Author: nick

It’s Time for a Tax Code That Lives Up to Our Ideals

Investigative Reports

[ad_1] “Builders,” Jacob Lawrence, 1974, Screenprint on paper, Gift of Mr. Terry Dintenfass, Raclin Murphy Museum of Art, University of Notre Dame, 1975.062 The 250th anniversary of the founding of the United States is a moment to celebrate the ideals that gave birth to this country. But the anniversary also presents an opportunity to ask a difficult question: What does it mean to honor a nation founded on equality when its tax code continues to reinforce inequality? Tax laws are often viewed as a technical collection of rates, deductions, and credits. In reality, they are one of the most powerful…

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Five Dynamics That Make Sense of an Increasingly Chaotic World

Conspiracy Theories

[ad_1] These dynamics and the incentives they generate lead to systemic crisis and collapse. As I noted in What Once Explained Everything Now Explains Nothing, the simplicity of either-or ideologies appeal to us. Identifying with an ideology is like having a favorite sports team: yea for our team! Our team good, other team bad. The roots of this simplistic either-or are obvious: our tribe good, other tribe bad. The problems with this simplistic loyalty arise when we attempt to explain complex real-world dynamics with the comic-book simplicities of ideology, which extend from politics to culture to finance. Rather than explain everything, they add…

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The Science of the Declaration of Independence

Truth or Scare

[ad_1] On America’s 250th Anniversary, a New Look at its Founding Document It is altogether proper for so many commentators on this 250th anniversary of the nation’s founding to treat the Declaration of Independence as a work of political philosophy unprecedented in history—drafted, edited, and approved as it was by Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, James Madison, and the other Founding Fathers, who were the intellectual heirs of the Enlightenment. I would like to consider this document, and the founding of the United States, one level deeper, namely as a product of not only the Enlightenment, but the Scientific Revolution…

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Fathers Closing the Gap on Parental Leave

Investigative Reports

[ad_1] Paid leave has gained significant support from researchers and policymakers across the political spectrum. Paid family and medical leave (PFML), which allows parents to bond with a new baby, acknowledges the important role of childbirth in women’s lives as they strive to balance work and family responsibilities. And while it benefits all families, paid leave can be particularly valuable for vulnerable populations with limited resources. Parents and other family caregivers experience psychosocial stress and opportunity costs due to the competing demands of labor market participation and household caregiving responsibilities. Paid leave can mitigate these stresses. Another positive development associated…

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U.K. might force social platforms to give government-backed media special status

Political Spin

[ad_1] While I was chowing down on fresh seafood and collecting beach rocks with my kids last week, busybodies on both sides of the Atlantic were scheming up ways to give the government more control over online speech and information. So for today’s newsletter, I want to cover a few of those developments—plus one uncharacteristically good omen for tech users’ civil liberties. You are reading Sex & Tech, from Elizabeth Nolan Brown. Get more of Elizabeth’s sex, tech, bodily autonomy, law, and online culture coverage. Forcing Social Platforms To Center Government-Approved Media Let’s start with the bad. In the U.K.,…

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