| I'm Jonathan Levin and this is Bloomberg Opinion Today, your baggy revolution of Bloomberg Opinion's opinions. Sign up here. In the movie The Wild Robot, a humanoid named Roz gets lost in transit and ultimately washes up on an undeveloped island, where she's surprised to learn that there are no humans to give her tasks. Programmed to constantly seek a purpose, she becomes a mother to an orphaned baby goose and teaches it how to eat, swim and fly. While the script includes plenty of "bad guy" robots, it seemed to suggest that the highest forms of artificial intelligence are actually capable of doing some good too. Here's hoping that message translates into the real world as well. In his new column, Tyler Cowen writes that AI could play a transformative role in philanthropy. "The productivity of small groups of people who are very good at directing AIs will go up by an order of magnitude," Tyler writes. "Philanthropists ought to consider giving more support to such people." For-profit business may be hamstrung in their use of AI for long-term gains, in part because they have near-term risk and return requirements that they must meet. But Tyler argues that philanthropists have more freedom to experiment. One possibility: deploying AI systems in poor countries to help tackle challenges around education, health and society-to-society communication. As Tyler points out, the same places that are already trailing the developed world in a series of key metrics are likely to fall further behind in the early stages of AI deployment — unless philanthropists step in. AI might also change the way we think about where to focus our philanthropic dollars; for instance, Tyler suggests that AI may lead to longer lifespans in the future, thus increasing the possible returns for addressing hard-to-reverse childhood diseases today. In the hands of well-intentioned philanthropists, perhaps AI can indeed be a good robot like Roz. Speaking of controversial technologies that can lead to positive outcomes in the right set of hands, the Editorial Board says crypto could do just that for cross-border finance. Strict verification requirements imposed after the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks have made international payments systems clunky, slow and expensive. The long list of rules and regulations have prompted correspondent banks to simply avoid business in risky areas, hurting exporters and migrants alike. That's where crypto technology could come in. The editorial points out that economists at the International Monetary Fund have already laid out details for how central bank digital currencies could be seamlessly and transparently exchanged on a unified platform. "Ultimately, the plumbing of money is a public good," the editors write. "Making it work better could make billions better off." There's a growing consensus in American politics in favor of protectionism. Former President Donald Trump, of course, has in a sense built his entire 2024 campaign on the promise of high across-the-board tariffs (well, that and mass deportations). Though not anywhere near the Trumpian extreme, Democrats too have cozied up to the idea of tariffs, edging away from the empirical evidence that global trade increases productivity and living standards. Clive Crook acknowledges that progress doesn't "make everybody better off, and market economies have done too little to help its victims." But he says that more protectionism isn't the answer; rather, the US can look to the proven tool of wage insurance to help smooth the challenges of economic change. Since its creation in the 1960s, the Trade Adjustment Assistance program has helped some of those displaced by trade by offering things like income support and retraining. But as Clive says, it struggled to gain major backing and, even at is 1970s peak, remained a modest force. In 2022, the government stopped certifying workers for the program. But Clive says that policymakers should consider reviving it as part of a broader overhaul the would modernize the social safety net. Baggy jeans have been having a moment, but Andrea Felsted — ever the forward-looking columnist — is calling a top. As she shows in this chart from her column, "baggy" dominated growth in women's jeans over the 12 months through August. If you throw in baggy-ish category "loose," it's clear that Americans have been extremely focused on comfortable fits since they emerged from their homes after the Covid-19 pandemic. According to Andrea, the retrofitting of closets for the baggy revolution has been a great revenue driver for the likes of Levi Straus & Co. and other companies — and they need to be careful not to get caught flatfooted as the trend turns. Andrea says fashion commentators are already talking about the return of, yes, skinny jeans. Markets should give UK Chancellor Rachel Reeves the benefit of the doubt. — Marcus Ashworth Beijing is learning about managing expectations. — Daniel Moss Jamie Dimon is right that analysts spend too much time on minutiae for their models. — Jonathan Levin Boeing needs help from the Defense Department. — Thomas Black Trump is winning over some immigrants and here's why. — Mary Ellen Klas There's some pressure on resale values for Ferraris. — Chris Bryant Humans remotely controlled some aspects of Optimus robots at Tesla event. The Nobel in economics goes to group studying colonial legacy. Fox News's Bret Baier will interview Kamala Harris. An Indian man has built the world's smallest washing machine. A woman pled guilty to smuggling turtles into Canada in a kayak. A Florida man tried to steal a generator powering a traffic light. Notes: Please send crypto scams and selfies with your humanoid robots to Jonathan Levin at jlevin20@bloomberg.net | 
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