If a City is going to operate a multimodal transportation system, then it helps to understand the motivations of people who continue to choose personal cars for their short trips.
Bicycle advocates often talk about this in terms of bike trips not taken because of a lack of quality infrastructure. Survey after survey shows that many people opt out of cycling because of gaps in the bike lane network, busy intersections to cross, or other real or perceived pain points. And case study after case study shows that when cities create comfortable and convenient bike infrastructure, more people choose to ride bikes.
Theres a similar issue with public transportation that urbanists seem afraid to talk about: If people feel unsafe using the subway or local bus, theyll find another way to reach their destination.
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The feeling might come from witnessing violence on the subway, from knowing their city has decriminalized shoplifting, or from trying to explain to their kids why a person on the bus is yelling at strangers. If people dont feel safe and secure on public transit, theyre going to do what they can to opt out.
Safe systems
Theres no easy answer to this issue, but it doesnt help anyone to pretend like perceived safety is exaggerated. Or worse, to act like these fears are just part of some kind of suburban conspiracy against city living.
A safe systems approach to transportation involves enforcement, and that makes some urbanists and city planners uncomfortable post-2020. I get ityou dont want the boys in blue dragging someone into a squad car for not paying a $2 fare. But the average American is aware of stories much more disturbing than a teenager hopping a subway turnstile.
According to the U.S. Department of Transportation, transit system homicides increased 50% from 20202024 compared with the previous five-year period (20152019), along with an 80% rise in assaults. In August 2025, Iryna Zarutska was murdered while riding the light rail in Charlotte, North Carolina. Ridership on the light rail and the local bus has been down since.
The thing is, a multimodal transportation system is much safer than one that prioritizes automobile trips at the expense of other modes. But most people dont know that because the news doesnt broadcast the 100+ people who lose their lives in preventable traffic crashes every single day.
Case study
In New York City, 2025 marked a turning point for subway safety. Governor Kathy Hochul announced that subway crime was on track to reach its lowest levels in 16 years (excluding the pandemic era). Accounting for surging ridership, the rate of major crimes per million riders fell to 30% lower than in 2021 and comparable to pre-pandemic lows. Felony assaults dropped sharply in the second half of the year (down 16% from 2024 overall).
MTA rider surveys showed perceived safety climbing dramaticallyfrom 57% of customers feeling safe in January 2025 to a record-high 71% by November 2025. This improved sense of security helped drive post-pandemic ridership records, with subway usage up nearly 8% for the year.
Safer than cars
Public transit remains far safer than the alternative most people default to: driving personal cars. Transit trips are about 10 times safer per passenger-mile than car trips, with far lower rates of traffic fatalities and injuries. Transit-oriented communities also see about one-fifth the per-capita crash risk overall, thanks to reduced vehicle miles traveled and safer speeds.
The sooner we talk openly about the real and perceived issues surrounding public transit, the better. The worst thing to do is downplay the topic out of fear that people might start sharing stories about perceived safety and crime.
Do you want more people to take the bus? Use the subway? Share rides with strangers? Then ask people who drive everywhere about transit trips not taken and take lots of notes.
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If you’re planning to hit up a movie over the long weekend, you’re in luck. Going to the theater will be a bit cheaper for two days, as long as you believe popcorn is a must-have movie accessory.
That’s because Cinemark, in partnership with Lowes, is celebrating National Popcorn Day, which falls on Mon. Jan. 19, with a reprise of last year’s Bring Your Own Bucket (BYOB) event. To celebrate, select Cinemark theaters will let you bring a bucket (any bucket) to fill to the brim on the 18th and 19th for just five bucks. And yes, they really mean any bucket.
Per the announcement, Cinemark says, “Get creative with itany container can be a bucket, including a Lowes 5-gallon blue bucket. And just for bringing in your Lowes bucket, youll get a FREE medium popcorn when you buy any medium fountain drink.” That’s up to 400 ounces of delicious buttery popcorn for a total steal.
According to some social media users, they were able to snag the deal last year without even seeing a movie. One TikTok user, @BanesaSilva, posted a video last year for National Popcorn Day. In it, she brings a massive pot and the theater fills it with popcorn without question. “Let’s go home! Movie night!” she says, joyfully, at the end of the clip.
Other users on TikTok proved that, when you’re asking Cinemark, “bucket” is a highly flexible term. One user showed up with a rolling cooler, which the theater happily filled. Others showed up with large shopping backs and storage containers to hold mounds of the salty snack. Needless to say, when Cinemark says “get creative” with your bucket, they really seem to mean it. So, don’t hold back. Anything can be a bucket with a little imagination (and a big appetite).
Still, bringing a Lowe’s blue 5-gallon might be the ticket to the ultimate reward. Those who do will be exempt from the 400-ounce limit. So, if your appetite (or your family’s) is endless when it comes to popcorn, that may be the most desirable route to go. Plus, customers who bring in the Lowe’s buckets will be gifted popcorn coupons (valid from Feb. 1 to Feb. 26).
Of course, the event wouldn’t be complete without movie-goers sharing their wild and wonderful buckets online for all to see. Therefore, the theater chain is asking everyone to tag @Cinemark in their BYOB posts.
I told myself I wont check emails until I check off my one thing to do for the day. I couldnt do it. I always reach for the phone in the morning. Willpower wasnt enough. The brain is wired to take the path of least resistance. Fighting it every day with willpower wont work. These days I use systems. I work with rituals. I get my most important tasks (MIT) done between 9 a.m. and 12 p.m.
I schedule my MITs the night before. And get straight to work at the scheduled time. Ninety percent of the time at the same place. Ive done it for so long, I do it on autopilot now. My three-hour block means no motivation required. Im not relying on willpower to stay productive. Im depending on a system that nudges me in the right direction. Goals are about the results you want; systems are the processes you actually follow. Your goal might be to write a book. The system is open the laptop at 7 a.m. and write 200 words before you start your other tasks.
Systems make good habits stick.
They take away unnecessary mental decisions. So you can focus on your meaningful tasks. If your schedule or environment is designed to support your habits, you are likely to follow through. For example, you dont wake up and give yourself a motivational speech before you brush your teeth. You dont look for hacks to make it stick. You just do it. Same bathroom. Same sink. Same routine. The system runs you.
No willpower or motivation required.
Your brain hates decisions
Now apply that to the things you struggle with. Writing. Exercising. Saving money. Eating well. Notice the pattern? Those areas usually have no clear or intentional default. They rely on you feeling like it. Thats where things fall apart. Your brain loves defaults. It hates decisions. Every decision costs energy. By noon, youve already burned through most of it deciding what to wear, what to reply, what to ignore, what to worry about. So when you say, Ill think about it later, youre just waiting to borrow energy you wont have.
Designing systems or rituals can be applied to almost anything. From batching similar tasks, blocking distractions on purpose to arranging your workspace in a specific way. Systems dont just help productivity. Want to sleep better? Define your ideal bedtime. Dim the lights, hide the blue light devices. The same principle applied to investing. Automate the transfer the minute it gets to your savings. Want quality connection with the people you love? Pre-schedule time with them. Dont hope youll feel like it. Systems are the invisible things we put in place to take back control of the direction of our lives.
Willpower can only nudge you so far.
If you want lasting change, real work, better life experiences, you need systems. Set them up, tweak or upgrade them, and let them do what they do best: make your life efficient and meaningful. Your future self will thank you. The minute you notice systems at work, you will wonder why you havent been applying them all those years. Its like realizing most of your day isnt driven by motivation at all.
Its driven by defaults.
Starting is everything
Systems dont make you better. They make starting easier. And starting is everything. The people who seem disciplined usually have just engineered fewer points of failure. They dont rely so much on motivation. They depend on structure. Even creativity works with systems. The myth is that structure kills freedom.
In reality, structure creates it.
When you remove distractions and decisions, your mind has space to play. Thats why so many artists swear by boring routines. Same walk. Same workspace design. Same start time. They are protecting their creative space. If you keep failing at something, the problem probably isnt you. Its the setup. Dont blame yourself for not thriving in environments designed to distract, stress, and fragment you. Design better systems to support the habits you want to start.
Put the phone away from sight to do deep work. If your phone sits next to your laptop while you work, you will check it. You cant willpower your way out of a notification. Put it in a drawer. Or disable the notifications. Put the book on the pillow to start a reading habit before bed. Your future self will find it there, a clear next action. Automate the bill. Get the running gear ready the night before. Every time you have to ask yourself, Should I work out now? you give yourself an out. When you have a system, the answer is already Yes. And your environment is designed to support the new habit. If my system fails, I dont get mad at myself. I get curious. What needs adjusting? Are there too many steps? I tweak my structure and try again.
We all respond to cues daily.
Systems put them to work for you. You are more likely to be disciplined if you design better structures for your week, both at work and at home. Design beats willpower. Every time. You dont need more motivation. You need fewer decisions. Want a challenge? Pick one area in your life. Now, design a new system for it so your brain does the hard work automatically. Start tiny. Start ridiculously small. But start.
How can you keep your brain agile and young throughout your life, even as you get older? By spending time on creative pursuits as often as you can. Thats the fascinating finding of a study by researchers from Universidad Adolfo Ibáez in Chile and Trinity College in Ireland, among others.
As the studys authors note, earlier studies have shown a connection between creative activities such as playing a musical instrument and improved brain health. They wanted to know just how creativity affects brain health. So they first recruited more than 1,200 healthy people as controls, and then compared them with 1,467 research participants who spent at least some of their time in creative pursuits. This included dancers, musicians, visual artists, and strategy-based gamers. (Real-time strategy-based games are complex and involve creativity.)
Using EEG readings, they determined each participants brain age gap, the difference between their chronological age and the apparent age of the participants brain. What they found was that creative people across all disciplines had younger brains than their noncreative peers. Dancers had some of the youngest brains compared with their actual ages. This isnt surprising since previous research has consistently shown that strenuous physical activity also slows brain aging. This means that dancing, which is physically strenuous as well as creative, packs a double dose of brain health. Strategic gamers had the smallest brain age gap, though they still saw benefits.
The researchers also discovered that those who were most expert in their respective creative areas saw the greatest brain benefit. And they found that connections within the brain that typically deteriorate with aging were stronger in these creative types.
We tend to treat creativity as a luxury
What does all this mean to you? If your current work involves a lot of creativity, thats good news. Chances are its benefiting your brain and helping you stay mentally young. But whether your work is creative in itself or not, it also means that you should make time in your week for your own creative activities. We tend to treat creativity as a luxury after the real work is done, writes Karen E. Todd, a registered dietitian who writes the Feed Your Brain blog for Psychology Today. Instead, she writes, we should prioritize our creative practices the same way we prioritize sleep, because both are essential for keeping our brains young.
Even 10 minutes of creative activity can make a difference if you do it every day, she writes. And, as the study shows, the more time you spend on it, and the more expert you become, the greater that benefit will be.
So pick up a paintbrush, guitar, camera, or notebook. Dive into a complex creativity-boosting game either online or in real life. Or put on your dancing shoes and sign up for tango lessons. Whatever you choose, make sure its something you enjoy, so that you are happy to make time for it and stick with it. Your brain will be happy you did.
Theres a growing audience of Inc.com readers who receive a daily text from me with a self-care or motivational micro-challenge or tip. Often, they text me back and we wind up in a conversation. (Want to know more? Heres some information about the texts and a special invitation to a two-month free trial.) Many of my subscribers are entrepreneurs or business leaders. They know how important it is for all of us to keep our brains as young as possible throughout our lives. Getting creative can be a fun way to do that. Should you give it a try?
For a long time, I told myself I was choosing stability.
I was working at a prestigious university, doing work that mattered, surrounded by smart people. The role had legitimacy and the paycheck came on the same day, in the same amount, every month. The path forward was clear and the structure well-defined. At that point in my liferaising very young kidsthat predictability felt not just comforting, but necessary. My work mattered, and it held up easily when I described it to others. I could justify why staying made sense.
And yet, I was unhappy.
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Not in a dramatic, crisis-driven way. There was no single bad boss or catastrophic moment that forced my hand. It was quieter than that. A low-grade, persistent sense that I was out of alignment with myself. A feeling that I was expending more energy maintaining the arrangement than the work itself required.
The tricky part was that I already knew what I wanted. I wanted to leave and build my own business full-time. I had started it on the side. I had a growing number of clients and the work energized me. I felt more like myself doing that work than I had in years. Still, I stayed in my academic role far longer than I needed to.
The explanation I gaveover and over againwas the same: I like stability. I didnt want to lose a consistent monthly paycheck. I was being cautious, responsible, and thoughtful.
All of that was true. And also not the whole truth.
What I can see now is that stability was doing a lot of emotional labor for me. It allowed me to avoid naming something harder and more uncomfortable: I was stuck and I was playing it small.
When stability and stuckness look the same
This distinctionbetween choosing stability and being stuckis one I see constantly in my coaching work. And its not an easy one to make, because culturally, we tend to reward staying put. We admire endurance and praise loyalty. And the more together your life looks from the outside, the harder it can be to question whether staying is still serving you.
But psychologically, stability and stuckness can feel almost identical from the inside. Both involve staying. Both involve tolerating discomfort. Both can be justified with perfectly reasonable explanations.
The difference isnt in the external facts of your life. Its in your internal relationship to them.
When youre choosing stability, theres usually a sense of agency underneath it. Even if the situation isnt ideal, the decision feels settled. Youre not constantly renegotiating it in your head. You know why youre there and the trade-offs feel conscious.
When youre stuck, the decision never quite lands. You keep revisiting the same questions without moving forward. You tell yourself stories about why now isnt the right time, but those stories keep changing. Theres often a low-level irritabilitytoward your work, your schedule, often even yourselfthat doesnt resolve with rest or time off.
For me, the clearest signal was how much mental energy I spent justifying staying. If the choice had really been aligned, I wouldnt have needed to keep convincing myself.
What stability was really protecting
Instead, I was always explaining myself. I had a reason for everything. It wasnt practical. It was risky. It wasnt the right moment. Eventually, I realized how much energy I was spending justifying a decision I claimed to feel good about.
Stability does something important for us. It regulates anxiety. Predictable income, clear roles, and familiar routines create a sense of containment that makes the rest of life possible. They reduce the cognitive and emotional load of uncertainty. When youre already carrying a lotchildren, relationships, aging parents, health, a world that feels increasingly fragileit makes sense to protect whats steady. Trust me, I get it.
So when someone says, I value stability, I tend to believe them. I value it too.
But heres the part we often skip over: fear and stability are frequently entangled. And when we dont separate them, stability can quietly become a cover story for fearfear of failing, fear of being exposed, fear of discovering that were not as capable or competent as we hope we are.
In my case, the paycheck wasnt just money. It was proof. Proof that I was legitimate. Proof that I hadnt made a reckless mistake. Proof that I still belonged in a system that knew how to recognize me. Letting go of that wasnt only a financial decision. It was an identity one.
Thats one reason stuckness can persist for so long. It often protects more than our income. It protects our sense of self and our story about who we are. The version of us that other people understand without explanation.
A few ways to tell the difference
This isnt about pressuring yourself to make a big shift. Its about getting more precise.
One thing I pay attention to now is the quality of my reasoning. Does it feel calm and grounded, or repetitive and defensive? Calm reasoning has space in it; defensive reasoning loops and spirals.
I also get specific about what Im actually protecting. When we say were protecting stability, it helps to finish the sentence. Stability of income? Stability of identity? Stability of other peoples expectations? Vagueness tends to keep us stuck.
Time language matters too. Stuckness lives in someday. Someday when things settle down. Someday when I feel more confident. Stability usually comes with a clearer horizon: For the next year, Im choosing this because
And then theres the shift from abstraction to action. You dont have to blow anything up to stop being stuck, but you do have to make something concrete. Run the numbers instead of imagining them. Set a decision deadline. Increase your commitment to the thing you say you want, rather than keeping it safely on the side.
Finally, I listen for where Im outsourcing authority. Am I deferring to a version of being responsible that no longer reflects my actual values or life stage? Am I living by a script I inherited rather than one I consciously chose?
Redefining stability
Leaving academia didnt mean I stopped valuing stability. It meant I redefined it.
Stability, for me now, includes agency and alignment. It includes trusting my ability to build something rather than relying on a single institution to hold me. That version of stability isnt as nea, but its far more honest.
I didnt leap blindly. I planned, I built a runway, I tolerated discomfort. And yes, there was fear. But fear turned out not to be a signal that I was doing something wrong. It was a signal that I was doing something consequential.
You dont owe anyone a dramatic reinvention. But you do owe yourself honesty about whether youre groundedor just standing still.
Clarity rarely comes from thinking harder. It comes from telling yourself the truth more precisely. And in my experience, thats often the first real form of stability.
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Most American presidents aspire to the kind of greatness that prompts future generations to name important things in their honor.Donald Trump isn’t leaving it to future generations.As the first year of his second term wraps up, his Republican administration and allies have put his name on the U.S. Institute of Peace, the Kennedy Center performing arts venue and a new class of battleships.That’s on top of the “Trump Accounts” for tax-deferred investments, the TrumpRx government website soon to offer direct sales of prescription drugs, the “Trump Gold Card” visa that costs at least $1 million and the Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity, a transit corridor included in a deal his administration brokered between Armenia and Azerbaijan.On Friday, he plans to attend a ceremony in Florida where local officials will dedicate a 4-mile (6-kilometer) stretch of road from the airport to his Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach as President Donald J. Trump Boulevard.
Another example of the unorthodoxy of Trump’s career
It’s unprecedented for a sitting president to embrace tributes of that number and scale, especially those proffered by members of his administration. And while past sitting presidents have typically been honored by local officials naming schools and roads after them, it’s exceedingly rare for airports, federal buildings, warships or other government assets to be named for someone still in power.“At no previous time in history have we consistently named things after a president who was still in office,” said Jeffrey Engel, the David Gergen Director of the Center for Presidential History at Southern Methodist University in Dallas. “One might even extend that to say a president who is still alive. Those kind of memorializations are supposed to be just that memorials to the passing hero.”White House spokeswoman Liz Huston said the TrumpRx website linked to the president’s deals to lower the price of some prescription drugs, along with “overdue upgrades of national landmarks, lasting peace deals, and wealth-creation accounts for children are historic initiatives that would not have been possible without President Trump’s bold leadership.”“The Administration’s focus isn’t on smart branding, but delivering on President Trump’s goal of Making America Great Again,” Huston said.The White House pointed out that the nation’s capital was named after President George Washington and the Hoover Dam was named after President Herbert Hoover while each was serving as president.For Trump, it’s a continuation of the way he first etched his place onto the American consciousness, becoming famous as a real estate developer who affixed his name in big gold letters on luxury buildings and hotels, a casino and assorted products like neckties, wine and steaks.
Trump’s for-profit branding has continued
As he ran for president in 2024, the candidate rolled out Trump-branded business ventures for watches, fragrances, Bibles and sneakers including golden high tops priced at $799. After taking office again last year, Trump’s businesses launched a Trump Mobile phone company, with plans to unveil a gold-colored smartphone and a cryptocurrency memecoin named $TRUMP.That’s not to be confused with plans for a physical, government-issued Trump coin that U.S. Treasurer Brandon Beach said the U.S. Mint is planning.Trump has also reportedly told the owners of Washington’s NFL team that he would like his name on the Commanders’ new stadium. The team’s ownership group, which has the naming rights, has not commented on the idea. But a White House spokeswoman in November called the proposed name “beautiful” and said Trump made the rebuilding of the stadium possible.The addition of Trump’s name to the Kennedy Center in December so outraged independent Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont that he introduced legislation this week to ban the naming or renaming of any federal building or land after a sitting president a ban that would retroactively apply to the Kennedy Center and Institute of Peace.“I think he is a narcissist who likes to see his name up there. If he owns a hotel, that’s his business,” Sanders said in an interview. “But he doesn’t own federal buildings.”Sanders likened Trump’s penchant for putting his name on government buildings and more to the actions of authoritarian leaders throughout history.“If the American people want to name buildings after a president who is deceased, that’s fine. That’s what we do,” Sanders said. “But to use federal buildings to enhance your own position very much sounds like the ‘Great Leader’ mentality of North Korea, and that is not something that I think the American people want.”Although some of the naming has been suggested by others, the president has made clear he’s pleased with the tributes.Three months after the announcement of the Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity, a name the White House says was proposed by Armenian officials, the president gushed about it at a White House dinner.“It’s such a beautiful thing, they named it after me. I really appreciate it. It’s actually a big deal,” he told a group of Central Asian leaders.Engel, the presidential historian, said the practice can send a signal to people “that the easiest way to get access and favor from the president is to play to his ego and give him something or name something after him.”
Supporters say the tributes are well-deserved
Some of the proposals for honoring Trump include legislation in Congress from New York Republican Rep. Claudia Tenney that would designate June 14 as “Trump’s Birthday and Flag Day,” placing the president with the likes of Martin Luther King Jr., George Washington and Jesus Christ, whose birthdays are recognized as national holidays.Florida Republican Rep. Greg Steube has introduced legislation that calls for the Washington-area rapid transit system, known as the Metro, to be renamed the “Trump Train.” North Carolina Republican Rep. Addison McDowell has introduced legislation to rename Washington Dulles International Airport as Donald J. Trump International Airport.McDowell said it makes sense to give Dulles a new name since Trump has already announced plans to revamp the airport, which currently is a tribute to former Secretary of State John Foster Dulles.The congressman said he wanted to honor Trump because he feels the president has been a champion for combating the scourge of fentanyl, a personal issue for McDowell after his brother’s overdose death. But he also cited Trump’s efforts to strike peace deals all over the world and called him “one of the most consequential presidents ever.”“I think that’s somebody that deserves to be honored, whether they’re still the president or whether they’re not,” he aid.More efforts are underway in Florida, Trump’s adopted home.Republican state lawmaker Meg Weinberger said she is working on an effort to rename Palm Beach International Airport as Donald J. Trump International Airport, a potential point of confusion with the Dulles effort.The road that the president will see christened Friday is not the first Florida asphalt to herald Trump upon his return to the White House.In the south Florida city of Hialeah, officials in December 2024 renamed a street there as President Donald J. Trump Avenue.Trump, speaking at a Miami business conference the next month, called it a “great honor” and said he loved the mayor for it.“Anybody that names a boulevard after me, I like,” he said.He added a few moments later: “A lot of people come back from Hialeah, they say, ‘They just named a road after you.’ I say, ‘That’s OK.’ It’s a beginning, right? It’s a start.”
Michelle L. Price and will Weissert, Associated Press
Taco Bell is saying new year, new offerings with the launch of its Luxe Value Menu.
From Friday, January 16, the fast food chain will offer 10 items for $3 or less. Initially, only Taco Bell Rewards members can access the new menu using the Taco Bell app or by checking in through the drive thru or in-store kiosk. The Luxe Value Menu will be available to all Taco Bell customers from Thursday, January 22.
However, starting 5 p.m. ET on Tuesday, January 27, Taco Bell will give 30,000 Rewards members a new menu item for just $1. The deal is first come, first served, exclusively through the app.
Whats on the new Taco Bell Luxe Value Menu?
The 10 menu items include five new products, alongside five that were available on the Cravings Value Menu.
Below are Taco Bells new items, as described by the chain:
Mini Taco Salad for $2.49: Seasoned beef, creamy Chipotle Sauce, cheddar cheese, lettuce, tomatoes, and refried beans in a crispy, golden tortilla bowl
Beefy Potato Loaded Griller for $2.49: Seasoned beef, crispy potato bites, nacho cheese sauce, creamy Chipotle Sauce, and reduced-fat sour cream, wrapped up and grilled
Chips & Nacho Supreme Dip for $2.49: Seasoned beef, refried beans, nacho cheese sauce, reduced-fat sour cream, pico de gallo, and a three-cheese blendserved with tortilla chips
Avocado Ranch Chicken Stacker for $2.99: Grilled all-white-meat chicken, Avocado Ranch Sauce, three-cheese blend, lettuce, and tomatoesfolded and grilled
Salted Caramel Churros for $1.99: Churros dusted in salted caramel sugar (available only for a limited time)
The returning Taco Bell items on the Luxe Value Menu are:
Cheesy Roll Up for $1.19
Spicy Potato Soft Taco for $1.29
Cheesy Bean and Rice Burrito for $1.49
3 Cheese Chicken Flatbread Melt for $2.29
Cheesy Double Beef Burrito for $2.79
The Luxe Value Menu was built on one ambition: to defy expectations of what value can be,” Luis Restrepo, North America CMO of Taco Bell, said in a statement. “Through extensive fan testing and bold innovation, we created menu items that deliver an elevated experience at an accessible price point. This isn’t just a menu refresh, it’s a new standard for value at Taco Bell and across the industry.
By the time they get into their 20s, every generation seems to have nostalgia for one year from their teenage years.
For people in my generation (Gen X), that year is usually cited as 1994the final year before the internet really started taking hold. But if a recent trend on TikTok is anything to go by, the year Gen Z is most nostalgic for is 2016.
Heres what you need to know.
‘2026 is the new 2016’
In recent days, TikTok has been flooded with variations of the phrase 2026 is the new 2016.
Along with the phrase, TikTokers are posting throwback pictures to when they were younger, listening to songs popular a decade ago, and reminiscing about how the world just seemed like a more stable and safe place in 2016.
@childhoodcore8 2016 is now officially a decade ago.. #nostalgia #fyp #2016 #edit original sound – Nostalgia
Its unclear exactly why or how this trend gained critical mass in the last few days, but at the start of any new year, it is natural to reflect on past years and compare how we and the world have changed over time.
Nostalgia and the 10-year rule
As a decade ago is both long enough to notice differences yet not so long ago that your memory becomes foggy of the time period, its little wonder why when we nostalgitize the past, we often choose a period that happened 10 years prior.
As for why many may feel nostalgic for 2016, you just have to look at events so far in 2026.
In America, we’re seeing increasing social upheaval and protests across the country, and once again, the U.S. is attacking other countries. Things feel chaotic, and that chaos makes us long for a time when things felt more stable.
For many on TikTok, that time was apparently 2016. As noted by Yahoo Entertainment, for many TikTok users, 2016 felt like the last year before the world shifted. The leader of the free world was predictable and stable, housing prices were more affordable, and AI hadnt yet put a big question mark over the future of peoples job security.
Its self-evident why those things are yearned for now.
The world that was 2016
If your memory is a little foggy about what 2016 was actually like, heres a little reminder.
Googles decade-old Year in Search 2016 roundup showed what people across the world spent their year searching for, which reveals key events from the time.
On the geopolitical front, the 2016 U.S. presidential election between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump was at the top of peoples minds. So were mass shootings in Orlando and Dallas, as well as fears over the Zika Virus outbreak.
Culturally, people were obsessed with a new show called Stranger Things, as well as the shows Westworld, Luke Cage, Game of Thrones, and Black Mirror.
The Rio Olympics and World Series were also on top of peoples minds.
Deadpool, Captain America: Civil War, and Batman v. Superman got people into the theaters, and Celine Dion and Kesha were some of the musicians who generated the most interest.
Meanwhile, 2016 was also the year that people were obsessed with Pokémon Go, and the top tech products of the year included the iPhone 7 and Google Pixel.
The sonic backdrop of the Twin Cities in 2026 is a cacophony.
As thousands of ICE agents raid residential neighborhoods, schools, hospitals, and businesses, theyre trailed by the ambient noise of piercing sirens, whirring helicopters, and screeching whistles at all hours of the day, along with the occasional boom of flashbang grenades and the odd cry for help.
Conspicuously silent in all the commotion, however, are major corporations that are headquartered in Minnesota.
It’s a list that includes some of the most well-known consumer-facing brands in the country, including Target, Best Buy, and Land O’Lakesall of which have an obvious direct stake in the communities that are currently being disrupted by this occupation.
As of Friday morning, not one of them has released an official statement about whats happening.
After an ICE agent killed Renee Nicole Good last week and brought international attention to Minneapolis, escalating tensions have knocked residents out of their normal routines.
A pervasive awareness has sunk inviolent ICE sweeps of residents or their neighbors can happen anywhere, and anyone might get caught up in them just for walking their dog at the wrong moment or not carrying proof of citizenship. One of the consequences is that small businesses are sufferingespecially those owned by immigrants.
Local restaurants are speaking up about the situation.
Minneapoliss Mothership Pizza, for instance, announced its owners are giving 10% of all dinner sales directly to team members affected by ICE, while Owamni by the Sioux Chefwhich the New Yorker dubbed the best new restaurant in the U.S. in 2022donated 10% of its proceeds last weekend to Goods family.
As for the Fortune 500 companies based in Minnesota, well, its anyones guess how those in their C-suites feelor at least prefer to be seen as feelingabout what ICE is doing in the state.
Fast Company reached out multiple times this week to General Mills, Target, Best Buy, Cargill, UnitedHealth Group, 3M, and Land OLakes for comment. None of them responded.
What a difference five yearsand a pivotal electioncan make.
The reckoning of the reckoning
In the summer of 2020, another broad-daylight killing at the hands of a law enforcement officersimilarly captured on videobrought this city international attention.
The murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis police sparked massive protests, and what some at the time prematurely called a racial reckoning. Even Donald Trump, whom many seem to forget was president at the time, briefly acknowledged in a statement, All Americans were rightly sickened and revolted by the brutal death of George Floyd, before turning his ire forever toward the angry mob of protesters.
Meanwhile, all of those major companies mentioned above were sufficiently moved to join the chorus of CEOs who had publicly weighed in on that moment.
Depending on your perspective, they were either unburdening their consciences or paying lip serviceyour mileage may varybut it’s notable that their ranks included Targets then-CEO Brian Cornell, who declared in a statement, “We are a community in pain.
Graveyard of good intentions
The intervening Biden years saw a swift and relentless rightwing backlash against anguished executives promising to do better. Tech CEO Vivek Ramaswamy, for instance, squeezed so much juice out of his staunch opposition to what he termed “woke capitalism” that he briefly became a long-shot 2024 presidential contender.
Conservative media hubs like Fox News and Trump-Lite figures like Governor Ron DeSantis of Florida strongly denounced corporate gestures toward social justice, including Targets Pride merch and Disneys LGBTQ advocacy.
After a flurry of high-profile boycotts, the sprawling corporate conscience of 2020 looked more like a dream blinked away in the harsh light of day.
Many companies had already begun retreating from DEI initiatives and inclusive messaging by 2024; partly for organic reasons, and partly as a result of MAGA influencers orchestrating social media attack campaigns.
The election, however, changed everything.
The Eye of Sauron is watching brands
Conservatives hailed Trumps return to office as the final nail in the coffin of Woke. Mega-companies such as Meta Platforms and Amazon, formerly critical of Trump, made a grand show of shredding their last remaining vestiges of DEI, seemingly part of a broader strategy to ingratiate themselves with the new president and his supportersor, at least, to avoid their wrath.
Nearly a year into Trump 2.0, corporations now understand that speaking up about social issues might bring to bear the full force of the federal government in retaliation.
Before Good was killed, for instance, a local Hilton affiliate declined to house ICE agents booked at the hotel. The Department of Homeland Security responded by posting on X that Hilton had launched a coordinated campaign against the agency, siding with murderers and rapists to deliberately undermine and impede DHS law enforcement.
By the end of the day, the #BoycottHilton hashtag was all over X and the companys shares were down by 2.5%.
The hotel giant quickly clarified that the establishment responsible for canceling the reservations was independently owned, and that Hilton is in fact a welcoming oasis for any government agency conducting violent missions in any U.S. city. (More or less.)
In another era, the company might have ended its ass-covering there. In this one, Hilton went scorched earth. It de-franchised the hotel, lest there be any confusion about whether the brand itself had been taking a stand against ICE, or even permitting a stand to be made on its property.
No brand wants to be a target
If it was unexpected how vehemently Hilton distanced itself from the possibility of having an opinion, other recent brand reactions to government overreach are much less surprising.
Not a peep was heard from Jeff Bezos this week when the FBI raided the home of a reporter at the newspaper he owns. Nor is anyone holding their breath waiting for Mark Zuckerberg to speak out about ICE reportedly abducting workers from a Meta data center in Louisiana this week
As for Minnesota businesses, the most conspicuously silent among them is Target. Its perhaps the company most closely associated with the area, the one whose name adorns local baseball stadium and concert venue Target Field.
And its the company most closely connected to the ICE raids, after agents snatched and injured two employees in the middle of a shiftboth of whom turned out to be U.S. citizens, as caught on a disturbing video.
But Target also might be the company with the most financially at stake. The retailer incurred persistent boycotts in 2025, after rolling back DEI initiatives amidst a changing political landscape. Its share price has only recently begun to recoverit’s up more than 10% in 2026.
Still, the Twin Cities community wants action from the brand. Since the incident last week, residents have protested outside the store where the employees were abducted, demanding a response.
A strong statement at least acknowledging that Minneapolis is, once again, a community in pain, might even help win back disappointed progressive shoppers.
Then again, if Minnesota businesses continue to keep quiet about the ICE invasion, perhaps consumer demand within the state will become silent too.
The Justice Department’s investigation into Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell has brought heightened attention to a key drama that will play out at the central bank in the coming months: Will Powell leave the Fed when his term as chair ends, or will he take the unusual step of remaining a governor?Powell’s term as Fed chair finishes on May 15, but because of the central bank’s complex structure, he has a separate term as one of seven members of its governing board that lasts until January 31, 2028. Historically, nearly all Fed chairs have stepped down from the board when they are no longer chair. But Powell could be the first in nearly 50 years to stay on as a governor.Many Fed-watchers believe that the criminal investigation into Powell’s testimony about cost overruns for Fed building renovations was intended to intimidate him out of taking that step. If Powell stays on the board, it would deny the White House a chance to gain a majority, undercutting the Trump administration’s efforts to seize greater control over what has for decades been an institution largely insulated from day-to-day politics.“I find it very difficult to see Powell leaving before midnight on Jan. 31, 2028,” said David Wilcox, a former top economist at the Fed and senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics. “This is a mortal threat to the governance structure of the Fed as we’ve known it for 90 years. And I think that Powell does take that threat exceedingly seriously, and therefore will believe that it is his solemn duty to continue to occupy his seat on the board of governors.”Powell, 72, was appointed as Fed chair by Trump in 2018, and must step down from the position in May because his second four-year term is ending. He has declined several times to comment on his plans beyond that when asked by reporters. A spokesperson declined to comment for this story.Trump has sought to push out Powell before his time is up, obsessively attacking him for not cutting rates as sharply as the president wants, particularly in light of ongoing concerns about high costs for groceries, utilities, and housing that have remained a salient political issue even as inflation has cooled.On Tuesday, Trump highlighted that mortgage rates have declined in the past year. “If I had the help of the Fed, it would be easier,” he said. “But that jerk will be gone soon.”Or maybe not.Here is a look at the impacts of whether or not Powell stays on the board could have:
What happens if Powell stays on the board
Trump said Tuesday that he hopes to name a new Fed chair in the next few weeks. But that could get held up by the criminal investigation of Powell.Several Republican senators, including at least two on the banking committee who would have to approve Trump’s nominees to the Fed, have expressed skepticism that Powell committed crimes during his testimony last June regarding the Fed’s $2.5 billion renovation of two office buildings, a project that Trump has criticized as excessive. That testimony is the subject of subpoenas sent to the Fed by U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia Jeanine Pirro.Sen. Thom Tillis, a North Carolina Republican, said he would not vote for any Fed nominees until the legal cloud around Powell is resolved. That would be enough to delay a nomination from getting out of the banking committee.If no new chair of the Fed’s board has been confirmed by May 15, then Powell could remain in that post until a replacement has been confirmed. As a result, the Fed might not cut interest rates anywhere near as quickly as Trump wants.If Powell stays on as a governor even after he is no longer chair, Trump could still name someone to lead the Fed but that would give him a total of three appointments on the board including two from his first term and short of a majority.So even if Trump nominates a chair who seeks to do the president’s bidding regarding interest rates, that person “would have very little persuasive power with his colleagues,” said Wilcox, who is also director of research at Bloomberg Economics. Powell, along with other members of the Fed’s 19-member interest-rate setting committee, could outvote the new chair. That hasn’t happened since 1986.
What happens if Powell leaves the board
In that case, Trump could nominate a fourth person to the board and gain a majority. He could even then add a fifth, if the Supreme Court allows his attempt to fire Governor Lisa Cook to proceed. The high court will hear her case on Wednesday.A majority on the board would enable the White House to make sweeping changes to the Fed. Trump’s Treasury Secretary, Scott Bessent, has advocated numerous reforms to reduce the central bank’s influence in the economy and financial markets.Trump’s majority on the Fed’s board could also remove some of the presidents of the 12 regional banks, who are members of the Fed’s rate-setting committee. The New York Fed president has a vote on the committee and four others vote on a rotating basis.Several of those bank presidents have expressed opposition to the deep rate cuts that Trump has demanded. The board of governors could seek to have them fired if a chair wanted to do so.
What past Fed chairs have done
While nearly all Fed chairs have left the board of governors before their terms were up, there is some precedent for Powell to stay. In 1978, then-Chair Arthur Burns stayed on the board for about three weeks after his chairmanship ended. But in 1948, then-Fed chairman Marriner Eccles remained as a governor for three years after finishing as chair, in part because President Harry Truman asked him to remain.In 1951, however, he played a key role in undercutting the Truman administration in a dispute over interest rates, which led to the Fed-Treasury Accord that established the modern Fed as a largely independent institution.Eccles became a symbol of Fed independence, though some academics say that reputation is overstated. The Fed’s principal office building currently under renovation and at the center of the criminal investigation of Powell is named after him.Truman then appointed a Treasury official, William McChesney Martin, to the Fed chairmanship and assumed he would do his bidding. Yet Martin defied Truman and raised interest rates. Years later, Truman ran into Martin in New York City and called him a “traitor.” The Fed’s second office building in Washington is named after Martin.“So it’s a cautionary tale also for Trump, thinking he’s going to get his own Fed chair in there,” said Lev Menand, a law professor at Columbia University who studies the Fed. “Martin didn’t do what Truman wanted.”
Christopher Rugaber, AP Economics Writer
