News Updates

12/6/16 – The labor pool worldwide might not be growing fast enough to support society’s needs, and the answer, according to an investment manager who has analyzed the technological and demographic forces driving global change, could well be…robots. Robots and artificial intelligence will likely reduce or eliminate some types of jobs, as an economic analyst has explained in Issues, but with careful preparation beginning now, humans can find ways of interacting with their automated creations to the benefit of workers and society alike.

11/30/16 – The US surgeon general recently declared substance misuse a public health crisis that “must be treated with skill, urgency and compassion.” This new approach, commented The Atlantic, could “profoundly impact the criminal-justice system, where addicts often end up.” As part of a series of articles on mass incarceration in the United States, Issues has also examined the impact of drug policies, noting, among other things, that intensified enforcement of drug laws has “contributed not only to overall high rates of incarceration, but also especially to extraordinary rates of incarceration of African Americans and Hispanics, who now comprise more than half of our prisoners.”

12/1/16 – Long a holy grail in energy research, nuclear fusion is getting a boost from the sharp-penciled world of venture capital, according to a Bloomberg online report. One of those investors has also described in Issues his reasons for supporting a private company pursuing fusion, noting that “sometimes an opportunity presents itself that, if it works, can change the future forever and for everyone.”

11/26/16 – On lands adjoining Mexico’s Monarch Butterfly Biosphere Reserve, where the long-distance fliers nest as they await their next migration northward, a push to plant income-generating avocado orchards in place of native oak and fir trees is endangering the butterflies’ survival. Indeed, as a wildlife researcher has explained in Issues, habitat loss threatens a number of animal species that regularly migrate long distances as part of their natural cycles.