Anti-woke activists are losing many of their school-board battles

economist.com T ago it seemed that a conservative movement against “wokeness” was taking over America’s schools. Seen by many on the right as an insidious liberal outlook emphasising…

Who will fill the expelled George Santos’s seat?

economist.com G last week became only the sixth member of America’s House of Representatives to be expelled from the chamber in its 234-year history. After his ejection, the disgraced…

One in five young Americans think the Holocaust is a myth

economist.com O for over five hours, lawmakers grilled the presidents of elite universities in a congressional hearing about antisemitism on college campuses. In one of the testiest…

New Jersey introduced a smart voting reform

economist.com T changed a lot of things. For some states, this included voting. Four states (California, Nevada, New Jersey and Vermont) and the District of Columbia decided to…

American life-sciences firms are moving labs downtown

economist.com F impressions, the headquarters of Portal Innovations, a business in Chicago, resemble any other tech-firm office space. In the main lobby, workers in jeans and -shirts sip…

Spending on infrastructure has fallen in real terms in America

economist.com I to take internet connectivity for granted these days. But when stringing up fibre-optic cable in the woods of Vermont, not much comes easily. Some homes are a mile back…

Higher wages are spurring innovation in dinner

economist.com B main course comes out on a Friday night, the diners are asked to pause for some entertainment. “I’m not one to just throw a dinner party with nothing,” says the host, and…

Some progressives are arguing for a religious right to abortion

economist.com T Exodus contains a section about liability. It is a bit outdated, enumerating damages if someone’s bull gores another person’s slave. But one parable is relevant to…

An FBI investigation raises questions about Eric Adams

economist.com “S going to be going on in the city and you have to be focused, no distractions and grind,” said Eric Adams, New York City’s mayor, recently. That is no easy task at the…

America’s government isn’t shutting down just yet

economist.com I to be doing the same thing repeatedly while expecting different results. But perhaps a dose of insanity is healthy when it comes to understanding the Republicans who…

The Supreme Court’s code of conduct is a good first step

economist.com F all but nine of America’s around 2,000 federal judges have been subject to a code of conduct laying out ethical guidelines for jurists’ behaviour on and off the bench. On…

Democrats are giddy from this week’s electoral sweep

economist.com A elections can be summarised by the tale of two promising governors—one who triumphed and another who flopped. On November 7th, Andy Beshear cruised to reelection in…

Why sexually transmitted infections are rising in America

economist.com T ago, syphilis seemed close to elimination in America. Gonorrhoea rates were also declining. Fast-forward to today and syphilis, gonorrhoea and chlamydia, three of the most…

The Supreme Court has found a gun-control measure it likes

economist.com H make bad law, warned Oliver Wendell Holmes junior, an early-20th-century justice. Cases reaching America’s Supreme Court often pose tricky, even wrenching, dilemmas. But…

Boston’s “cradle of liberty” was paid for with slavery profits

economist.com T , Faneuil Hall is sacred ground. Built in 1742 as a market place and meeting hall, it became the centre of Boston’s civic life. In the years leading to the American…

Chicago’s progressive coalition is struggling with migration

economist.com I highest drama is often about nothing. So it is in the Windy City at least. For the past few weeks, Chicago’s city council has been tearing itself apart over a proposal to…

Why doctors in America earn so much

economist.com A Association of American Medical Colleges ( ), in a decade America will have a shortage of up to 124,000 doctors. This makes no sense. The profession is lavishly paid:…

Why is America’s capital so violent?

economist.com T a black belt in karate, when a trio of armed boys in ski masks threatened Henry Cuellar, a congressman from Texas, outside his Navy Yard flat on October 2nd he swiftly…

How to make NYC work better for its winged inhabitants

economist.com E may spot an unusual patrol group in Manhattan this autumn. They sport sensible shoes, latex gloves and an armful of brown paper bags. As in spring, they comb the streets…

The economics of pumpkin patches

economist.com Q is one of the few pastoral corners in New York City. It has an apiary, an orchard, livestock and, in autumn, a pumpkin patch. Parents take photos of their tykes, some…

Mitt Romney is the fixed point revealing the Republicans’ slide

economist.com S in the evening of his career, with a vast family, a rich spiritual life and great wealth to fall back upon, summoned the nerve to declare what his peers muttered…

America’s House of Representatives finally has a speaker

economist.com A House of Representatives began its fourth week without a speaker, it seemed like nothing would ever get Republicans to unite behind a new leader. But it turns out…

Paralysis in Congress makes America a dysfunctional superpower

economist.com Editor’s note (October 12th): Steve Scalise, the Republican congressman who won his party’s nomination to be speaker of America’s House of Representatives, withdrew from the…

New York City discovers a revolutionary technology: the bin

economist.com A , how it sparkles—from afar. Street level is a different experience. Smelly rubbish mounds create trash-fjords on city pavements, with buildings on one side and piles of…

Could feather bowling be the next pickleball?

economist.com P take their sport seriously. Downtown, Comerica Park, the home of the Tigers, a baseball team, and the Little Caesars Arena, where the Red Wings play ice hockey and the…

It’s OK to gerrymander, as long you discriminate by politics

economist.com A two years and two trips to the Supreme Court, Alabama got a slap on the wrist. On October 5th a trio of federal judges barred the state from using the congressional map it…

Joe Biden should admit Republicans are (partly) right about border security

economist.com I ever a good case for a centrist third party in American presidential elections—and right now there is not—the strongest reason would be the mass migration under way in the…

The worst job in Washington is within Steve Scalise’s grasp

economist.com Editor’s note (October 12th): Steve Scalise, the Republican congressman who won his party’s nomination to be speaker of America’s House of Representatives, withdrew from the…

Travelling to and from America has become a waiting game

economist.com T flight to Spain last month found themselves in a stinky situation. An ailing passenger had trailed diarrhoea down the aisle, forcing the plane to return to Atlanta. For…

The post-Title-42 lull in border crossings is over

economist.com I before the end of Title 42, a pandemic rule that made it easy for America to quickly deport undocumented migrants, pundits predicted pandemonium. Newsrooms dispatched…

Detroit wants to be the first big American city to tax land value

economist.com F vantage point of a new apartment on the 33rd floor of the Book Tower, a stunning 1920s Italian-Renaissance-style skyscraper in downtown Detroit, two aspects of the city…

What America should really learn from Dianne Feinstein

economist.com I another age—almost a different America, shrouded in a different dark cloud—but it was just nine years ago, on a Friday: Dianne Feinstein, then the chairman of the Senate…

Kevin McCarthy’s sacking deepens the chaos in American government

economist.com K stint as speaker of America’s House of Representatives ended the way it had begun: in utterly humiliating fashion. On October 3rd members of the lower chamber of Congress…

Parts of America are becoming uninsurable

economist.com E remembers watching the wildfire crest the desiccated hills in front of her property. “We’re talking about a wall of fire coming towards you and eating everything in its…

What Ken Paxton’s acquittal means for Texas Republicans

economist.com T Texas House of Representatives overwhelmingly impeached Ken Paxton in May, in a trial that concluded on September 16th a star-studded prosecution team failed to persuade…

Illinois is the first state in America to abandon cash bail

economist.com A of room 100 in the Cook County criminal court, in south-west Chicago, a conversation is taking place before proceedings start. The room is packed, and two young men…

America’s states are trying to set rules for the internet

economist.com T has changed a bit since America Online’s discordant tones marked the slow progress towards an even slower online connection. But federal and state legislators have…

America’s dumbest, wildest budget fight yet

economist.com H that some American politicians have persuaded themselves it is patriotic and wise to menace their own country’s credit or shut down its government. Amid such nonsense, one…

Biden, alone at the top table as the UN withers

economist.com C , come the gridlock to Manhattan as leaders gather for the General Assembly. This year, though, there was less grandeur to it. President Joe Biden was the only leader of…

America’s school day starts too early. That’s beginning to change

economist.com T season can be hard—not least in Syracuse, New York. On September 6th and 7th high-school students there returned to classrooms at 7.25am, 25 minutes earlier than the year…

Where do Americans mingle?

economist.com T back to the 1960s simply step into an Olive Garden. Booths at the chain restaurant, known for its surfeit of breadsticks, are lined with spotted upholstery. The sound of…

New York City is restricting Airbnb

economist.com “I says Gia Sharp, a host on Airbnb, a rental platform. “I’ve worked really hard to buy it. So the thought that someone else can tell me what I can do with my house is a…

How the Pentagon assesses Ukraine’s progress

economist.com A months of achingly slow progress, Ukraine’s counter-offensive is gaining some momentum. Near the southern village of Robotyne, Ukrainian troops have pierced the first of…

American cities are suing car manufacturers over auto theft. They have a case

economist.com T social-media platform where users post short videos, is a fount of useful information. Type “Kia” into its search bar and the helpful autosuggest adds “boys tutorial”.…

Lawsuits over disabled Americans’ access to websites have surged

economist.com B is trying to become an Italian citizen. He has all the documents ready to go. But Mr Dengler, an American software engineer who was born fully blind, cannot make an…

is far from dead

economist.com “W is not what I was expecting at all,” says Allison, a nurse, remembering the first romance novel she ever read. Having shared the general literary snobbery that clings to…

Joe Biden’s re-election bid is in trouble

economist.com T for the Republican presidential nomination is under indictment for 91 felonies in four criminal cases, and he probably is, as one of his primary opponents remarked during…

A MAGA court in New Orleans is shaping the Supreme Court’s agenda

economist.com I Joseph Overton came up with a metaphor for the spectrum of tolerable political views. Taking positions not found within the “Overton window”, he warned, puts you outside…

A key part of Obamacare is in jeopardy

economist.com P are an eccentric lot, but even among them Steven Hotze stands out. The Houston doctor got rich by hawking hormone therapies for all sorts of ills. Motivated by outlandish…

Is it cheaper to rent or buy property?

economist.com F new homebuyers in America have enjoyed lower housing costs than renters. Between 2011 and 2020 the monthly mortgage payment on a typical home was 12% lower than the rental…

What to do about an uptick in Americans unjustly held abroad

economist.com “M has been wrongfully detained by the Taliban in deplorable and inhumane conditions for 461 days,” Anna Corbett told a congressional committee in November. “His crime:…

A national milk-carton shortage sours America’s dairy industry

economist.com “T saying, ‘oh, it’s going to be coming’,” remembers Scott Stoner of Cream-O-Land, a dairy supplier. It was early September, just as many schools in America’s north-east…

The Supreme Court may toss out Purdue Pharma’s bankruptcy settlement

economist.com F ago Owen Fiss, a legal scholar, wrote an article called “Against settlement”, about lawsuits’ social purpose. Big civil disputes of public import, he argued, are about…