Nobody is sure when it will arrive. Google, which is testing a fleet of autonomous cars, thinks in maybe a decade, others reckon longer. A report from KPMG and the Centre for Automotive Research in Michigan concludes that it will come “sooner than you think”. And, when it does, the self-driving car, like the ordinary kind, could bring profound change.
Tag Archives: economics
The rise of the ‘childfree’
Not so long ago, all women without children were known as childless, with its implication of a state of loss. Nowadays, a growing number of women are insisting on the term childfree – with its emphasis on liberation.
An increasing number of women in their 30s are rejecting the job description that they believe comes with parenting – loss of freedom, reduced career prospects and financial burdens.
How ATM fraud nearly brought down British banking
This is the story of how the UK banking system could have collapsed in the early 1990s, but for the forbearance of a junior barrister who also happened to be an expert in computer law – and who discovered that at that time the computing department of one of the banks issuing ATM cards had “gone rogue”, cracking PINs and taking money from customers’ accounts with abandon.
The Register: How ATM fraud nearly brought down British banking
Wal-Mart Wants $10 CDs
In the past decade, Wal-Mart has quietly emerged as the nation’s biggest record store. Wal-Mart now sells an estimated one out of every five major-label albums. It has so much power, industry insiders say, that what it chooses to stock can basically determine what becomes a hit. “If you don’t have a Wal-Mart account, you probably won’t have a major pop artist,” says one label executive.