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It is a political truism that it’s bad to be the president in charge when the economy turns sour. It may be especially bad for President Donald Trump — because, through endless controversies during his decade in politics, voters’ belief in his economic savvy has been his most consistent polling bright spot, Now that bright […]

My entire job takes place on my laptop. I write stories like this in Google Docs on my laptop. I coordinate with my editor in Slack on my laptop. I reach out to sources with Gmail and then interview them over Zoom, on my laptop. This isn’t true of all journalists — some go to […]

This story originally appeared in Kids Today, Vox’s newsletter about kids, for everyone. Sign up here for future editions. Over the last few weeks, I’ve been doing a lot of reporting on the Trump administration’s efforts to dismantle the Department of Education. The news on that front has been chaotic — a draft executive order to close […]

Donald Trump has a gift for inheriting valuable things. And the economy of January 2025 was no exception.  When the president took office, stock values were hitting record highs, unemployment was hovering near historic lows, and consumer confidence was stable. Wall Street expected that business conditions would only improve. Among investors, conventional wisdom held that […]

This story appeared in The Logoff, a daily newsletter that helps you stay informed about the Trump administration without letting political news take over your life. Subscribe here. Welcome to The Logoff. Today I’m focusing on the Trump administration’s move to cut the Department of Education’s staff by half. Before we dive in, a request: If you’re enjoying The […]

Conservative activists have been dreaming of dismantling the Department of Education for decades.  They’re halfway there. On Tuesday, the Department of Education announced mass firings of its workforce, which would cut the department staff down to about half of what it was when Joe Biden left office — from about 4,000 to about 2,000. President […]

Is Donald Trump tanking the economy? The stock market has taken a beating, giving up six months of gains in the past three weeks. Several economic indicators — consumer confidence, GDP estimates — have gotten gloomier.  All signs point to the main culprit being Trump and his trade war obsession. The markets have spoken loud […]

There’s a thought experiment that has taken on almost mythic status among a certain group of technologists: If you build an artificial intelligence and give it a seemingly innocuous goal, like making as many paper clips as possible, it might eventually turn everything — including humanity — into raw material for more paper clips.  Absurd […]

Civil rights advocates are accusing the Trump administration of trampling the First Amendment following the arrest of an immigrant who was involved with pro-Palestinian protests at Columbia University. US Immigration and Customs Enforcement reportedly showed up at Mahmoud Khalil’s university-owned apartment in Manhattan on Saturday and arrested him without telling him or his pregnant US […]

If I ever need a reminder that I’m not a natural extrovert, I need only to look at the journal I kept during the early days of my improv classes. “I am having incredible dread about improv tomorrow,” I wrote one day. “I would literally pay any amount to get out of this class,” I […]

Exactly five years ago today, after more than 118,000 cases and more than 4,200 deaths across 114 countries had been recorded, the World Health Organization declared the novel coronavirus a pandemic.  With the virus spreading rapidly around the world, the need for a vaccine was desperate — but the prior record for the fastest development […]

The beginning of Donald Trump’s second presidential term has most certainly been full of sound and fury. What has it signified? As in the first Trump administration, it’s been challenging to distinguish between the controversies of the day that will soon be forgotten, and the concrete changes that truly matter and will last.  On many […]

This story appeared in The Logoff, a daily newsletter that helps you stay informed about the Trump administration without letting political news take over your life. Subscribe here. Welcome to The Logoff. Today I’m focusing on the Trump administration’s arrest of a pro-Palestinian activist, a chilling development for defenders of free speech and the First Amendment. What’s the latest? Immigration […]

The past few years have violated many of my assumptions about human progress. Twenty-year-olds are going MAGA. More and more Americans say that women should return to their “traditional” roles in society. For some reason, we have decided to gamble with bringing back once-eradicated deadly diseases.  And now, add to the list: Cow’s milk is […]

I sat down with Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz on Saturday at SXSW in Austin, Texas. Remember Tim Walz? His running mate, former Vice President Kamala Harris, has been keeping a relatively low profile since leaving elected office earlier this year, but Walz is still out there talking — to Rachel Maddow, to Molly Jong-Fast, to […]

My job, like many of yours, demands more from my brain than it is biologically capable of. For all its complexity, the human brain is frustratingly slow, running at about 10 bits per second — less bandwidth than a 1960s dial-up modem. That’s not enough to keep up with the constant firehose of information we’re […]

The Supreme Court announced on Monday that it will hear Chiles v. Salazar, a challenge to a Colorado law preventing most mental health professionals from offering “conversion therapy” — a discredited method of counseling that attempts to turn LGBTQ patients cisgender and heterosexual (or at least make patients act that way) — to people under age […]

Dating is tough. And for many single straight young men, it can feel downright hopeless.  As a man in his mid-30s, I can attest to this. When I was younger, meeting a potential partner felt so accessible. In school, it’s easy to meet women your age who have similar interests and hobbies because you’re in […]

President Donald Trump is going after a pair of major law firms — and attacking the First Amendment in the process. Trump issued an executive order on Thursday that took aim at Perkins Coie, a law firm that represented Hillary Clinton when she ran against Trump in 2016. Notably, Perkins Coie hired a research firm that […]

It’s possible that three years of fighting between Russia and Ukraine could end — at least temporarily— in a matter of weeks. It’s more likely it could continue for months or even years.  US and allied intelligence agencies have concluded Russia is probably not serious about making peace, which means the war would continue. If […]

In the 1970s, acid rain was one of the most serious environmental threats in North America and Europe. The air was so laden with pollution from coal power plants and cars at the time that it turned the rain toxic. Downpours killed fish, destroyed forests, eroded statues, and damaged buildings, sparking public outcry.  “Acid rain […]

In a show full of unlikable people, it takes a special character to be the absolute, no-contest worst of the bunch. On White Lotus’s season three, it’s without a doubt Greg (Jon Gries) a.k.a. Gary a.k.a. the not-so-grieving widower of season one and two’s Tanya McQuoid (Jennifer Coolidge).  In a bit of a twist, Greg […]

A Vox reader asks: What is wealth inequality and class warfare and why is it extra bad at this point in time? “Wealth” is someone’s net worth — that is, their assets (like savings, stock portfolios, and the value of their property) minus their debts (like student loans). “Wealth inequality” is measured by looking at […]

A global economic meltdown seems to be the only event that can cause people to cut back on meat. In the years that followed the 2007 Great Recession, the average American’s annual meat consumption fell by almost 9 percent. Milk purchases fell too.  But through it all, egg consumption remained relatively stable and kept climbing, […]