model.
You don’t need a revolutionary idea. You just need to make one annoying thing go away.
If you can do that, it won’t matter how it looks. It will sell.
Most people building with AI are chasing the same thing: viral chatbots, cool demos or the next trending wrapper. But I think the real money — the serious, unicorn-level money — is somewhere else entirely.
It’s in the stuff nobody wants to touch. Tedious, time-wasting, must-do tasks. The things you hate doing, but have to. That’s where the next wave of AI companies will emerge.
