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Presents a list of the best books in business literature, including topics such as decision-making, ethics, office politics, economics, and power. "The Great Crash 1929," by John Kenneth Galbraith; "The Killer Angels," by Michael Shaara; "Den of Thieves," by James Stewart; "On Leadership," by John Gardner; "Something Happened," by Joseph Heller; "Personal History," by Katherine Graham; "Only the Paranoid Survive," by Andrew S. Grove; "Morgan: American Financier," by Jean Strouse; "Where Are the Customers' Yachts?" by Fred Schwed Jr.; "Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting by in America," by Barbara Ehrenreich.

The article discusses economic relations between China and North Korea in relation to United Nations (UN) sanctions against North Korea. Topics include trade in the China-North Korea border region, the dependence of North Korea's mineral industry on exports to China, and the status of a copper mine in Hyesan, North Korea.

Presents a list of the best books in business literature, including topics such as decision-making, ethics, office politics, economics, and power. "The Great Crash 1929," by John Kenneth Galbraith; "The Killer Angels," by Michael Shaara; "Den of Thieves," by James Stewart; "On Leadership," by John Gardner; "Something Happened," by Joseph Heller; "Personal History," by Katherine Graham; "Only the Paranoid Survive," by Andrew S. Grove; "Morgan: American Financier," by Jean Strouse; "Where Are the Customers' Yachts?" by Fred Schwed Jr.; "Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting by in America," by Barbara Ehrenreich.

The airline crew scheduling problem is the problem of assigning crew itineraries to flights. We develop a new approach for solving the problem that is based on enumerating hundreds of millions random pairings. The linear programming relaxation is solved first and then millions of columns with best reduced cost are selected for the integer program. The number of columns is further reduced by a linear programming based heuristic. Finally an integer solution is obtained with a commercial integer programming solver. The branching rule of the solver is enhanced with a combination of strong branching and a specialized branching rule. The algorithm produces solutions that are significantly better than ones found by current practice.

The article presents an interview with financial risk consultant and author Nassim Nicholas Taleb. Taleb says the title of his book "The Black Swan" refers to an unpredictable event. He explains how some businesses are more exposed to the effects of these events than others. He calls the subprime crisis a "grey swan" because it was partially predictable. When asked to assess the effectiveness of Wall Street's risk management, he says the 'science' of risk models has replaced common sense.

The article discusses various reports published within the issue, including one about choosing stocks for retirement and another about finding affordable condos.

The article profiles financier Dominique Senequier who founded and runs France's large private equity firm Axa Private Equity. Senequier also is chief executive of the buyout unit of Axa, called the country's largest insurance company. Senequier's business acumen is detailed in comments by Blackstone Group Chairman Stephen A. Schwarzman. Investment transactions made by Senequier are noted.