Nevin's Data "Points"

My wife and I recently celebrated our wedding anniversary—it was a “big” one, one of those that almost takes your breath away thinking about how rich your life together has been. If someone had asked on my wedding day if I thought I’d still be alive and married this many years hence, I’m sure that I would have expressed confidence, likely strong confidence, in both outcomes. However, if someone on that same day had asked me to guess then where I would be living now, what I would be doing for a living, or what my income would be (or need to be)—well, my responses would likely have been much less certain—and trust me, I would have been… wrong. Not that there haven’t been bumps along the road—life is a series of zig-zags, after all—and no matter how carefully you try to plan—well, life is what happens to you while you’re making other plans, right? There was the wedding limo with faulty air conditioning on the hottest July day in history, the flat tire in the middle of nowh...

As the nation enters its third month under the constraints of the COVID-19 pandemic, it seems a dramatic understatement to say we are living in uncertain times. Let’s face it, even as the nation begins to (re)open, concerns about the coronavirus remain widespread, and the markets, though stabilizing, remain volatile. Unemployment rates, though optimism remains that they will be short-lived, are at levels not seen since… well, at levels never seen before. And then, in the midst of all this, as a nation, we are reeling from a fresh wound—the tragedy and implications of George Floyd’s death—and while many are hopeful that meaningful change can finally come from this, there’s sadness—and anger—that the protests calling for that change have been accompanied by acts of violence. Amidst all this worry and uncertainty, it’s hard to believe that the CARES Act —and the Payroll Protection Program —have only just been drafted, executed, and implemented to help stave off at least ...