Business Opinion

With the U.S. population expected to reach 300 million in the coming months, it seems a good time to ask, with apologies to David Byrne, "How did we get here?" What were the innovations, technologies, and inventions that enabled the settlement of a vast country and growth of a population that size? We set out to identify 10 innovations, large and small, that played parts in ways both plain and surprising.

In the classic 1977 bodybuilding documentary Pumping Iron, a young Arnold Schwarzenegger plays a trick on his friend and rival Franco Columbu. Schwarzenegger tells Columbu that if he really wants to impress the judges at a competition he should let out a big roar at the end of his last pose. Columbu does so -- much to his embarrassment. And Schwarzenegger ends up winning the tournament.

NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. stocks may gain and volume may rebound as Wall Street goes back to work after the Labor Day holiday, and investors bet the Federal Reserve will keep rates unchanged at its meeting this month.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Stop treating your cash like trash. With yields on money market mutual funds pushing 5 percent, it's time to stop ignoring the returns you're getting on the money you have saved for a rainy day.

NEW YORK (Reuters) - The cost of insuring companies against lawsuits from products such as faulty tires and asbestos has dropped as much as 10 percent this year, the largest decline in more than a decade, insurance specialists say.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Here's another limited-time offer from the U.S. government: For the next two years, some older taxpayers will be able to donate money to charity directly from their individual retirement accounts (IRAs).

NEW YORK - Sector investing can look deceptively easy.

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Management-led buyouts are running more than eight times ahead of this time last year, buoyed by blockbuster deals at HCA Inc. and Kinder Morgan Inc. , and more announcements are expected.

NEW YORK - If Bill Miller were an athlete, he'd be an Olympian with a rock in his shoe. Miller manages Legg Mason Value Trust, the only mutual fund to outperform the Standard & Poor's 500 for the past 15 calendar years. But Value Trust had, in his own words, "a dreadful second calendar quarter."

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - As increasingly harried consumers grapple with overwhelming fashion choices, inconsistent sizes and expanding waistlines, Web-based companies are casting themselves as personal shoppers, catering to every body type's special needs.

(Linda Stern is a freelance writer. Any opinions in the column are solely those of Ms. Stern. You can e-mail her at lindastern(at)aol.com.)

NEW YORK (Reuters) - What price is collective wisdom? At TIGER 21, an exclusive club for high-net worth individuals, it's $25,000 a year.