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When China suddenly cut the value of its currency Tuesday, investors everywhere were caught off guard.

And they didn’t like it. They sent both stock and commodity prices much lower. Even interest rates fell.

Now maybe you are wondering: Huh? What does this China move mean for me?

Before we get to that, let’s first run through what happened on the other side of the world:

— China’s government wants to reverse an economic slowdown there. So it decided that to boost growth, it had to take steps to lower export prices and attract foreign customers.

— That meant cutting the value of its currency, the yuan, by nearly 2 percent.

— So now China can, in effect, offer its goods at a discount in the global marketplace, gaining an advantage over competitors, including U.S. manufacturers.

That triggered a lot of fears, including these:

— Investors worry that China’s unexpected move tells us that the country’s economy is even weaker than they thought. If it is weaker, then China might start pulling back on purchases of goods and services from other countries.

— U.S. manufacturers fear that other central banks might follow China’s lead and devalue their currencies too. U.S. exports already are down this year, so tougher competition would be unwelcome here.

— Economists don’t like currency or trade wars that distort free markets. And political anger in Washington is rising. Many lawmakers already had been calling for measures to penalize currency “manipulators.” Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, said in a statement that China’s latest currency move means “it’s past the time to do something about it.”

Those fears roiled markets:

— Stock prices took a big hit, with the Dow Jones industrial average falling to 17,403, down 212 points. The S&P 500 index tumbled 20 points to 2,084. European stocks fell too, down by 1.6 percent.

— Commodity prices got slammed because a lot of investors figure that China will be buying less of everything. So oil and metal prices fell especially hard, but so did corn, wheat and lumber.

— Interest rates slipped on U.S. Treasuries because investors wanted to put their money somewhere safe. When investors are eager to own Treasuries, then the U.S. government can offer lower rates. So the yield on the 10-year Treasury note fell to a two-month low of 2.13 percent.

What does all of this mean for your wallet?

Here are some upsides:

— U.S. consumers got good news on oil prices, which fell to a six-year low of $43.28 per barrel. That pretty much guarantees bargains at the pump this fall. Many experts say gas could be averaging less than $2 a gallon by winter.

— All sorts of commodity prices fell, so that should beat back inflation. For example, if copper and lumber cost less, then builders can hold down prices for new homes.

— Those lower commodity prices might encourage the Federal Reserve to hold off on raising interest rates this fall. If Chinese imports are cheaper, and gas is lower and food prices are restrained, then the risk of inflation is down, so why raise rates?

Here are some downsides:

— Tumbling commodity prices may sound good if you are a consumer, but not if you are a miner or a farmer or an oil field worker. Lower prices could mean lower profits and more layoffs.

— If you’re a saver, you may feel like you just can’t win. Interest rates are down on your bank savings, and the stock in your 401(k) retirement account is down too.

— If you are a U.S. manufacturer who must compete with China, you too may feel like the deck is stacked against you.

It’s not easy sorting out whether on balance, China’s move will hurt or help you because it depends on whether you mostly consume commodities or produce them — and whether you mostly save money or borrow it.

But in any case, a decision made by a few officials in China reached into your wallet on Tuesday. Small world.

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Nick Symmonds, an American middistance runner, won’t be competing in the world championships in Beijing this month.

Symmonds, who is a U.S. National champion and has competed in the Olympic Games, failed to sign a terms and conditions agreement with USA Track & Field that is necessary to be part of the team. He has a personal sponsorship deal with Brooks Running, while the American world championships team is sponsored by Nike.

He posted this photo of the USATF letter he received to his Instagram account:

After receiving the letter that said he had to wear either Nike or nonbranded apparel, Symmonds posted again on his Instagram, asking that the team contract be rewritten, because he wouldn’t sign it with the sponsorship requirements.

Because he wouldn’t agree to wear Nike, the team replaced him, writes ESPN:

” ‘Two years’ worth of work to try to win another medal for my country are now down the drain,’ Symmonds said. ‘Is it frustrating? Of course. But no part of me regrets doing this.’

“Symmonds decided to take a stand in order to push for more rights for his fellow athletes, believing they should be rewarded with a bigger piece of the pie.”

USATF said that it respects his decision but that the Statement of Conditions has been in place for years and that “athletes and agents are familiar with the provisions of the document, which include requirements pertaining to athlete conduct as goodwill ambassadors for the United States, proper handling of the American flag, wearing the designated Team uniform at official Team functions, attendance at official Team practices, meetings and other events, commitment to train and report fit to compete, and following doping rules.”

It adds that it has no restrictions on “athlete footwear, eyewear or watches.”

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Music icon Prince is worried about the future of the music business for artists, and his top priority can be summed up in one word: Freedom.

“Record contracts are just like — I’m gonna say the word – slavery,” Prince told a group of 10 journalists Saturday night, during a meet and greet at his Paisley Park Studios in Minneapolis. “I would tell any young artist … don’t sign.”

His pitch to the group was simple: Typical record company contracts turn artists into indentured servants with little control over how their music is used, particularly when it comes to revenue from streaming services playing their music online — and he wants to change that.

Cellphones and recording devices were banned for everyone at Paisley Park — as was any kind of alcohol — so no photos or audio of his words were recorded.

Sitting at the head of a glass table emblazoned with his trademark image combining the astrological symbols for male and female, Prince wanted to talk up his new alliance with Jay Z and the rap star’s new music streaming service, Tidal.

He talked about how his deal with Jay Z still gave him the freedom to collaborate with other artists on songs which might appear elsewhere, stressing the importance of artists controlling as much of the revenue from their work as possible.

“Once we have our own resources, we can provide what we need for ourselves,” he said. “Jay Z spent $100 million of his own money to build his own service. We have to show support for artists who are trying to own things for themselves.”

He advocated seeing artists paid directly from streaming services for use of their music, so that record companies and middlemen couldn’t take a share. He also criticized radio giant Clear Channel, saying its dominance of the radio industry homogenized stations across the country.

Asked how he would get his message out, Prince chuckled and looked at the group crowded around his conference table. “That’s why you’re here,” he laughed.

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The Labor Department’s July jobs report, released Friday, showed employers added 215,000 workers and that the unemployment rate was unchanged at 5.3 percent.

So how would you interpret that report if you were a policymaker for the nation’s central bank?

It really — really — matters how you read those numbers, because you have a huge decision to make in September. You and the other Federal Reserve Board policymakers have to set the direction for interest rates.

Lots of economists say you should vote for the first rate hike since 2006. But will you?

If you raise interest rates too soon, you might choke off growth. Think of the young family that wants a bigger car but needs an affordable loan. Consider the small-business owner who needs to borrow money to hire more workers.

Higher interest rates would hurt them and slow growth for all of us; maybe even bring on a recession.

But then think about the retirees who have earned almost no interest on their savings for years. Superlow rates have not only hurt savers; they’ve enabled some businesses to buy assets they can’t really afford, driving up prices and possibly creating bubbles. (Remember the pain caused by the housing bubble.)

Holding down interest rates could hurt savers and lead to inflation and dangerous price bubbles.

So what should you do? Let’s dig into this latest evidence to help make a decision.

Factors Favoring A Rate Hike

• When the Federal Reserve met in July, policymakers said they saw “solid” job growth, and most private economists agreed, predicting 215,000 new hires for that month. They were right — the economy continues to churn out jobs at a pace consistent with 2.5 percent to 3 percent growth.
• July’s unemployment rate held steady at 5.3 percent, and the workforce participation rate remained unchanged at 62.6 percent. Those stable numbers suggest the labor market is in no danger of going bust.
• Average hourly earnings rose 0.2 percent in July — a hint that wage inflation might be starting.

Given that evidence, a reasonable person might say the economy is strong enough to allow interest rates to rise a bit in September. Nariman Behravesh, chief economist at IHS Global Insight, reached exactly that conclusion, saying: “Another solid jobs month in July strengthens the case for a September Fed rate hike.”

Factors Opposing A Rate Hike

• The labor force participation rate may be steady, but it’s dismal. It hasn’t been this low since the late 1970s, when large numbers of women were entering the workforce. It suggests lots of workers remain so discouraged that they have dropped out of the market.
• Sure, the pace of hiring is steady, but it’s still too slow to absorb all of the available labor force and significantly boost wages. Pay raises are meager.
• The average workweek barely grew, up just one-tenth, to 34.6 hours.

That evidence may suggest the economy is still too weak to absorb higher interest rates. “This morning’s report was hardly suggestive of improvement,” Lindsey Piegza, chief economist at Stifel Fixed Income, said in her assessment. “Status quo is hardly a step in the right direction, making it difficult for the Fed to justify a near-term rate increase.”

The Fed will have one more chance to collect evidence before making a decision. The next monthly jobs report is due out Sept. 4, and the Fed’s policymakers will meet Sept. 16 and 17.

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Sam’s Meat Market was looted and vandalized at least three times during the unrest in Ferguson, Mo., last year. Cheryl Corley/NPR hide caption

itoggle caption Cheryl Corley/NPR

Businesses in Ferguson, Mo., are bracing as the city prepares for peaceful protests marking the one-year anniversary since it was embroiled in violence following the death of 18-year-old Michael Brown. Brown was unarmed when he was shot by police officer Darren Wilson on Aug. 9. In November, many businesses were looted, vandalized and set on fire after a grand jury decided to not indict Wilson. Since then businesses have been working to rebuild.

There are two main business districts in Ferguson, one in the downtown area along North and South Florissant Ave., and the other on West Florissant, not far from where Brown was killed by then police officer Darren Wilson.

Along West Florissant Ave., there are some empty lots where once thriving businesses were located. Five buildings in Ferguson and several more in neighboring Dellwood were set on fire during the unrest after Brown’s death. Nearly all have been demolished and most are being rebuilt.

Sheila Sweeney, interim CEO of the St. Louis Economic Development Partnership, points out barbershops, cellphone stores and others that suffered less damage.

“I think there’s a general sense of growth that most of them feel. Some are still obviously in need of assistance and a customer base is kind of starting to grow back, and it’s all going forward,” Sweeney says.

The partnership, banks and the state have given about $750,000 to more than 70 businesses in the region — either grants or loans — some at zero percent interest. St. Louis County is funding a matching grant program to help businesses pay the cost of fixing up their facades.

The smoldering remains of a beauty supply store in Ferguson, Mo., in November. Unrest gripped the city after a grand jury decided not to indict police officer Darren Wilson in the shooting death of Michael Brown. Cristina Fletes-Boutte /TNS/Landov hide caption

itoggle caption Cristina Fletes-Boutte /TNS/Landov

At Sam’s Meat Market, there’s an open sign out front but the owner doesn’t want to talk. The grocery store sits back off the road. It was looted and vandalized at least three times during the unrest. Marquess Mull, who often cleans the floors of area businesses, says he expected the market to reopen after it was looted the first time.

“But the second and third time, woo, it could take a lot out of a person,” Mull says. “I know it took a lot out of him just to really come back and get that mindset to come back, but this store is definitely important to the community.”

But others don’t feel as positive about doing business in Ferguson.

Dionneshea Forland has been in business for 10 years running Missouri Home Health and Therapy out of an office building on West Florrisant. She had to move out last August and again in November. Vandals stole computers and office furniture. Her clientele dropped because therapists weren’t comfortable coming to the area. Her client base is slowly growing, but Forland is still moving out.

“I think businesses are having a hard time with coming back to where they were at before the incident happened,” Forland says. “I think the visual when you ride down West Florissant is not a good visual.”

Ferguson Mayor James Knowles says the city is making progress and even attracting new business. He says perceptions about West Florissant are caused in part by people he says are taking advantage of a situation.

“It’s very difficult when you have a group of 30 kids that show up on the lot of McDonalds scream, yell, intimidate people, scare people and claim it’s their right to do it, and it has nothing to do with any movement,” he says.

Knowles says the good news is that Ferguson will have more businesses overall than last year — among them, a call center that a managed health care company plans to open, creating up to 200 jobs. And Starbucks will locate a shop on West Florissant.

Jerome Jenkins, who owns a diner called Cathy’s Kitchen in downtown Ferguson, says the crowds are good at breakfast and lunch but it’s slower at night. “People still unsure if they should come out after 5,” he says.

While some may view Ferguson as a city scarred by violence, Jenkins calls it a goldmine.

“So Ferguson will not fail, and we will rise out of the ashes from a riot not because we have this great idea but because we are surrounded by economic development,” he says.

Other business leaders say they just want people to recognize all the work that’s been done in the past year to help bring the community back.

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Tens of thousands of people in the southeastern U.S. went without cellphone service Tuesday for about five hours. For some, that even meant they couldn’t call 911.

The outage hit parts of Kentucky, Tennessee, Alabama and Georgia. It’s not exactly clear what caused the incident. State officials say years of deregulation have made it nearly impossible for authorities to find out details from telecom companies. State regulators say they have no way of knowing if the problem stemmed from neglect of the infrastructure, an accident, or sabotage.

What is known comes from statements made by the major phone carriers — Verizon, T-Mobile, Sprint and AT&T. All of the carriers say the problem started at a part of the infrastructure that’s buried in the ground, and is owned and operated by AT&T.

Derek Turner, with the nonprofit watchdog group Free Press, says most cellphone providers still have to rely on some older networks. “What a lot of people don’t realize is that a cell tower connects your calls to a wire and usually that wire is owned by the legacy monopoly phone company,” he says.

In an email, an AT&T spokesperson said engineers pinpointed a “hardware related issue.”

NPR contacted the state utility authorities in Kentucky and Tennessee. Andrew Melnykovych of the Kentucky Public Service Commission says he thinks it may have been a cut fiber optic cable. “But, beyond that,” says Melnykovych, “we don’t know much.”

Tim Schwartz, a spokesperson for the Tennessee Regulatory Authority, has different information. “My understanding is that it was a router issue,” says Schwartz. “It just failed to work and so they just had to replace it.”

And it is likely these agencies will never be able to tell us more than the phone companies choose to reveal. According to Schwartz, “the wireline and wireless service in particular is market-regulated here in Tennessee. So the TRA, the Utility Commission, does not have jurisdiction over these issues.”

Turner of the Free Press says that the telecoms have been lobbying for years to get rid of the federal and state regulations that once covered telephone service.

“They’ve tried to sell policy makers on this idea that once we switch over to all IP based communications that there won’t be any need for ongoing regulatory oversight,” says Turner.

The Federal Communications Commission does have the ability to look into it. But, Turner thinks that it would be more efficient for state regulators to have oversight. And he says, the telecoms have been trying to get rid of the federal regulations as well.

One thing is certain. Cellphones have become essential to contemporary life. When Ashley Johnson of Louisville lost her service on Tuesday, she struggled to make child care arrangements.

“I was trying to get on my work computer to get in touch with my grandma,” she says, “so she made sure she had my kids and to let her know my phone wasn’t working. It was horrible. It was several hours.”

About five hours, say authorities. And that’s about as much detail as they may ever know.

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A worker at Ford’s assembly plant in Wayne, Mich., installs back seats made from soy-based foam in a Ford C-Max. Jason Margolis/NPR hide caption

itoggle caption Jason Margolis/NPR

It’s earnings season on Wall Street, and investors are again looking to quarterly reports to gauge the health of companies. Some environmentalists are looking to so-called “sustainability reports” — how companies are improving their ecological footprints. But not all environmentalists are putting so much stock in these reports.

Andrew Hoffman, at the University of Michigan, breaks environmentalists into two colors, or rather shades of a color. First, the perspective of the “dark greens”:

“Business is the enemy because they just want to make money and they don’t care about the environment,” Hoffman says.

Then, there’s the “bright green.”

“[That person] looks at business as an ally, looks at the market as the solution. Business is the power. So if we’re going to solve the problems we face, it has to come through business,” Hoffman says.

Hoffman puts himself in this camp. He splits his time between the University of Michigan’s Business School and the School of Natural Resources and Environment as the director of the University’s Erb Institute, which blends the two fields. Hoffman teaches sustainability in business, and we’re not just talking about Patagonia and Tom’s of Maine. He tracks what big multinationals are doing.

“Dow is doing some really interesting things on valuing ecosystem services partnering with the Nature Conservancy,” says Hoffman. “Coca-Cola, for all its problems, is doing a lot of work to start to look at water issues.”

And just down the road, Hoffman points to Ford Motor Co. The automaker is improving its ecological footprint by making changes like using more renewable materials in its manufacturing process for interior car parts.

At its assembly plant in Wayne, Mich., workers quickly install back seats in sedans. In the past, the padding in seats was made mostly from petroleum-based compounds. Aaron Miller with Ford’s communications team says now, they’re made partly from plants, specifically soy.

Chemical engineer Debbie Mielewski heads Ford’s plastics and sustainable research division. She says the automaker is looking to increase the amount of environmentally friendly materials in its vehicles. Jason Margolis /NPR hide caption

itoggle caption Jason Margolis /NPR

“If you feel it, it’s very structured, very rigid,” Miller says, picking up a seat. “So when we use it in our seats, it meets the same safety standards, but now we’re using more environmentally friendly materials.”

But before there were soy seats in a factory, there were soybeans in a lab. Chemical engineer Debbie Mielewski, who heads Ford’s plastics and sustainable research division, points to some misshapen, deformed soy foams.

“Stinky, flat, something that nobody really wanted in their car or would be interested in sitting on,” she says.

Eventually, her team got the formula exactly right.

“We’re utilizing about 31,251 soy beans in every vehicle. But toward the future, we’d like to even put even more bio-based content in the foams,” Mielewski says.

She still has to include some petroleum compounds to make her foam. She’d like to eliminate that entirely with something like algae — to further reduce the company’s carbon emissions.

She’s also looking to build dashboard components from tomato stems, oat hulls, and old shredded U.S. currency.

Before chemists can run years of tests, they first need approval from people like John Viera, Ford’s global director of sustainability.

Would Ford use biomaterials that cost the company a little more?

“We wouldn’t because we just really believe there are more than enough opportunities to find applications that are good for business and good for the environment,” Viera says.

Ford has won several prominent environmental awards for its work with biomaterials and for reducing energy use and waste at its factories, including being named one of the Ethisphere Institute’s most ethical companies for six straight years. Still, not everyone is impressed.

John Ehrenfeld, a retired faculty member from MIT who studies business and the environment, says the very idea of a corporate sustainability report is flawed.

“I think companies just don’t get it,” he says. “Almost all things that show up in sustainability plans are one form of Band-Aid, trying to do less bad.”

Ehrenfeld doesn’t think companies like Ford are trying to mislead people.

“I just think that if they’re fooling anybody, they’re fooling themselves about the nature of the problem and the effectiveness of their solutions,” he says.

He says if Ford was really serious about tackling issues like global warming, it would invest in things like public transportation.

Ford’s leaders don’t entirely disagree.

Viera says Ford wants to become a “mobility solutions” leader — moving goods and people around in increasingly congested places, and not just by selling more cars and trucks. For that to work, though, the company — or any for-profit company — has to make sure it can make money doing it.

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The next time you’re in the dairy aisle at the supermarket, take a moment to imagine the animals that produced all that milk. Do these cows have horns? Chances are they do, or at least they did at birth.

About 85 percent of milk sold in the United States comes from Holstein cows born with horns. But it’s standard practice for farms to remove horns from cattle to prevent injuries to workers, veterinarians and other cows in the herd.

“Horned cattle: You get them on the truck, you get twice as many bruises when you get to the slaughterhouses. Bruises have to be cut out and thrown away,” says Colorado State University professor and well-known animal advocate Temple Grandin. “In the dairy industry, removing horns improves safety for the stock people and the farmworkers.”

But not everyone agrees with the practice of dehorning cattle. In recent years, animal welfare groups including The Humane Society and People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) have called for an end to horn removal in cattle.

Their research shows it causes animals significant pain and stress, and that painkillers are rarely used during these procedures.

In the United States, there are no national rules regarding how farms should remove horns from cattle. Many farms follow the guidelines of the American Veterinary Medical Association and the National Milk Producers Federation, which recommend a practice called disbudding. Disbudding halts the growth of horn tissue in very young calves before pointy horns start to grow. Other dehorning techniques, like excising developing horns with metal scoops, are arguably harder on the cows and the workers.

Grandin is in favor of disbudding, as long as it’s done quickly and with pain relief. “It’s just like the dentist — you’ve got to wait for the drugs to take effect,” she says.

But PETA and The Humane Society are pushing for a different approach. They want dairy farms to breed more hornless, or polled, animals into their herds. Thanks to advances in genomic selection and DNA testing, farmers can more easily find animals that carry naturally occurring hornless genes and breed the best of these animals with horned cattle. To be clear, this isn’t genetic modification but breeding, since the polled gene occurs naturally in cattle.

“What’s really exciting is that the polled gene is a dominant gene. Right away you get at least 50 percent of offspring born without the horn gene. Right off the bat, 50 percent of animals are spared from this cruel procedure,” says PETA spokesman Dave Byer.

Until recently, selecting for the hornless gene hasn’t been a top priority for the dairy industry, which is more interested in traits like superior milk production, cow health and fertility.

“In the past, there weren’t very many polled bulls for farmers to choose from, so the ability to find one with good genetics for milk production and all the other traits was low,” says Virginia Tech genetics professor Ben Dorshorst. That’s changed now: “It is easier to find a good one, and that gets even more farmers interested in using polled genetics,” he says.

Dorshorst recently conducted an analysis that revealed there are now twice as many polled dairy bulls for farmers to buy semen from than there were two years ago.

Bryan Quanbury, whose company, DairyBullsOnline, specializes in polled dairy breeding, says he’s seen that uptick in demand firsthand. “Five years ago, people hardly knew polled dairy cattle existed. Today farmers are asking for polled bulls,” he says. “With increased awareness, there is increased demand.”

Aurora Organic Dairy, which milks 19,000 cows in Colorado and Texas, began using polled genetics in its herd more than three years ago. Now nearly 70 percent of the farm’s newborn calves are hornless.

“The main reason that we do a lot of these things at Aurora is because cow care, animal wellbeing, is our no. 1 priority. And we share what we’re doing with our customers, and they love it,” says Aurora’s vice president, Juan Velez.

Most of the milk sold in the US comes from Holstein dairy cows that are born with horns. To protect animals and workers, it’s standard practice for farms to remove horns from calves soon after they’re born. Abbie Fentress Swanson for NPR hide caption

itoggle caption Abbie Fentress Swanson for NPR

Responding to calls from PETA, the Humane Society and concerned customers, many food manufacturers, retailers and restaurants are asking their suppliers to integrate more polled cattle into their herds. In July, the nation’s largest supermarket, Kroger, became the latest retailer to get on board. Other companies with animal welfare policies that address dehorning and polled genetics in the supply chain include Starbucks, Sodexo, Dannon, Aramark, Nestlé, General Mills, Chipotle, Dunkin’ Brands and Wal-Mart.

But these companies aren’t requiring suppliers to act, and farms aren’t exactly chomping at the bit to make their herds 100 percent polled. Fair Oaks Farms milks 15,000 cows in Indiana and is one of Kroger’s largest milk suppliers.

“We use very little polled breeding,” says Fair Oaks president Mike McCloskey, because there aren’t enough polled dairy bulls that carry the most desirable Holstein traits.

“As soon as bulls start catching up, you’ll see dairy producers across the country using polled breeding, because we all would like to eliminate the process of dehorning,” he says.

There’s also the question of cost. A recent study from Purdue University and the U.S. Department of Agriculture found adopting polled genetics and phasing out dehorning may save farmers money in labor and veterinary costs. But polled genetics could also cost farmers lost profits if their hornless cattle produce less milk. Farmers may also have to pay a premium for hornless bull semen – a concern that keeps many farmers from making the jump to polled bulls, says Mark Kerndt, an analyst with the cattle reproduction company Select Sires.

Even if all of America’s dairy farms adopt polled genetics, it will be a while before all the milk we buy comes from cows born without horns. Since polled genes in Holsteins occur at a relatively low frequency, farmers and breeders fear inbreeding if they move too quickly.

Steve Maddox, who has 3,200 milking cows on his California dairy, is working hard to identify genetically polled animals in his herd. But he says it’s slow going.

“We’re trying to stay away from inbreeding, and we’re trying to maintain the genetic levels we’re at,” Maddox says. “You don’t want to do it overnight, and you don’t want to go back in genetics 20 or 30 years.”

Abbie Fentress Swanson is a journalist based in Los Angeles. She covers agriculture, food production, science, health and the environment.

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