As the year ends there is some good news about the preservation of our democracy. It is not definitive but it made me feel more optimistic to read it.
Credit: Alex Wong / Getty
Over the past few years, states across the country have passed laws that make voting more difficult and elections more vulnerable to partisan interference, and 2023 is no exception. But it is critical to remember that there is also flourishing pro-democracy movement that has pushed many states to make important strides in the opposite direction.
Between January 1 and October 10, at least 23 states enacted 47 laws that expand access to voting. In addition, there have been other important advancements across the country: at least six states passed laws to protect election workers from harassment and two states passed campaign finance reform. Yet state lawmakers cannot safeguard democracy on their own. Robust federal legislation is needed to ensure that democracy is protected across the country and that every voter has equal access to the ballot.
Among the most notable advances in 2023 was Minnesota’s passage of a transformative package of pro-voter reforms. Among them is automatic voter registration, bringing the total number of states with automatic voter registration to 23 […]
In spite of everything else going on in the U.S. and all the negative news, we are beginning to create a clean energy infrastructure, and I see that is good news for the future.
Clean energy workers Credit: Mario Tama / Getty
When people hear the phrase, “clean energy jobs,” many think of solar panel installers or wind turbine technicians. But those are just two of many careers in clean energy.
Keefe: “Think about the manufacturers that produce, for instance, energy-efficient appliances, who produce electric vehicles … construction workers … who go out and make our homes, our offices, our schools more energy efficient through better insulation, through better windows and doors, through better lighting systems, better HVAC systems and that sort of thing. That’s actually the biggest part of the clean economy and the clean jobs market.”
Bob Keefe directs Environmental Entrepreneurs (E2), which publishes an annual clean jobs report.
The report finds that more than 3 million people in the U.S. are employed in clean energy, and clean jobs grew 4% in 2022.
These jobs are expected to keep growing, so Keefe says it’s important to make people aware of the many career paths available in clean energy.
Keefe: “And starting at an early age. We need to be talking to high school students […]
Here is a follow up report on a story I published several months ago, and it is more good news. It gives us some proven information on fostering wellbeing, and helping the poor.
Residents of a Kenyan village learn they will receive UBI payments from GiveDirectly. Credit: Oliver Ochanda / Vox
Large sections of my brain that could contain useful knowledge are instead filled up with dumb tweets I saw years ago. One of my absolute favorites was someone identifying himself only as “Side Hustle King,” who would ask his followers, “Would you rather get paid $1,000,000 right now or $50 every month for the rest of your life? I’ll take Option B. That’s what passive income is.”
To save you some arithmetic: Unless you plan to live at least another 1,667 years (which is what it would take to make $1 million in $50 monthly increments) and do not care about inflation, Side Hustle King is mistaken. Option A is far better. It’s a case in point that, sometimes, you should take the lump sum, not regular payments.
GiveDirectly, a charitable nonprofit that sends cash directly to low-income households, has identified another such case, one where the answer was a little less obvious. For years now, GiveDirectly […]
The christofascist Republicans who control the Texas government are committed to their “Texit” vote in March 2024 to secede from the United States and create a Republic of Texas. It is an astonishing stupid play because it will turn Texas into a third world country. Texas is already so badly governed that it social outcome data, from education to maternal mortality is already dreadful, and it’s all going to get worse because a third of the Texas budget is paid for from the money the federal government gives to Texas. We will also see massive emigration of tens of thousands out of Texas if they secede.
The Texas State Flag is seen during the game between the Baylor Bears and the Texas Longhorns at McLane Stadium in Waco, Texas, on September 23, 2023. The Texas Nationalist Movement is campaigning for Texas to become an independent nation. Credit: Tim Warner / Getty
Supporters of “Texit,” the campaign for Texas to secede from the United States and become a fully independent nation, have had a busy year. Earlier this month the Texas Nationalist Movement (TNM), the leading pro-independence campaign group, delivered a petition with 139,456 signatures to the Republican Party of Texas in Austin.
It called for an advisory referendum on Texan independence to be included on the March 2024 primary ballot. According to the Texas election code, the minimum number of signatures needed for a referendum to be considered is “five percent of the total vote received by all candidates for governor in the party’s most recent gubernatorial general primary election.”
The most recent Republican gubernatorial primary was in 2022, when 1,954,172 votes were cast, electing incumbent State Governor Greg Abbott. […]
RICHARD FRY, Senior Economics and Education Researcher - Pew Research Center
Stephan:
America, compared to the rest of the world, has lower literacy, math skills, and the ability to solve problems and, as this report describes it is getting worse, particularly as it concerns young men. We are becoming a nation with a population that is very different from the populations of other developed nations, and that has profound negative implications for our future.
College enrollment among young Americans has been declining gradually over the past decade. In 2022, the total number of 18- to 24-year-olds enrolled in college was down by approximately 1.2 million from its peak in 2011.
Most of the decline is due to fewer young men pursuing college. About 1 million fewer young men are in college but only 0.2 million fewer young women. As a result, men make up 44% of young college students today, down from 47% in 2011, according to newly released U.S. Census Bureau data.
This shift is driven entirely by the falling share of men who are students at four-year colleges. Today, men represent only 42% of students ages 18 to 24 at four-year schools, down from 47% in 2011.
At two-year colleges, which are largely community colleges, the drop in enrollment has been similar for men and women, so the gender balance has not changed much. Men represent 49% of students ages 18 to 24, up slightly from 48% in 2011.
The decline in young college enrollment since 2011 is not driven by a drop in the overall number of 18- […]
