FRIDAY, AUGUST 2, 2019 The Boston Globe Business B9
25
THEBOSTONGLOBE
Indexof publicly traded companiesin Massachusetts
Stocks slumped and bond prices spiked after President
Trump surprised markets with a new 10 percent tariff on
$300 billion worth of goods from China. The news erased a
broad rally, leading to the market’s fourth straight loss.
Bond prices surged, sending yields sharply lower, as inves-
tors sought safety. The price of US crude oil skidded nearly
8 percent, a signal that investors fear the economy could
slow. They were caught off guard; the White House a day
earlier said Beijing had promised to buy more farm goods.
Companies that rely on China business took the brunt of
the selling. Best Buy went from a slight gain to a drop of
10.8 percent, Apple from a gain of 1.4 percent to a loss of
2.2 percent. ‘‘Investors never like to be taken by surprise,
and that’s what happened today,’’ said Sam Stovall, at
CFRA. The United States has already applied tariffs of 25
percent on $250 billion worth of goods from China. Beijing
retaliated with tariffs on $110 billion of US goods. The Fed
cut its key interest rate Wednesday, citing uncertainty over
trade conflicts. US government bond prices rose, sending
yields lower. The 10-year Treasury fell to 1.90 percent.
Markets
Stocks slip after surprise tariff
DOW JONES industrial average
NASDAQ Composite index
S&P 500 index
Globe 25 index
SOURCE:BloombergNews
I don’t have a beef with the
paper taking Beacon Hill to
task over the need for more
transparency.
But in an attempt to embar-
rass lawmakers (“Baker backs
DeLeo’s $5,000 Chinese feast,
doubles down on secrecy”), the
Herald succeeded only in em-
barrassing itself.
In a Twitter post Thursday,
Boston City Councilor Michelle
Wu, a Chinese-American, said
“it is offensive and irresponsi-
ble that a major Boston publi-
cation would feature a cover
image promoting stereotypes
so often used to mock Asian
Americans.”
Yes, the Herald’s story is
about Chinese food, and a
white takeout box and a for-
tune cookie may seem like apt
images to represent that. But
these tropes touch a raw nerve
among Asian-Americans, the
same way speaking in a mock
accent or using gibberish to
mimic Chinese speakers is
troublesome.
One egregious example from
last year: WEEI sports radio
host Christian Fauria mocked
Tom Brady’s agent, Don Yee,uLEUNG
Continued from Page B6using a stereotypical broken-
English accent; Yee, who was
born in America, speaks perfect
English. The station suspended
Fauria for five days, and he of-
fered a sincere apology for his
antics.
“The Herald should recog-
nize the harmful impact of us-
ing racially charged images and
take responsibility, especially
because for children of color,
every mockery can create anxi-
ety and undermine what all our
kids deserve — to feel that they
truly belong in this country and
community they call home,”
Wu wrote.
Wu believes the Herald rais-
es a legitimate issue about
holding elected officials ac-
countable but said the paper
went about it the wrong way.
“For the story to be reduced
to a set of stereotypes through
this imagery distracts from and
reduces the message of the
news behind it,” she said in an
interview.
Wu, in her tweet, said she
had spoken to Boston Herald
editor in chief Joe Sciacca
about the cover. I reached out
to him for comment but have
not heard back.
In a story posted on the Her-ald website Thursday after-
noon, Sciacca said: “The front
page was purely a reference to
Chinese food. But when a con-
cern is raised that the words or
images we use are hurtful, we
doneedtolistenandapologize.”
Jimmy Liang, CEO and chef
for JP Fuji Group, which has
eight Asian-style restaurants in
the Boston area, said he
couldn’t believe the Herald
would publish such a headline
at a time when race relations in
America are fraying.
“Being clever is fine, but not
at the expense of injecting
more racism into this country,”
Liang said.
For Leverett Wing, whose
family ran a Chinese restaurant
in Chelsea for three genera-
tions, the Herald cover brought
back memories of having to en-
dure off-color jokes.
“It’s third-grade humor. Ever
since we were little, we have
had our names, words, and lan-
guageusedasthebuttofjokes,”
said Wing, an Asian-American
community activist who runs
the Commonwealth Seminar, a
program that trains diverse
leaders in politics.
Growing up, Wing worked
in the restaurant, called Wing’s,which was passed down to his
father from his grandfather. A
few times a week, he recalled,
customers would read over the
menu and attempt some sopho-
moric moo goo gai pan humor
by asking, “Do I poo?”
“What the Herald did was
just reinforce with readers the
perception it’s OK to do that.
It’s not,” said Wing, whose fam-
ily has since sold the restau-
rant. “I don’t think they meant
to be offensive. I think it was la-
zy. It was insensitive. Hopefully,
if people speak out about it,
they will learn from it.”
It’s sad that some people
still need to learn something so
obvious in 2019.
For his part, DeLeo didn’t
hesitate to blast the paper’s
coverage.
“I am deeply offended and
disgusted by the Herald’s racial
and cultural insensitivity,” he
said in a statement. “Although I
can’t say I’m surprised.”
The Herald can make this
right. A sincere apology would
be a good start.Shirley Leung is a Globe
columnist. She can be reached
at [email protected].
Follow her on Twitter @leung.Herald’s ‘wok’ headline just stirs the pot
moved a few doors down to the
current tiny space.
“We call it the closet,”
Fournier says. “I used to have a
bathroom when I lived up
north that was bigger than this
store.”
He’s never considered
changing the name of the shop,
even after the retirement of his
father-in-law, who died about
11 years ago.
“It started out as Harry’s,
and I thought he would feel
good by me not taking the
name away,” Fournier says. “He
felt proud that his name was
still being honored like that.
And honestly speaking, a lot of
people think my name is Harry.
I don’t correct them.”
Fournier sells prosciutto,
other meats, pasta sauces, and
condiments, but 80 percent of
his business is cheese. He has
remained competitive by keep-
ing prices far lower than those
at Whole Foods and high-end
cheese shops, where a pound of
cheese can reach north of $30.
At Harry’s, the most expen-
sive cheese retails at $$19.99 a
pound.
Asked how he keeps prices
low, Fournier shrugs.
“I shop around and look for
the best deals,” he says.
He is more likely to close the
shop because the neighborhood
is changing so quickly.
For more than a year, con-
struction crews have been dig-
ging in front of Harry’s and the
half-dozen other mom-and-pop
shops on Blackstone Street.
The crews are laying downuWORK SPACE
Continued from Page B6the groundwork for a hotel
planned across the street. The
construction has also displaced
the pushcart vendors who used
to set up shop in front of Har-
ry’s and the half-dozen other
stores on Blackstone Street.
Now, those vendors, which
attract huge crowds that once
spilled into Harry’s, have been
forced at least a block away.
“My business is probably
down 40 percent,” Fournier
says. “I don’t see myself doing
this in five years.”
Fournier, a 65-year-old
grandfather of three who worksnearly 60 hours a week running
the shop and buying from
wholesalers, says he is at peace
with retiring.
He is more worried about
the fate of his neighbors — a
pizza shop, a pub, and stores
selling Middle Eastern food and
halal meat that are run by men
and women who may be
pushed out by the encroaching
development.
“I’m sure the rents are going
to go up,” Fournier says. “Every-
body is on edge about what’s
going to happen. Is it going to
affect their business?”He admits he would not
miss being around cheese every
day. Years of slicing it, sampling
it, and selling it have moved it
far down on his list of go-to
snacks, he jokes.
“If you were to have a party
and put cheese out, I’d go
straight for the chicken wings,”
Fournier says, laughing. “If you
worked at a McDonald’s for 10
years, you wouldn’t want to go
for the burgers.”Maria Cramer can be reached
at [email protected]. Follow
her on Twitter @globemcramer.Cheese
shop’s a
slice of old
Boston
tion, harassing residents
through repeated telemarket-
ing calls, and even incidents
where door-to-door salespeople
allegedly pressured elderly peo-
ple by refusing to leave until
they signed a contract.
Low-income customers were
hit hardest by these strategies.
The report found those custom-
ers contracted through the
competitive electricity market
twice as much as those with
deeper pockets, and paid espe-
cially high rates.
The energy suppliers “target
non-English-speaking commu-
nities,” added Charles Harak of
the National Consumer Law
Center, an advocacy group.
“And I’ll bet they find it a little
easier to deceive people with
low income.”
Harak called Healey’s report
“highly credible” and “consis-
tent with every other state thatuELECTRICITY
Continued from Page B6has studied the problem.”
Industry representatives
condemned the tactics de-
scribed in the report, but cau-
tioned against regulation.
“If you were going to draw a
conclusion at all from the re-
port, it would be that at most it
tells you consumers certainly
could save more money if theywere better at shopping, if they
were paying more attention to
the terms under which they’re
buying electricity and shopping
more frequently,” said Dan Alle-
gretti, a spokesperson from the
Retail Energy Supply Associa-
tion.
But, Allegretti added, “I
think the suggestion thoughthat somehow we should take
people’s choice away and end
competition in this industry is a
bit like cutting the head off the
patient. It certainly makes the
symptoms go away, but it’s not
really the best solution.”
Frank Caliva of the Ameri-
can Coalition of Competitive
Energy Suppliers said there are
“legitimate” concerns about
sales tactics, but noted it is of-
ten difficult to directly compare
plans from competitive suppli-
ers with those from the utility.
“One of the things we like to
emphasize is comparisons be-
tween the utility commodity
price and the supplier price is
very difficult to do on an ap-
ples-to-apples basis, because
the terms are different, the
price is different, what’s includ-
ed is different,” Caliva said.Max Jungreis can be reached at
[email protected]
w him at @maxjungreis.Healey: Energy suppliers overcharging users
PHOTOS BY LANE TURNER/GLOBE STAFF
Roy Fournier
inherited
Harry’s Cheese
and Cold Cuts
on Blackstone
Street from his
father-in-law.
Products
include beer-
flavored
Guinness
cheddar and
several
varieties of
brie.$76.2
million
The amount that
consumers who
had switched to
competitive
electricity
suppliers paid
more per year
than if they had
stayed with their
state-regulated
utilities,
according to
Healey’s report. CRAIG F. WALKER/GLOBE STAFF