Stacker-Business & Economy

  Every June, for some industries, a familiar pattern emerges. Phones seem to ring less often. Invoices start to stretch. Decision-makers seemingly vanish, their joyful “out of office” replies taking their place. During the summer, B2B companies may notice a slump in sales that stretches beyond just a few months, resulting in major long-term consequences

  Eight years ago, GDPR became enforceable across the European Union. The first two years were quiet enough that plenty of organizations took the silence as a sign the urgency had been overstated. Then came Google’s 50 million euro fine in 2019 and Meta’s record-breaking 1.2 billion euro fine in 2023. The organizations that had

  For years, the warning has been the same: AI is coming for jobs. But the data from businesses actually using it shows otherwise. Small businesses using AI are four times more likely to say it helped them hire than say it led to cuts, according to the 2026 AI Impact Report from Intuit QuickBooks.

  In mid-July, new Federal Reserve Chair Kevin Warsh testified before two congressional committees and pledged to restore annual inflation to the central bank’s stated target of 2%. Given that inflation, as measured by the personal consumption expenditures (PCE) index, has been above that mark for 63 consecutive months, Warsh has some work ahead of

  Mushrooms may not be the first crop that comes to mind when you think of high-tech agriculture. But in B.C., Agaricus bisporus — the fungal species sold in grocery stores as button mushrooms, creminis, and portobellos — is grown using cutting-edge techniques. “If you go back 10 or 15 years, you would travel to

  Jersey Mike’s franchise system is consolidating into the hands of large, multi-unit operators ahead of the sandwich chain’s planned initial public offering, according to a new analysis from ZoomInfo, an all-in-one AI GTM platform. Ownership is consolidating into larger operators Jersey Mike’s roughly 630 franchise owners span a wide range: More than 330 run

  Local Services Ads (LSAs), Google Ads, and the Local Pack each play a different role in home services marketing. WebFX’s 2026 study analyzed 100 keywords across five home service industries to determine which channel appears most often, when each one dominates search results, and how these channels impact visibility. The study pulled real search

  When a subcontractor invoice lands in the wrong project, the error doesn’t stay in accounts payable. It can show up in the client bill, the profitability report, and the general ledger, potentially all at once. For consulting firms, agencies, and law practices, that’s not an edge case. It’s a routine risk in any project-based

  Every Google Ads account looks healthy until you hold it against the benchmark. Google Ads benchmarks are the average results advertisers earn across Google’s search, display, and shopping campaigns, and they tell you in seconds whether your campaigns lead or lag the field. In 2026, the headline numbers to know are a 3% to

  Sustainability stopped being a hotel’s side project the moment it became a booking filter. Eco-certified properties now see up to 24.5% higher booking share than uncertified competitors, and travelers say they’ll pay a premium to stay somewhere with credible environmental credentials. Uniqode’s 2026 report, Sustainability in Hospitality: The Operational Playbook for Hotels, digs into

  For decades, the U.S. dollar has been the world’s financial anchor. It has dominated foreign exchange reserves, global trade invoicing, cross-border funding, and safe-haven flows during periods of market stress. But in 2026, that role is being questioned more openly. De-dollarization, rising gold reserves, U.S. fiscal concerns, geopolitical tensions, and changing expectations for Federal

  In 2024, the U.S. fertility rate reached a new low of 1.6. Net immigration started declining rapidly that same year and quite possibly turned negative in 2025. This combination of factors has brought the rate of population growth to a historic low, a development with major economic implications, The Dispatch reports. Perhaps the most

  If you’ve signed up for ChatGPT, Claude, or another AI tool on a work laptop without looping in your IT department, you’re not alone. Across industries, employees are under pressure to work faster with AI, and many are finding and installing tools on their own to keep up. New data suggests this is happening

  In high-turnover industries, the time it takes to fill a role is an increasingly important measure of competitive strength. Yet leaders across manufacturing, healthcare, hospitality, and other sectors with steady hiring demand often underestimate what’s at stake, where every open role drives unplanned labor costs, operational drag, and a mounting hit to the bottom

  Finance teams can no longer treat mobile invoicing as optional. AP approvals, vendor payments, and reconciliation don’t stop moving when controllers leave their desks, and the workflows supporting them shouldn’t either. For distributed teams managing payments across time zones, close weeks that can’t wait for someone to be online at their desk, and field

  Traditional promotional merchandise underperforms at industry events, with attendees retaining minimal brand recall from low-cost novelties. Businesses are shifting to larger-format, high-impact branded materials to address this ROI challenge and extend engagement beyond the event, Bagmasters reports. Bagmasters Engaging Attention and Influencing Memory The argument that larger-format, creatively designed branded materials have a greater

  The financial institutions many rely on are already using AI to handle some of their customer communications, and every message, from routine payment confirmations to fraud alerts, involves sensitive information. But how well AI handles these interactions doesn’t always depend on the AI itself. New research from Sinch, which surveyed over 500 financial services

  Last week (July 5-11) was defined by the transition from temporary, emergency U.S. surcharges toward a permanent, investigation-justified centralized trade architecture. The USTR’s launch of public hearings for the 60-nation forced labor tariffs signaled that Washington will lock in a new double-digit baseline duty structure before its temporary Section 122 fees expire. This unyielding

  For most businesses, energy is a line item that gets paid without much scrutiny. The bill arrives, it gets processed, and attention moves on to more pressing operational concerns. That approach is increasingly costly. Average commercial electricity rates rose 4.8% year over year as of early 2026, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration,

  The AI notetaker has quietly become a coworker. One in 3 employed Americans (33.4%) say an AI notetaker or transcription bot, tools like Otter.ai, Fireflies, Zoom AI Companion, or Microsoft Copilot, has been present in their work meetings, according to a July 2026 survey of 500 employed U.S. adults commissioned by Kolmogorov Law and