 |
|
|
|||||
Next week’s conclave to elect the successor to Pope Francis as leader of the world’s 1.4 billion Catholics is a solemn affair steeped in centuries-old traditions.But far from the Sistine Chapel where cloistered cardinals will cast votes, people are placing bets on who will be chosen as the next pope. From cash bets on websites to online games modeled after fantasy football leagues and casual wagers among friends and families, the popularity of guessing and gambling on the future of the papacy is increasing worldwide, experts and participants say.It’s even topped the Europa League soccer tournament and Formula One drivers’ championship, said Sam Eaton, U.K. manager for Oddschecker, a leading online platform analyzing odds across sports, events and other betting markets.“There’s a huge level of interest globally,” he said. “I don’t think we’ve had a market like this where we’ve had so many countries interested in seeing odds.” Around the world, thousands of bets on the next pope Hundreds of thousands of people from some 140 countries have visited Oddschecker to review each cardinal’s chances of becoming the next pope, Eaton said. He noted special eagerness in the United Kingdom, Ireland and the United States.In the U.K., about 30,000 pounds (almost $40,000) have been wagered with one leading online betting platform as of this week, Eaton saida far cry from 1.2 million pounds on the singing contest Eurovision but still noteworthy as a trend, with the conclave days away.“Betting on the next pope is definitely a niche market in the grand scheme of things, but it generates global interest,” said Lee Phelps, a spokesman for William Hill, one of the U.K.’s biggest bookmakers.“Since April 21, we’ve taken thousands of bets, and it’s the busiest of all our non-sports betting markets,” said Phelps, who expects a surge in interest once the conclave begins Wednesday.Betting on elections, papal conclaves and all manner of global events is almost a tradition of its own in the U.K., but such betting is not legal in the United States. BetMGM, one of the world’s top sports-betting companies, said it would not have any bets up.But Eaton noted that in the unregulated, illegal space, one of the biggest sites has $10 million wagered so far in pope bets. Fantasy “teams” of cardinals In Italy, betting on the papal electionand all religious eventsis forbidden.Some people in Rome are making friendly, informal wagersthe equivalent of $20 on a favorite cardinal, with the loser pledging to host a dinner or buy a pizza night out.Others are turning to an online game called Fantapapa, or Fantasy Pope, which mimics popular fantasy football and soccer leagues. More than 60,000 people are playing, each choosing 11 cardinalsas if for a soccer teamwhom they believe have the best shot at becoming the next pope.They also draft the top contender, or captain. As with online wagers, the No. 1 choice for fantasy players has been Italian Cardinal Pietro Parolin, closely followed by Filipino Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle.“It’s a really fun game to play with friends and have a laugh,” Italian student Federico La Rocca, 23, said. “Initially my dad sent it to me ironically, but now that it’s going to be the conclave, I decided to have a go and try it.”La Rocca said he chose Tagle because “he looks like a nice guy and fun person.”Players’ selections determine the number of points they rake in. But what’s the jackpot?“Eternal glory,” joked Mauro Vanetti, who created the game when Francis was hospitalized earlier this year.Vanetti said he and his co-founder are against gambling, but they wanted to create something fun around the event.“It seems like in Italy there’s a certain inquisitiveness about the mechanisms of the Catholic hierarchy, but it’s a critical curiosity, a sarcastic and playful curiosity, so we were interested in this jesting spirit for such a solemn event,” Vanetti said. “In some ways it deflates the sacredness, in a nonaggressive way.” Some concerns about betting on a solemn event Beyond simply picking who the next pope will be, players and gamblers also can guess how many tries it will take the cardinals to choose the leader, which day of the week he’ll be elected, what new name he will decide on, or where his priorities will land on the progressive-conservative scale.While the game and some of the bets have a novel or fun nature, anti-gambling advocates have raised overall concerns about legal gaming and the growing popularity of wagering on all manner of events.A study published last fall found that 10% of young men in the U.S. show behavior that indicates a gambling problem, which is a rising concern in other parts of the world, too.And for gambling around the papacy in general, some have raised religious concerns. Catholic teaching doesn’t go so far as to call games of chance or wagers sinful, but its Catechism warns that “the passion for gambling risks becoming an enslavement.”It says gambling becomes “morally unacceptable” if it gravely affects a person’s livelihood. Hui reported from London. AP writers Giovanna Dell’Orto in Rome and Mark Anderson in Las Vegas contributed. Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content. Maria Grazia Murru and Sylvia Hui, Associated Press
Category:
E-Commerce
The Trump administration’s layoffs across the federal workforce have already left tens of thousands of employees without jobs or on indefinite leave. But many federal agencies have since been instructed to make even deeper cuts to their workforce. In total, at least 12% of the 2.4 million workers employed by the federal government could be impacted, according to the New York Times. For many workers, the sweeping cuts have upended the stability that federal jobs long promised. They also significantly impact women and people of color, effectively making them another attack on diversity, equity, and inclusion effortssomething that has been a priority for the Trump administration. The diversity of federal agencies An analysis by the National Women’s Law Center takes a closer look at how these job cuts are chipping away at the diversity of the federal workforce, which has historically mirrored the demographics of the overall U.S. workforce. As of September 2024, nearly half of federal workers (46%) were women and about 41% were people of color. (Since the administration took down current demographic data on the federal workforce in March, the NWLC analysis draws on data from September 2024.) Among the agencies that have been ordered to further reduce headcount, women accounted for an even higher percentage of their employees relative to the overall federal workforce, according to the NWLC. The administration wants to cut 80,000 employees from the Department of Veterans Affairs, for example, where women comprise 64% of the workforce. The Department of Education’s workforce, of which 63% are women, has already been slashed in halfand President Trump is striving to shutter the agency altogether. Proposed layoffs at a number of other cabinet departments and agencies where women and people make up the majority of the workforce could impact tens of thousands of employees. Black workers, for example, account for 36% of the Department of Housing and Urban Development, as compared to 18% of the overall federal workforce. Latinos and Indigenous workers, too, are employed at higher rates by certain federal agencies that have been marked for layoffs, relative to the overall workforce. How probationary workers are affected The Trump administration has targeted probationary workers, in particular, who are not entitled to the same rights as federal workers with tenure. Probationary workers are typically in their first year of service or have recently been promoted to a new role. They also lack the protections that other federal workers have against being fired without cause. Nearly 25,000 of these workers have reportedly been fired; some were temporarily reinstated in response to court orders, but a new ruling in April granted Trump the ability to fire them yet again. Probationary workers are often younger and earlier in their career, but they’re also more likely to be women: The NWLC reports that half of probationary employees across the federal workforce are women, but in certain departments, well over 60% of them can be women. The same is true among people of color, who make up 46% of probationary workers overall and a far larger percentage of those workers at specific agencies like the Treasury Department and the Social Security Administration. The benefits of a federal job Beyond offering a measure of job stability, federal roles are often a source of solid benefits that are harder to come by in the private sector, like 12 weeks of paid parental leave. Federal jobs also offer greater salary transparency and narrower wage gaps, mitigating the pay inequities that are more likely to impact women and people of color in the workplace: As of September 2024, women in the federal workforce were paid 95 cents for every dollar that men earned, a stark contrast from the 83 cents per dollar earned by women across the U.S. workforce. (The NWLC found that some departments had even narrower gender wage gaps prior to the recent layoffs.)
Category:
E-Commerce
Lucas Krafts friends knew him as the guy who always had an antacid. His recovery from bulimia left him with gastrointestinal damage, which made him reliant on over-the-counter digestive medicines. But they were also filled with chemicals that didnt mesh with his health-conscious SoCal lifestyle. Luckily, his brother Noah had an eye for predicting where consumer interests are headed. He founded Doppler Labs, the buzzy 2010s startup hoping to create an in-ear computer, three years before Apple launched their AirPods. Doppler Labs was too early, but Wonderbellythe brothers digestive health brandhas been right on time with its focus on clean ingredients and opposition to existing giants of OTC medicines. In the late 2010s, clean beauty was already surging. Whole Foods and Erewhon were on the rise, but they were siloed within wealthy communities. But a new and growing swatch of health obsessivesboth within and without Robert F. Kennedy Jr.s Make America Healthy Again movementhas put Wonderbelly in an unusually dominant position. The superstores came knocking: First Target, then CVS, and now Walmart. [Image: courtesy Wonderbelly] Wonderbelly products now feature prominently at 2,500 Walmart stores nationwide via a fleet of endcaps. These offerings include reworked packaging as well as a debut multisymptom product designed to compete with Pepto-Bismol. Noah contrasts Wonderbellywhich is sold as an OTC product with health claims that are regulated by the Food and Drug Administrationwith the $53 billion supplements market. Supplements are the Wild West. They are unregulated, so when you take a supplement, its hard to determine whether it works or is a placebo, he says. As an FDA-regulated OTC medicine . . . credibility is key. Growing the the old-fashioned way Medicine moves slower than Noahs native tech world. The brothers incorporated Wonderbelly in 2021, before spending two years deep in product development. (Noah got antsy in this period, so he made an app to track digestive health.) When the companys clean Tums alternative was ready in April 2023, Target was immediately on board. The retailer asked to place Wonderbelly in 2,000 stores, but the Kraft brothers needed more time, eventually agreeing to 650. Even that pared-back retail presence was important to Wonderbellys vision to build its brand credibility the old-fashioned wayin brick and mortar. People buy medicine as a bottom-of-funnel product, Noah says. You go into your supermarket, youre picking up bananas, and you grab some Tums. It is not the sort of thing where you go to someone’s website like you do with Casper. With more stores, Wonderbelly brought more products. For the company’s CVS launch, it debuted a clean Gas-X alternative. Now, with Wonderbelly’s new placement in Walmart, it’s rolling out a clean Pepto-Bismol challenger. Wonderbelly intentionally positions itself against these name brands; it’s not interested in customers shopping for generics. Even the store placement mattersthe company isn’t interested in selling in Whole Foods or Sprouts, because they dont carry Tums. We dont want to sit next to apple cider vinegar, Noah says. [Image: courtesy Wonderbelly] Wonderbellys bet is that, when given the choice between a chemical-filled name brand and a cleaned up alternative, the premium customer will choose it instead. The strategy has been lucrative. While he declined to disclose specific financials, Noah notes that the company hit profitability in April. As of April 2024, Wonderbelly was valued at about $53 million, according to market insight tool PitchBooka number that Noah confirmed is still roughly accurate. Jeff Behm, Wonderbellys VP of sales, points out that the company will double its sales year over year, having reached 100,000 points of distribution. (It helps that the company is incredibly slim: Wonderbelly has 12 employees, and Noah has no desire to hire more.) The Walmart launch is poised to skyrocket sales by introducing 2,500 colorful endcaps nationwide. Walmart has a different customer, than the deep-pocketed shoppers that frequent the likes of Erewhon and similarly priced boutique grocers that dominate the clean space. So Wonderbelly created a new, cheaper $9.99 version of its antacidwith fewer tabletsto meet Walmarts everyday low prices mandate. It seems to have paid off: Looking at the first-week data from the brands soft launch, Noah says sales are where he expected them be after three months of a concerted marketing push. Customers are familiar with these legacy brands, and they’re going to stay connected to these legacy brands, says Kristin Piper, Walmarts vice president of wellness merchandising. Some customers are looking for innovation, like [what] Wonderbelly is bringing to the space. [Image: courtesy Wonderbelly] Navigating a MAHA minefield The Krafts grew up in Los Angeles, where their mother enforced a clean regime. Lucas describes a house full of alternative brands that always tasted so much worse. That includes drinking imitation milk at age 5. Noah points out that they werent allowed to drink Diet Coke. The brothers have mostly carried this clean ethos to their adult life, leading Lucas to count the ingredients on the back of his medicine bottles. Though Wonderbellys antacid has six ingredients to the average of 20 in Tums, that model of ingredient numbering can be reductive, especially in medicine, where some foreign chemicals are crucial to the products transportation around the body. So Wonderbelly makes its definition even clearer: non-GMO, vegan, free of artificial dyes, sweeteners, talc, titanium dioxide, parabens, and gluten. The siblings timing with Wonderbelly couldnt have been better. The consumer wellness market skyrocketed coming out of the pandemic. Clean beauty, once a miniscule portion of the makeup market, is now valued at more than $8 billion. Consumers are buying Oura Rings and drinking kombucha. Its also not lost on the Krafts that their product appeals to a broad enough consumer base to include those buying into the Make America Healthy Again movement. We strongly believe in science, but we also align heavily with a lot of the things that the MAHA movement is pushing for, Lucas says, adding that he and his brand are still positioned for people eating food that can upset their stomachs. Antacids usually dont come after youve had a big meal of kale salad. MAHAs reach is also broad, and has spurred actions that range from Sweetgreen eliminating seed oils in its food to the state of Utah banning fluoride in drinking water against prevailing medical consensus of the elements public health benefits. As a result, the Krafts have had to be somewhat judicious about who they associate the brand with. There have been several instances where were talking to someone and then we go to their socials, and were like, Thanks for the support. Please dont mention our company name, Noah says.
Category:
E-Commerce
All news |
||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||