Recent content from Lee Schafer
Schafer: Fed's Kashkari sees strengthening case for higher rates
Kashkari spent much of last year as a sometimes lonely voice at the Fed opposing the idea that short-term interest rates should go up. While he's not exactly on board now with boosting them, a lot has changed since his last no vote. That was only last December.
Schafer: Private equity has a PR problem
An April blizzard turned into just another bad PR moment for private-equity managers, who can't even seem to come up with a good word to describe themselves.
Schafer: Rolling recalls test Polaris' commitment to running lean
If operational excellence is a big part of the Polaris story, it really needs to stop recalling its products for potential safety problems.
Schafer: How much are your online data really worth?
So what's the users' privacy worth? It's priceless.
Schafer: UCare created a culture that allowed turnaround after big loss
UCare executives had to cut costs to survive. But there are lessons to be learned here about how they went about it.
Ceridian growth is good sign for the Twin Cities
You may have to forgive some of us for our enthusiasm at the launch of Ceridian HCM Holding as a public company. It's a compelling growth story right now.
New numbers show PolyMet's Minnesota mine holds smaller potential, except to backer Glencore
Opponents of PolyMet Mining's plan to mine for copper, nickel and other metals in northeastern Minnesota keep hoping that the economics of the project collapse…
Schafer: Pawlenty's futurism helps steer broader understanding of changing economy
Whether talking about 3-D printed houses or smart toilets is a shrewd way to win votes remains to be seen.
Schafer: Firing MNLARS manager won't fix what led to debacle
It may look like the state of Minnesota acted just like the state’s best-run companies by holding someone accountable for the mess made of a…
Schafer: Lawsuit calls out Pioneer Press owner for its tactics
Alden Global Capital has for years treated one of the biggest media companies in the country like a big ATM. Someday, it will run out of money.
Schafer: Target's decision to remodel stores goes beyond gut instinct
Target Chief Operating Officer John Mulligan says he gets asked “all the time” why the company keeps investing in its stores. It’s a new digital…
Schafer: New ERP programs can cause headaches for companies — ask Patterson
After Patterson Cos. announced that an ERP problem — among other factors — led to a disappointing quarter, its stock ended the day about 24 percent cheaper.
Schafer: Lawmakers' claims that tax cuts led to state surplus don't add up
The best explanation for the billion-dollar surplus guess has to be that Republicans had really wanted to take a victory lap.
Schafer: Annuities may offer a security blanket in uncertain times
For those of us who have had no choice but a do-it-yourself retirement program, there just isn't a sure path to a worry-free future.
Schafer: 3M must learn from its $850 million mistake
Minnesota's lawsuit and the settlement arose out of the traditional strengths of an enduringly excellent company.
Schafer: Is General Mills deal a good one? Only the company can make it so
General Mills is paying what seems like a lot of money — about 25 times cash earnings — for the Blue Buffalo pet food maker.…
Schafer: Chief resilience officer is lesson in risk management
It was a bad PR day for the city of Minneapolis last week when its chief resilience officer left after only seven months and without…
Schafer: Noncompete contracts can make it tough to change jobs
The law is fine, one Twin Cities attorney says. It's getting the law applied that's so challenging for workers.
Schafer: Minneapolis mutual fund manager Disciplined Growth Investors aims to attract clients directly
Some pithy, funny or sometimes odd statements about investing that appear on the sides of transit buses and billboards in the Twin Cities can be…
Schafer: St. Paul schools negotiators started out on the same side
Let’s hope the St. Paul Public Schools’ contract negotiations with its teachers’ union aren’t the start of a new and more chaotic era in labor…
Schafer: Fed wisely puts Wells Fargo on a short leash
The agreement with the Federal Reserve keeping a lid on the size of the Wells Fargo balance sheet is a big deal.
Schafer: Cliffs' CEO plays offense in Iron Range land dispute
Lourenco Goncalves, who put on a not-to-be-missed show for a roomful of Iron Rangers last week in Eveleth, is a miner with a track record of delivering.
Schafer: Wage inflation starting to show its face
There's nothing riskier when deciding what to do with your savings than concluding "this time it's really different" in the market.
Schafer: U.S. Bank finds policing the bad guys is expensive
U.S. Bank just booked a $608 million expense to settle with regulators over compliance failures.
Schafer: Why would Amazon snub Twin Cities in headquarters contest?
The worst possible outcome in the competition for Amazon.com's second headquarters has already come to pass for the Twin Cities.
Schafer: Higher interest rates drive investment? One CFO explains
Neel Kashkari of the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis visited Cargill, and much of what the Fed really does was discussed.
Schafer: Visible City connects data to real-life decisionmaking needs
His company is still just a startup, yet Visible City has been analyzing multiple layers of data to do things like help a client find the single best site for a new apartment building. That seems pretty practical.
Schafer: Are co-working spaces disrupting real estate?
It's also seen as a sign of a healthy culture of entrepreneurship to have lots of busy co-working places nearby.
Schafer: Retailers do care what happens in far-off apparel factories
Brands can be easily tarnished when workers are injured or systematically exploited.
Schafer: Students, find your vocation, not your passion
The college students career counselor Emily Reinert sees at Augsburg University in Minneapolis won’t hear much from her about passion. Instead they will hear more…
Schafer: Tax bill helps some industries a lot more than others
The assumption in my household all year was that the Republican tax cut bill was meant to really benefit people richer than we are,…
Schafer: No one should be upset that Medica transferred funds to a for-profit subsidiary
It’s hard to guess who critics thought got the profits when nonprofit Medica transferred capital to its for-profit health insurance subsidiary. No one does, of…
Schafer: Ignore the talk of new paradigms in rise of bitcoin
To state the obvious, no one can really "invest" in bitcoin. Just speculate.
Schafer: Aetna sale spotlights CEO pay
Aetna Inc. CEO Mark Bertolini will collect about half-a-billion dollars when and if Aetna’s sale to CVS Health closes, according to the Wall Street Journal.…
Schafer: CVS-Aetna deal is about catching up to UnitedHealth
Of the two competitors, the one to bet on is the one that doesn't need to operate a big network of brick-and-mortar stores.
Schafer: Big ACA tax bills catch some smaller employers by surprise
Some employers in the region have still been knocked back by the IRS letters landing in their mailboxes.
Schafer: Activist exits Wild Wings with little gain
Provided the deal with Arby's closes early next year as planned, McGuire persevered in a grimly determined proxy fight only to agree to a buyout premium of all of 3 percent once his nominees were elected.
Schafer: It's tempting to jump on that last 747 to MSP
Sure, it's just the retirement of a commercial airplane, but there never was anything ordinary about the 747.
Schafer: Saving for retirement isn't easy at any level of income and is hardest for the poor
Some books and financial advisors make it seem that saving for retirement is pretty simple. The implicit idea is that, if people still live on the financial edge after many years of working, there must be something wrong with them. That's not the case.
Schafer: Smart-home devices can learn too much about our daily lives
So really how smart — and harmless — is one of these things?
Schafer: Private equity firm finds Twin Cities has big pool of management talent
The sale of a majority stake in the Minneapolis software firm Jamf that was announced last month marked another milestone for investment firm Summit Partners,…
Schafer: Investment dollars always pursue a return
The decisions about how capital gets deployed also help explain why so many industries, such as restaurants and groceries, are cyclical.
Schafer: Merger is a good fit for Capella, Strayer
Some awfully entertaining reading can usually be found in the background of the merger section of the securities filings that companies prepare for shareholders when…
Schafer: Fleck's approach shows importance of building a culture
How the Gophers head football coach define culture? "Connection ... It's connecting people."
Schafer: Trump should just take a shortcut to saving household taxes
Champions for tax reform in Washington want to help the middle class so much that they have proposed a big income tax cut for the biggest U.S. corporations. Really. And they think it's going to work, too.
Schafer: Bloomington firm Stevens Foster invests locally, keeps the bar high
Lots of people see the good that can come of spending money at a shop owned and staffed by people from the neighborhood. A financial…
Schafer: Would the Twin Cities be a better Amazon partner than Seattle?
Minneapolis residents found out this month that seven of their City Council candidates and two people who are running for mayor can imagine a city…
Schafer: Trading case tied to former Life Time exec hits investing neophytes
It's a cautionary tale, if proven in court, about how quick profits can easily tempt unsophisticated people to break the law.
Schafer: Mayo Clinic is invested in Rochester, but there's more work to be done
Company towns got their bad reputation when the big employers veer from not just bossing people around to taking advantage of them.
Schafer: In sizing up bids for businesses, you can't forget Minnesota starts better off
Compared with Iowa and Wisconsin, in Minnesota we enjoy higher household incomes and are more likely to have a job, have college degrees and be covered by health insurance.
Schafer: Perception of the Twin Cities technology market doesn't meet reality
Entrepreneur Chip Pearson has been trying to get the word out that our region’s startup technology sector is a lot bigger — and has created…
Schafer: Target's wage hike not invoked for theatrics
Some local employers can't imagine how Target gets attention for starting people at $11 per hour. It's far too late in this tight labor market for $11 an hour to be news.
Schafer: Could Amazon steal the Twin Cities' top talent if it expands here?
Complaining about competing against Amazon for workers would make Best Buy and Target look like whiners. But it's clearly an issue.
Oct. 5 event aims to help investors be better stewards of assets
Fred Martin, the founder and lead portfolio manager for Disciplined Growth Investors of Minneapolis, is also the founder and host of an event he hopes will recur annually called Objective Measure.
Schafer: Best Buy CEO tells investors it's all about the customer experience
Keeping the customers coming back seems pretty fundamental, but in traditional retailing it's easy to get distracted by the store.
Schafer: Teachers pension plan officials cry foul over report that used its numbers
When a standard changed, what was already a sizable financial hole turned into a crater.
Schafer: Is Amazon the big game for Twin Cities? Bring it on
The Twin Cities doesn't have to get Amazon.com's second headquarters and its potential of 50,000 jobs to get a big win out of the new headquarters sweepstakes.
Schafer: There's no good economic case for ending DACA
Most of what I learned in economics for a degree granted more than 30 years ago has long ago leached away, but I remembered enough…
Schafer: Savings from joining forces could make this deal a winner for H.B. Fuller Co.
Savings achieved by joining forces might make this deal a winner for H.B. Fuller Co.
Schafer: CEOs get a windfall and need perspective to handle it
People would be happier, and not to mention a lot easier to work for, if they really grasped that it's far too easy to give themselves credit for good fortune.
Schafer: Place your bets on college, not the lottery
There's an old line about a lottery that is well worth repeating: It's not a form of legalized gambling, it's a form of legalized swindling.
Schafer: Criticism isn't the only thing Wells Fargo's board deserves
Somebody on that board did a lot of hard work trying to fix the bank's problems.
Schafer: Thrivent executives have hard conversations about race
It turns out that it's not elitist or corporatist to believe that businesses will do better if they find a way to include everybody. It's common sense.
Schafer: For Red Wing entrepreneur, 'make the world a better place' isn't an empty phrase
Susan Langer's start-up is called Live. Give. Save., but this is business, not philanthropy.
Schafer: Staying the same has made Minneapolis investment firm new
Traditional, even old-fashioned, precisely describes Minneapolis money manager Compass Capital Management. Yet it is also growing.
Schafer: 10 years later, financial crisis remains a puzzle
A commentary by two savvy economists shows something new and important to say about the financial crisis even 10 years later.
Schafer: Foxconn's economic impact study fails to show the math
What the people of Wisconsin need is a cost-benefit analysis to answer questions. What they got was Foxconn's economic impact study.
Schafer: Co-founder CEOs often need to step aside
Clay Collins' transition from co-founder and CEO to chairman of the board of the fast-growing Minneapolis company Leadpages could not have been managed any better.
Schafer: High income tax may aggravate Connecticut's budget problems
Connecticut's individual income tax collections have slid, recently coming in far below what had been forecast and lower than had been collected last year.
Schafer: Chaos in health care not scaring off investor
The latest healthcare and health insurance reform proposal collapsed in Washington this week, about when the Minneapolis health benefits company Gravie Inc. announced its latest…
Schafer: Sky-high pay packages have many searching for good explanations
It turned out to be a bad idea to look for research papers that explain why big companies routinely pay their top executives well into…
Schafer: St. Paul Ford plant site rhetoric exaggerates the risks
A decision about the master plan is still a long way off, but at least we know one thing now: Opponents are willing to talk nonsense about it.
Schafer: Business wisdom is seldom truly new
Another one of life's dreams ended, that of closing a career by writing a terrific management book.
Schafer: Wage hike will reshape dining experiences in Minneapolis
With Minneapolis charging ahead with a $15 per hour minimum wage last week, Minneapolis restaurant owners are already well down the road to figuring out a new model for the table service segment of the local industry.
Schafer: Minnesota's Lake County looks for exit on broadband project
One of the biggest projects to bring broadband to rural areas of Minnesota has reached a crossroads.
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