Former mayor Mike Bloomberg has announced that he would spend as much as $100 million of his own money to help Vice-President Biden prevail in Florida on Election Day. This underscores once again the importance of Florida in this and every presidential contest.  read more »

The long-rising blue tide that has colored American politics and values may have crested, but it could still have enough momentum to make it through the election year. Even if Trump is somehow reelected, the wielders of power and influence — academia, media, Wall Street, Hollywood, the big-tech oligarchs, the dominant nonprofits, and the governmental apparat — will remain deep blue for the foreseeable future.  read more »

This article expands on the 2000 to 2019 state net domestic migration data from last week, covering the 110 metropolitan areas with more than 500,000 residents (Note). The big surprise may be that the largest proportional outflow of net domestic migrants, outside Hurricane Katrina ravaged New Orleans was San Jose, the nation’s most affluent metropolitan area and perhaps the wealthiest in the world. In both cases, many more people left in the first 10 years than since 2010.  read more »

One of the toughest challenges in real estate is revitalizing urban boulevards. There are dozens of plans for remaking these, but very few of these plans have actually sparked much private investment back of the curb line, and the reason is that in most cases these streets are simply so big and busy that people don't want to live or shop along them. It's time to use a new strategy, one of building at right angles to them, and of re-attaching underused land to the surrounding neighborhoods.  read more »

Governor Newsom announced on Friday September 11th that he is about to take one giant step toward following Germany’s failed climate goals which should be a wake-up all for governments everywhere. Like Germany, California’s renewables are becoming an increasing share in intermittent electricity generation, but at a HIGH COST.  read more »

SUVs “ruined the environment,” says to a rather shrill article in the Guardian that was also reprinted in Mother Jones and other publications. It reached this conclusion based on a study showing they were the “second largest contributor to the increase in global carbon emissions from 2010 to 2018.”  read more »

By now, everyone who's paid attention to the Trump Administration lately knows that the suburbs, however defined, look to figure very prominently in the 2020 presidential election.  read more »

America is still a mobile nation. Back in the 2000-2010 decade, 12.9 million people moved interstate, nearly five percent of the total population. In the 2010s the population has been a bit less mobile, with net domestic migration of 11.7 million residents, slightly under four percent. Nonetheless, 11.7 million is a large number. This is nearly equal to the population of Ohio, with only five states being larger  read more »

I have been a New Yorker for over a decade now, but I have spent the past few months in the Hampton Roads region of Virginia, since it’s a little easier on our family during the pandemic. Locals joke that it’s a “suburb of nowhere,” and it’s true that the region may lack some of the density and sizable cultural institutions that define the New York experience—24/7 amenities, robust public transit, and the sidewalk ballets. But the tidewater region is anything but an isolated wasteland, and spending time here has been absolutely lovely.  read more »

A recent blog post by investor and stand-up comedian James Altucher (mentioned here) arguing that New York is dead forever attracted the hostility of many New Yorkers. Fellow comedian Jerry Seinfeld wrote a New York Times op-ed calling Altucher a “whimpering putz.” Mayor De Blasio, naturally, agrees with Seinfeld.  read more »