California likes to think of itself as the brain center of the universe, but increasingly much of that intellectual content comes from somewhere else. Once a leader in educational innovation and performance, California is now toward the bottom of the pack. read more »
Newgeography.com - Economic, demographic, and political commentary about places
Public Schools Should Be Places of Learning, Not Propaganda
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The World’s $86 Trillion Economy Visualized in One Chart
The world’s GDP still grew a healthy 6.9% in 2018, up from $80.2 trillion in 2017 to $85.8 trillion. Nearly half of this growth came from the world’s two largest economies: the United States, at $20.5 trillion (up 5.4% from 2017), and China, at $13.6 trillion (up 10%). However, fear of a global recession are mounting -- much of it related to growing economic tension between the two leading economies. read more »
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Ridership Falls Another 2.9 Percent in June
June 2019 transit ridership was 2.9 percent lower than in June 2018, according to the Federal Transit Administration’s most recent data release. Ridership dropped in all major modes, including bus, commuter rail, heavy rail, and light rail. Ridership also dropped in 41 of the nation’s 50 largest urban areas, declining even in Seattle, which had previously appeared immune to the decline that is afflicting most of the nation’s transit industry. read more »
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Australia's Long Suffering Commuters
Daily commute times are ballooning in Australia's largest capital cities (metropolitan areas, called Greater Capital City Statistical Areas). This is a finding of the latest Household, Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia (HILDA) Survey. The HILDA Survey is conducted across the nation by the University of Melbourne. read more »
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A Blast from the Past in Charlotte and Columbus
I saw a couple of recent reposts containing very interesting material from several decades ago in Charlotte and Columbus.
The first is a 25 minute TV special from the 1960s looking at a proposal to issue bonds to fund urban renewal in downtown Charlotte. A few things struck me about this. read more »
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Green Technology’s Dark Side
The hype these days is to stop using those dirty fossil fuel driven cars and trucks and convert everyone to those clean electric vehicles. But wait!
Before you jump onto the EV train, those EV’s have a very dark side of environmental atrocities and a non-existing transparency of human rights abuses associated with mining for the exotic minerals that power the EV’s. read more »
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Can the Working Class Trust the Democrats?
Two years ago, we compared the opioid epidemic to the mortgage crisis that nearly cratered the global economy, noting how both were caused by corporate greed. Recent reporting in the Washington Post and other media outlets reveals an important difference between the two: unlike the regulators who were blithely ignorant of what was happening in the financial markets, officials at the U.S. read more »
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A Comparison of the World’s 1,000 Largest Urban Areas
A tourist or even a demographer may sit at a café near the Louvre and imagine that the architecture and development of Paris looks the same, all the way to the urban fringe. Yet Paris is much more than the city proper (“Ville de Paris”). It is surrounded by the balance of the Paris urban area (“unité urbaine”), the continuous urban footprint that extends up to 20 miles (32 kilometers) in each direction and is largely suburban. read more »
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Ending The War On Communities: 14 Suggestions To Protect Neighborhoods While Providing Meaningful Housing Solutions
The debate on solving California’s housing affordability crisis has reached a fever pitch, and the level of noise is drowning out solutions. We are facing a push to indiscriminately force density on neighborhoods and a war on single-family housing, which some in Sacramento paint as inherently “racist” and “immoral.” read more »
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Will The Democrats End Up Saving The California Republican Party?
Left to its own devices, California’s Republican Party would be ready to be embalmed for display at the Museum of Natural History. But there’s one last hope for the state GOP: the growing lunacy among Democrats.
Many positions now taken for granted by Democrats should threaten their hold on the bulk of California’s middle- and working-class voters. read more »
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