“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity.” This was the famous opening line of Charles Dickens’ novel, A Tale of Two Cities, but it could be said of America and the world 175 years after being published. In a parochial way, it applies to the machining world I have inhabited for so many years. Every week I talk to somebody who is frustrated, fraught with defeat, and ready to “hang it…
Author: Lloyd Graff
He has one arm being pulled by Donald Trump and the other by Xi Jinping, with his back pressed against a brick wall. Tim Cook, the head of Apple Corporation, is in a pickle of his own making, despite having pulled in trillions of dollars as head of one of the richest iconic companies in the world. Strangely, Jensen Huang, the founder of Nvidia, seems to want to do the same thing as Tim Cook. Patrick McGee just published a book, Apple in China: The Capture of the World’s Greatest Company, which tells the story of Apple investing in China…
This is a blog I hate to write, but I’m doing it anyway. Joe Biden has prostate cancer. It has metastasized and could end his life. I was diagnosed with prostate cancer 16 years ago, but I have struggled with prostate miseries for over 30 years. I’ve had several procedures to ease my woes along the way, and I almost died during one of them when my heart stopped beating while they were working on the nasty gland. I’ve had more biopsies than I choose to remember. The sad fact is that probably at least half the men in America…
Would you like to live in the Arctic? Frankly, it isn’t for me, yet I am fascinated by the TV shows that are popping up like baby penguins–though they thrive in Antarctica, not the Arctic. The brutal lifestyle of the guys who harvest King crabs in the Bering Sea off Alaska has always fascinated me. I also loved a short series on the boys on the basketball team in a little town called Hooper Bay in the Aleutian Islands, where harvesting sea cucumbers in scuba equipment and playing high school basketball are both rites of passage which can conflict. The…
The myth of the great value of a college degree is fading rapidly as the cost of school loans becomes more onerous, especially for degrees in philosophy, political science, and sociology. Meanwhile jobs go begging across America for medical instrument sterilizers and aircraft repainters. Such jobs without a degree will pay $60,000 to $80,000. Sociology will start you at $45,000 if you can find a job. A toy designer with a knack for tinkering might make $100,000 and bring joy to thousands of kids. A private chef can earn up to $140,000 without a degree if they can design appealing…
My middle granddaughter, Chava, left on a college exploration trip today with my daughter, Sarah. They will check out Washington University in St. Louis, where her mom went as an undergrad, and maybe Northwestern if they have the time to get to Evanston. These are elite colleges. But if I could choose a school for Chava, that rare high school student who loves to push her mind and connect with people who are not just like her, she would be headed to a brand new four-year school, housed in a converted department store in Austin, Texas. It has 92 students…
I imagine playing basketball if I have trouble falling asleep. I envision the basketball rolling delicately off my fingertips while shooting a free throw. March is a wonderful month for me because the NCAA tournament is taking place and great basketball games erupt over three straight weekends. To add to the smorgasbord of games and commentary, this past week I saw an old documentary that went back to my high school days called GameChangers. It was about the 50th anniversary of one of Illinois’ most famous high school basketball games between New Trier, whose students were among the richest and…
It started as a pimple on the elbow. Today it has metastasized. Draftkings, FanDuel, BetMGM, and a dozen more have become a cancer which will kill the Cubs, the Bears – all the teams and sports I love. They will crush college sports too. And high school after that. But more devastating will be the misery for those whose lives have been taken over by the cancer of betting after they started with the harmless $5 bet, advertised incessantly on TV and radio. A few days ago, I read the betting biography of Allen Loeb in The Free Press online…
How My 80-Year-Old Business Started Yesterday, March 5, was my father Leonard’s birthday. He was born in 1917, the youngest of four–a younger brother had died at four years old. From everything he told me, it was a malfunctioning household. His dad, Louis, who I never met, told him often that his wedding day was the worst day of his life. Leonard’s mother, Ethel, suffered from mental illness and was in various institutions during his youth. But my dad told me his youth wasn’t that bad because he had a close-nit extended family that lived in the same neighborhood. He…
Do you know what President Trump’s basket of tariffs is supposed to accomplish? Do you think they will work for the country? Will they be good for you? How about for me? Well I have my doubts. So yesterday I tried to find out by talking to a few of Graff-Pinkert’s most successful customers, who happen to be some of the brightest folks in the machining world. The following is what I learned. Nobody is really sure about this tariff strategy. Twenty five percent of tariffs on a host of things from Canada and Mexico? Lumber and avocados will be…