Digital Gems

Air-pollution laws, enforcement sprees and educational campaigns haven’t worked. What will it take to make drivers shut off their engines when they’re parked?

When given the choice between a free meal and performing a task for a meal, cats would prefer the meal that doesn't require much effort. While that might not come as a surprise to some cat lovers, it does to cat behaviorists. Most animals prefer to work for their food—a behavior called contrafreeloading.

What this report finds: Corporate boards running America’s largest public firms are giving top executives outsize compensation packages that have grown much faster than the stock market and the pay of typical workers, college graduates, and even the top 0.1%. In 2020, a CEO at one of the top 350 firms in the U.S. was paid $24.2 million on average (using a “realized” measure of CEO pay that counts stock awards when vested and stock options when cashed in rather than when granted). This 18.9% increase from 2019 occurred because of rapid growth in vested stock awards and exercised stock options. Using a different “granted” measure of CEO pay, average top CEO compensation was $13.9 million in 2020, slightly below its level in 2019. In 2020, the ratio of CEO-to-typical-worker compensation was 351-to-1 under the realized measure of CEO pay; that is up from 307-to-1 in 2019 and a big increase from 21-to-1 in 1965 and 61-to-1 in 1989. CEOs are even making a lot more than other very high earners (wage earners in the top 0.1%)—more than six times as much. From 1978 to 2020, CEO pay based on realized compensation grew by 1,322%, far outstripping S&P stock market growth (817%) and top 0.1% earnings growth (which was 341% between 1978 and 2019, the latest data available). In contrast, compensation of the typical worker grew by just 18.0% from 1978 to 2020.

Corporations, law firms and investment banks all state that diversity matters. This Article shows that there is a chasm between discourse and action. For the mo

As the pandemic took hold, more than 1 million children did not enroll in local schools. Many of them were the most vulnerable: 5-year-olds in low-income neighborhoods.

Many emojis have evolved different meanings for Gen Z while keeping their original ones for older people. The result is a lot of confusing interactions.

$15 an hour is suddenly the rule, not the exception, for U.S. workers. It’s a major shift from pre-pandemic.

"This is a system we don't want to mess with," one scientist said.

The Northwest Multiple Listing Service reported Home buyers are finding some relief, but Northwest MLS brokers say it is temporary Competi...

Corporate consolidation is squeezing our economy

A new study analyzing hundreds of aerial readings of emissions above the forest canopy found that forest regions in the southeast were most affected.

The City Observatory is a study of modern-day cities and urban development practices.

ADUs are small housing structures that share a lot with a traditional, single-family home.

'Things are going in the wrong direction for buyers,' the report author wrote.

Flooding is becoming worse due to the climate crisis. But the risk doesn’t affect us all equally. A report released by the real estate brokerage firm Redfin this week shows that formerly redlined areas are more vulnerable to the threat of floods.

A new study shows that poor communities and communities of color are exposed to higher temperatures all across the U.S.

Stop using the worst-case scenario for climate warming as the most likely outcome — more-realistic baselines make for better policy.

On this episode of Now & Then, “Projecting America at the Olympics,” Heather and Joanne frame the current Tokyo Olympics alongside historical examples of American cultural diplomacy. They trace efforts to appeal to France in the Revolutionary Period, the rise of World’s Fairs, and the controversies that accompanied Jesse Owens’ 1936 Olympics dominance in Berlin and the 1968 Black Power salute by medalists Tommie Smith and John Carlos. What do these earlier negotiations say about American self-definition, particularly given the contemporary Olympics controversy over Simone Biles’ decision to withdraw from portions of the gymnastics competition?

The Biden administration has made large investments in care work—both child care and elder care—key planks in its American Jobs Plan (AJP) and American Families Plan (AFP). These investments would be transformative, and a greater public role in providing this care work can make the U.S. economy fairer and more efficient. The administration has also…

Why is English spelling so weird and unpredictable? Don’t blame the mix of languages; look to quirks of timing and technology

When employees are paid more, they give more. Going above market pay might sound like a fantasy, but in a growing number of companies it’s becoming a profitable reality. Peek inside workplaces that have reinvented their pay structures to give employees their worth and more—and explore the science of how it can pay off for everyone in the long run.

People are finally paying attention to mental health at work, but some major myths are holding us back. Adam breaks down what we get wrong about mental health at work, what individuals and organizations can do to start getting it right, and why we all need compassion more than empathy. Thanks to our guests Demar Derozan, Sally Maitlis, Darlene Upton and Paul Bloom for joining us on this episode.

Predatory Inclusion and What To Do Now