The Push for a Third Worker Classification Between Employee and Contractor
Lawmakers are testing a third worker classification category specifically for gig workers, caught between advocates who see it as a pragmatic fix and those who worry it entrenches a permanently lower tier of protection.
What the Research Actually Says About Voter ID Laws and Turnout
Voter ID laws have expanded to most states and poll consistently well, but academic research on their actual effect on turnout remains genuinely mixed rather than settled in either direction.
How Ranked-Choice Voting Is Spreading, One City at a Time
Ranked-choice voting has spread to a growing number of jurisdictions, promising better reflection of voter preference in crowded races — at the cost of added complexity and slower tabulation.
The Global Fight Over Carbon Border Tariffs
Carbon border tariffs aim to stop climate policy from simply pushing emissions-heavy manufacturing elsewhere — but trade partners and developing economies both raise real concerns about how the mechanism actually works.
The State-by-State Legal Battle Over Kids and Social Media
States have passed a wave of laws restricting minors' social media use, and early court rulings are mixed on how to balance child protection against speech and privacy concerns.
Opinion: Why Popular Structural Reforms Almost Never Actually Pass
Term limit and structural reform proposals poll well and go nowhere, for a simple structural reason: they ask the people with power to vote against their own interest. History suggests a different path works better.
Opinion: The Real Reason Transit Projects Take So Long Isn’t What You Think
Transit projects in many major cities cost several times more per mile than comparable projects abroad — and the real culprit is a planning process with too many sequential veto points, not any single villain.
Opinion: Stop Treating Polling Averages Like They’re More Precise Than They Are
Polling averages get treated as precise predictions when they're really probabilistic ranges — and the gap between how polls are conducted and how they're reported is doing real damage to public understanding.
Opinion: We’re Only Now Seeing the Real Cost of Losing Local News
The decline of local news isn't just a media story — the civic costs, from lower voter turnout to higher municipal borrowing rates, are becoming measurable, and philanthropy alone won't fill the gap.
Why Undersea Internet Cables Have Become a Geopolitical Flashpoint
A string of damaged undersea cables in sensitive waters has drawn new government attention to critical internet infrastructure that's nearly impossible to physically defend at scale.