A New York-based AI startup called Hebbia says it’s developed techniques that let AI answer questions about massive amounts of data without merely regurgitating what it’s read or, worse, making up information.
To help generative AI tools answer questions beyond the information in their training data, AI companies have recently used a technique called retrieval-augmented generation, or RAG. When users ask a question, RAG-powered AI typically uses a search-engine-style system to locate relevant information it has access to, whether that’s on the web or in a private database.
Then, that information is fed to the underlying AI model along with the user’s query and any other instructions, so it can use it to formulate a response.
The problem, says Hebbia CEO George Sivulka, is that RAG can get too bogged down in keyword matches to focus on answering a user’s actual question. For instance, if an investor asks a RAG-powered system whether a particular company looks like a good investment, the search process might surface parts of the business’s financial filings using that kind of language, like favorable quotes from the CEO, rather than conducting an in-depth analysis based on criteria for picking a stock.
“Traditional RAG is good at answering questions that are in the data, but it fails for questions that are about the data,” Sivulka says.
It’s a problem that surfaces in general-purpose AI-powered search engines, which can confidently regurgitate satire, misinformation, or off-topic information that matches a query, as well as special-purpose tools. One recent test of a legal AI tool, where the system was asked to find notable opinions by a made-up judge, found it highlighted a case involving a party with a similar name.
And, according to Hebbia, questions that require an analysis of a big data set that goes beyond finding relevant documents often can’t be answered by RAG alone.
Hebbia, says Sivulka, has approached the problem with a technique the company calls iterative source decomposition. That method identifies relevant portions of a data set or collection of documents using an actual AI model rather than mere keyword or textual similarity matching, feeding what it finds into a nested network of AI models that can analyze portions of the data and intermediate results together. Then, the system can ultimately come up with a comprehensive answer to a question.
“Technically, what it’s doing is running a LLM over every token that matters and then using that to feed that into another model, that feeds it into another model, and so it recurses all the way up to the top,” Sivulka says.
Hebbia’s nested processing techniques also help overcome limitations with AI context windows, which limit the amount of information that can be provided to a language model in one query, he says.
Hebbia announced a $130 million Series A funding round in July and claims clients like the U.S. Air Force, law firm Gunderson Dettmer, and private equity firms Charlesbank and Cinven. Sivulka says various clients harness the company’s technology to answer complex questions about financial data for potential investments or to search for valuable information buried deep in voluminous legal discovery data sets, among numerous other use cases. The tool can also be configured to notify users when new data enables it to draw new conclusions, such as when new financial filings by a particular company appear online, Sivulka says.
Demand is high enough that Hebbia, which uses models from big providers like OpenAI and Anthopic, has developed its own software to maximize the number of queries it can send to different models. Its system even takes into account varying rate limits for, say, access to GPT offered by Microsoft and by OpenAI directly.
And, says Sivulka, demand continues to increase, as customers use Hebbia’s software to consider larger data sets than previously would have been possible in making decisions. The company says it’s handled 250 million queries from users so far this year, compared to 100 million last year.
“If you’re an investor and you’re building a case to invest or not to invest, you can look atand corroborate your assumptions withway more data,” Sivulka says.
Earlier this week, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney drew a line in the sand about relations with America. The old relationship we had with the United States, based on deepening integration of our economies and tight security and military cooperation, is over, he said during a speech on Parliament Hill.
The same could be said for many Canadian property owners who haveor used to havesecond homes and winter escapes in the United States. Anger over the Trump administrations continued references to the country as the 51st state and the prime minister as a governor, in addition to the tariffs that have set off a trade war between allies, have led to the beginning of a property sell-off.
This isnt a small issue for U.S. real estate. Canada has the largest number of distinct investments in U.S. property, representing 13% of foreign buyers. Canadas $5.9 billion in real estate assets is second only to China. There have been some sell-offs in the past year due to both the declining value of Canadian currency in relation to the U.S. dollar, as well as the increasing cost of U.S. homeownership, including rising insurance and HOA costs. Canadian sellers represented a quarter of foreign home sales in Florida between April 2023 and March 2024, according to the National Realtors Association.
But U.S.-based brokers who specialize in selling to Canadians, especially in Sun Belt markets popular with snowbirds and second home owners, have seen a significant increase in Canadians selling their property. Anger over Trump’s actions, anxiety over immigrants and travelers being detained, and fear of future restrictions and economic regulations have been driving transactions.
Sheri Dettman, who has been selling properties in Palm Springs, California, since 2007, and whose firm did $50 million in business last year, says typically, when it came to nice homes in the desert, buyers looked for an escape and didnt discuss politics. But since the Trump administrations talk of annexing Canada, sales and inquiries from Canadians looking to sell their homes have skyrocketed, and clients have been animated. She has had Canadians call to yell at her for being an American advertising in Canadian newspapers.
Within the first two weeks of tariffs talks, I had sellers calling and saying, were out of here, Trump has irrevocably damaged the relationship between Canada and the United States, she said. They were very, very emotional. I had a couple this morning call and say they were afraid Trump would put some executive order on their property.
Quebec-based real estate broker Alexandra DuPont told The Canadian Press shes extremely busy handling dozens of Canadians who want to sell off their U.S. homes.
Laurie Levine, a dual Canadian-American citizen who sells homes in the Greater Phoenix area, typically handles two or three listings for sale at this time of year. Now hes juggling 18 Canadian sellers at once and getting calls every day from owners who have had enough. He said Canadians have already started heading home earlier in the season, leading to less crowded and less profitable local businesses. He thinks Canadians may start looking more toward Mexico and the Dominican Republic.
It might take a long time for America to get its reputation back, Levine said.
Investment analysts initially expected 2025 to be a bit of a rebound for foreign investment in U.S. real estate, including expansion into secondary markets like Phoenix, due to a widely shared sentiment that the U.S. economy was doing well and was still a safe haven for capital.
But with increasing anxiety over travel, as well as tariffs and trade issues, these early-year predictions may not play out as planned. Sales figures havent shown the full extent of the demand to dump U.S. property, since it typically takes a few months to sell. With many Canadians owning in seasonal markets like Florida and Phoenix, sales will likely stop soon, take a break during the summer, and restart in the fall, so real figures wont show themselves until later in the year. But anecdotal evidence suggests a shift will take place.
My clients are saying we might come back, but not in the next four years, or not, said Levine. It’s going to continue on for quite some time. Local businesses are going to be feeling the difference, especially next winter, when half the amount of Canadians come down here.
Gerardo Valerio had been looking for a bathroom in Los Angeles Little Tokyo neighborhood for 20 minutes when he stumbled across a blue and white trailer with FREE BATHROOM at the top. At first, he was hesitant to enter the bathroom, which had been installed by the Washington, D.C.-based portable toilet startup Throne. To get in, he had to scan a QR code which pre-loaded a text onto his phone. After sending the text, the door would automatically slide open.
What do I text, I need to pee? he jokes.
All in all, he says, it was a positive experience: It was pretty to look at but it definitely has a smell to it. It needs to be maintained a bit more. But overall, nice.
In Little Tokyo, there are almost no public restroomsin most of the restaurants and shops, you have to buy something first. There should be more, Valerio says.
After years of complaints from riders, LA Metro is rolling out more free public Throne bathrooms this year at transit stations across L.A. County. The portable, touchless trailers are self-contained, requiring no water or electric hookup. This allows the company to rapidly deploy restrooms wherever neededlike a busy train station. The new location at Little Tokyo station has been particularly popular, with 120 to 150 uses per day during the weekend. Thrones have also been deployed in the D.C. area, Ann Arbor, Michigan; Beverly Hills; and in the Bay area at two Caltrain stations.
View this post on Instagram /div>A post shared by Throne Bathrooms (@thronebathrooms)
Built on accountability
Throne says its smart bathrooms use accountability to solve the age-old problem of unwanted bathroom activity. Accessing a Throne requires a unique user ID, usually a cell phone number. For those without access to a phone, Throne also distributes key cards through local service providers.
[Its] just behavioral science, explains Throne cofounder and COO Jessica Heinzelman. If somebody knows that theyve used their phone to get into a bathroom, theyre treating it a little bit nicer, kind of the same mentality of if you have somebody in line behind you in a regular bathroom.
Every user is asked to rate the cleanliness of the Throne and can report any issues via text. Throne uses this feedback to optimize the cleaning schedule which relies on gig laborand rapidly respond to any issues. As of March 1, there have been 425,900 uses nationally, with 168,600 in L.A., and a rating of 4.07 out of five stars.
The biggest issue facing public bathrooms in Metro stations has been preventing inappropriate behavior, says Stephen Tu, deputy executive officer of station experience at Metro.
Throne bathrooms are cheaper to clean and maintain because problem users can be banned from the system. So far, only 375 people out of 37,144 unique users across the national Throne network have been access-restricted, according to Heinzelman.
Last year, after a six-month pilot at four locations, Metro approved a $22 million four-year contract with Throne to provide up to 64 bathrooms. Currently, there are 14 Thrones in the Metro system, with four more set to roll out in April.
View this post on Instagram A post shared by Throne Bathrooms (@thronebathrooms)
Tapping the gig workforce
Some Throne features might be high-tech, but the bathrooms are still cleaned the old-fashioned way: by people, specifically gig workers who sign up to clean specific locations at specific times through an app.
It allows us to respond really quickly, while also providing people flexible income opportunities, says Heinzelman. If we had a W-2 workforce, we would probably be able to accomplish a quarter of the cleans in twice the time.
Correna T., a public transportation advocate with the L.A. chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America, believes that the bathrooms should be staffed by unionized Metro employees, not gig workers.
We would much rather see those jobs go to union employees who have protections and benefits and are staffed publicly, she says.
In July of last year, DSA-LA successfully mobilized to push LA Metro to conduct a feasibility study on bringing cleaning staff in-house. Over seven months later, the report is still not out. Next City reached out to Metro for a status update on the report but did not receive a response.
Throne declined to provide details about how much a member of the cleaning network is paid per clean, but according to Thrones website, each clean is priced dynamically.
There are all sorts of variables to how we are setting clean tasks including when we have two Thrones co-located next to each other (no transit time or transit cost) [plus] the ability to get bonuses for rapid response, says Heinzelman in an email.
Workers can receive an extra $15 for extra tough jobs after submitting before-and-after photos that are then confirmed by the company. Thrones top earners are making up to $1,800 per week, says Heinzelman.
Having bathrooms is an enormous social service support and health and safety strategy that we wholeheartedly support, says Alfonso Directo, Jr., advocacy director for the Alliance for Community Transit, a coalition of transportation and housing organizations. But ACT-LA would rather see Metro provide stable employment for local residents.
Metro, as a public agency with public dollars, could be using those dollars to develop the infrastructure themselves, he says.
A temporary fix?
Correna T. was initially excited about the Throne bathroom program, but thinks it doesnt go far enough in providing a permanent solution.
The bathrooms are portable, not permanent, she points out. Metro doesnt own themThrone does. The contract only extends to 2028the year that L.A. is hosting the summer Olympic games. To DSA-LA, this shows that the Throne partnership is primarily meant to serve tourists during the Olympics.
If they dont expand this program past the Olympics, Throne could literally just come in and take them away, and they would no longer be an amenity for the city, she adds.
Tu doesnt see the restrooms as necessarily temporary and says the agency has the option to renew the contract at the end of four years.
The beauty of its portability allows us to scale very quickly, because to be able to do this with a more traditional approach would take many years to be able to get this at up to 64 locations, he says.
LA Metro riders have been requesting bathrooms for decades with little success. The system has only three stations with permanent bathrooms in a system with 107 rail stations and about 12,000 bus stops (the city of Los Angeles has four bathrooms at Metro stations that it maintains separately).
Tu says that the challenge with building and maintaining public bathrooms has been not just the capital costs of adding new bathrooms, but also the amount of money needed to staff them and keep them clean.
During the pilot, Metro saw a 50% reduction in public urination and defecation incidents at locations where Thrones were deployed.
When Next City asked if Metro could use the money saved on maintenance to build permanent bathrooms, Tu repeated that the partnership with Throne allows the agency to roll out multiple bathrooms in a short period of time.
He stresses the high rating that Throne has received from users as evidence of the programs success, though he states that Metro is not opposed to exploring other options in the future.
The only solution we see in the market right now is the Throne solution, he says.
This story was originally published by Next City, a nonprofit news outlet covering solutions for equitable cities. Sign up for Next City’s newsletter for their latest articles and events.
Amtrak has revealed a first look at its new Airo trains, and they come with panoramic windows, comfier chairs, and more accessibility features.
The national rail service is currently constructing 83 of the new-and-improved Airo trains, which will operate on around 15 existing routes in the Eastern U.S. and Pacific Northwest. According to a spokesperson, the Airo manufacturing is currently underway at Siemenss Sacramento plant, with testing of the first trains expected to begin in the second half of this year.
By modernizing its fleet with a variety of design improvements, Amtrak is making a play to attract more Americans to train travel instead of flighta step toward its ultimate goal to revitalize Americas passenger rail system and double ridership by 2040.
[Image: Amtrak]
Nicer seats, bigger views
In an announcement released earlier this month, Amtrak revealed a first look at the specs and interiors of its Airo design, and theyre a marked improvement to the rail services existing models.
On the inside, new seating offers moveable headrests, a cupholder, bigger and sturdier tray tables, and “plenty of legroom,” per the release. Panoramic windows have been added to let in plenty of light and allow travelers to take in the passing views. And, to make finding your seat simpler, each car will be color-coded based on its class, while each chair will be labeled with an individual number.
[Image: Amtrak]
More thought has also been given to the trains amenities. In the Airos cafe cars, riders will now have a self-service option rather than waiting in one long line to order from a single attendant. The cafe caras well as the bathrooms, walkways, and vestibuleshas also been modified to allow wheelchair users to navigate more easily.
Aesthetically, the Airos staid gray and blue interiors are still lagging far behind the train designs one might find overseaslike in Frances high-speed TGV Inoui model, which looks like a 70s space age mood board. Still, the Airo represents a technological improvement on former Amtrak models in that it can travel up to 125 mph and produces 90% less particulate emissions in diesel operations. Fast Company reached out to Amtrak for more details on the Airos design and environmental impact, and the rail service declined to provide further information at this time.
[Image: Amtrak]
Its a good time for Amtrak to be investing in new trains, given that some of its old cars are going out of service: Just last week, the rail service announced that it would be suspending its entire Horizon fleet after inspectors uncovered potentially dangerous corrosion on several cars.
[Image: Amtrak]
Amtraks plan to revitalize Americas rail system
The Airo trains, slated to hit tracks in 2026, are the first phase of Amtraks larger plans to refresh its existing fleet and expand its service across the U.S.
Last February, former Amtrak CEO Stephen Gardner told Fast Company that the U.S. is essentially still operating Victorian railways in the 21st century. Meanwhile countries like France, Japan, Switzerland, and China are moving light-years ahead in terms of their high-speed rail systems (the closest the U.S. has come to high-speed rail is Amtraks Acela route). Amtrak has been working to bring the countrys rail system into the modern era by epanding its routes, enticing younger customers, and, of course, upgrading its trains.
So far, its efforts seem to be paying off. In 2024, Amtrak saw a record ridership of 32.8 million passengers, up from 28 million the year before. The rail services ultimate goal is to see 66 million riders by 2040. As Amtrak works to achieve that benchmark, some criticsincluding Elon Muskhave called for the service to be privatized. However, as Fast Company has previously written, such a move could derail the providers expansion plans by raising prices for consumers and even eliminating less profitable routes.
In the meantime, if Amtrak is allowed to continue operating under its current structure, a spokesperson predicted that the service is on track to reach operational profitabilityfor the first time in historyduring this administration.
After making his mark in Silicon Valley, Icelandic designer and tech mogul Haraldur Halli Thorleifsson is now solving a far more analog problem: the inaccessibility of local storefronts.
As a wheelchair user, Thorleifsson knows firsthand how exclusion can be built into a city. If you dont see anyone using a wheelchair, he says, its not because they dont existits because they have nowhere to go. Thorleifsson has experienced such access barriers to public spaces throughout his life, but the turning point came on a late-night walk with his family in downtown Reykjavík, when he couldnt join his son in a corner store because of a single step at the entrance.
As I was sitting outside, I kept looking at that one step, he recalls. Over the years, steps like that had stopped me from being able to go cafés to meet friends, from going to the barber, or going Christmas shopping with my family. That one step was the main obstacle between me and fully participating in society. And, not just me; anyone who uses a mobility device to get around. I decided that this had to change and since nobody else seemed to be doing anything, I figured it was up to me.
So in 2021, Thorleifsson launched Ramp Up Reykjavík to fund the installation of 100 ramps in places with the most foot traffic across Icelands capitalcafés, restaurants, and shops. Four years later, the project has delivered far more ramps than initially promised and well beyond Reykjavík to additional Icelandic cities, garnering a fitting name change to Ramp Up Iceland. On March 14, Thorleifsson celebrated the completion of Ramp Up Iceland with a ribbon-cutting ceremony and the support of the mayor, prime minister, president, and other leaders of the municipal governments across Iceland. Now, the team plans to expand the initiative to Paris and Lviv, Ukraine.
[Photo: Ramp Up Reykjavík]
An age-old accessibility problem
Creating accessibility in any urban environment is often met with logistical and bureaucratic challenges. But in cities with historic buildings that predate modern accessibility standards by decades or even centuries, those challenges are even further amplified. In downtown Reykjavík, most buildings date back to the 18th century with storefronts that sit slightly elevated above street level, making one or two steps a recurring access barrier across most of the citys core business district. And this isnt just an Icelandic issue. In a recent study, 70% of disabled people surveyed said theyve shown up to a building only to realize they couldnt get inside. More than half of them (60%) reported that they had to leave without completing their task because the building wasnt accessible. This study was conducted in the United States, where we have the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), a law intended to protect the rights of disabled people and ensure accessible infrastructure.
Yet, even with the ADA, there are still massive access inequities in our urban environments. Buildings, sidewalks, and transportation systems often remain out of compliance or are poorly maintained, and legal protections such as the ADA arent universal. In many older cities around the world, accessibility standards are inconsistent, and the push to retrofit historic areas is often delayed or deprioritized in favor of architectural preservation.
Thorleifssons work is beginning to change this. The goal of Ramp Up Reykjavík was to install 100 ramps within a year; the project finished it in half the time and under budget. Following the success of the trial project, Thorleifsson expanded the initiative to cities across Iceland, with a new target goal of building 1,000 ramps in five years. They ended up building more than 1,700 ramps and again came in under budget.
[Photo: Ramp Up Reykjavík]
Building a better ramp
Each ramp is built for the location, and is integrated into the environment with designers working with the city and municipalities to try and match existing materials when possible. In many cases, passersby wouldnt even notice modifications to the historic buildings because the ramps are intentional design choices built into the urban environment. The role of a designer is to make something simple and beautiful to use, for as many people as possible,” says Thorleifsson. “So when I look at how some things are made, I can’t help but wonder how easy it would have been, with small tweaks, to make it usable by more people without losing any of the beauty.
The biggest challenge in the beginning was making people believe that this was possible, Thorleifsson says. “These problems have been discussed for decades, often with very little progress. So the approach was really to give people no excuses. We fund, design, build, and get all the permits; it’s all free for the shop owner or the person who owns the building. Once people start seeing success, where before there was none, all the arguments go away and doors open.
Thorleifsson initially funded the project with dividends made through the sale of his digital design agency Ueno to Twitter in 2021. He joined the company as a senior director of product design but was abruptly terminated in 2022 along with some 200 others when Elon Musk took over Twitterwhich led to a Twitter exchange with Musk that made international headlines.
The sale of Thorleifssons company helped get the Ramp Up Reykjavík initiative off the ground, but the project has been a collaborative venture between Thorleifsson and local businesses, government agencies, and city officials. I had some money, and I was able to quickly raise more. Once the snowball was rolling, everyone jumped on board very quickly, he says.
Now he is looking to make quick improvements at the international level. Ukraine has a lot of peope coming back from the war that need access. So the urgency is there, Thorleifsson explains of where the initiative will head next. I’m not a very patient person. I don’t think there is any excuse to move slowly on fixing a human rights issue. So I sometimes have to push hard for change to happen.
When asked what lessons hes learned that other cities should consider when trying to improve accessibility, Thorleifsson says, It’s easy. It’s cheap. There’s no excuse. Just do it. We can help. Call me.
While Teslas stock has seen a sharp decline in recent weeks, Elon Musk has quietly been working to expand his influence in a different area of tech: AI supercomputing. Recent reports have revealed that Musks AI startup, xAI, has been quietly building a new data center in Atlanta. The facility will house around 12,000 Nvidia graphics processing units (GPUs), crucial chips that power AI computation.
While the Atlanta data center is modest compared to Musk’s supercomputer project in Memphis, nicknamed Colossus, which boasts 100,000 GPUs, its construction is part of a broader trend in the tech world that has been advancing largely under the radar.
Last December, Meta announced its plans to build a $10 billion data center in Richland Parish, Louisiana. In February, OpenAI began constructing a facility in Abilene, Texas, while scoping out potential sites in 16 other states, as they seek to invest $500 billion in AI infrastructure over the next four years under the Trump Administrations Stargate project. While megaprojects like Colossus and Stargate have captured national attentionespecially as Musk trumpeted his goal of creating the most powerful AI supercomputer in the worldthis broader wave of data center construction has largely proceeded under the radar, with minimal public oversight, particularly from the communities that will host these centers.
This silent expansion underscores an important issue: We cannot allow Big Tech to have unchecked control over the development of AI infrastructure, especially when there is a lack of transparency and limited public scrutiny.
The problem with unchecked AI expansion is multifaceted. While tech companies promise their data centers will rejuvenate local economies with jobs and tax revenue, it is not entirely clear that the risks outweigh the rewards.
First, the AI industry is an environmental crisis waiting to happen. Data centers typically consume an immense amount of resources, particularly water. Liquid-based cooling systems are essential to prevent overheating in the massive networks of servers that power these centers, and this process requires vast quantities of water. The Colossus project in Memphis alone is estimated to consume one million gallons of water a day, according to public utilities companies in the city.
And its not just Memphiswith an estimated 50% of the worlds population projected to live in water-stressed areas by 2025, the growing demand for water in AI data centers presents a real threat to local communities. In Memphis, activists are already sounding the alarm about the impact on local water supplies, especially in a region with a history of arsenic contamination in drinking water. xAI has reached an agreement with the City of Memphis to build a recycled wastewater facility for the data centers cooling needs, aimed at alleviating some pressure on local water sources.
However, the company has not been transparent with the local community regarding its plans for the facility, which is expected to reduce the strain on the Memphis Sand aquifer by only 9%even as xAI announced plans to expand its supercomputing operation to one million GPUs more than 10 times its current capacity.
The environmental impact extends beyond water usage. The supercomputing industry is highly carbon-intensive. According to a report by Morgan Stanley, data centers worldwide are projected to emit 2.5 billion tons of CO2 by 2030. Many of these data centers are being built in the U.S. South, a region already vulnerable to rising temperatures. The carbon emissions from these projects will only worsen the heat risks in areas that are already hot. The effects of extreme heat are not felt equally.
In Atlanta, for instance, where some neighborhoods were redlined in the 20th century, residents in predominantly Black communitieswho ofte lack access to air-conditioning and shaded green spacesare already disproportionately at risk for heat-related illness and death. The continued expansion of data centers and the heat generated by their carbon emissions will only make these inequities worse. While Musks xAI may tout its role in advancing AI innovation, these environmental tolls cannot be ignored.
Moreover, its not even clear that we need this kind of computing power. Earlier this year, the launch of DeepSeek, a more resource-efficient AI model developed in China, shocked the tech industry. DeepSeeks breakthrough suggested that the future of AI could be far less resource-hungry than what Musk and others are pushing. Since DeepSeeks success, tech giants like Microsoft have canceled data center leases in the U.S., signaling that perhaps the need for supercomputing power is not as pressing as Musks ambitions would have us believe.
This raises the question: Are these massive data centers even necessary, or are they just part of a generative AI hype bubble? And will the communities hosting these data centers be left to foot the bill once the bubble bursts?
Of course, many will argue that the global AI race is too important to let these concerns get in the way. But we cannot allow Silicon Valleys “move fast and break things” mentality to dictate how our cities evolve and how resources are allocated. Urban leaders must step up to demand oversight and accountability in the development of these data centers.
AI is undeniably vital to the future of human progress, but its too important to be left in the hands of unaccountable tech oligarchs. Atlanta, Memphis, and other cities across the country need to assert control over the expansion of data centers and insist on transparent, responsible development.
President Trump says he is eager to make America healthy again and boost economic growth. His success hinges, in large part, on the National Institutes of Health.
Yet the Trump administration recently paused NIH meetings on new grant applications and proposed a cap on NIH funding for overhead costs. In response, research universities are already cutting studies and rescinding doctoral degree offers.
For decades, the NIH has functioned like a giant venture capital firm operating on behalf of the American taxpayer. It makes tens of thousands of small investments in basic scientific research each year thatin the aggregateyield enormous societal returns, even though they often take decades to come to fruition. The government’s own research indicates that for each one-time $1 investment it makes in basic science research, society reaps $0.43 in recurring annual benefits from increased economic activity, improved worker productivity, and better health as a result of new medicines.
Of course, the NIH doesn’tand couldn’tdo it alone. Universities, research hospitals, and the biotech industry all play their part. But it’s the NIH that essentially kickstarts this cycle of innovation.Most of the NIH’s budget goes toward grants that support university labs across the country. Between 2019 and 2023, NIH funding levels for universities, hospitals, and medical research institutions increased 23%. In fiscal 2023, the agency doled out nearly $35 billionabout 73% of its total budgetto almost 59,000 grantees at 2,500 different organizations. The average grant was less than $600,000.In these labs, scientists conduct experiments that sometimes, at first glance, seem to have little practical application. Think of past NIH-funded research featuring cocaine-addicted rats pressing levers or tiny shrimp jogging on underwater treadmills.
These seemingly wasteful experiments have actually informed medical breakthroughs and saved lives. The rat research helped crack open the secrets of dopamine and addiction, paving the way for opioid abuse treatments like buprenorphinea drug proven to decrease overdose deaths by 38%.
Meanwhile, the shrimp cardio workouts weren’t just crustacean CrossFit; they revealed how low oxygen affects muscle endurancewhich yielded insights for treating muscle atrophy and heart disease. What looked like government-funded lunacy to outsiders led to scientific findings that made Americans healthier, proving that curiosityeven the weird kindpays off. But when labs make a research breakthrough, that’s merely the startnot the endof the development process. Universities have neither the resources nor the desire to turn insights into real-world drugs or medical devices. Instead, universities typically license their discoveries to biotech companies, which then spend years and billions of dollars working to turn those initial findings into FDA-approved treatments.
It’s a riskyand enormously expensiveprocess. About nine in 10 experimental medicines fail in clinical trials.
Fortunately, the financial risk of that process mostly falls on private companies and their investors, not on taxpayers. One recent study that examined FDA-approved drugs found that for every dollar the NIH had contributed toward their development, the private sector contributed over $65. But without NIH grants, this entire cycle of innovation would never begin, because private companies could never justify funding extremely early-stage basic research with unclear commercial applications on their own.
That wouldn’t merely harm public healthit’d also send shockwaves through our economy.
In my home state of Illinois, research institutions received around $6 billion in NIH grants from 2019 to 2023. That sort of research yields significant scientific investmentevidenced by the fact that Illinois biotech startups raised nearly double that in venture capital from 2019-2023.
These research and commercialization efforts boost our economy. Illinois’ biotech sector supported over 93,000 jobs spread across nearly 5,000 establishments in 2023. And Chicago recently ranked 10th in the nation for biopharma R&D and third for biopharma manufacturing jobs.
Texas and Ohio, meanwhile, have seen around a 21% and 13% bump in bioscience employment from 2019 to 2023, respectively. In 2023, Texas boasted over 9,200 firms employing about 129,000 employees, while Ohio’s workforce added up to almost 64,000 workers across 4,800 firms.
It’s important for policymakers to ensure that taxpayer dollars are spent judiciously. That’s precisely why the Trump administration would be wise to fully fund and staff the NIH. Significant cuts could impede American biotech breakthroughs, compromise U.S. biotech talent, and gut the nation’s job-creating biotech hubs.
The agency’s grants more than pay for themselves by kickstarting a cycle of innovation that saves American lives and grows the economy.
Celebrity assistants have a demanding job. The role requires being on call outside of normal working hours, working proactively to anticipate the needs of their boss, and protecting their boss’s schedule and privacy. It takes someone who is engaged, professional, and a team playerand searching for the right person to fill the role takes skill.
I might as well be a scientist instead of a recruiter, because I’m putting people under a microscope, says Susan Levine, founder and CEO of Career Group Companies, which has placed assistants with celebrities including Kevin Costner, Maria Shriver, and the Kardashian-Jenners. I need to be a very good listener with the client first and equally a good listener with the candidate. I make sure that everything that the candidate wants fits what the actor wants, and vice versa.
In any profession, there are overarching qualities that help you perform well in your job. The key to a long-lasting hire, however, is focusing on the person behind the skills, says Monique Helstrom, an executive assistant recruiter and former assistant to author and speaker Simon Sinek. Ultimately the relationship is human, she says. Human connection is something you have to search for.
Bonnie Low-Kramen, author of Staff Matters: People-Focused Solutions for the Ultimate New Workplace, says a strong working relationship comes down to chemistry. If an executive or a celebrity is choosing between two candidates, theyre going to choose who they feel theyll be most compatible with, she says.
As a result, hiring can be an exercise in matchmaking. While not every manager is going to be a high-profile individual, hiring managers can learn some tips from celebrity assistant recruiters on how they go about finding the right candidates:
Start with the Boss
An important tool for finding the right person is a well-written job description, says Helstrom. You need to be blunt, she says. I interview the executive quite thoroughly. I also interview people that they know and love. Some pieces will connect to their values, and some pieces will look for slightly opposite skills. I describe both sides thoroughly, so that I can attempt to weed out those that don’t fit the bill.
For example, the manager may value honesty and need someone who is not afraid to speak up. Or the manager may be a high-energy person. Finding someone who has a calmer demeanor could bring better balance to their relationship.
Levine likes to find out what an executives Achilles’ heel is. Like any relationship in life, in order for there to be compatibility and synergy, you need to know what makes someone tick, she says. If they didn’t care for the last assistant they had and are replacing them, what was it about that person that annoyed them?
Find Matching Values
Having a good understanding of the person behind the management role can help guide the interview. Helstrom asks questions that reveal if their values are in alignment. She likes to ask What do you value in a personal and professional experience? And give me some examples of the last time you lived one of those values.
If one of their values is living with integrity, for example, Helstrom wants to hear a story about a time when they didn’t drop the ball, even though there were things against them that could have stopped them from doing their job.
Did they take ownership of the project? she asks. I want to see if the behavior is what the executive wants, but I also look at their body language. Does what they’re saying match how theyre acting?
Assess Their Engagement
Some candidates want a job, and some want this job. To determine how important the role you need to fill is to the candidate, Low-Kramen, who was the personal assistant to actress Olympia Dukakis for 25 years, likes to check if theyve done their homework.
Not just homework, but deep homework, she says. What do they know about the organization, and what do they know about the people involved, even the recruiter. You will be able to tell very quickly if they’ve done their homework or if they ask questions that could have easily been found on Google.
During the interview, Helstrom assesses engagement by making sure the person is prepared. I’ve had people come to the interview and say, What interview is this for? or What job is this for? she says. I ask them Why do you want this job?
Measure Professionalism
Personality is what’s going to get you the job, but you need a high level of professionalism, says Levine. [Your boss] is not going to be your friend over the years; you might develop a relationship, but its a job, she says.
Different roles will measure professionalism in different ways. For a celebrity assistant, confidentiality is an important value. Helstrom says one of her favorite ways to discern the candidates ability to maintain the employers privacy is asking them questions about their former executive.
Ill say, Tell me about your last executive, or Tell me about the worst executive youve ever had, she says. I want to see if they start getting personal. If they dish to me, they’re dishing to other people.
Another way to get insights on someones level of professionalism is by checking references. In addition to talking to previous employers, Low-Kramen looks at candidates social media platforms for clues.
[Posts are] evidence of discretion and what is appropriate to be putting out publicly, she says. I don’t think it’s a big reach that an executive or hiring manager might think, If she or he is presenting themselves like this on social media, that may be what they’ll do with me. Your private life is your private life except when it impacts your professional life. It speaks to their professionalism and dedication to the career. I know of assistants who have not been offered jobs because of what’s on social media.
Finally, Low-Kramen looks for common courtesies that might indicate how someone behaves in a professional setting. For example, does the candidate stand when the intervewer enters the room? Do they look you in the eye? Did they silence their phone? If you meet them for a meal in a restaurant, how do they treat the waitstaff?
All of this shows respect and deference to the situation, she explains. They should make it intentional that the most important person they’re talking with right now is you.
If youre feeling anxious about AI right now, youre not alone. Its reasonable to wonder whether AI will soon be able to do a lot of what we used to think of as human work. As of now, this technology has already shown some degree of promise for all of the following very human psychological skills: diagnosing diseases, writing code, summarizing and teaching information, predicting markets, brainstorming, product design, project management, coaching, and much more.
We probably all know some optimists who think AI will be merely an efficiency tool that gets you 80% there and humans will still be needed for the other 20%. But even in a scenario like that, some current jobs will surely be lost. Im not going to try to predict the future and say what is right. Im just pointing out that there are plenty of reasons why many of us are worried, anxious, or downright afraid of AI taking our jobs at some point.
Psychology has something very valuable to offer here. What this is really about is living with uncertainty.
One good way to live wellperhaps even happilywith uncertainty is to start by understanding what the worry, anxiety, and fear (WAF) are there for. As University of Michigan Professor Ethan Kross explains, emotions are useful sources of information. When it comes to WAF, very often the information is that there is something coming in the future that you cant fully control and you want the outcome to turn out a certain way. In other words, WAF serves a functionto help us try to control the future.
That can be adaptive at times, like when preparing for a major licensing exam. Its a specific goal where you can control the outcome in some important ways. Worrying about whether certain topics will be covered on the exam can help you do some downside planning. Feeling a little anxious on the morning of the exam can help you stay energized and focused. Having some fear about what would happen if you failed to study enough and were embarrassed with the results can motivate you when your motivation lags. All of that helps you try to control the future.
Trying to control the future is not so adaptive when its not meaningfully possible, such as when the future is as uncertain as it is with AI. In this context, downside planning can have no end, the anxiety can be chronic because there is no singular eventlike the examcoming up to apply it to, and the fear of failure can feel unending when any job you might have or prepare for might be taken away by AI.
But the truth is that no one can know what capabilities and impact AI will have in the future. Theres a place for some guessing and downside (or upside) planning with AI, but thats different from the ongoing and repeated fears many have of AI taking their jobs. WAF in this case often leads to a general sense of doom and hopelessness. It no longer serves an adaptive purpose. Instead it holds you backand its unpleasant.
However, the information in the WAF is still useful. The information is often that you seek a greater sense of control over your career success.
What can you do to gain some sense of control and reduce WAF when the future is so uncertain? It all comes down to bringing your focus to what you can control. These three steps can be a great way to do so:
Honor that goal of having a sense of control, and find a better way to get there.
Focus on what you can control, which, in this case, is the present and your use of AI now.
Answer this question: What do I want to do with AI now?
For example, I need to engage in negotiations from time to time. On occasion, I find I am quite cynical about the chances that the other side will play fair or be open to listening. So one way I want to use AI right now is to get guidance from experts on cynicism.
I might not have access to Jamil Zaki, author of Hope for Cynics. But I know that researchers have often found that your beliefs and attitudes make a big difference in how things turn out. So if I wanted to change my cynical attitude about my negotiation, I could ask AI to suggest a few pointers that Zaki would likely recommend to help me to approach a negotiation with hopeful skepticism rather than having already cynically written the other side off.
When you focus on what you want to do with AI now, you do two things that should decrease the WAF feelings. One is that you increase your sense of control, which has been shown to reduce stress and anxiety. The other is that, rather than trying to avoid what you fear, you reorient toward approaching what you desire. So its more about desire and less about WAF.
Shifting your focus to what you want that is within your control now, as pertains to AI, can help you live well with the uncertainty around how AI will affect your job.
Often people try to gain control over a highly uncertain future by dwelling on what the future could hold. But this leads to avoidance and distracting negative WAF feelings. Paradoxically, shifting your focus to the present and to what you want that is within your control now, can be the best way to set your future self up for success. As you get to know the technology you can build a more constructive relationship with it.
Theres a Kraft Heinz commercial running in Canada right now that is a perfect embodiment of the geopolitical moment between the U.S. and its northern neighbor. In it, the brand is celebrating its Canadian workers, and highlighting all the Canadian ingredients in its products like peanut butter, cheese, and Kraft Dinner.
For context, in case you dont read the news: Since the election, President Trump has not only threatened and implemented trade tariffs on Canadian goods, but has added insult to injury by suggesting America’s longtime ally become its 51st state. This has not gone over well in Canada for obvious reasons.
Thats why an American conglomerate like Kraft Heinz feels the need to clarify a few things. Sure, the cream cheese might be called Philadelphia, but ITS MADE IN MONTREAL with CANADIAN DAIRY, WE SWEAR. As a Canadian, it feels to me like the brand equivalent of my American friends turning to me during every commercial break of a hockey game to assure me they dont actually want to annex my country.
Canadian to the core
Of course, its not only American companies creating ads to hype how deep their Canadian connections are. This moment has given Canadian brands a chance to really fly their maple leaf flags to make sure we all know whos really from here.
Thats important because Canadians buy more American-made goods than the U.K., France, Japan, and China combined. Yet a recent KPMG study found that 70% of Canadians would boycott U.S. products if President Trump implemented his 25% tariffs, while 80% are actively seeking non-U.S. alternatives when Canadian options arent available.
The threats and tensions aren’t just theoretical: The Globe & Mail reported this week that cross-border travel is falling sharply: Statistics Canada reported that Canadians made 1.2 million fewer round-trip visits to the U.S. last month, which is 23% less than February 2024. Meanwhile, hotels in Maine are reporting a major drop in summer bookings, some as much as 90%.
Peter Chapman, founder of consulting firm SKUFood and a former executive with Canadian grocery giant Loblaw, told The Canadian Press, Its by far the most dramatic and swiftest shift Ive seen in consumer behavior.
Ian Westworth, Grey Canadas head of planning and effectiveness, wrote in Campaign recently that this shift in consumer behavior presents a significant opportunity for Canadian brands to align with this cultural moment and tap into a groundswell of national pride. This is an opportunity to build not just short-term momentum but also enduring consumer relationships, said Westworth.
Halifax-based Moosehead Breweries is facing tariff impacts across its packaging supply chain, but managed to keep its sense of humor, creating a Presidential Pack of 1,461 beersone beer for every day of the next four years. It’s sold at least 10 of the $3,400 packs so far, and now has a waiting list.
View this post on Instagram A post shared by Moosehead Breweries (@moosehead)
Everyone up here, from the Prime Minister to Mike Myers, has been using the Elbows up mantra (it’s a hockey thing). And now brands from both countries have been forced to reconcile what that actually means for them.
Flying the flag
This isnt the first time a brand has aimed at the under-tapped resource that is Canadian national pride. Back in 2000, Molson Canadian created a spot called The Rant that featured a guy named Joe proudly dispelling what amounts to American stereotypes of Canada.
Cheesy, sure, but it struck a very strong nerve. As loathe as we are to admit it, a sizable proportion of the Canadian identity is tied to all the various ways we arent American. Were often a nation stuck between the influences of a colonial past (Britain and France), and a pop culture present (America). Part of our contemporary identity is finding ways to move beyond this binary. Marvel star, and Toronto native, Simu Liu leaned into our unique brand of multiculturalism when he hosted the 2022 Juno awards (Canadas Grammys) and re-created his own rant: I grew up on ketchup chips, roti, and Jamaican beef patties . . . Thats about as Toronto as you can get.
Like any emphasis on buying local, or touting Made in the USA stateside, brands have long used their connection to Canada as a marketing device here. But this time its different. It feels like all at once, every marketer in Canada is a maple-syrup-swigging, hockey-loving hoser.
Some are doing it by adding phrases like Proudly Canadian or Canadian Made to their labels. Others are creating full ad campaigns. Maple Leaf Foods recently launched a partnership with other Canadian brands urging people to look for the leaf on grocery products.
View this post on Instagram A post shared by Maple Leaf Foods (@mapleleaffoods)
Grocery giant Loblaws has created a black T label to highlight products impacted by the new American tariffs.
Retailer Canadian Tire dropped a spot to reiterate its roots, while using harsh winds as a nod to the current political and economic climate.
The Canadian Forces even has a spot that could weirdly double as a tourism ad, encouraging Canadians to be maple-leaf buying, local adventuring in their spending habits.
Graham Candy, chief strategy officer at Toronto-based ad agency Angry Butterfly, is expecting to see more marketers join the chorus. “We feel like this is just the beginning of what we are going to see out there from a political and marketing comms perspective,” says Candy. “We expect to see bolder messages, more pride, potentially more anger and stronger ‘Us versus Them’ messaging.”
Personally, I’m just waiting for Nestlé to finally announce a brand partnership with Shoresy for its Canadian-made Drumsticks ice cream treat.
Same rules apply
For some marketers, wrapping their brands in the flag may work perfectly well. For others, its a mistake.
In so many ways, the current situation between Canada and the U.S. is unprecedented. But the solution for marketers is actually still rooted in the best practices of a modern brand: know what your core values are and use that as the lens through which you communicate with your audience.
Plenty of brands in Canada will jump on this patriotic bandwagon, but the ones who find success will be those who have built their Canuck credentials over time. Just as brands that decide to aim attention at a particular cultural nichewhether anime fans, surfers, or Swiftiestheir actions need to be true to who they are or else the brand will be called out and, ultimately, unsuccessful in reaching that audience.
American and international companies that have built the strongest brand connections to their Canadian consumers will ultimately weather the tariff storm, and it wont be because of some haphazard flag-waving.
That said, Diageo should probably start re-airing its 2023 Crown Royal Super Bowl ad immediately.
