| This is Bloomberg Opinion Today, a gracious loser who accepts defeat for the good of Bloomberg Opinion's opinions. Sign up here. A wise woman once said that money can't buy you class. But it can buy you happiness, I suppose: Adrian Wooldridge says a new paper by a senior fellow at the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton Business School pours cold water on the idea that rich people are always miserable. When comparing the life satisfaction of 33,000 regular shmegular Americans against ultra-wealthy individuals — millionaires from around the world and members of the Forbes 400 list — Matthew Killingsworth found that people with private planes, luxury yachts and designer handbags are significantly happier than the rest of us. Go figure! "The happiness gap between truly wealthy people and middle-income earners is three times as large as the happiness gap between middle and low-income groups," Adrian writes. "We not only get happier as we move from the middle-income herd to the Succession crowd, but we get a lot happier." Which brings me to the election: Which presidential candidate would make Kendall Roy's bank account happiest? On one hand, you have the richest person on earth down on his hands and knees begging acolytes of P'Nut, the euthanized squirrel, to vote for Donald Trump. But on the other, you've got the wife of JPMorgan's CEO knocking on doors for Kamala Harris. If this election really is about the economy, who is best suited to take control of America's purse strings? In terms of GDP growth, Justin Fox says it's a no brainer: Democratic presidents have a far better track record than Republican ones. But if its fiscal austerity you're after, welp, I have some bad news: Neither candidate is particularly alluring. "It's hard to recall an election that ignored the issue so totally or in which pandering on taxes and public spending was so unrestrained," Bloomberg's editors write. The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget has tried to tally the impacts of each candidate. Harris would add $4 trillion of debt over the 10 years to 2035, but that's somehow a "model of probity compared to Trump's proposals," which would tack on nearly $8 trillion in the same time period. "These are both silly numbers, and the fact that the Harris number is less silly should not give voters or bond markets much comfort," writes Allison Schrager. "The question is how long markets will continue to indulge these fantasies." Nir Kaissar says it's a waiting game: "The details of Harris and Trump's tax proposals — importantly among them the breaks and loopholes available to companies — will determine the actual rates companies pay. Those details won't be known until a new administration takes office next year, so any initial market reaction is more likely to be based on the headline tax rates already proposed." Clearly, this country needs to get its finances in order. The powers that be could start by confiscating Rudy Giuliani's 1980 Mercedes, I'm sure that could pay part of the tab... Bonus Election Reads: - Whether in Texas or Tehran, misogyny is dangerous. And women won't go back. — Francis Wilkinson
- Regardless of who wins the US election, Europe's economic jump scares may be just beginning. — Lionel Laurent
- Stocks near all-time highs and rising bond yields, hallmarks of "Trump trades," remain intact. – John Authers
We've reached the delusional stage of the race where people are coining new terms at a rapid clip. Some youngs are "libbing out" while others are "rawdogging the election." Frank Barry, though, is taking a different tack: He's carrying a sack of flour around town. Unlike all these newfangled trends, it's a tradition steeped in history. In 1864, there was a general store owned by a Democrat named Reuel Gridley, Frank explains: As the story goes, Gridley made a bet with a town Republican over who would win the local mayoral race. Whoever lost the wager would have to march through town carrying a sack of flour, as a band played the winning side's anthem — "Dixie," if Gridley won, or "John Brown's Body," if the Republican won. Gridley lost the best and stood by his word. He marched through Austin carrying the sack of flour, and at the end of the parade, he even agreed to auction off the flour to benefit wounded Union soldiers … As word of the event spread to other towns, a young reporter in Virginia City, Nevada — Samuel Clemens, later known as Mark Twain — got wind of the story … Thanks partly to Clemens, news of the flour sack spread nationally. And so Reuel Gridley, a Democrat with Southern sympathies, carried the sack all across the country, raising more than $250,000 for wounded Union army soldiers. Gridley played an essential role in democracy: the gracious loser who accepts defeat for the good of the country.
It's a shame there may not be many "gracious losers" this time around: Stephen L. Carter says both sides are already revving their post-election lawsuit engines, even though Noah Feldman doesn't expect the Supreme Court to repeat Bush v. Gore. Meanwhile, Barbara L. McQuade warns that America's adversaries — China, Iran and Russia — are about to flood social media with fake news after the polls close. "The best way to defend against this barrage of lies is to get ahead of them," she writes. Authorities ought to "pre-bunk" false claims before they establish a foothold in public discourse. For instance, the idea that dead people are casting ballots? That's a myth. If only Gridley were alive to see the state of the world today; he'd be dumping his flour sack over us all. No amount of Van Jones' tears will fill the nation's near-empty reservoirs: After America's fourth-hottest summer ever, Mark Gongloff says it simply stopped raining. "New York, which typically gets about 4.5 inches of rain in October, got nada, leading Mayor Eric Adams to issue a drought watch for the city and giving new viral life to former Mayor Ed Koch's must-see 1980 ad to 'Keep New York City Wet,'" he writes. "New Jersey, meanwhile, has been cosplaying as California, with much of the state on wildfire alert." Mark notes how "freak" dry spells will become far more commonplace as climate change worsens. I'd say "pour one out for Mother Nature," but we need to be conserving liquids:  Meanwhile, Javier Blas says Saudi Aramco is struggling to put out a wildfire of its own: "Year-to-date, Aramco has paid dividends of $93.2 billion, financed by taking on debt as its free cashflow amounted to just $63.7 billion during the same period. Put simply, Aramco has burned through more than $100 million a day – a day – to finance its distribution to shareholders. Even the fortress-like balance sheet of the Saudi company cannot sustain that for ever." Quincy Jones reminds us why AI will never surpass human genius. — Dave Lee São Paulo is becoming a city you don't want to miss. — Juan Pablo Spinetto Algorithms could help drive up the price of kale at the farmer's market. — Matt Levine Investors are pulling money from Indian stocks in favor of China. — Andy Mukherjee Vodafone might get away with a fix that regulators denied Microsoft and Activision. — Chris Hughes The Boeing strike finally ended. Goldman has a huge partner class. Airplane food is not alright. Unclench your jaw. Read a book. Pet puppies. Watch Donnie Darko. Bake a cake. Eat it too. Book a vacation. Hide under a desk. Put up holiday decor. Contemplate the cosmos. Panic responsibly. Notes: Please send a sack of flour and feedback to Jessica Karl at jkarl9@bloomberg.net. Sign up here and follow us on Threads, TikTok, Twitter, Instagram and Facebook. | 
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