Its 9:30 p.m. Snack time. A sacred fourth meal, when I pull out my handwash-only kobachi and drop in a small handful of Blue Diamond Smokehouse almonds. Ive been eating them for more years than I care to admit, appreciating the mix of natural (high protein and fiber) almonds with a splash of addictive processing (mmm, hickory smoke flavor and maltodextrin) to keep them feeling dangerous.
Its the perfect portion of the perfect snack in the perfect bowl. Almost.
[Image: Blue Diamond]
The problem with Blue Diamond Smokehouse isnt the product. Its the packaging. Specifically, the Ziploc-esque “resealable zipper stops working, like clockwork, when Im about halfway through the bag. The plastic zip itself seems to hold too strongly, so that inevitably, theres a point when I open the bag, and the heat-sealed weld gives out. The zip stays zipped, but now its attached to only one side of the bag. ONE SIDE!!! A bag that now gapes open, possibly in shock from my own ineptitude in opening and closing a snack.
I know its not my fault. Its the damn dysfunctional bag. But like dropping a cheap glass, Im left with an unnecessary burden of guilt. Was it something I did, Blue Diamond?? I can change! Ill do better next time! (I never do.) WHY DOES NOTHING EVER GO RIGHT IN MY LIFE????!?? WHY DO I DRIVE ALL SOURCES OF MONOUNSATURATED FATS AWAY??!??!
From there on out, Im left with this domestic conundrum: Shove the almonds into another bag (feels wasteful, and the powder is gonna stick to everything)or curse . . . curl the bag up the best I can . . . and wedge it between two canned goods to keep it from springing open. Inevitably, I choose the latter. But more air gets in over the coming weeks. The smoky almonds grow stale.
This sounds dramatic. I am being dramatic! But also, cmon: 3 gallons of water go into each nut. That means my 25-ounce pack represents 2,100 gallons of water. And Blue Diamond cant even take the time to make sure that so much investment isnt leaking all over my pantry.
Resealable packs suck
To be fair, Blue Diamond is far from the only culprit when it comes to poorly built zips. Since the late 1980s, resealable bags have taken over supermarket shelves for products including nuts, pre-shredded cheese, and frozen nuggets. Into the 1990s, these technologies were largely perfected to replace boxed goods with soft packaging in pyramidic forms, creating bags with a wide bottom and thin top that stood up and stood out on the shelf.
Despite decades of manufacturing innovations, resealable packs can still be stupidly hard to cut open without hitting the zip. Bits of food can clog the seals. And, more and more, Im noticing how one side of the zip can inevitably fail, as with Blue Diamond, leaving the pack less than airtight.
But when they work, its the best UX that the American supermarket has to offer (dont get me started on self-checkout!), inevitably helping to keep food fresh and reduce food waste. As much as 40% of Americas food is thrown away each year. And resealable packs help reduce this numberall without introducing more packaging (looking at you, Ziploc!) to solve the problem.
So consider this an open call for Blue Diamond, and all those making suss resealable products, to rethink their packaging. We must have the technology to actually seal bags shut . . . again . . . and again.
Across Appalachia, rust-colored water seeps from abandoned coal mines, staining rocks orange and coating stream beds with metals. These acidic discharges, known as acid mine drainage, are among the regions most persistent environmental problems. They disrupt aquatic life, corrode pipes, and can contaminate drinking water for decades.
However, hidden in that orange drainage are valuable metals known as rare earth elements that are vital for many technologies the U.S. relies on, including smartphones, wind turbines, and military jets. In fact, studies have found that the concentrations of rare earths in acid mine waste can be comparable to the amount in ores mined to extract rare earths.
Scientists estimate that more than 13,700 miles of U.S. streams, predominantly in Pennsylvania and West Virginia, are contaminated with acid mine discharge.
A closer look at acid mine drainage from abandoned mines in Pennsylvania from the Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission
We and our colleagues at West Virginia University have been working on ways to turn the acid waste in those bright orange creeks into a reliable domestic source for rare earths while also cleaning the water.
Experiments show extraction can work. If states can also sort out who owns that mine waste, the environmental cost of mining might help power a clean energy future.
Rare earths face a supply chain risk
Rare earth elements are a group of 17 metals, also classified as critical minerals, that are considered vital to the nations economy or security.
Despite their name, rare earth elements are not all that rare. They occur in many places around the planet, but in small quantities mixed with other minerals, which makes them costly and complex to separate and refine.
China controls about 70% of global rare earth production and nearly all refining capacity. This near monopoly gives the Chinese government the power to influence prices, export policies, and access to rare earth elements. China has used that power in trade disputes as recently as 2025.
The United States, which currently imports about 80% of the rare earth elements it uses, sees Chinas control over these critical minerals as a risk and has made locating domestic sources a national priority.
Although the U.S. Geological Survey has been mapping potential locations for extracting rare earth elements, getting from exploration to production takes years. Thats why unconventional sources, like extracting rare earth elements from acid mine waste, are drawing interest.
Turning a mine waste problem into a solution
Acid mine drainage forms when sulfide minerals, such as pyrite, are exposed to air during mining. This creates sulfuric acid, which then dissolves heavy metals such as copper, lead, and mercury from the surrounding rock. The metals end up in groundwater and creeks, where iron in the mix gives the water an orange color.
Expensive treatment systems can neutralize the acid, with the dissolved metals settling into an orange sludge in treatment ponds.
For decades, that sludge was treated as hazardous waste and hauled to landfills. But scientists at West Virginia University and the National Energy Technology Laboratory have found that it contains concentrations of rare earth elements comparable to those found in mined ores. These elements are also easier to extract from acid mine waste because the acidic water has already released them from the surrounding rock.
Experiments have shown how the metals can be extracted: Researchers collected sludge, separated out rare earth elements using water-safe chemistry, and then returned the cleaner water to nearby streams.
It is like mining without digging, turning something harmful into a useful resource. If scaled up, this process could lower cleanup costs, create local jobs, and strengthen Americas supply of materials needed for renewable energy and high-tech manufacturing.
But theres a problem: Who owns the recovered minerals?
The ownership question
Traditional mining law covers minerals underground, not those extracted from water naturally running off abandoned mine sites.
Nonprofit watershed groups that treat mine waste to clean up the water often receive public funding meant solely for environmental cleanup. If these groups start selling recovered rare earth elements, they could generate revenue for more stream cleanup projects, but they might also risk violating grant terms or nonprofit rules.
To better understand the policy challenges, we surveyed mine water treatment operators across Pennsylvania and West Virginia. The majority of treatment systems were under landowner agreements in which the operators had no permanent property rights. Most operators said ownership uncertainty was one of the biggest barriers to investment in the recovery of rare earth elements, projects that can cost millions of dollars.
Not surprisingly, water treatent operators who owned the land where treatment was taking place were much more likely to be interested in rare earth element extraction.
West Virginia took steps in 2022 to boost rare earth recovery, innovation, and cleanup of acid mine drainage. A new law gives ownership of recovered rare earth elements to whoever extracts them. So far, the law has not been applied to large-scale projects.
Across the border, Pennsylvanias Environmental Good Samaritan Act protects volunteers who treat mine water from liability but says nothing about ownership.
This difference matters. Clear rules like West Virginias provide greater certainty, while the lack of guidance in Pennsylvania can leave companies and nonprofits hesitant about undertaking expensive recovery projects. Among the treatment operators we surveyed, interest in rare earth element extraction was twice as high in West Virginia than in Pennsylvania.
The economics of waste to value
Recovering rare earth elements from mine water wont replace conventional mining. The quantities available at drainage sites are far smaller than those produced by large mines, even though the concentration can be just as high, and the technology to extract them from mine waste is still developing.
Still, the use of mine waste offers a promising way to supplement the supply of rare earth elements with a domestic source and help offset environmental costs while cleaning up polluted streams.
Early studies suggest that recovering rare earth elements using technologies being developed today could be profitable, particularly when the projects also recover additional critical materials, such as cobalt and manganese, which are used in industrial processes and batteries. Extraction methods are improving, too, making the process safer, cleaner, and cheaper.
Government incentives, research funding, and public-private partnerships could speed this progress, much as subsidies support fossil fuel extraction and have helped solar and wind power scale up in providing electricity.
Treating acid mine drainage and extracting its valuable rare earth elements offers a way to transform pollution into prosperity. Creating policies that clarify ownership, investing in research, and supporting responsible recovery could ensure that Appalachian communities benefit from this new chapter, one in which cleanup and clean energy advance together.
Hélne Nguemgaing is an assistant clinical professor of critical resources and sustainability analytics at the University of Maryland.
Alan Collins is a professor of natural resource economics at West Virginia University.
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
Below, Jay Belsky shares five key insights from his new book, The Nature of Nurture: Rethinking Why and How Childhood Adversity Shapes Development.
Belsky is emeritus professor of human development at the University of California, Davis.
Whats the big idea?
Seen through an evolutionary lens, early adversity can shape development in adaptive ways. And because children differ in their sensitivity to their environments, early experiences may matter a lot for some and much less for others.
Listen to the audio version of this Book Biteread by Belsky himselfin the Next Big Idea app.
1. A radically transformed understanding of development
It is beyond dispute that the Hubble Telescope, launched in 1990 (to say nothing of the James Webb Space Telescope launched 11 years later), radically transformed our understanding of the universe. To virtually everyone involved in the life sciences, Charles Darwins theory of adaptation by natural selection in the mid-19th century and William Hamiltons insights on kin selection and inclusive fitness in the mid-20th century have functioned much like these recent telescopic wonders in understanding life on planet Earth.
This is true not simply with respect to human nature, as long highlighted by many evolutionary-minded scholars, but specifically with respect to why, how, and for whom early-life conditions shape, or fail to shape, child, adolescent, and even adult development.
2. Childhood adversity looks different when cast in evolutionary perspective
What stimulated the radical shift in my thinking some three decades ago was the realization that the prevailing, mainstream view of development I cut my teeth on reflected an idealized, romanticized view of the human condition: Good experiences foster well-being, whereas bad things lead to disorder, dysregulation, and dysfunction.
Putting on evolutionary lenses made me realize that because childhood adversityin the form, for example, of threat and deprivationwas not uncommon over the course of human history, the ways children develop in response to it likely evolved and reflect adaptation rather than problematic functioning, as so long presumed. Critically, adaptations evolve because they increase, directly or indirectly, the chances of an individual reproducing, that is, passing on genes to future generations, the ultimate goal of all living things.
Thirty years after first coming to view life on Earth through an evolutionary-developmental, or evo-devo, perspective, I find it astonishing that the discoveries this perspective led to remain extremely underappreciatedby developmental scholars, clinicians, parents, and policymakers alike. While genetics has been how nature has been conceptualized for decades in nature and nurture thinking and research, evolution itself has been more or less ignored, especially with regard to the effects of early life on later development.
3. Early-life adversity accelerates development
Early-life adversity should accelerate development, resulting in earlier pubertal maturation than would otherwise be expected. Because adversity can result not just in compromised functioning, but early death, accelerating sexual maturity, I theorized that adversity would have increased the chances of our ancestors successfully passing on genesdespite the fact that early puberty carries health and longevity risks. The perhaps sad truth is that evolution privileges reproduction more than health, wealth, and happiness, though these can serve as means to that end under some conditions.
4. Children differ in their susceptibility to environmental effects
The future is, and always has been, uncertain, making it somewhat unpredictable. This means that developing in a manner consistent with the nurture a child experiences, whether adverse or supportive, could undermine the passing on of genes if and when the future environment proves substantially different from the one the child was prepared for. This realization led me to predict that children would vary in their developmental plasticity, that is, susceptibility to environmental influenceswhat I labeled the differential-susceptibility hypothesis. Whereas some would be strongly shaped by their early-life conditionsfor better and for worseas those emphasizing nurture have long argued, others would be far less so, as those emphasizing genetic nature have long asserted.
By implication, then, those most vulnerable or susceptible to the negative effects of adversity would, at the same time, prove most susceptible to the beneficial effects of support and nurturance. Conversely, those who prove resilient in the face of adversity, so as not to succumb to its pernicious effects, would also prove less susceptible to the developmental benefits of support and nurturance.
Clearly, then, the benefits and costs of being more or less developmentally plastic depend on the quality of the development context to which the child is exposed early in life. Being resilient is a benefit, for example, in the face of adversity, but a cost in the face of support and nurturance.
5. Implications of evo-devo thinking
One implication of evolutionary thinking aligns with mainstream developmental thought: If we dont like the effects of adversity on development, given prevailing values, we can intervene to reduce these anticipated risks, and probably the earlier, the better. At the same time, we need to appreciate the second implication that even the most successful such efforts will fail to benefit, or benefit modestly, many childrenbecause they are less developmentally plastic. Factors that shape susceptibility to environmental influences include genetics, early temperament, and physiology.
The Nature of Nurture challenges long-standing ways of thinking about human development, the role of the environment, as well as genetics, while advancing a 21st-century way of thinking about why and how early life conditions doand do notshape later life by underscoring evolution and thus natural selection, adaptation, and reproduction.
Enjoy our full library of Book Bitesread by the authors!in the Next Big Idea app.
This article originally appeared in Next Big Idea Club magazine and is reprinted with permission.
As Americans increasingly report feeling overwhelmed by daily life, many are using self-care to cope. Conversations and social media feeds are saturated with the language of me time, burnout, boundaries, and nervous system regulation.
To meet this demand, the wellness industry has grown into a multitrillion-dollar global market. Myriad providers offer products, services, and lifestyle prescriptions that promise calm, balance, and restoration.
Paradoxically, though, even as interest in self-care continues to grow, Americans mental health is getting worse.
I am a professor of public health who studies health behaviors and the gap between intentions and outcomes. I became interested in this self-care paradox recently, after I suffered from a concussion. I was prescribed two months of strictly screen-free cognitive restno television, email, Zooming, social media, streaming, or texting.
The benefits were almost immediate, and they surprised me. I slept better, had a longer attention span, and had a newfound sense of mental quiet. These effects reflected a well-established principle in neuroscience: When cognitive and emotional stimuli decrease, the brains regulatory systems can recover from overload and chronic stress.
Obviously, most people cant go 100% screen-free for days, much less months, but the underlying principle offers a powerful lesson for practicing effective self-care.
A nation under strain
Americans self-rated mental health is now at the lowest point since Gallup started tracking this issue in 2001. National surveys consistently detect high levels of stress and emotional strain.
Roughly one-third of U.S. adults report feeling overwhelmed most days. Sleep disruption, anxiety, poor concentration, and emotional exhaustion are widespread, particularly among young adults and women.
Chronic disease patterns mirror this strain. When daily stress becomes chronic, it can trigger biological changes that increase the risk of long-term conditions like heart disease and diabetes. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that 6 in 10 U.S. adults live with at least one chronic condition, and 4 in 10 live with multiple chronic conditions.
Stress triggers physiological responses that can lead to a range of symptoms.
How people try to cope
Many Americans say they actively practice self-care in everyday life. For example, they describe taking mental health days, protecting personal time, setting boundaries around work, and prioritizing rest and leisure.
The problem lies in how they use that leisure time.
Over the past 22 years, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics American Time Use Survey has consistently found that watching television is the most popular leisure activity for U.S. adults. Americans spend far more time watching TV than exercising, spending time with friends or practicing reflection through activities like yoga. Other common self-care activities include watching movies and gaming.
Modern leisure time increasingly includes smartphone use. Surveys suggest that mobile phones have become the dominant screen for many Americans, with adults spending several hours per day on their phones.
For many adults, checking social media or watching short videos has become a default relaxation behavior layered on top of traditional screen use. This practice is often referred to as second screening.
Although many people turn to screen-based activities to wind down, these activities may have the opposite effect biologically.
Why modern screen use feels different
Pre-internet forms of leisure often involved activities such as watching scheduled television programs, listening to radio broadcasts, or reading books and magazines. For all of these pastimes, the content followed a predictable sequence with natural stopping points.
Todays digital media environment looks very different. People routinely engage with multiple screens at once, respond to frequent notifications, and switch rapidly between several streams of content. These environments continuously require users to split their attention, engage their emotions, and make decisions.
This type of mental multitasking draws on the same neural systems people are often attempting to rest with leisure. The result is a far more fragmented and cognitively demanding environment than in the past.
Americans now spend approximately six to seven hours per day on screens across multiple devices. Splitting attention between more than one screen at a time, such as using the phone while watching television, is common. This juggling exposes peoples brains to multiple streams of sensory and emotional input simultaneously.
Survey data also suggests that Americans may check their phones roughly 200 times per day. In doing so, they repeatedly pull their attention back to screens during routine moments.
Modern digital platforms are designed to maximize engagement. Algorithms tend to prioritize emotionally arousing content, particularly anger, anxiety, ad outrage. These feelings drive clicks, sharing, and time spent on platforms. Research has shown that this design is associated with higher stress, distraction, and cognitive load.
When “rest” doesnt restore
Against the backdrop of daily hassles and competing demands, it can feel like relief to flip on the TV. Practices such as streaming or so-called bed-rottingspending extended periods in bed while scrollingoften are framed as a form of radical rest or self-care.
Other common coping behaviors include leaving the television on as background noise, scrolling between tasks throughout the day, or using phones during meals and conversations. These strategies can feel restful because they temporarily reduce external demands and decision-making.
However, pairing rest with screen use may undermine the very restoration that people are seeking. Digital media stimulate attention, emotion, and sensory processing. Even while people are sitting or lying still, being on-screen can keep their nervous systems in a heightened state of arousal. It may look like downtime, but it doesnt create the biological conditions for restoration.
How to wind down
Evidence suggests that mental relief comes not from adding new coping strategies, but from reducing the number of demands placed on the brain.
Here are some evidence-based strategies that support genuine restoration:
Reduce digital multitasking, such as using your phone while watching television. This lowers stress and cognitive strain.
Limit task-switching and interruptions. This improves focus and reduces cognitive fatigue.
Spend time in low-stimulation environments, including quiet spaces and outdoor settings. This supports mood and emotional well-being.
Unwind with analog or low-novelty activities, such as reading print materials, journaling, gentle movement, or device-free walking. These pastimes allow mental engagement without overload.
The goal is to intentionally reduce mental load, not to abandon all digital devices.
To improve well-being in our overstimulated society, its important to understand the difference between feeling as though you are unwinding and actually allowing your brain and body to recover. In my view, fewer screens, fewer inputs, fewer emotional demands, and more protected time for genuine cognitive rest are important components of an effective wellness strategy.
Robin Pickering is a professor and chair of public health at Gonzaga University.
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
Make Denmark angry. Make Norway angry. Make NATOs leaders angry.
President Donald Trumps relentless and escalating drive to acquire Greenland from Denmark, whose governmentalong with that of Greenlandemphatically rejects the idea, has unnerved, offended, and outraged leaders of countries considered allies for decades.
Its the latest, and perhaps most significant, eruption of an attitude of disdain towards allies that has become a hallmark of the second Trump administration, which has espoused an America First approach to the world.
Trump, Vice President JD Vance, and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth have all said a lot of things about longtime allies that have caused frustration and outright friction among the leaders of those countries. The latest discord over Greenland could affect the functioning and even existence of NATO, the post-World War II alliance of Western nations that won the Cold War and led the globe, as a recent Wall Street Journal story put it.
As a former diplomat, Im aware that how the U.S. treats its allies has been a crucial question in every presidency, since George Washington became the countrys first chief executive. On his way out of that job, Washington said something that Trump, Vance, and their fellow America First advocates would probably embrace.
Above: Ambassador Don Heflin recaps 250 years of American alliances, with their benefits and challenges.
In whats known as his Farewell Address, Washington warned Americans against entangling alliances. Washington wanted America to treat all nations fairly, and warned against both permanent friendships and permanent enemies.
The irony is that Washington would never have become president without the assistance of the not-yet-United-States first ally, France.
In 1778, after two years of brilliant diplomacy by Benjamin Franklin, the not-yet-United States and the Kingdom of France signed a treaty of alliance as the American Colonies struggled to win their war for independence from Britain.
France sent soldiers, money, and ships to the American revolutionaries. Within three years, after a major intervention by the French fleet, the Battle of Yorktown in 1781 effectively ended the war, and America was independent.
Isolationism, then war
American political leaders largely heeded Washingtons warning against alliances throughout the 1800s. The Atlantic Ocean shielded the young nation from Europes problems and many conflicts; Americas closest neighbors had smaller populations and less military might.
Aside from the War of 1812, in which the U.S. fought the British, America largely found itself protected from the outside worlds problems.
That began to change when Europe descended into the brutality of World War I.
Initially, American politicians avoided involvement. What would today be called an isolationist movement was strong; its supporters felt that the European war was being waged for the benefit of big business.
But it was hard for the U.S. to maintain neutrality. German submarines sank ships crossing the Atlantic carrying American passengers. The economies of some of Americas biggest trading partners were in shreds; the democracies of Britain, France, and other European countries were at risk.
A Boston newspaper headline in 1915 blares the news of a British ocean liner sunk by a German torpedo. [Image: Serial and Government Publications Division, Library of Congress (002.00.00)]
President Woodrow Wilson led the U.S. into the war in 1917 as an ally of the Western European nations. When he asked Congress for a declaration of war, Wilson asserted the value of like-minded allies: A steadfast concert for peace can never be maintained except by a partnership f democratic nations.
Immediately after the war, the Alliesled by the U.S., France, and Britainstayed together to craft the peace agreements, feed the war-ravaged parts of Europe and intervene in Russia after the Communist Revolution there.
Prosperity came along with the peace, helping the U.S. quickly develop into a global economic power.
However, within a few years, American politicians returned to traditional isolationism in political and military matters and continued this attitude well into the 1930s. The worldwide Great Depression that began in 1929 was blamed on vulnerabilities in the global economy, and there was a strong sentiment among Americans that the U.S. should fix its internal problems rather than assist Europe with its problems.
Alliance counters fascism
As both Hitler and Japan began to attack their neighbors in the late 1930s, it became clear to President Franklin Roosevelt and other American military and political leaders that the U.S. would get caught up in World War II. If nothing else, airplanes had erased Americas ability to hide behind the Atlantic Ocean.
Though public opinion was divided, the U.S. began sending arms and other assistance to Britain and quietly began military planning with London. This was despite the fact that the U.S. was formally neutral, as the Roosevelt administration was pushing the limits of what a neutral nation can do for friendly nations without becoming a warring party.
In January of 1941, Roosevelt gave his annual State of the Union speech to Congress. He appeared to prepare the country for possibleboth on behalf of allies abroad and for the preservation of American democracy:
The future and the safety of our country and of our democracy are overwhelmingly involved in events far beyond our borders. Armed defense of democratic existence is now being gallantly waged in four continents. If that defense fails, all the population and all the resources of Europe, and Asia, and Africa and Australasia will be dominated by conquerors. In times like these it is immatureand incidentally, untruefor anybody to brag that an unprepared America, single-handed, and with one hand tied behind its back, can hold off the whole world.
When the Japanese attacked Hawaii in 1941 and Hitler declared war on the U.S., America quickly entered World War II in an alliance with Britain, the Free French and others.
Throughout the war, the Allies worked together on matters large and small. They defeated Germany in three and half years and Japan in less than four.
As World War II ended, the wartime alliance produced two longer-term partnerships built on the understanding that working together had produced a powerful and effective counter to fascism.
Postwar alliances
The first of these alliances is the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, or NATO. The original members were the U.S., Canada, Britain, France, and others of the wartime Allies. There are now 32 members, including Poland, Hungary, and Turkey.
The aims of NATO were to keep peace in Europe and contain the growing Communist threat from the Soviet Union. NATOs supporters feel that, given that wars in the former Yugoslavia in the 1990s and in the Ukraine today are the only major conflicts in Europe in 80 years, the alliance has met its goals well. And NATO troops went to Afghanistan along with the U.S. military after 9/11.
The other institution created by the wartime Allies is the United Nations.
The U.N. is many thingsa humanitarian aid organization, a forum for countries to raise their issues and a source of international law.
However, it is also an alliance. The U.N. Security Council on several occasions authorized the use of force by members, such as in the first Gulf War against Iraq. And it has the power to send peacekeeping troops to conflict areas under the U.N. flag.
Other U.S. allies with treaties or designations by Congress include Australia, New Zealand, Japan, Israel, three South American countries, and six in the Middle East.
Many of the same countries also created institutions such as the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, the Organization of American States, and the European Union. The U.S. belongs to all of these except the European Union. During my 35-year diplomatic career, I worked with all of these institutions, particularly in efforts to stabilize Africa. They keep the peace and support development efforts with loans and grants.
Admirers of this postwar liberal international order point to the limited number of major armed conflicts during the past 80 years, the globalized economy and international cooperation on important matters such as disease control and fighting terrorism.
Detractors point to this systems inability to stop some very deadly conflicts, such as Vietnam or Ukraine, and the large populations that havent done well under globalization as evidence of its flaws.
The world would look dramatically different without the Allies victories in the two World Wars, the stable worldwide economic system, and NATO and the U.N. keeping the world relatively peaceful.
But the value of allies to Americans, even when they benefit from alliances, appears to have shifted between George Washingtons attitudeavoid themand that o Franklin D. Rooseveltgo all in . . . eventually.
This is an updated version of an article originally published on February 20, 2025.
Donald Heflin is an executive director of the Edward R. Murrow Center and Senior Fellow of Diplomatic Practice at the Fletcher School at Tufts University.
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
Starting a new job is exhilarating and exhausting. Exhilarating, because youre trying new things, meeting new people, and picking up new skills. Exhausting, because all of those activities tax your brain, so that by the end of the day, you just want a nap.
Over time, though, some of the things youre doing become routine. You know the general tasks that drive your workday, and you can solve most of the problems that come up on most days. Once that happens, you go from being exhausted to being bored. Ultimately, your brain craves a middle-ground in which your world is generally predictable, but there are enough novel situations that you have to pay attention, think a bit, and learn some new things.
So, if you feel like youre running in place at work, then you have to take responsibility for learning new things. You have to decide what you ought to learn and how to learn it. Here are three approaches that can motivate you to get out of your rut.
1. Plan your next move
Where do you want to be in five years? Have you got an answer to that question? You might have a sense of the next role or two youd like to take. If not, chat with more senior colleagues to get a sense of how your career might progress. You might even think about working with a career coach to get some ideas.
Then, take a hard look at your current skills. How do they match up with what is required to take on the next role? You should focus both on the skills you dont have that are a big part of a new role, but also on leveling up some of your existing skills where you may need even greater proficiency when you move up.
It is a natural first step to pick up a book on one of these topics. That is a good start, because it gives you a lay of the land of what needs to be learned to gain competence in an area. But, active practice is an important part of skill development. Seek opportunities that will teach you and also enable you to practice those skills. That might involve taking a class in which you work to hone your new abilities. There are also an increasing number of online platforms that use structured lessons incorporating AI that enable you to try new things and get personalized feedback.
2. Try new things
You may not be so sure what you want to do next. Even if you have a clue, that doesnt mean you have to direct your study just at skills that will get you to the next rung of the ladder.
Learning itself is invigorating. When you take up a new topic, it often lets you notice things you havent seen before. Even picking up a new hobby can change the way you engage with the world. I have written a lot about how I took up the saxophone in my mid-thirties. Not only did it lead to some new skills and the chance to play in some bands, but it also gave me unexpected insights into education and leadership.
After all, you never know where your next great idea might come from. The more you know, the more likely you will be to see a professional situation in a way that is different from how those around you view it.
3. Consider a deep dive or a pivot
A lot of the work-related training people do is cursory. You read a book (or perhaps two). You take a seminar (or two) online or at a local university. Those classes open up some new vistas and can often jolt you out of the rut that drives your daily routine.
But, if you really want to transform yourself, you need a much deeper dive in either a topic you’re familiar with, or perhaps you want to switch to something completely different. That is where a degree program can be a huge benefit. Most universities have realized that master’s programs are an important part of peoples career paths. An increasing number of those programs are tailored to working professionals who can retain their jobs while doing the program. In some fields (like computer science, data science, and AI), these programs are also structured to enable a large number of people to take these programs so that the cost is low.
One advantage to a master’s program is that you often get to know a cohort of fellow students who are pursuing the same degree. That enables you to meet new people with similar goals (and often at a similar point in their careers). These individuals can often give you insight into how you can think differently about your own career. Not only do you leave a degree program with a greatly enhanced bag of tools, you also have a fresh perspective that can drive the next decade of your career.
When crypto first gained prominence more than 15 years ago, one of the big selling points of the currency was its lack of ties to any specific government. Unlike fiat currency, cryptocurrency offered the possibility of a purely mathematical currency that was unrelated to politics, governance, or taxes.
While crypto is still touted as an alternative to fiat currency, such as the U.S. dollar, the real world of politics, governance, and taxes has found a way to intrude on the use of this alternative currency in America. Specifically, the IRS requires U.S. taxpayers to report crypto earnings on their taxes. Because in this world nothing can be said to be certain, except the death of idealistic perfection and taxes.
And since the IRS is involved, the process of reporting your crypto assets on your tax return can include the kind of tear-your-hair-out complexity that makes you want to forgo money altogether and return to the barter system. Thats why we spoke to personal finance expert Robert Farrington about how to handle tax filing when you have crypto assets.
Heres what we learned.
How you received your crypto matters
There are several ways you can find yourself the proud owner of cryptocurrency:
You might receive crypto as a payment for goods or services
You might mine it yourself
You might purchase it as an investment
Depending on how the crypto came into your possession can affect how you report it on your taxes, and Farrington explains that this can make your taxes complex as a result.
Crypto as income
If you accept crypto as a payment for goods or services, the currency is considered part of your income. In that case, you treat the income as business income regardless of the currency. You need to report it as the USD value at the time you received it, Farrington says.
For example, lets say you received 0.25 Bitcoin on August 31, 2025, as payment for your businesss services. Bitcoin was worth $108,236.71 USD on that day, which means youll need to report your 0.25 Bitcoin income as $27,059.18, even if you did not immediately convert the cryptocurrency into USD.
When or if you convert the crypto to USD, you’ll have a secondary transaction that may have a capital gain or loss associated with it, Farrington explains. (More on that below.)
Its also important to note that mining your own crypto is also treated as income, which could either be considered business income or hobby income. If it’s mined as part of a business, you can also potentially deduct related business expenses, like computer hardware, software, or utility costs, Farrington says.
Crypto as investment
Investing in crypto has become much more mainstream in recent years, and the tax rules governing cryptocurrency investments are largely the same as the rules for other investments.
In particular, like other types of investments, short-term and long-term capital gains rules apply to cryptocurrency gains and losses. For any cryptocurrency youve held for less than one year, short-term capital gains or loss rules apply, while any crypto youve held for longer than a year will fall under long-term capital gains or loss rules.
Where things get a little confusing is how you experience capital gains or losses with crypto: by converting your crypto into USD.
When you convert the crypto to fiat currency, like USD, you’ll typically pay capital gains taxes on it, Farrington says. Thats because you will usually convert the crypto at a higher currency exchange rate than you purchased it for.
For example, lets say you invested in a crypto asset worth $20,000 USD and held it for three years, during which time it increased in value to $28,000 USD. When you convert the asset into USD, you would have a long-term capital gain of $8,000.
Dont forget to account for crypto shopping
Another confusing aspect of reporting crypto on your taxes is the fact that you can have a capital gain or loss when you pay for goods or services via cryptocurrency.
Heres how it works: In any transaction where you use your cryptocurrency to make a payment, there will likely be a difference between the amount the crypto was worth when you received it and its current fair market value (FMV).
If the FMV has gone up, thats a capital gain, which means youll have to pay the capital gains tax. If the FMV has gone down, thats a capital loss, which you may be able to use to offset future gains or income.
The IRS is getting more aggressive
As with any new technology, cryptocurrency operated in a kind of lawless Wild West environment before legislation, regulations, and tax law got a chance to catch up with the new state of affairs. With the new reporting requirements for the 2026 tax filing season, the IRS is now catching up toand getting more aggressivewith crypto.
This year, for the 2025 tax year, centralized exchanges will be required to file form 1099-DA with the IRS to report digital asset sales, Farrington says. Theoretically, the government has always required taxpayers to report their digital asset sales on their taxes in previous years, but without the requirement that crypto exchanges file these 1099-DA forms, the IRS was more reliant on self-reporting.
This is why Farrington says it’s essential that you ensure your crypto transactions are accurately reported on your tax return, or it could trigger an audit. Meticulous crypto bookkeeping is a must, and Farrington suggests taking the time to ensure that your transactions are accurately categorized on the exchange so there are no incorrect 1099s filed.
For example, if you transfer tokens between exchanges, you may want to go in and make certain its categorized as a transfer so that the exchange doesn’t mistakenly report it as a gain, Farrington recommends. A little bit of extra prepaation, documentation, and double-checking can give your tax season some important peace of mind.
Virtual currency, real taxes
Cryptocurrency may not feature portraits of Washington, Lincoln, Hamilton, or Jackson, but that doesnt keep Uncle Sams sticky fingers out of your virtual wallet. American taxpayers have to report their crypto income, investments, gains, and transactions on their tax returns. And for the first time in 2026, crypto exchanges are now required to file 1099-DA forms to report digital asset sales.
Keeping good records of your crypto assets will help you tame the tax filing beastbut Farrington stresses that If you’re not familiar with these concepts to begin with, you should definitely seek advice from a tax professional.
Every year, Tennis Australia CEO Craig Tiley issues a challenge to his team that would make most executivesand their teamsbreak into a cold sweat: Reinvent 50% of the Australian Open. Not subtle changes or a few tweaks. Half of everything, so no two tournaments are ever the same.
Today, to help satisfy Tiley’s mandate, the event has evolved into a three-pronged innovation machine. There’s an in-house R&D lab that’s been developing analytics, broadcast, and fan engagement advancements for more than 15 years, alongside a startup accelerator that’s piloted 40 companies, and a $40 million VC fund to capitalize those startups.
“The 50% innovation challenge creates something most large organizations struggle to cultivate: permission to fail,” says Machar Reid, director of innovation and AO Ventures general partner.
It’s working. The 2025 Australian Open set attendance records with 1,218,831 fans through the gates over three weeks, breaking the previous year’s mark by more than 100,000. It attracted 1.9 billion global viewers, drew 2.3 billion social impressions, and generated $565.8 million for host city Melbournes economy. And this year’s tournament, which rolls into its final rounds this weekend, is poised to be another record-setter.
Inside Tennis Australia’s tech workshop
It all started with AO Labs, Tennis Australia’s research and development arm. This is the internal division that builds the broadcast and fan engagement technologies that have transformed how people watch tennis.
Last year’s breakout was AO Animated, which uses skeletal tracking to turn live matches into Nintendo Wii-style cartoons. The technology tracks 29 points on each player’s body at 50 frames per second, creating real-time avatars that move exactly as the players do. The feed went viral in 2025, drawing nearly 1 million viewers in the first four days alone.
[Image: AO Animated]
The technology is fun. But it also solves a real problem. Tennis Australia took over its own broadcast production in 2015one of only two Grand Slam tournaments to control its own broadcast (the US Open only recently started moving in this direction). Other Grand Slams turn broadcast production over to networks like ESPN or TNT Sports. Tennis Australia maintains creative control, then licenses that production to broadcast partners including ESPN in the U.S. and Channel 9 in Australia.
[Image: AO Animated]
But those licensing agreements create restrictions. The AO Animated stream functions as a legal work-around. Since it’s generated from tracking biometric data rather than relying on video footage, it doesn’t violate exclusivity agreements. Viewers without broadcast subscriptions could clip highlights and share them.
Fans loved it. Players found it hilarious. By week two of last years tournament, Tennis Australia was providing the feed to three broadcast partners, and they’ve brought it back again for 2026.
AO Animated is among the latest in a series of experiments. But even AO Labs isn’t enough to satisfy Tiley’s 50% mandate. To achieve that, the team knew it had to tap external resources.
Turning Melbourne Park into a tech incubator
In 2022, Tennis Australia launched AO Startups. The goal: identify early-stage companies with technology Tennis Australia could eventually implement, giving both sides a chance to test product-market fit at one of the world’s biggest sporting events.
“Rather than trying to be really narrow with a problem statement, we stay purposefully broad,” says Reid. “There are occasions where we don’t know what we don’t know.”
The 2025 cohort included 12 companiesthe largest since inceptionspanning digital ticketing platforms, AI-powered personalized menus for dietary needs, automated screening checks, production project management software, and wearable resistance suits for athlete training.
The selection process is rigorous, but fast. Startups apply through aostartups.ausopen.com, with applications opening periodically throughout the year and Tennis Australia announcing new cohorts in the lead-up to each Australian Open. Applicants are evaluated on team quality, market opportunity, ambition level, and mutual impact potential. Those accepted get access to Tennis Australia executives, pilots across the organization’s summer events, and pathways to becoming official suppliers.
Each pilot is customized based on the company’s stage and technology. Some test products still in development. Others run full-scale deployments. Some pilots test across Tennis Australia’s entire three-week summer seriesthe United Cup in Sydney and Perth, Brisbane International, and Adelaide Internationalwith select pilots deployed at the Australian Open itself. The customized trials give funders real-world feedback at scale while giving Tennis Australia confidence that the systems work under pressurewhich is critical, given that they’re not just piloting tools that enhance the broadcast and fan experience, but technology that can impact the matches themselves.
Six engineers vs. one monopoly
In 2021, four engineers walked away from Hawkeye, the company that had dominated electronic line calling in tennis for two decades. They teamed up with two others and founded Bolt6 specifically to build something bettera cloud-first system that could do things Hawkeye’s legacy architecture couldn’t.
Tennis Australia had been a Hawkeye client for 17 years. When Bolt6 approached the team about piloting new technology through AO Startups, Reid saw opportunityand a lot of risk.
“[Line calling] is our highest-risk technology,” Reid says. “If that does not work, we’re in trouble, because it’s calling lines for the playing group. It’s not like we have lines people waiting on standby to jump in if the technology goes down.”
So Tennis Australia methodically de-risked it, inviting Bolt6 to join AO Startups. At the 2023 Australian Open, Bolt6 ran in stealth mode alongside Hawkeye on the tournament’s center courtside-by-side testing, every call compared. In 2024, Bolt6 handled all Australian Open lead-up events and expanded to testing alongside Hawkeye on three stadium courts during the main tournament. Only after two years of testing did Tennis Australia deploy Bolt6 across all 17 courts for the entire 2025 summer, fully replacing Hawkeye.
Risk/reward
The gamble paid off. Bolt6’s cloud architecture unlocked capabilities Hawkeye couldn’t deliver. Because the system is cloud-based, Tennis Australia could centralize operationsrunning all courts from one location instead of requiring on-site servers at each venue. The system processes faster and integrates with other platforms more easily, opening new possibilities beyond just calling lines.
[Image: Bolt6]
In fact, it’s Bolt6’s technology that drives the skeletal tracking and 360-degree camera system that AO Labs integrated to create the Wii-style animations and dynamic broadcast angles. Technology that started as line calling evolved into a dynamic broadcasting tool.
[Image: Bolt6]
“It is a genuine partnership around how to create stories for the viewer at home,” says James Japhet, Bolt6 cofounder and chief commercial officer. “It’s not just us doing it, this is us working hand in hand with Tennis Australia.”
The partnership has turbocharged Bolt6’s growth. The company went from being deployed at three events in 2023 to 40 in 2024, around 90 in 2025, and now a projected 170 events in 2026, expanding beyond tennis into sports like NASCAR and the PGA Tour.
“I don’t think we would have had that same trajectory without the partnership and support of Tennis Australia,” Japhet says.
A global stage for tech startups
Another company, Raven Controls, came through AO Startups in 2023 with a different kind of technology. Founder Ian Kerr, a former police officer in Scotland who specialized in emergency planning, had built an incident management platform after witnessing chaos at major eventssafety decisions that weren’t properly logged, stakeholders who couldn’t communicate, critical information lost in radio chatter.
Raven digitizes that coordination. The platform is cloud-based and AI-driven, creating one centralized system where every incident gets logged, every decision gets recorded, and security, medical, and crowd control teams can all see what’s happening in real time.
“Before Raven, these systems were all siloed,” Kerr explains. “Security would know about an incident, but medical wouldn’t. Or crowd management would see a problem, but it would take 20 minutes to coordinate a response.”
By the time Kerr connected with Tennis Australia in 2023, Raven had already managed UEFA Champions League finals, two Euro soccer championships, and two Ryder Cups.
Reid saw the value immediately. The platform could handle the complexity of coordinating security, operations, and emergency response across Melbourne Park’s 17 courts and sprawling grounds. The AO Startups pilot tested Raven across Tennis Australia’s summer events in 2023, giving Kerr’s team real-world feedback at scale while providing global exposure beyond their European base.
Completing the innovation loop
With the in-house lab and external tech incubators thriving, in January 2025 Tennis Australia completed the innovation loop, launching a $30 million fund called AO Ventures. Backed by 150 investors, including venture capitalist Brad Feld and prominent Australian families, the fund writes checks of around $500,000 for seed rounds and $1 million for Series A, according to Reid.
To date, four investments have closed: Bolt6 and Raven, along with two padel propertiesMindspring Padel and Padel Haus. The goal, according to Reid, is to invest in approximately 20 companies, with at least five emerging from the AO Startups pipeline.
The key, Reid says, is that Tennis Australia becomes not just the investor, but ideally the customer a well. “Our best way of delivering return is for us to be a client and be able to shout from the rooftops,” he says.
After Raven completed its pilot and became a Tennis Australia client, the company competed for a contract with Legends Global, which operates more than 300 stadiums across North America. Legends conducted due diligence with Tennis Australia, and its reference, Kerr sayscombined with Raven’s proven performance across Tennis Australia’s eventsis what helped Raven win the contract.
“Having Tennis Australia as a part of our profile has absolutely given us a massive stamp of approval at a very senior level,” Kerr says. “That support was invaluable to us.”
A 70% success rate
Ten startups are participating in the 2026 tournament, including the National Pickleball League, VueMotion, and Truefuels. Since launching in 2022, 40 companies have piloted their technology through AO Startups. Some 70% have become Tennis Australia suppliers or partnersa conversion rate that significantly outperforms typical corporate accelerator programs, where 40% to 50% is considered strong.
Tiley has said he wants to make the Australian Open “the biggest sporting event in the world.” The three-pronged innovation engine turning startups into global players is driving the Open to ever-higher levels of fan engagement.
“From a leadership point of view, I tell the team to come and ask for forgiveness, not permission,” Tiley told Boardroom. “The approach is: Just go for it. If it works, great. If it doesn’t, we’ll just make some adjustments and give it a go again.”
Tesla CEO Elon Musk just admitted what we have been saying since he first made his grand promises about the companys Cybercab robotaxi and Optimus humanoid robot: His target to mass-produce these products was unrealistic, and now theyre crumbling faster than a Cybertruck’s accelerator pedal.
On January 20, Musk said on X that early production of both products will be “agonizingly slow”a remarkable admission for a man who has spent the past year telling investors these moonshot projects would save his flailing car company. “For Cybercab and Optimus, almost everything is new, so the early production rate will be agonizingly slow, but eventually end up being insanely fast,” Musk wrote.
This is the same man who promised that the Cybercab would launch in 2026 at a price “under $30,000,” revolutionizing urban transportation with fully autonomous vehicles that would cost riders just 20 cents per mile. And the same person who, at his Hollywood spectacle of an event in October 2024, claimed these scissor-doored wonders would transform parking lots into parks.
It’s the same Musk who said Optimus would be working in Tesla factories by the end of 2025, with 5,000 units produced in 2026 and eventually 1 million per year within five years. But two sources in the Optimus supply chain claim that “Tesla had only procured enough parts to produce 1,200 Optimus units and had manufactured close to 1,000 before manufacturing halted (more on this later).
As of now, there are no robots doing any meaningful work in Tesla factories; this week, Musk claimed they are “currently doing simple tasks.” We do know, from videos online, that they move at glacial speeds and can’t replace human workers in any way.
[Image: Tesla]
Fail after fail
Let’s review the scoreboard of broken promises. Musk announced the Cybercab in 2024 at the We, Robot event, saying production would begin in 2026. Experts immediately called BS. “Tesla software is at least years behind where Waymo is,” Matthew Wansley, a professor at New York’s Cardozo School of Law, told Reuters at the time.
Wansley was right to be skeptical. Tesla’s Full Self-Driving manages 71 miles between critical disengagementsmoments when a human has to grab controlcompared to Waymo’s 17,311 miles. And that gap hasn’t closed. Tesla still reportedly depends heavily on tele-operators to prevent fatal accidents. On December 7, 2025, Musk promised that unsupervised Cybercabs were going to start driving in Austin in three weeks. There are no reports confirming this that I could find, though there is word that those Cybercabs are still supervised as of January 23, albeit from a chase car.
Optimus, meanwhile, has become the Fyre Festival of robotics. Musk claimed in April 2025 that “Optimus has the potential to be north of $10 trillion in revenue, like it’s really bananas. It will be the biggest product ever.” He told investors the robot would “eventually dwarf” Tesla’s vehicle business and could unlock “massive new economic value.”
Production of the robot froze completely last June and October. Overheating joints, limp wrists, and batteries that died before lunch forced Tesla to halt procurement after manufacturing only about 1,000 units at $60,000 eachunits that moved at less than half the speed of the humans they were supposed to replace. Its no wonder hes now warning that he was deeply wrong (and yet still managed to throw another empty promise that we are supposed to believe).
This slow admission is just the latest chapter in Musk’s decade-long saga of vaporware. He has claimed Tesla would solve Full Self-Driving “this year” every year since 2014. Its 2026, and Musk is warning of “agonizingly slow” production instead of the revolution he promised.
[Image: Tesla]
Here’s a prediction
The timing of Musk’s confession couldn’t be worse for Tesla. The company’s core business is collapsing. Much of Tesla’s $1.39 trillion valuation, according to Reuters, “hinges on investor expectations for its self-driving technology and humanoid robots, even as the company’s core revenue and profit continue to come from electric vehicle sales.” Translation: The stock is inflated on fantasies while the actual business falters.
So here we are, watching Musk admit that his previous timeline was fiction while maintaining that production will “eventually end up being insanely fast.” Eventually. That word again. Tesla trades with the valuation of a tech revolutionary while delivering the results of a struggling automaker with stagnant design, obsolete technology, and a CEO more focused on serving popcorn with speeded-up robots at Hollywood diners than fixing his company’s hemorrhaging sales.
I’m not Musk, and my crystal ball may be as broken as his, but here’s my prediction: These “agonizingly slow” production ramps will decrease revenue numbers, wear investors patience thin, and ultimately end in an agonizingly fast stock collapse.
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Based on our analysis of the Zillow Home Value Index, U.S. home prices are up just 0.1% year over year from December 2024 to December 2025. That marks a deceleration from the +2.6% growth rate a year earlierthough national price growth has recently stabilized, ticking slightly higher from a low of -0.01% in August 2025.
In the first half of 2025, the number of major metro-area housing markets seeing year-over-year declines climbed. That count has since pretty much stopped ticking up.
31 of the nations 300 largest housing markets (10% of markets) had a falling year-over-year reading in the January 2024 to January 2025 window.
42 of the nations 300 largest housing markets (14% of markets) had a falling year-over-year reading in the February 2024 to February 2025 window.
60 of the nations 300 largest housing markets (20% of markets) had a falling year-over-year reading in the March 2024 to March 2025 window.
80 of the nations 300 largest housing markets (27% of markets) had a falling year-over-year reading in the April 2024 to April 2025 window.
96 of the nations 300 largest housing markets (32% of markets) had a falling year-over-year reading in the May 2024 to May 2025 window.
110 of the nations 300 largest housing markets (36% of markets) had a falling year-over-year reading in the June 2024 to June 2025 window.
105 of the nations 300 largest housing markets (36% of markets) had a falling year-over-year reading in the July 2024 to July 2025 window.
109 of the nations 300 largest housing markets (35% of markets) had a falling year-over-year reading in the August 2024 to August 2025 window.
105 of the nations 300 largest housing markets (35% of markets) had a falling year-over-year reading in the September 2024 to September 2025 window.
105 of the nations 300 largest housing markets (35% of markets) had a falling year-over-year reading in the October 2024 to October 2025 window.
98 of the nations 300 largest housing markets (33% of markets) had a falling year-over-year reading in the November 2024 to November 2025 window.
106 of the nations 300 largest housing markets (35% of markets) had a falling year-over-year reading in the December 2024 to December 2025 window.
As you can see above, in the first half of 2025, there was a notable increase in the number of housing markets slipping into year-over-year price declines as the supply-demand equilibrium (as measured by inventory) shifted more quickly toward homebuyers. Over the past seven months, however, the list of declining markets has begun to stabilize as inventory growth has decelerated.
Home prices are still climbing a little year over year in many regions where active inventory remains well below pre-pandemic 2019 levels, such as pockets of the Northeast and Midwest. In contrast, some pockets in states like Texas, Florida, and Coloradowhere active inventory exceeds pre-pandemic 2019 levels by a solid clipare seeing modest home price pullbacks or flat pricing.
Many of the housing markets seeing the most softness, where homebuyers have gained the most leverage, are primarily located in Sunbelt regions, particularly the Gulf Coast and Mountain West.
Many of these areas saw even greater price surges during the Pandemic Housing Boom, with home price growth outpacing local income levels. As pandemic-driven domestic migration slowed and mortgage rates rose in 2022, markets like Tampa and Austin faced challenges, relying on local income levels to support frothy home prices.
That Sunbelt softening was further compounded by an abundance of new home supply in the region. Builders are often willing to lower prices or offer affordability incentives to maintain sales, which also has a cooling effect on the resale market. As a result, some buyers who might have previously opted for existing homes are instead choosing new construction with more attractive dealswhich added further upward pressure to resale inventory growth over the past few years.
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Of course, while 106 of the nations 300 largest metro-area housing markets are seeing year-ove-year home price declines, another 194 are seeing year-over-year home price increases.
Where are home prices still up on a year-over-year basis? See the map below.
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Below is a historical chart showing the year-over-year change in home prices across the 50 largest metro housing markets, with the yellow line representing the national aggregate, dating back to 2000.
