Economy

Last April, Chris Kotchick, a Scranton, Pa., oral surgeon, and his family spent a week on a chartered catamaran in the calm, clear waters off the British Virgin Islands. A crew of two — part of the deal — ran the show.Until then, Dr. Kotchick said, the sum total of his nautical experience had been riding ferries. But his search for a vacation that would appeal to his wife, Bridget, a high school biology teacher, and their two teenage children led him to a 50-foot-long boat, which they used as a base for swimming, snorkeling, wake-boarding and scuba diving as…

In the refurbished gym at Aston Villa’s training ground, players are regularly put through their paces, spend time building up their strength and flexibility and develop the team bond that is such a key part of their incredible current form.Another regular sight in the gym has been head coach Unai Emery putting in the miles on the treadmill. But unlike most people, who listen to music or a podcast while working out, the man behind one of the biggest turnarounds in recent Premier League history uses the time to watch recordings of their upcoming opponents’ games.He’s looking for patterns, for…

A federal judge in Texas on Monday upheld a ban that prevented state employees from using TikTok, the Chinese-owned short-form video app, on government devices and networks, rejecting a challenge by lawyers who argued that the prohibition had violated the First Amendment.The ban was challenged in July by the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University. The institute filed the lawsuit on behalf of the Coalition for Independent Technology Research, whose members include Texas college professors who said that their work had been undermined after they were blocked from gaining access to TikTok on campus Wi-Fi and university-issued computers.In his…

Here’s a holiday recipe you probably haven’t made.First, pour two brightly colored powders into a bowl. Then add water and mix until a dough-like substance forms. Place that into an animal-shaped baking mold, remove it and put it inside a plastic oven. Set a timer for 90 seconds; when you hear a ding, open the oven. What’s inside? A smiling stuffed animal with large, pleading eyes. Squeeze it and you’ll find that not only is its plush body warm, but it also smells like cinnamon.Such is the alchemy of Cookeez Makery, one of the stranger toys released ahead of the…

It’s not just that DK Metcalf is learning American Sign Language and using it on a national stage — it’s that, even as a discernible novice, he’s doing it with a level of finesse that shows he just gets it.“He has the swag with it. And that’s half the battle sometimes with signing,” said Sean Forbes, one of the deaf rappers who broke down barriers at the Super Bowl halftime show two years ago with Eminem, Snoop Dogg and other hip-hop stars. “You have to have the nuances, the vibes, the way that your hands move and flow has to…

Vincent van Gogh has been surprisingly busy for a dead man.His paintings have featured in major museum exhibitions this year. Immersive theaters in cities like Miami and Milan bloom with projections of his swirling landscapes. His designs now appear on everything from sneakers to doormats, and a recent collaboration with the Pokémon gaming franchise was so popular that buyers stampeded at the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam, forcing it to suspend selling the trading cards in the gift shop.But one of the boldest attempts at championing van Gogh’s legacy yet is at the Musée D’Orsay in Paris, where a lifelike…

In the fight to bring down inflation, the falling price of gasoline stands out, even if Federal Reserve policy has little to do with it.The national average for unleaded gas was $3.14 a gallon on Dec. 12, according to AAA. That’s 23 cents less than it was a month ago and the lowest it has been in nearly a year.The biggest driver behind cheaper gas is falling oil prices. The price of Brent crude, the international benchmark, has plunged around 20 percent to $76 a barrel since approaching $100 in late September.Gas prices usually start abating in the fall, as…

It might be time to start taking the Dallas Cowboys seriously as Super Bowl contenders.Because they’ve never looked better in the Dak Prescott era, and their quarterback’s never played better.The knock that’s trailed the Cowboys throughout this season — their lack of a signature victory over a legit contender — was silenced quite convincingly Sunday night. Dallas whupped the Philadelphia Eagles 33-13 in a game the Cowboys were in control of from the start.That means there’s a three-team tie atop the NFC, with the 49ers, Cowboys and Eagles all 10-3. San Francisco owns tiebreakers over both due to head-to-head victories…

The price of Bitcoin is surging again. Major financial firms are showing renewed interest in digital currencies. And crypto fanatics are celebrating the end of a long period of depressed prices and business collapses.But the sudden explosion of optimism has come at a turbulent moment for the cryptocurrency industry.The last time crypto prices were skyrocketing, the industry’s most influential executives were Sam Bankman-Fried and Changpeng Zhao, rival billionaires whose online sparring could move markets. Now Mr. Bankman-Fried, the founder of the FTX crypto exchange, and Mr. Zhao, who ran the world’s largest crypto firm, Binance, both face prison time after…

A bright orange robot, 10 feet tall, looms over Volkswagen’s new electric car assembly line in central China. It was imported from Germany. The factory’s other 1,074 robots were made in Shanghai.Volkswagen used to import shock absorbers from Central Europe for cars it makes at Chinese factories. Now it buys them from a company in China for 40 percent less.After relying for decades on engineers in Germany to design cars for the Chinese market, Volkswagen has begun hiring for a team of nearly 3,000 Chinese engineers, which will include hundreds transferred from Volkswagen operations elsewhere in China. They will design…