The chief-executive-to-be at money-losing Japanese automaker Nissan is determined to speed up decision-making to come up with models that say Nissanand really sell.Ivan Espinosa, 46, chief planning officer and a Mexican with two decades of experience at Nissan Motor Corp., told reporters in embargoed comments for Wednesday that the company’s corporate culture is “lacking empathy” and has to change.“We need to work together as one single team,” he said at the Nissan Technical Center in Atsugi city on the outskirts of Tokyo. “We need to work together hand in hand.”Nissan recently appointed Espinosa to take its helm, effective April 1, replacing Makoto Uchida.Espinosa has his work cut out for him as the maker of the Sentra sedan and Infiniti luxury cars faces yet another crisis, which began decades ago when Carlos Ghosn was sent in by French alliance partner Renault to save it from the brink of bankruptcy.Ghosn was arrested by Japanese authorities in 2018 on financial misconduct allegations but jumped bail and is now in Lebanon.Uchida, chief since 2019 when Ghosn’s successor Hiroto Saikawa resigned over a separate money scandal, stepped down after the company projected a loss for the fiscal year through March.Espinosa expressed an openness to partnerships, including with parties outside the auto industry, although he declined to give specifics.Nissan recently ditched talks with Japanese rival Honda Motor Co. to set up a joint holding company. They will continue to cooperate on technology development.Espinosa repeatedly came back to the importance of being nimble. New cars will be developed in 37 months, and offshoot models within 30 months, he said.Auto production, starting with design and culminating in product tests, takes several years. Bringing a product to market in 30 months would be relatively quick for the industry.To showcase its turnaround plans, Nissan showed an array of models rolling out in the next two years for the U.S., Europe, Japan, and other markets, some of them as mockup models.Espinosa and other officials promised a lineup that highlights Nissan’s legacy, like the Leaf electric car, and models that sell in greater volumes. It’s also bringing out various ecological models, like hybrids, plug-ins and electric vehicles, and cutting-edge technology like self-driving cars.When announcing his replacement, Uchida called Espinosa “a car guy.”Espinosa, who drives a Z sportscar, Nissan’s flagship nameplate, said he saw himself as “a car lover.” He loves the stories behind each car, he said, like how it’s developed and becomes loved by customers.Analysts have so far taken a cautious approach to Espinosa’s appointment. As an insider, he takes up where Uchida left off, meaning the verdict is still out.“We view it as unlikely that Nissan would be open to becoming a subsidiary of Honda at this time, at least until the board has time to assess the effectiveness of Espinosa’s strategy, once it is unveiled and put into action,” CreditSights analysts Todd Duvick and Will Lee wrote in a recent commentary.
Yuri Kageyama is on Threads: https://www.threads.net/@yurikageyama
Yuri Kageyama, AP Business Writer
China protested Wednesday after the U.S. added dozens of companies to its export control list, including more than 50 based in China that it says sought advanced knowhow in supercomputing, artificial intelligence and quantum technology for military purposes.Companies from Taiwan, Iran, Pakistan, South Africa and United Arab Emirates also were included in the roughly 80 companies added to the “entity list” of the Commerce Department’s Bureau of Industry and Security.Six are subsidiaries of the Inspur Group, China’s leading cloud computing and big data service provider. It was listed in the U.S. government’s entity list in 2023.The update also includes the Beijing Academy of Artificial Intelligence, which objected vehemently.“We are shocked that a private non-profit scientific research institution has been added to the entity list. We strongly oppose this wrong decision without any factual basis and ask the relevant U.S. departments to withdraw it,” the research institute said in a statement.A review committee said the BAAI and another company, the Beijing Innovation Wisdom Technology Co. were judged to have developed large AI models and advanced computer chips for military purposes.China’s Foreign Ministry also lashed back, saying the entity list and other export controls were an abuse meant to “unjustly suppress Chinese enterprises.”“It seriously violates international law and basic norms of international relations, severely damages the legitimate rights and interests of enterprises, and undermines the security and stability of global supply chains. China firmly opposes and strongly condemns this,” ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun said at a routine news briefing Wednesday.The aim is to restrict China’s capacity to acquire and develop ultra fast, or “exascale” supercomputers, to develop hypersonic weapons and other sensitive technologies, the bureau said in a notice on its website. It also is intended to prevent South Africa’s Test Flying Academy from using U.S. goods to train Chinese troops, disrupt Iran’s access to unmanned aerial vehicles and other military items and hinder development of insecure nuclear and ballistic missile programs, it said.The companies on the list are subject to the “foreign direct product rule” of the BIS which allows it to control reexports and transfers of foreign-made products containing technology that the U.S. government deems vital for national security.The tightening of controls comes as the Trump administration prepares for another round of tariff hikes due next week, an escalation of the trade war that President Donald Trump launched during his first term in office.Trump has already raised tariffs on imports of Chinese goods to 20%. On Monday he said he would impose a 25% tariff on all imports from any country that buys oil or gas from Venezuela. China buys a large share of the oil exported by Venezuela.China has retaliated with its own countermeasures, including sweeping new duties on a variety of American goods and an anti-monopoly investigation into Google.It also has moved to tighten its own sanctions regime, meanwhile, with a law enabling it to freeze assets of companies subject to Chinese sanctions.
Elaine Kurtenbach, AP Business Writer
Before the advent of GPS, especially at sea, navigation meant finding your position by looking up at the stars. Today, when the Global Positioning System isn’t workingor gets jammed by electronic warfaredrones are learning to do something similar, orienting themselves by looking down at the Earth instead.
This concept underpins a growing wave of efforts to use cameras, sensors, and AI to keep drones aware of their surroundings, allowing them to complete their missions or pursue their targets without the use of GPS, or even any communication signal. This week satellite giant Maxar entered the fray with Raptor, a suite of software that can determine a drone’s position on the planet by matching its camera feed with the companys giant collection of 3D Earth data.
The system began taking shape about a year ago, says Peter Wilczynski, chief product officer at Maxar Intelligence. By then, he says, it reached a fever pitch of people in defense realizing that all of a sudden, all of these systems that had been designed with GPS would not work in a modern battle space.”
An array of technologies for autonomous navigation and alternative positioning have emerged in recent years, driven by the rise of cheaper and more powerful drones, cameras, sensors, and chips. But even as other companies have tapped 2D and 3D imagery for GPS-free navigation, they werent leveraging the abundance of satellite data that Maxar had.
“As one of the leaders in this kind of 3D mapping, especially globally, you can either wait for customers to do that development or you can do it yourself,” says Wilczynski.
Compared to the basemaps used by other vision-based positioning systems, Wilczynski says Raptors 3D foundation offers advantages particularly at low altitudes, and during nighttime operations, especially with infrared cameras, and in complex terrain, with an accuracy of around three meters. Maxars 3D globe, totaling 125 petabytes in size, now covers 90-million-plus square kilometers, with about three million square kilometers added every month.
The imagery comes from Maxars space unit, which operates a constellation of 10 earth observation satellites that provide imagery to defense and intelligence, government, and industry customers. Last year, it added WorldView Legion, a fleet of six high-performing satellites that expanded its ability to more quickly revisit the most rapidly changing areas on Earth.
[Photo: Maxar]
Acquired in 2022 by private equity firm Advent International for $6.2 billion, the company is a giant in a fast-growing commercial satellite industry, which has been propelled by cheaper flights to low earth orbit on SpaceX rockets, as well as a surge in interest following Russias invasion of Ukraine. Some of the earliest public reporting of the Russian military buildup along its border in 2022 came from nonclassified Maxar imagery, and its satellites have provided key intelligence for the countrys offensive and defensive operations.
The importance of that imagery became even clearer earlier this month, when the Trump administration temporarily suspended Ukraines access to the Defense Dept.-funded, Maxar-run cloud platform that U.S. agencies and allies use to task satellites and access images. The suspension cut off free imagery access to Ukraine, though it did not apply to paid access to Maxar’s imagery within Ukraine and did not impact the provision of imagery to U.S. allies including France and the U.K.
The war “emphasized the criticality of these technologies,” says Wilczynski, “and especially as Europe starts rearming and starts to think about what does a European continental defense system look like, it really does push a lot of those countries to think much more seriously about space-based reconnaissance technology.”
As satellites criss-cross the Earth far above Ukraine, drones have filled its skies, along with the electronic attacks intended to disable their navigation or communication systems. Some Russian counter-satellite systems have been so powerful that they have degraded the encrypted “M-Code signals” used by the U.S.’s constellation of GPS satellites. To survive the jamming and spoofing, Russian and Ukrainian military units have taken to flying drones attached to their controllers by miles-long fiber-optic cables, controlling them by wire rather than over the airwaves.
Defense officials around the globe are taking notice. The U.S. has put an emphasis on unmanned and autonomous systems, especially fleets and swarms of attritable drones, designed for one-way trips. Ret. Army General Mark Milley, former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has said that within the next 10 to 15 years, up to a third of the U.S. military could consist of robotic systems. (U.S. policy still requires a human to pull the trigger.)
[Photo: Maxar]
Maxars GPS-free positioning system is designed to work with existing front-facing drone cameras and on-board inertial navigation units. Performing the real-time image matching on the fly necessitates a GPU, either installed on a computer at a ground station or embedded in the drone itself, which would allow it to operate offline.
In addition to helping provide positioning for vehicles, remote operators working alongside drone controllers can use the software on commercial laptops to extract real-time target ground coordinates from the drones’ full-motion aeril video feeds. As with Maxar’s imagery data, the system is designed to integrate with workflows in map-based command and control systems, including software from Esri, Palantir, Lattice, and SitaWare.
Raptor represents a larger shift for Maxar, from 2D to 3D mapping, and a new business strategy that expands beyond overhead imagery and data. Wilczynski declined to name any Raptor customers, but said the company has already begun conducting operational tests with drone manufacturers in conflict areas, and plans to work with defense primes in Europe and the U.S. to upgrade existing non-GPS resilient technologies.
You can upgrade the existing technology in situ without having to do a whole hardware refresh, he says.
A push for autonomy without GPS (or maps)
In Ukraine, where the domestic drone industry could produce three million drones this year, autonomy has become a major focus. Government officials have said that more autonomous drones with AI targeting will arrive on the battlefield this year, potentially making way for real drone swarm uses.
American startups are also developing software and sensors to help drones fly autonomously, without communication or GPS signals, and find and attack ground targets and other drones. U.S. defense tech hotshot Anduril recently debuted an autonomous drone it tested in Ukraine, while drone maker Red Cat announced a partnership with Palantir to integrate visual navigation software into its Black Widow drones. YCombinator startup Theseus builds a small sensor unit for GPS-denied navigation that has attracted the interest of Special Operations Command.
Four U.S. autonomy specialistsCX2, Swan, Auterion, and KEF Roboticsare also working with Ukrainian drone makers to develop their systems, with endorsement from the Pentagon. Earlier this month, Pittsburgh-based Swan and Arlington, Va.-based Auterion were chosen to compete in a Defense Innovation Unit project called Artemis, in which they will partner with Ukrainian attack-drone makers to develop prototype units that can fly in GPS-denied skies by the end of fiscal year 2025.
Another Pittsburgh startup, KEF Robotics, has formed a joint venture with Kiev-based augmented reality company Sensorama Lab to build its autonomous-navigation systems for drones. The new venture, Blue Arrow, has already won a $50,000 award in a DIU hackathon, and is now preparing to test its plug-and-play software and hardware on the front lines in Ukraine.
Blue Arrow takes two appraoches to navigating and finding targets in GPS-denied environments. Terrain Relative Navigation (TRN), like Maxars Raptor, matches ground features with onboard maps, using machine learning to correct for outdated mapping data. Another approach, ideal for shorter distances, called visual inertial odometry (VIO), works without maps: instead, the system relies on the drone’s inertial data and computer vision techniques like optical flow estimation and simultaneous localization and mapping.
We’ve constrained our algorithms and our software to a point where it doesn’t even need a full processor, so we can use just a very small part of the brain of an airplane,” says Olga Pogoda, a co-founder of Blue Arrow.
Researchers are developing more outlandish ways of giving drones geospatial awareness. Last year, NILEQ, a subsidiary of British missile-maker MBDA, introduced a low-power visual navigation system that relies on neuromorphic cameras, which, rather than processing a whole image, can operate more efficiently by measuring the differences between pixels in a moving image.
The stars can still be useful, too. Last year, engineers at the University of South Australia demonstrated a new, low-cost prototype system that merges vision-based algorithmic computing with celestial triangulation for UAVs flying at night. Accuracy remains a challenge.
Maxar is now developing methods to use 2D satellite imagery and drone video to more quickly update its 3D reference map, enabling more up-to-date mapping, especially in areas of rapid change. Improving accuracy is also a priority, especially at lower altitudes; eventually, Raptor could help replace GPS for ground-based autonomous vehicles, too.
Beyond positioning and navigation, Raptor represents a broader vision at Maxar for a shared, dynamic “living globe,” says Wilczynski, one capable of connecting disparate systems and sensor data in near real-time. That project has been in the works since at least 2015, when Maxar predecessor DigitalGlobe entered into a joint venture with defense manufacturer Saab to produce photorealistic 3D digital elevation models for enterprise and government use. In 2020, Maxar acquired Saabs stake in that company, Vricon, and it began developing Raptor last year, after it hired Wilczynski, a former executive at data fusion giant Palantir.
“This general GPS-denied problem space really gave us a natural way to fuse together 2D data from drones, 2D data from satellites into a 3D world,” says Wilczynski.
Among its biggest customers for the 3D Earth data is the U.S. Army, which pays Maxar to power its One World Terrain (OWT) program, a global simulation environment for use in military training. The company won the $95 million OWT contract in June 2019, with its most recent extension awarded last year.
“We have this belief that mapping over he next 10 years is going to shift from predominantly 2D to predominantly 3D, he says.
Featuring Gene Eidelman, Cofounder, Azure Printed Homes; Kate McLeod, Cofounder and Formulator, Kate McLeod and Nicole Richards, CEO, Allonnia. Moderated by Rebecca Barker, Editorial Event Producer, Fast Company.
It’s not enough for companies to declare their commitment to the environment. As the federal government rolls back environmental programs and policies at a head-spinning pace, businesses are on their own to maintain momentum in the push toward sustainability. Hear from leaders who are spearheading climate-positive practices by tackling forever chemicals, reimagining what’s possible with recycled plastic and packaging, and more.
As Americans struggle under backbreaking rental prices, builders are turning to innovative ways to churn out more housing, from 3D printing to assembling homes in an indoor factory to using hempyes, the marijuana cousinto make building blocks for walls.It’s a response to the country’s shortfall of millions of homes that has led to skyrocketing prices, plunging millions into poverty.“There’s not enough homes to purchase and there’s not enough places to rent. Period,” said Adrianne Todman, the acting secretary of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development under former President Joe Biden.One way to quickly build more is embrace these types of innovations, Todman said. “I can only imagine what our housing situation would be like now if we could have made a decision to be more aggressive in adopting this type of housing.”So what are these new ways of building homes? And can they help reduce the cost of new housing, leading to lower rents?
Factory-built housing put together in a week
In a cavernous, metal hall, Eric Schaefer stood in front of a long row of modular homes that moved through the plant, similar to a car on an assembly line.At a series of stations, workers lay flooring, erected framing, added roofs and screwed on drywall. Everything from electrical wiring to plumbing to kitchen countertops were in place before the homes were shrink-wrapped and ready to be shipped.The business in the Colorado Rocky Mountains, Fading West, has pumped out more than 500 homes in its just over three years of operation, each taking just five to seven days to build, even in the coldest winter months, Schaefer said.Once assembled in the plant, the narrow townhouse-style homes with white trim, balconies and front porches, are about 90% done. At their final destination they are move-in ready within six weeks, Schaefer said.The company works with towns, counties and housing nonprofits to help address the shortage of affordable homes, mostly for workers who’ve been squeezed out by sky-high prices in ritzy mountain towns.That includes Eagle, Colorado, not far from the Vail ski resort, where Fading West worked with Habitat for Humanity to install modular homes at affordable rents for teachers and other school district employees. The homes tend to be on the smaller side, but can be multifamily or single family.“You can build faster. The faster you buildeven at a high qualitymeans the lower the price,” Schaefer said. “We see this as one of the pieces to the puzzle in helping solve the affordable housing crisis.”There’s a hefty upfront cost to build the factory, and part of the challenge is a lack of state and federal investment, he said. A patchwork of building codes governing how a structure can be built also makes it difficult, requiring changes to the construction depending on the town or county it is being sent to.Manufactured housing is similar to modular housing, but the units are constructed on a chassislike a trailerand they aren’t subject to the same local building codes. That’s part of the reason they are used more broadly across the U.S.Roughly 100,000 manufactured homes were shipped to states in 2024, up from some 60,000 a decade earlier, according to Census Bureau data. Estimates of modular homes built annually often put them below 20,000.
3D printing is innovative but still ‘a long game’
Yes, there’s technology to 3D print homes.A computer-controlled robotic arm equipped with a hose and nozzle moves back and forth, oozing lines of concrete, one on top of the other, as it builds up the wall of a home. It can go relatively quickly and form curved walls unlike concrete blocks.Grant Hamel, CEO and co-founder of VeroTouch, stood inside one of the homes his company built, the wall behind him made out of rolling layers of concrete, distinct to a 3D printer. The technology could eventually reduce labor costs and the time it takes to build an abode, but is farther off than manufactured or modular methods from making a dent in the housing crisis.It’s “a long game, to start chipping away at those prices at every step of the construction process,” Hamel said.The 3D printers are expensive, and so are the engineers and other skilled employees needed to run them, said Ali Memari, director of the Pennsylvania Housing Research Center, whose work has partly focused on 3D printing. It’s also not recognized by international building codes, which puts up more red tape.The technology is also generally restricted to single-story structures, unless traditional building methods are used as well, Memari saidIt’s “a technology at its beginning, it has room to grow, especially when it is recognized in code,” Memari said. “The challenges that I mentioned exist, and they have to be addressed by the research community.”
A hemp-and-lime mixture called hempcrete has ‘a bright future’
Hempthe plant related to marijuanais being used more and more in the construction of walls.The hemp is mixed with other materials, most importantly the mineral lime, forming “hempcrete,” a natural insulation that’s mold- and fire-resistant and can act as outer wall, insulation and inner wall.Hempcrete still requires wood studs to frame the walls, but it replaces three wall-building components with just one, said Memari, also a professor at Penn State University’s Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering. Memari is now helping oversee research into making hempcrete that doesn’t need the wood studs.As much as a million hemp plants to be used for hempcrete can grow on one acre in a matter of months as opposed to trees, which can take years or decades to grow.The plant is part of the cannabis family but has far less of the psychoactive component, THC, found in marijuana. In 2018, Congress legalized the production of certain types of hemp. Last year, the International Code Council, which develops international building codes used by all 50 states, adopted hempcrete as an insulation.Confusion over the legality of growing hemp and the price tag of the machine required to process the plant, called a decorticator, are barriers to hempcrete becoming more widespread in housing construction, Memari said.Still, he said, “hempcrete has a bright future.”
Associated Press video journalist Thomas Peipert contributed to this report from Buena Vista, Colorado.
Bedayn is a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.
Jesse Bedayn, Associated Press/Report for America
After years of struggling with the complexities of a merger that saw the combination of two major discount retailers a decade ago, Dollar Tree has decided to cut ties with Family Dollar.
The company has announced an agreement to divest its Family Dollar business to private equity firms Brigade Capital Management and Macellum Capital Management for $1 billion, a strategic move that aims to streamline operations and enhance focus on its core Dollar Tree segment.
Following the announcement, Dollar Tree’s shares surged nearly 7% in premarket trading on Wednesday.
The deal is part of the companys ongoing efforts to improve performance, with CEO Rick Dreiling emphasizing that the divestiture “enables us to better allocate capital and resources to support our long-term growth strategy.”
The transaction is expected to be completed later this year.
Writing on the wall
The 2015 merger of Dollar Tree and Family Dollar, initially viewed as a strategic move to expand market reach, ultimately highlighted the complexities of integrating large retail operations. The decision to divest Family Dollar reflects a reassessment of strategic priorities and a focus on core business operations.
During Q4 of fiscal 2023, the company announced that it had initiated a “comprehensive store portfolio optimization review.” This review focused on, among other things, identifying underperforming stores for closure.
Following Dollar Trees Q1 results for 2024, there were hints that the company might spin off Family Dollar to focus on its core business after it announced it would close about 600 Family Dollar stores in the first half of fiscal year 2024 and 370 more over a period of a few years as their lease terms expire.
Dollar Tree said in its earnings report on Wednesday that it closed 695 stores in fiscal 2024 as part of its review.
Dollar Tree has not yet responded to Fast Company‘s inquiry regarding whether additional store closures are now anticipated.
A new chapter
With Brigade and Macellum’s backing, Family Dollar is poised for future success, according to Mike Creedon, CEO of Dollar Tree, as the discount retailer transitions into a new phase of growth.
Under the experienced, dynamic leadership of Family Dollar President Jason Nordin, and with the financial support of Brigade and Macellum, Family Dollar will be well-positioned for growth as a private company, said Creedon in a statement. With the support of a dedicated team, Family Dollar will be able to strengthen its commitment to providing affordable and essential goods to customers so they can do more with less.
Fast Company also reached out to Brigade Capital Management to ask if it planned to make any additional reductions to Family Dollar’s physical footprint
The deadline to file your taxes is less than a month away, and if you’re doing them for the first time, you might be feeling added pressure.“It’s an incredibly daunting and stressful experience for many of them,” said Miklos Ringbauer, a certified public accountant based California.Planning ahead, doing your research and talking with experts can help first-time filers feel better about their taxes, Ringbauer said.The deadline to file your 2024 taxes is April 15. If you run out of time, you can file for an extension until Oct. 15. The extension is only to file your taxes, not to pay them. If you think you will owe taxes, you should pay an estimated amount before the deadline to avoid paying penalties and interest. If you expect to receive a refund, you will still get your money when you file your taxes.Here are some expert recommendations if you are filing taxes for the first time:
Gather your documents
The first step is to gather all the relevant documentation, said Eva Simpson, vice president of Member Value, Tax & Advisory Services for the American Institute of CPAs.“Tracking down documentation is key, especially if they may be in college and have correspondence sent to their parents house,” Simpson said.Ringbauer also recommends that you make a folder, either physical or electronic, with all of the documents you need so it’s easier to file your taxes.While the required documents might depend on your individual case, here is a general list of what everyone needs: Social Security number W-2 forms, if you are employed 1099-G, if you are unemployed 1099 forms, if you are self-employed Savings and investment records Any eligible deduction, such as educational expenses, medical bills, charitable donations, etc. Tax credits, such as child tax credit, retirement savings contributions credit, etc.
Talk to your parents
Many young adults are still receiving some financial help from their parents when they’re ready to file their taxes for the first time. It’s important that first-time filers communicate with their parents in case they are being claimed as dependents, Simpson said.“Being claimed as a dependent affects their standard deduction and eligibility for certain credits,” said Simpson.Having a conversation with your parents will prevent you from claiming tax credits that you might not qualify for if they claim you as a dependent. If your parents claim you as a dependent, you will add this information to your tax return.
Know about tax credits and deductions
Knowing if you are eligible for any tax credits and deductions is a crucial step when filing your taxes, Simpson said. Tax credits can lower the amount of taxes you owe or increase the amount of your refund. Some relevant tax credits for first-time filers include the American Opportunity tax credit and the Earned Income credit.When it comes to deductions, you can either opt for a standard deduction or itemize. Itemizing generally only makes sense if your itemized deductions add up to more than the current standard deduction of $14,600 for a single filer and $29,200 for a married couple.“In many cases, first-time filers won’t need to be itemizing their expenses,” said Simpson.Doing research or asking a professional for the types of deductions and tax credits you qualify for can save you money.
Include investments and gig economy income
If you freelance, work in rideshare or sell your clothes online in addition to your part- or full-time job, you must add this income to your tax returns, said Tim McGrath, a certified financial planner based in Chicago.Forgetting to add tax income from freelance work in your tax documents is a common mistake by young filers, Ringbauer said.Some gig workers receive 1099 forms from their employers while others don’t, but both must document their income and expenses so they can be added to their tax returns.
Know the resources available
Simpson recommends that first-time filers look into the multiple resources available to file taxes for free or at a low cost. One of the is the new Direct File program, which allows people in 25 states who have very simple W-2s to calculate and submit their returns directly to the IRS for free.Aside from Direct File, IRS offers free guided tax preparation that does the math for you. This is available for people who make $79,000 or less per year. If you have questions while working on your tax forms, the IRS also offers an interactive tax assistant tool that can provide answers based on your information.The AARP also offers a tax-aid locator where you can search for tax assistance near you.
Double check to avoid mistakes
Mistakes can happen to everybody, but deliberately ignoring income can have more consequences, Ringbauer said. In general, if you make a mistake our you’re missing something in your tax return, the IRS will audit you, which means they will ask you for more documentation.A common mistake is failing to declare a source of income such as gig work or selling products online, said Ringbauer. This, he said, should be taken very seriously.“One of the biggest challenges is not taking it seriously, not caring about the nuances,” Ringbauer said. “It has to be accurate and exact information whether you self prepare or you’re doing it with a professional, because life is exact.”If you need to correct an error in a tax return you already filed, you can file an amended return.
Keep your records
It’s always good practice to keep a record of your tax returns, just in case the IRS audits you for an item you reported years ago, Ringbauer said. The IRS recommends that you keep your documents for at least three years and up to seven depending on your situation.Ringbauer recommends that his clients keep records of their tax documents in a digital folder on a cloud platform of their choosing. Password-protecting your tax folders can also add an extra layer of protection against scammers.
The Associated Press receives support from Charles Schwab Foundation for educational and explanatory reporting to improve financial literacy. The independent foundation is separate from Charles Schwab and Co. Inc. The AP is solely responsible for its journalism.
Adriana Morga, Associated Press
Wind-driven wildfires that were among South Korea’s worst ever have ravaged the country’s southern regions, killing 24 people, destroying more than 200 structures, and forcing 27,000 residents to evacuate, officials said Wednesday.The death toll included a pilot who died after a helicopter crashed during efforts to contain a blaze in the southeastern town of Uiseong, one of the hardest-hit areas. The aircraft had no other crew members. Police said that most of the dead are those in their 60s and 70s.The National Fire Agency said at least 26 people sustained varying degrees of injuries.An ancient Buddhist temple, houses, factories, and vehicles were destroyed in the wildfires that have burned 43,330 acres (17,535 hectares), the government’s emergency response center said.In a televised address, South Korea’s acting President Han Duck-soo said the wildfires that began last Friday were worse than many previous ones.“Damages are snowballing,” Han said. “There are concerns that we’ll have wildfire damages that we’ve never experienced, so we have to concentrate all our capabilities to put out the wildfires in the rest of this week.”Han said crews struggled to extinguish the wildfires because strong winds swept the areas overnight. He also said about 4,650 firefighters, soldiers, and other personnel were working Wednesday with the help of about 130 helicopters, adding that “a small amount” of 5-10 millimeters (0.1-0.3 inches) of rain was expected Thursday.As of Wednesday evening, firefighters were tackling at least four active wildfires, including in the southeastern coastal town of Yeongdeok, which alerted residents of the nearest village to evacuate to an indoor gymnasium.Strong winds and smoke-filled skies forced authorities in the southeastern city of Andong to order evacuations in two villages, including Puncheon, home to the Hahoe folk villagea UNESCO World Heritage Site founded around the 14th15th century. Hikers were advised to leave the scenic Jiri Mountain, one of the country’s largest national parks, as another fire spread closer.Observers say the ongoing wildfires are the third biggest in South Korea’s history in terms of land burned. The largest fires were in Andong, the neighboring counties of Uiseong and Sancheong, and the city of Ulsan.On Tuesday, officials said firefighters had extinguished most of the flames from the largest wildfires in those areas, but wind and dry conditions allowed them to spread again.The blaze in Uiseong destroyed about 20 of the 30 buildings and structures at Gounsa, a temple said to be originally built in the 7th century. Among the burned structures were two state-designated “treasures”a pavilion-shaped building erected overlooking a stream in 1668, and a Joseon dynasty structure built in 1904 to mark the longevity of a king.Meanwhile, the Justice Ministry said it protectively removed 500 inmates from a detention center in Cheongsong, another southern town, but no damages were reported to the facility.The Korea Forest Service said it had raised its wildfire warning to the highest level nationwide, requiring local governments to assign more workers to emergency response, tighten entry restrictions for forests and parks, and recommend that military units withhold live-fire exercises.Among the dead were four firefighters and government workers who died in Sancheong on Saturday after being trapped by fast-moving flames driven by strong winds, according to officials.Government officials suspect human error caused several of the fires, possibly due to the use of fire while clearing overgrown grass in family tombs or sparks from welding work.
Kim Tong-Hyung and Hyung-Jin Kim, Associated Press
Activist and advocate Tarana Burke has spent 30 years raising awareness of sexual violence and working to eradicate it. Burke, who currently serves as the chief vision officer of the nonprofit organization Me Too Movement, coined the phrase “Me Too” in 2006 as a way show young women of color who had experienced sexual violence that they were not alone. The phrase took off as a hashtag on social media in 2017 in the wake of sexual assault allegations against Harvey Weinstein and other high-profile men. Since then, Burke’s organization has partnered with groups including &Rise, Black Women’s Blueprint, and Callisto to support survivors of sexual violence in more than 80 countries.
Burke spoke at the Fast Company Grill at South by Southwest about how advances in generative AI can lead to sexual violence, what the current political climate means for Me Too, and her organizations agenda for the next couple of years.
Earlier this month, former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, who stepped down amid a barrage of sexual harassment allegations, announced that hes running for New York City mayor. We also have a president and members of his cabinet accused of sexual assault. How do you feel about this?
I’m a little angry. I just want us to do better and dream better and think bigger. There’s so many people who say that they care about this issue. The issue of sexual and gender-based violence is really at pandemic levels in this country. There are so many people who are like, I want this to end. What can we do about it? What you can do when things like this happen, is figure out where the line is and hold the line. We keep moving it and pushing it.
You have somebody like Cuomo, a governor who stepped down from his position. A governor who has both a Department of Justice investigation and an investigation by his own Attorney General into the allegations against him. If we actually want these things to stop, if we want to make an impact on the issue of sexual and gender-based violence, we cant say, Maybe we can take him even though I know that happened. Right there, when you say that, that is exactly where the issue dies.
What do you make of men like this being able to make a comeback?
I get asked about the bad actors all the time. When people harm other people, there should be a pathway for the person who caused harm to come back. Sexual violence happens on the spectrum. Accountability should happen on a spectrum. This is not just about throwing people away. What most of us haven’t witnessed is the thing that happens after the harm. Where is the accountability? Where is the person that comes back and says, I understand that this person was harmed and this is what I did to understand that better. This is how I’ve changed. We don’t see that. What we see is people who disappear for a while and then come back.
How should we treat survivors in this situation?
When a woman is just trying to save her own life, we still think about the man whose life is being ruined. That is fundamentally the problem. We have to fix that. We have to shift that so that there’s enough space for us to get what we need. We say “believe survivors” because we want survivors to have the respect and dignity of investigation. If you believe me, you won’t try to undermine me. You won’t ask me questions like, Why were you wearing this? Or what were you doing? You’re going to start from the premise that I’m telling the truth. And if you think somebody’s telling the truth, then you’re going to help them get the resources they need. Sometimes that’s an investigation and that helps everybody involved. If you’re the person being accused or you’re the person who has the accusation, everybody involved should be treated with respect and humanity. It’s not going to always be comfortable though. There’s a misconception that you deserve comfort, that we have to create a life where you’re never uncomfortable.
I just referenced some examples in politics and entertainment. Do you get frustrated that these industries get the bulk of media coverage and attention?
One of the biggest challenges, and probably the saddest part, of the viral moment around Me Too, is that it created so much attention around people who cause harm or people who have been accused of causing harm. I tell people this all the time. You had millions and millions of people around the world who raised their hand to say, This happened to me, too. But you wouldn’t know the hashtag, you wouldn’t know any of that, if it wasn’t for the celebrities and politicians. Then we immediately took our eyes off the survivors. And so it is harmful when the news cycle is only talking about the Me Too movement when some other person has been accused or to tell us that we’re dead again. We created the organization to be a container for the movement because we knew we couldn’t depend on mainstream media or politicians to do that.
Since the height of the Me Too movement in 2017when you were, along with other activists, Time‘s person of the yeardo you think weve seen a true cultural shift?
Sexual violence has a history that goes all the way back to the Bible. There’s no way that a hashtag was going to erase that. I think the leaps and bounds [of progress] that we’ve seen in the last seven years would’ve probably taken 20 years without that viral moment. That said, we still have a ways to go. Those front-page moments never last. But what has lasted is the policies that have been changed, the laws that have been changed, but also the way people think and talk about it. We have given the world language and a way to talk about sexual violence. We’ve given survivors a community. So there has been a cultural shift, but it hasn’t shifted enough. You’re talking about power structures that have existed for so long. Patriarchy is a structure that has existed for so long. So we’ve made a dent in that. Of course, the pendulum is going to try to swing back the other way. We would be foolish not to expect that. The difference is that when it swings back this time, we are coming with a different analysis. Twenty-one-year-olds grew up with the Me Too movement. They’re going into college now with a particular analysis around that. They have less shame about talking about things that have happened to them, and they’re really clear about what they will not allow to happen to them.
What kinds of trends are you seeing in the larger movement to combat sexual and gender-based violence?
Funding for sexual and gender-based violence is at an all-time low. We’ve actually seen in the last five years that several of the foundations that support this work have either closed or have closed their portfolios. That predates this administration. It’s something that has been happening globally. So it is very difficult to fund the work to end sexual and gender-based violence. We talk about this as something that’s not solvable, but this is a solvable issue. I often use the example of [former New York City Mayor] Mike Bloomberg. He decided about 25 years ago that he wanted to make America smoke-free. What he did was he invested more than $20 billion in making us smoke free. Now, if you light a cigarette anywhere, people are like, Oh my God, who’s smoking? Now, yes, people still smoke, but we had multiple interventions because of that investment. We had research that came out talking about secondhand smoke will kill you. We had legal interventions where the tobacco industry was sued. We had research intrventions and we had cultural interventions. Imagine if that was the kind of intervention we had around sexual and gender based violence where we had a curriculum in schools that taught children year over year about consent, not just one time in the 12th grade in front of a computer. Imagine if we had research that showed us the medical effects that sexual trauma has on people. So my point is, we need more funding across the board because this is a solvable issue.
#MeToo harnessed the power of social media to spread a message. Now, Xs algorithm has changed, and the social media landscape has become pretty toxic. Do you think its still a useful medium?
Just because the tool becomes weaponized, doesn’t take away its usefulness. It’s really about how we use it and the safety measures that we put in place. Tech has facilitated gender-based violence. There’s a new app where they can undress you based on a fully dressed picture. Character AI is another thing. There’s ways in which violence is being perpetuated through social media and online. It’s the new frontier.
How are you harnessing tech to further your organizations mission?
Were working on something that we call Digital Direct Service. When Me Too went viral, so many survivors were like, what can Me Too do for me? So we set up a database of resources. Those resources are deeply diversified. When I was doing this work with young Black girls in the South, I could never find resources that were specific to them. So when we built this resource database, we wanted to make sure you could filter to find yourself.
You can be a disabled trans veteran and a survivor. You can put all of these things into our website. You can say, this happened to me in college, this happened to me as a child. And you can find what you need specifically. The other thing we have is our Pride and Joy Survivors Sanctuary. It’s an online healing platform and it’s free. We have a variety of videos from as short as five minutes to as long as 30 minutes.
What else is on your organizations agenda in the next year or two?
The other way we focus our attention is engaging survivors from a place of power. People often engage survivors of sexual and gender-based violence from a place of pity. But survivors are the most powerful people that you can encounter. We’ve already come through the worst of the worst and landed on the other side. I’m really excited about the idea of building a constituency. Imagine us voting along the lines of our survivorship. And there’s millions of us as a voting bloc. I’m really interested in how we take that trauma, how we take those experiences, and turn them into power for people.
Then the third thing is our global work. We’re called Me Too International because it’s a global movement. We have a network in Latin America, the Caribbean, Africa, and in some parts of Europe. A large part of it is from 134 [partner] organizations across 70 countries. We come into those conversations not from a place of US imperialism. We come to it saying, listen, what’s happening here is also happening in America.
A number of big-name tech companies have announced or are said to be planning layoffs this month, in continuation of a trend we saw in February. March 2025s most prominent tech layoffs include those from Jack Dorsey’s fintech company Block, online meal kit company HelloFresh, server maker Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE), social media giant TikTok, and retailer Wayfairs technology division. Heres what you need to know.
Jack Dorsey’s Block lays off over 900 workers
Twitter founder Jack Dorseys latest company, Block, has announced that it will cut 931 jobs. Block owns the popular fintech app and platforms Cash App and Square. The 931 laid-off workers represent about 8% of Blocks workforce.
Block made the announcement internally in an email Dorsey sent to Block staff. That email was later leaked to TechCrunch. In the email, Dorsey was very specific about why Block was cutting the chosen workers, citing three reasons:
eliminating employees that are part of teams that are off strategy”
eliminating those who have a below or trending toward a below performance rating”
and in order to flatten Blocks organizational hierarchy.
Dorsey revealed the exact numbers being cut for each of the three reasons. Strategy cuts totaled 391 people, performance cuts totaled 460 people, and hierarchy cuts totaled 80 managers. Dorsey also announced Block was closing many of its 748 open roles at the company.
Were behind in our actions, and thats not fair to the individuals who work here or the company. When we know, we should move, and there hasnt been enough movement, Dorsey said in the email. We need to move to help us meet and stay ahead of the transformational moment our industry is in.
Block declined Fast Company’s request for comment.
HelloFresh axes 273 jobs in Texas
Online meal kit company HelloFresh has revealed that it is set to eliminate nearly 300 positions at a facility in Texas, reported GroceryDive. The layoff plans were made public because the company was required to file a Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) in the state. WARN notices are required in some states when a company plans mass layoffs. They are intended to give workers and the local community advanced notice.
According to HelloFreshs WARN notice, 273 workers at its Grand Prairie, Texas, distribution center will lose their jobs on May 13. In an email to GroceryDive, HelloFresh confirmed the layoffs, which are being made because the company is consolidating its operations in the state to its Irving, Texas, location.
As the meal kit market normalizes, we are now focused on diversifying our product offerings and driving profitable growth by optimizing our operational footprint, a company spokesperson said in the email. As a result, we have made the difficult decision to consolidate our operations in Texas.
Hewlett Packard Enterprise cuts 2,500 jobs
In what is the largest known tech mass layoff in March, server maker Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) announced during its recent earnings report that it would cut 2,500 jobs.
As noted by CNBC, Hewlett Packard Enterprise said it is seeking to achieve $350 million in gross savings by fiscal 2027. Part of those savings will come from the 2,500 job cuts, which are expected over the next 18 months. That equates to about 5% of Hewlett Packard Enterprises workforce.
Despite its name, its important to note that Hewlett Packard Enterprise is a separate, distinct company from consumer computer maker Hewlett Packard (HP). HPE separated from HP nearly a decade ago. However, its worth pointing out that HPEs March job cuts follow HPs job cuts last month. In February, consumer computer maker Hewlett-Packard announced it would be cutting 2,000 workers.
TikTok could cut 300 jobs in Ireland
Social media giant TikTok is another tech company that might see job cuts. However, these cuts are limited to its operations in Ireland.
As reported by Irelands public broadcaster, Raidió Teilifís Éireann (RTÉ), the countrys minister for enterprise, tourism and employment said it was his understanding that TikTok will cut around 300 jobs at its Dublin headquarters.
The job cuts will reportedly happen in April. TikTok is said to employ almost 3,000 individuals at its Dublin headquarters, meaning the job cuts will impact about 10% of its workforce there.
We’ve reached out to TikTok for comment.
Wayfair Inc. to cut around 340 technology team members
Home goods e-commerce giant Wayfair revealed in a Form 8-K filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on March 7 that it is initiating a workforce reduction. According to the filing, Wayfair will let go approximately 340 members of the companys Technology team.
These changes reflect efforts to reshape, streamline and refocus the Companys Technology organization after completing significant modernization and replatforming milestones, Wayfair wrote in its 8-K.
Wayfair says that it employs more than 12,000 people across North America and Europe.
Tech layoffs reach nearly 25,000 in 2025 so far
With the layoffs above, as well as others through the month of March, total layoffs for the tech industry since the year began currently stand at 24,313, according to data compiled by tech layoffs tracking site Layoffs.fyi. The site says that so far in 2025, 90 companies have announced tech-related layoffs.
To put the nearly 25,000 figure into more perspective, in all of 2024, Layoffs.fyi says there were just over 152,000 tech layoffs. And in all of 2023, there were over 264,000.
