Last week’s breakfast speaker was John Ydstie, a long-standing and important member of NPR in Washington, D.C. He, along with club member Jay Davies, grew up in a small community in North Dakota, some of which had unpaved roads leading to schools, etc. They married sisters. The pursuit of their expanding professional horizons over three decades has brought both of them to the Washington, D.C. area.

For the past 28 years, John Y. has been economic correspondent with NPR whose audience is expanded as people become more mobile. Primary communication is through internet and radio. Magazines are failing because of the diminishing commercial advertising. NPR’s primary funding is from individual and corporation contributions, but its outreach to smaller areas could not continue without at least 10% funding by the federal government. Next, Jon commented on our interest in betting on markets (national and international) since early in our democracy. This applies to various areas: financial markets as well as the periodic election returns. He observed that an expensive market in England has functioned for over 100 years.

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