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Category: Society

The miracle of the commons

The miracle of the commons

Michelle Nijhuis writes: In December 1968, the ecologist and biologist Garrett Hardin had an essay published in the journal Science called ‘The Tragedy of the Commons’. His proposition was simple and unsparing: humans, when left to their own devices, compete with one another for resources until the resources run out. ‘Ruin is the destination toward which all men rush, each pursuing his own best interest,’ he wrote. ‘Freedom in a commons brings ruin to all.’ Hardin’s argument made intuitive sense,…

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How companies rip off poor employees — and get away with it

How companies rip off poor employees — and get away with it

The Associated Press reports: Already battered by long shifts and high infection rates, essential workers struggling through the pandemic face another hazard of hard times: employers who steal their wages. When a recession hits, U.S. companies are more likely to stiff their lowest-wage workers. These businesses often pay less than the minimum wage, make employees work off the clock, or refuse to pay overtime rates. In the most egregious cases, bosses don’t pay their employees at all. Companies that hire…

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In rural America, fear more than politics shapes attitudes to Covid vaccine

In rural America, fear more than politics shapes attitudes to Covid vaccine

The New York Times reports: “So have you gotten the vaccine yet?” The question, a friendly greeting to Betty Smith, the pastor’s wife, lingered in the air as the four church women sat down for their regular Tuesday coffee and conversation at Ingle’s Market. Mrs. Smith hesitated, sensing a chilly blast of judgment from a never-mask, never-vax companion. She fumbled through a non-reply. Recalling the moment later, she sighed, “We were there to get to know each other better but…

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‘This is a catastrophe.’ In India, illness is everywhere

‘This is a catastrophe.’ In India, illness is everywhere

Jeffrey Gettleman reports: Crematories are so full of bodies, it’s as if a war just happened. Fires burn around the clock. Many places are holding mass cremations, dozens at a time, and at night, in certain areas of New Delhi, the sky glows. Sickness and death are everywhere. Dozens of houses in my neighborhood have sick people. One of my colleagues is sick. One of my son’s teachers is sick. The neighbor two doors down, to the right of us:…

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Young adults’ relocations are reshaping political geography

Young adults’ relocations are reshaping political geography

The Associated Press reports: The choices by … members of the millennial generation of where to live have reshaped the country’s political geography over the past decade. They’ve left New York and California and settled in places less likely to be settings for TV sitcoms about 20-something urbanites, including Denver, Houston and Orlando, Florida. Drawn by jobs and overlooked cultural amenities, they’ve helped add new craft breweries, condominiums and liberal voters to these once more-conservative places. The U.S. Census Bureau…

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Hollywood’s anti-Black bias costs it $10 billion a year

Hollywood’s anti-Black bias costs it $10 billion a year

Franklin Leonard writes: Days after a Minneapolis police officer, Derek Chauvin, suffocated George Floyd and the video went viral, I watched my social media feed fill with blackout tiles and corporate publicity statements. They poured in from every industry, proclaiming solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement. Hollywood — where I have worked for almost two decades — was no exception. Far from offering relief, each new assertion by a talent agency, film studio, television network or streaming service that…

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Derek Chauvin’s conviction is progress, but it ‘will do nothing to change’ urban policing on its own

Derek Chauvin’s conviction is progress, but it ‘will do nothing to change’ urban policing on its own

USA Today reports: The guilty verdict returned by jurors Tuesday in the murder trial of former police officer Derek Chauvin was a reason for joy among many, especially in the Black community. But it was also a vivid demonstration of what the criminal justice system could be if prosecutors went after all “bad cops” with the same gusto, legal observers said. During the 42-day trial, jurors heard from 45 witnesses and listened to hours of technical testimony about whether Chauvin,…

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Pressure on Biden to act on police reform will grow post-Chauvin conviction

Pressure on Biden to act on police reform will grow post-Chauvin conviction

ABC News reports: For activists, advocates and communities of color, the urgency behind the need for police reform does not end with the guilty verdict in the trial of former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin. Chauvin was found guilty on all charges after kneeling on George Floyd’s neck for more than nine minutes, the killing caught on camera. The graphic images of Floyd’s murder ignited a movement across the country, forcing the nation to begin to reckon with how people…

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Black and brown people’s defiance is not the problem. Our compliance is not the solution

Black and brown people’s defiance is not the problem. Our compliance is not the solution

Ibram X. Kendi writes: Chicago Police Officer Eric E. Stillman chased a boy down an alleyway. It was the early morning of March 29. In Minnesota, opening statements in the Derek Chauvin trial were coming in a few hours. Stillman had responded to reports of gunshots in Little Village, a predominantly Latino community on Chicago’s West Side. “Stop right now!” the officer yelled at Adam Toledo, a 13-year-old seventh grader at Gary Elementary School. “Hands. Show me your hands. Drop…

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Throughout trial over George Floyd’s death, killings by police mount

Throughout trial over George Floyd’s death, killings by police mount

The New York Times reports: Just seven hours before prosecutors opened their case against Derek Chauvin, a former Minneapolis police officer charged with murdering George Floyd, a Chicago officer chased down a 13-year-old boy in a West Side alley and fatally shot him as he turned with his hands up. One day later, at a hotel in Jacksonville, Fla., officers fatally shot a 32-year-old man, who, the police say, grabbed one of their Tasers. The day after that, as an…

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Amazon lives off America’s failure

Amazon lives off America’s failure

Sarah Jones writes: Bill Bodani liked his old job. He cleaned slag out at the Sparrows Point steel mill in Maryland, cleared the flues and the broken brick out of the blast furnace. He loved it despite the asbestosis it gave him, writes Alec MacGillis in his new book, Fulfillment. “I enjoyed the people,” Bodani told MacGillis. “They made it enjoyable. The Black, the white. It was a family thing. I don’t care if you knew them for five minutes,…

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The pandemic’s terrible toll on kids: ‘All of the people I look up to, they are all, like, breaking down’

The pandemic’s terrible toll on kids: ‘All of the people I look up to, they are all, like, breaking down’

The Wall Street Journal reports: When Victoria Vial’s Miami middle school shut down last spring and her classes went online, it felt like the beginning of an adventure. “I was in my pajamas, sitting in my comfy chair,” the 13-year-old recalled. “I was texting my friends during class.” Then she received her academic progress report. An A and B student before the pandemic, she was failing three classes. The academic slide left her mother, Carola Mengolini, in tears. She insisted…

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U.S. intelligence report warns of global consequences of social fragmentation

U.S. intelligence report warns of global consequences of social fragmentation

The New York Times reports: U.S. intelligence officials warned in a report issued on Thursday about the potential fragmentation of society and the global order, holding out the possibility of a world where international trade is disrupted, groups of countries create online enclaves and civic cohesion is undermined. The report, compiled every four years by the National Intelligence Council, mixes more traditional national security challenges like the potentially disruptive rise of China with social trends that have clear security implications,…

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Fears of white people losing out permeate Capitol rioters’ towns, study finds

Fears of white people losing out permeate Capitol rioters’ towns, study finds

The New York Times reports: When the political scientist Robert Pape began studying the issues that motivated the 380 or so people arrested in connection with the attack against the Capitol on Jan. 6, he expected to find that the rioters were driven to violence by the lingering effects of the 2008 Great Recession. But instead he found something very different: Most of the people who took part in the assault came from places, his polling and demographic data showed,…

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The forgotten history of the western Klan

The forgotten history of the western Klan

Kevin Waite writes: The Ku Klux Klan was on the rise in the spring of 1869. Vigilantes could measure their success that season by the carnage they left behind: marauded homesteads, assaulted politicians, a church burned to the ground. According to a local report, insurance companies considered canceling their policies, “owing to the Ku Klux threats.” A school serving students of color was supposedly next on the Klan’s hit list. Such havoc could describe almost any southern state in the…

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If you sell a house these days, the buyer might be a pension fund

If you sell a house these days, the buyer might be a pension fund

The Wall Street Journal reports: A bidding war broke out this winter at a new subdivision north of Houston. But the prize this time was the entire subdivision, not just a single suburban house, illustrating the rise of big investors as a potent new force in the U.S. housing market. D.R. Horton Inc. built 124 houses in Conroe, Texas, rented them out and then put the whole community, Amber Pines at Fosters Ridge, on the block. A Who’s Who of…

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