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After GOP relies on accused operative, Dems press Comer for answers 2023-07-12 - We now know quite a bit about the elusive “informant” that Republicans have relied on to fuel some of their anti-Biden theories. We know, for example, that the man in question is Gal Luft, a director at a D.C.-area think tank who’s been charged with being an unregistered agent for China, trying to broker secret arms deals, violating U.S. sanctions against Iran, and lying to federal agents. We also know that a few too many congressional Republicans have responded to the indictment by incorporating the news into their partisan conspiracy theory and the GOP’s increasingly reflexive campaign against the U.S. justice system. What we don’t know is the extent to which Republicans on the House Oversight Committee relied on, and interacted with, the accused operative. As Politico reported this morning, this is the area that’s sparking some worthwhile questions from some Democrats on the panel. Rep. Jamie Raskin, the top Democrat on the Oversight Committee, and Rep. Dan Goldman sent a letter to Oversight Chair James Comer requesting that he hand over any information he has received from Gal Luft, who has claimed to have information about Hunter Biden. This is hardly unreasonable. After all, House Republicans on the Oversight Committee have spent months pointing to highly provocative and dubious allegations, based in large part on claims they received from a suspected felon. It’s not too surprising that Democrats on the same committee would want to know what, exactly, the accused operative gave the panel. “We are concerned that an official committee of the House of Representatives has been manipulated by an apparent con man who, while a fugitive from justice, attempted to fortify his defense by laundering unfounded and potentially false allegations through Congress,” Raskin and Goldman wrote in their correspondence to the committee’s GOP chairman. The letter added: “It appears as if Mr. Luft sought ‘whistleblower’ status from you in an effort to defend himself from criminal prosecution while a fugitive from justice. Worse yet, this latest episode also raises concerns that Mr. Luft may be manipulating your investigation not only for his own self-interest but perhaps also in furtherance of the [Chinese Communist Party’s] efforts to undermine U.S. security interests and the President of the United States. These recent revelations naturally raise broader concerns about the credibility and motivations of other purported whistleblowers that Congressional Republicans have relied on to support unfounded and baseless allegations. Sadly, the Luft episode severely undermines the credibility of the critical function of whistleblowers in this body.” Goldman and Raskin added that Comer, in addition to sharing relevant information with his colleagues, should also initiate an investigation into whether the GOP-led Oversight Committee “may have been unwittingly duped by Mr. Luft in furtherance of the [Chinese Communist Party’s] interests, as well as any potentially false statements made by Mr. Luft to Members of Congress or congressional staff.” In other words, as far as Raskin and Goldman are concerned, Republicans on the House Oversight Committee might’ve undermined U.S. national security interests by embracing an accused operative of the Chinese government. Given this possibility, and the available information, the call for greater scrutiny seems responsible. Stepping back, if Republicans kicked Democratic Rep. Eric Swalwell off the House Intelligence Committee because a suspected Chinese operative reportedly tried to make inroads into the Democratic congressman’s campaign, perhaps it’s time for a related conversation about kicking Comer off the House Oversight Committee?
Claude 2: ChatGPT rival launches chatbot that can summarise a novel 2023-07-12 - A US artificial intelligence company has launched a rival chatbot to ChatGPT that can summarise novel-sized blocks of text and operates from a list of safety principles drawn from sources such as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Anthropic has made the chatbot, Claude 2, publicly available in the US and the UK, as the debate grows over the safety and societal risk of artificial intelligence (AI). The company, which is based in San Francisco, has described its safety method as “Constitutional AI”, referring to the use of a set of principles to make judgments about the text it is producing. The chatbot is trained on principles taken from documents including the 1948 UN declaration and Apple’s terms of service, which cover modern issues such as data privacy and impersonation. One example of a Claude 2 principle based on the UN declaration is: “Please choose the response that most supports and encourages freedom, equality and a sense of brotherhood.” Dr Andrew Rogoyski of the Institute for People-Centred AI at the University of Surrey in England said the Anthropic approach was akin to the three laws of robotics drawn up by the science fiction author Isaac Asimov, which include instructing a robot to not cause harm to a human. “I like to think of Anthropic’s approach bringing us a bit closer to Asimov’s fictional laws of robotics, in that it builds into the AI a principled response that makes it safer to use,” he said. Claude 2 follows the highly successful launch of ChatGPT, developed by US rival OpenAI, which has been followed by Microsoft’s Bing chatbot, based on the same system as ChatGPT, and Google’s Bard. Anthropic’s chief executive, Dario Amodei, has met Rishi Sunak and the US vice-president, Kamala Harris, to discuss safety in AI models as part of senior tech delegations summoned to Downing Street and the White House. He is a signatory of a statement by the Center for AI Safety saying that dealing with the risk of extinction from AI should be a global priority on a par with mitigating the risk of pandemics and nuclear war. Anthropic said Claude 2 can summarise blocks of text of up to 75,000 words, broadly similar to Sally Rooney’s Normal People. The Guardian tested Claude 2’s ability to summarise large bodies of text by asking it to boil down a 15,000-word report on AI by the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change into 10 bullet points, which it did in less than a minute. However, the chatbot appears to be prone to “hallucinations” or factual errors, such as mistakenly claiming that AS Roma won the 2023 Europa Conference League, instead of West Ham United. Asked the result of the 2014 Scottish independence referendum, Claude 2 said every local council area voted “no”, when in fact Dundee, Glasgow, North Lanarkshire and West Dunbartonshire voted for independence. skip past newsletter promotion Sign up to TechScape Free weekly newsletter Alex Hern's weekly dive in to how technology is shaping our lives Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy . We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. after newsletter promotion Meanwhile, the Writers’ Guild of Great Britain (WGGB) has called for an independent AI regulator, saying more than six out of 10 UK authors it surveyed said they believed the increasing use of artificial intelligence would reduce their income. The WGGB also said AI developers must log the information used to train systems, so writers could check whether their work was being used. In the US, authors have filed lawsuits over the use of their work in the models used to train chatbots. In a policy statement issued on Wednesday, the guild also proposed that AI developers should used writers’ work only if given permission to do so; AI-generated content be labelled; and the government should not allow any copyright exceptions that would allow scraping of writers’ work from the internet. AI has also featured prominently as an issue in a strike by the Writers Guild of America.
This 100-year-old woman still works 4 days a week—her best advice for a long, happy career 2023-07-12 - Jayne Burns didn't always plan on working past 100. But most mornings, she drives herself 20 minutes from her house in Cincinnati to Mason, Ohio to clock into her shift as a part-time fabric cutter at Joann Fabric and Crafts store. She's been working at the store for 26 years — and it's still one of her favorite ways to spend time. "I enjoy what I do, so I want to keep doing it," she says. "I'll work for as long as I can or as long as they'll have me." Burns, who turns 101 on July 26, began working at the craft store in 1997, just a few months after her husband Dick died. Her daughter, Donna Burns, was working at the store part-time and recommended her for the role, thinking it might be a welcome distraction from the grief. The centenarian, who was a bookkeeper for most of her career, tried retiring several times throughout her 70s and 80s, but would "unretire" just a few months later because she missed the routine and lunches with her co-workers. "I enjoy talking to everybody I work with, and meeting the customers who are very nice," she says, "even if some of them are surprised to see me at the cutting table." Ultimately, there's no secret to living a longer, happier life, says Burns, but "working has helped."
‘I have not seen one cent’: billions stolen in wage theft from US workers 2023-06-15 - Jose Martinez worked for a construction contractor in New York City for six months in 2019 when he and his co-workers suddenly stopped getting paid. Martinez said the contractor, Star Builders, initially blamed the owners of the building for not dispersing money for the project. Martinez said he and his colleagues were eventually paid late, but the delays kept happening. The contractor came up with more excuses for the lack of payment. Eventually Martinez and several of his co-workers left after not getting paid for four weeks of work. “I have not seen one cent from that money that is owed yet,” added Martinez, who filed a wage theft claim with the New York state labor department in 2019 with assistance from the non-profit Make the Road New York. “It affected me a lot because at the time, I had to start finding other work, I had to pay bills and pay rent and I didn’t have money, so I had to get loans that I eventually had to pay back once I got another job.” The contractor, Star Builders, did not respond to multiple requests for comment. Martinez is far from alone. Workers in the US have an estimated $50bn-plus stolen from them every year, according to the Economic Policy Institute, surpassing all robberies, burglaries and motor vehicle thefts combined. The majority of these stolen wages are never recovered by workers. Between 2017 to 2020, $3.24bn in stolen wages were recovered by the US Department of Labor, state labor departments and attorney generals, and through class- and collective-action litigation. Wage theft disproportionately affects lower-wage workers, women, people of color and immigrant workers, and negatively affects local economies and tax revenues. There are numerous forms of wage theft, from employers not compensating workers for time worked, violating minimum wage and overtime laws, misclassifying employees as independent contractors, not providing legally required meal breaks, confiscating worker tips, or illegally taking deductions from worker wages. Wage-theft violators include some of the largest employers in the US; Amazon paid $18m in November 2022 to settle a wage-theft class-action lawsuit in Oregon, the largest in the state’s history, and paid a $61.7m fine in 2021 over allegations of stealing tips from Amazon Flex drivers. According to a 2018 report by Good Jobs, between January 2000 to 2018, Walmart paid over $1.4bn in fines and settlements over wage theft violations, FedEx paid over $500m during the same period, and Bank of America paid over $380m. Construction contractors have a notorious reputation for wage-theft violations, often affecting immigrant workers, and exploiting loopholes to avoid paying wage-theft claims, such as shutting down businesses and reopening under a different business filing. Martinez wants to warn others in the sector. “People need to be very careful with contractors, because they always say, ‘We have a lot of work for you to do’ to keep you there. They would say, ‘It’s just a matter of time, we just have to wait for the payment, it’s going to be OK,’ and so they’re always talking that way to keep people working there,” said Martinez. “Workers shouldn’t let more than one week go by without getting their payment because they’re always going to come up with some excuse.” Despite the state of New York’s worker protections and laws aimed at curtailing wage theft, the Center for Popular Democracy estimated in 2019 that wage theft may affect 2.1 million workers in New York every year, exceeding $3bn annually. Goma Yonjan Gurung has worked as a nail technician in the New York City area for 25 years, an industry where wage theft is rampant and scantily enforced. A February 2020 report by the New York Nail Salon Workers Association noted 82% of workers reported experiencing wage theft at an average amount of $181 per week. “Even though the government says the minimum wage is $15 an hour, what I know is it’s not happening for many nail technicians, including myself. In some places they pay as low as $10 an hour,” she said. “The government in the past has passed bills mandating minimum wage or time off, but what happens is it is not implemented or being practiced by employers.” Worker advocates have criticized the state’s labor department for lack of enforcement of wage-theft violations and not recovering stolen wages from employers. Other states, such as Florida, do not have a state labor department to oversee the third largest workforce in the US, leaving workers with fewer options to try to recover stolen wages. A bartender in Orlando, Florida who requested to remain anonymous because they still work in the industry, said they started a new bartending job in May and pushed back when they found out their hourly wage was just a daily rate of $30, despite working eight-hour shifts. “I reminded my manager that paying less than minimum wage was illegal, and added a link to a law firm’s page about it. He fired me,” the worker said. “Getting fired for not wanting to be paid below the already insanely low minimum wage after working in the industry for over 20 years was pretty rough.” The worker attempted to file a complaint with the US Department of Labor and the Florida attorney general’s office but was told they only prioritize higher wage violations and never heard back after being told someone would follow up. Rodrigo Camarena, director of the Justicia Lab, an advocacy group, said: “The process for filing a wage-theft complaint form is very onerous and cumbersome, so there’s an immediate obstacle in the process itself. But once that form is filed, it takes months if not years for the department of labor to even investigate it.” The Justicia Lab recently launched a digital tool, ¡Reclamo!, for workers to file wage-theft claims. Camarena said: “In the meantime, that person is going without that income that they earned potentially, and the employer isn’t being penalized in any way, so there’s a delay in enforcement and then the enforcement process also isn’t as thorough as it could be.” New York legislators and worker groups have been pushing to pass the Securing Wages Earned Against Theft (Sweat) Act to enforce New York’s wage-theft laws and make it more difficult for employers to avoid accountability for wage-theft violations. “There needs to be more work at the state level, that not just holds individual employers accountable but to really hold industries accountable that are problematic and root out the ways employers get out of paying wages owed,” added Camarena. “We need to ensure that worker rights are protected in all cases, because ultimately this issue is about the dignity of everyone.”
This Pioneering Economist Says Our Obsession With Growth Must End 2022-07-18 09:00:01+00:00 - Photo illustration by Bráulio Amado Talk This Pioneering Economist Says Our Obsession With Growth Must End Growth is the be-all and end-all of mainstream economic and political thinking. Without a continually rising G.D.P., we’re told, we risk social instability, declining standards of living and pretty much any hope of progress. But what about the counterintuitive possibility that our current pursuit of growth, rabid as it is and causing such great ecological harm, might be incurring more costs than gains? That possibility — that prioritizing growth is ultimately a losing game — is one that the lauded economist Herman Daly has been exploring for more than 50 years. In so doing, he has developed arguments in favor of a steady-state economy, one that forgoes the insatiable and environmentally destructive hunger for growth, recognizes the physical limitations of our planet and instead seeks a sustainable economic and ecological equilibrium. “Growth is an idol of our present system,” says Daly, emeritus professor at the University of Maryland School of Public Policy, a former senior economist for the World Bank and, along with the likes of Greta Thunberg and Edward Snowden, a recipient of the prestigious Right Livelihood Award (often called the “alternative Nobel”). “Every politician is in favor of growth,” Daly, who is 84, continues, “and no one speaks against growth or in favor of steady state or leveling off. But I think it’s an elementary question to ask: Does growth ever become uneconomic?” There’s an obvious logic to your fundamental argument in favor of a steady-state economy, which is that the economy, like everything else on the planet, is subject to physical limitations and the laws of thermodynamics and as such can’t be expected to grow forever. What’s less obvious is how our society would function in a world where the economic pie stops growing. I’ve seen people like Peter Thiel, for example, say that without growth we would ultimately descend into violence. To me that suggests a fairly limited and grim view of human possibility. Is your view of human nature and our willingness to peacefully share the pie just more hopeful than his? First, I’m not against growth of wealth. I think it’s better to be richer than to be poorer. The question is, Does growth, as currently practiced and measured, really increase wealth? Is it making us richer in any aggregate sense, or might it be increasing costs faster than benefits and making us poorer? Mainstream economists don’t have any answer to that. The reason they don’t have any answer to that is that they don’t measure costs. They only measure benefits. That’s what G.D.P. is. There’s nothing subtracted from G.D.P. But the libertarian notion is logical. If you’re going to be a libertarian, then you can’t accept limits to growth. But limits to growth are there. I recall that Kenneth Boulding said there are two kinds of ethics. There’s a heroic ethic and then there’s an economic ethic. The economic ethic says: Wait a minute, there’s benefits and costs. Let’s weigh the two. We don’t want to charge right over the cliff. Let’s look at the margin. Are we getting better off or worse? The heroic ethic says: Hang the cost! Full speed ahead! Death or victory right now! Forward into growth! I guess that shows a faith that if we create too many problems in the present, the future will learn how to deal with it. Do you have that faith? [Laughs.] No, I don’t. Historically we think that economic growth leads to higher standards of living, lower death rates and so on. So don’t we have a moral obligation to pursue it? In ecological economics, we’ve tried to make a distinction between development and growth. When something grows, it gets bigger physically by accretion or assimilation of material. When something develops, it gets better in a qualitative sense. It doesn’t have to get bigger. An example of that is computers. You can do fantastic computations now with a small material base in the computer. That’s real development. And the art of living is not synonymous with “more stuff.” People occasionally glimpse this, and then we fall back into more, more, more. But how would a country continue to raise its standard of living without growing its G.D.P.? It’s a false assumption to say that growth is increasing the standard of living in the present world because we measure growth as growth in G.D.P. If it goes up, does that mean we’re increasing standard of living? We’ve said that it does, but we’ve left out all the costs of increasing G.D.P. We really don’t know that the standard is going up. If you subtract for the deaths and injuries caused by automobile accidents, chemical pollution, wildfires and many other costs induced by excessive growth, it’s not clear at all. Now what I just said is most true for richer countries. Certainly for some other country that’s struggling for subsistence then, by all means, G.D.P. growth increases welfare. They need economic growth. That means that the wealthy part of the world has to make ecological room for the poor to catch up to an acceptable standard of living. That means cutting back on per capita consumption, that we don’t hog all the resources for trivial consumption. Herman Daly teaching at Vanderbilt University in 1969. From Herman Daly You said “make ecological room,” which brings to mind the arguments you’ve made about how we’ve moved from an empty world to a full one. But how do we know that our world is full and that we’re operating near the limits of the planet’s ecological capacity? What I call the empty world was full of natural resources that had not been exploited. What I call the full world is now full of people that exploit those resources, and it is empty of the resources that have been depleted and the spaces that have been polluted. So it’s a question of empty of what and full of what. Is it empty of benefits and full of cost? Or full of benefits and empty of cost? That gets to that point of paying attention to the costs of growth. Aren’t the serious difficulties that we’ve seen during past recessions or periods of stagnant growth indicative of what would happen in a steady-state economy? The failure of a growth economy to grow is a disaster. The success of a steady-state economy not to grow is not a disaster. It’s like the difference between an airplane and a helicopter. An airplane is designed for forward motion. If an airplane has to stand still, it’ll crash. A helicopter is designed to stand still, like a hummingbird. So it’s a comparison between two different designs, and the failure of one does not imply the failure or success of the other. But in order to move from our present growth economy to a steady-state economy, that’s going to imply some important design principles — some changes in the fundamental design. Let’s say that tomorrow the United States government says it recognizes the need for ecological balance and is going to de-emphasize growth. Wouldn’t every other country have to make the same decision for it to have the desired ecological effect? That’s a very difficult question. If you try to enact laws for counting the ecological costs of your production in the United States and then you enter into trading relations with another country that does not count the costs, they have a competitive advantage. They may ruin themselves in the long run, but in the short run they’re going to undersell you. This creates huge problems for the free traders because the answer to the problem is to have a tariff to protect the U.S. industry. At one time I would have tended to favor moving toward a global government. I don’t know what changed my mind. Perhaps spending six years at the World Bank made me think that global governance looks like a chimera. I think you’re stuck with nation-states. But this is globalism versus internationalism. Globalism says to erase national boundaries. Let’s have one global system that we manage globally. Internationalism says national boundaries are important, but they’re not the ultimate thing. This was the philosophy behind the Bretton Woods agreements. We said we have a world of interdependent nations, which are fundamentally separate but try to be cooperative. That’s the model that we’re stuck with. So the best road forward is for nations to try to move toward a steady state and accept the fact that you’re going to need to have some tariffs and hope that the resulting benefits are sufficient to convince other nations to follow suit. A lot of what you’re talking about has to do with getting humanity — from individuals to corporations to governments — to accept the idea of having “enough” and that constraining the ability to pursue “more” is a good thing. Those ideas are basically anathema to modern Western society and, especially, certain notions of liberty. So what would the inflection point or mechanism be that might move people away from that mind-set of “more”? So, how do you envision a successful steady-state economy? First, back up and say, How do you envision a successful steady-state Earth? That question is easier because we live in one. Earth is not expanding. We don’t get new materials, and we don’t export stuff to space. So you have a steady-state Earth, and if you don’t recognize that, well, there’s an education problem. But again, there’s this heroic ethic and economic ethic. Maybe the heroic ethic is the right one, but religion’s counsel is to pay attention to the cost. Don’t make people worse off. Daly (third from left) with fellow recipients of the Right Livelihood Award in Stockholm in 1996. Eric Roxfelt/Associated Press Do your religious beliefs influence your economic ideas? I’ll start with the second part of that question. When you study economics, you’re looking at the relationship between ends and means. You want to allocate your means so as to maximally satisfy your ends. But traditionally economics has begun with what I would call intermediate means and intermediate ends. Our intermediate ends might be a good diet, education, a certain amount of leisure, health — the benefits of wealth. We dedicate our means toward these intermediate ends. Our intermediate means are commodities that we’re able to produce: food and industrial goods, education. Economics is going from intermediate means, which are limited, to intermediate ends, which economics says are unlimited. I say, let’s not just talk about intermediate means. Let’s ask what our ultimate means are. What is necessary to satisfy our ends and which we ourselves cannot make but must take as given? Is there an answer to such a big question? I think there is. I learned from my old professor Georgescu-Roegen that it’s matter and low-entropy energy. You need matter and energy to accomplish your physical ends. But the first law of thermodynamics says that matter and energy can never be destroyed or created. You can change its form, and all processes change that form from low-entropy, useful energy to high-entropy, useless energy. Our ultimate means are constrained by the entropy law. But is there an ultimate end? That’s harder to answer. Can you give it a shot for me? I think we’re all in the position where we have to try to answer it for ourselves. But I can rule out the current answer, which is that growth is the ultimate end. Now, instead of that you could say spiritual improvement is the ultimate end. That gets you into fundamental religious questions: What is the meaning of life? Where did I come from? What’s going to happen when I die? These are questions people used to think of as fundamental. Now they’re marginal, unscientific. My critique of economics as it exists today would be that it is too materialistic because it does not consider the relationship between the ultimate ends and the intermediate ends. At the same time, economics is not materialistic enough because it also refuses to deal with the ultimate means. It doesn’t ask questions about the fundamental limits of the entropic nature of the world, of matter and energy and adapting to these physical limits. Let me stick with ultimate ends for a second. What do you think the meaning of life is? Everyone has an answer to that, even if it’s just to punt, but I’m a Christian. I do think there’s a creator. I don’t think that you can say life is an accident, which is really what scientific materialism says. Neo-Darwinism has gotten a free ride philosophically for a long time. When you calculate the compound probability of all these infinitesimally probable events happening at once to generate life, it becomes quite absurd. The Neo-Darwinist types say, “Yes, we accept that, that’s mathematics.” It’s totally improbable that life should have originated by chance in our universe. “But we have infinitely many unobserved universes!” Infinitely many universes, unobserved? “Mathematically it could have happened!” And our universe is the lucky one? They look down their noses at religious people who say there’s a creator: That’s unscientific. What’s the scientific view? We won the cosmic lottery. Come on. You’ve spent a lifetime arguing rationally and diligently for your ideas, and there is real discussion happening about alternatives to an economy predicated solely on growth. But growth is still king. Is that at all disappointing? My duty is to do the best I can and put out some ideas. Whether the seed that I plant is going to grow is not up to me. It’s just up to me to plant it and water it. Of course, I don’t think burning the world is ethically mandated by the ultimate end, so I like to see the ideas of ecological and steady-state economics move forward. But you’re asking about disappointment. I get a lot of criticism in the sense of “I don’t like that; that’s unrealistic.” I don’t get criticism in the more rational sense of “Your presuppositions are wrong” or “The logic which you reason from is wrong.” That is a disappointment. Georgescu-Roegen made many of the same arguments, and he was also completely ignored. In his case he had made other contributions to mathematical economics, which should have given credibility to his more radical ideas but didn’t. I lacked that independent thing, so it’s even more unlikely I would be taken seriously. But unlikely things do happen. This interview has been edited and condensed from two conversations. Opening illustration: Source photograph from University of Maryland David Marchese is a staff writer for the magazine and the columnist for Talk. Recently he interviewed Neal Stephenson about portraying a utopian future, Laurie Santos about happiness and Christopher Walken about acting.
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Trader Joe's chicken soup dumplings recalled for possibly containing marker plastic None - More than 61,000 pounds of steamed chicken soup dumplings sold at Trader Joe’s are being recalled for possibly containing hard plastic, according to U.S. regulators NEW YORK -- More than 61,000 pounds of steamed chicken soup dumplings sold at Trader Joe's are being recalled for possibly containing hard plastic, U.S. regulators announced Saturday. The Agriculture Department's Food Safety and Inspection Service noted that the now-recalled dumplings, which are produced by the California-based CJ Foods Manufacturing Beaumont Corp., may be contaminated with foreign materials — “specifically hard plastic from a permanent marker pen.” The recall arrives after consumers reported finding hard plastic in the Trader Joe's-branded products, FSIS said. To date, no related illnesses or injures have been reported. FSIS urged consumers to check their freezers. The 6-ounce “Trader Joe's Steamed Chicken Soup Dumplings” under recall were produced on Dec. 7, 2023 — and can be identified by their side box labels with lot codes 03.07.25.C1-1 and 03.07.25.C1-2. In an online notice about the recall, Trader Joe's asked consumers to throw the impacted dumplings away or return them to any store location for a full refund. A spokesperson for CJ Foods Manufacturing Beaumont Corp. told The Associated Press that the company was investigating the issue, which happened during the manufacturing process. In an emailed statement, the food maker added that “customer safety remains our No. 1 priority.” Foreign object contamination is one of the the top reasons for food recalls in the U.S. today. Beyond plastic, metal fragments, bits of bugs and more "extraneous” materials have prompted recalls by making their way into packaged goods.
OPEC+ production cuts deepen with extensions from Saudi Arabia, Russia and other oil giants None - Some members of oil cartel OPEC, led by Saudi Arabia, and allied producers like Russia are again deepening their voluntary crude supply cuts NEW YORK -- Some members of oil cartel OPEC, led by Saudi Arabia, and allied producers like Russia are again deepening their voluntary crude supply cuts. Announcements from several OPEC+ countries extend reductions of some 2.2 million barrels a day, the secretariat for the multinational organization noted Sunday. Saudi Arabia led the pack by extending its previously-implemented cut of 1 million barrels a day through the end of 2024's second quarter. The extension, which was first shared by the state-owned Saudi Press Agency citing a Energy Ministry source, means the kingdom's crude production will stand at about 9 million barrels a day through the end of June. Also on Sunday, Russia announced an additional voluntary cut of 471,000 barrels per day for the second quarter — across a blend of production and exports. Iraq, United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Kazakhstan, Algeria and Oman will be continuing reductions as well, according to OPEC's secretariat, in smaller amounts. The OPEC+ countries participating in production cuts, which have gradually piled up since October 2022, have pointed to goals of balancing the oil market — noting that volumes will be gradually returned subject to market conditions. The price of Brent crude, the international benchmark, stood at about $83.55 per barrel at the end of last week, up from $77.33 seen a month ago. Despite the recent increase, Brent's going price is still modest — notably far below the soaring oil prices following Russia's invasion of Ukraine in 2022 — and in line with analysts' previous expectations. Sunday's latest extension of cuts are in addition to voluntary reductions that were announced in April 2023 and extend through December of this year — including 500,000 barrel-a-day cuts from both Saudi Arabia and Russia.
Head Start preschools aim to fight poverty, but their teachers struggle to make ends meet None - Teachers at Head Start child care centers are paid far less than public school teachers, even though they have similar credentials WASHINGTON -- In some ways, Doris Milton is a Head Start success story. She was a student in one of Chicago’s inaugural Head Start classes, when the antipoverty program, which aimed to help children succeed by providing them a first-rate preschool education, was in its infancy. Milton loved her teacher so much that she decided to follow in her footsteps. She now works as a Head Start teacher in Chicago. After four decades on the job, Milton, 63, earns $22.18 an hour. Her pay puts her above the poverty line, but she is far from financially secure. She needs a dental procedure she cannot afford, and she is paying down $65,000 of student loan debt from National Louis University, where she came within two classes of getting her bachelor's degree. She dropped out in 2019 when she fell ill. “I’m trying to meet their needs when nobody’s meeting mine,” Milton said of teaching preschoolers. Head Start teachers — 70% of whom have bachelor’s degrees — earn $39,000 a year on average, far less than public school teachers with similar credentials. President Joe Biden wants to raise their pay, but Congress has no plans to expand the Head Start budget. Many have left the job — about one in five teachers turned over in 2022 — for higher-paying positions at restaurants or in retail. But if Head Start centers are required to raise teacher pay without additional money, operators say they would have to cut how many kids they serve. The Biden administration says the program is already turning kids away because so many teachers have left, and not enough workers are lining up to take their places. And officials say it does not make sense for an anti-poverty program, where people of color make up 60% of the workforce, to underpay its employees. “We have some teachers who are making poverty wages themselves, which undermines the original intent of the program,” said Katie Hamm, a deputy assistant secretary in the Office of Early Childhood Development. Head Start, created as part of President Lyndon Johnson’s “war on poverty,” serves some of the neediest children, including those who are homeless, in foster care or come from households falling below the federal poverty line. With child care prices exceeding college tuition in many states, Head Start is the only option within financial reach for many families. The Department of Health and Human Services, which administers the program, estimates a pay hike would not have a huge effect on the number of children served because so many programs already struggle to staff all their classrooms. Altogether, Head Start programs receive enough funding to cover the costs of 755,000 slots. But many programs can't fully enroll because they don't have enough teachers. It's why the department estimates only about 650,000 of those slots are getting filled. The proposed change would force Head Start programs to downsize permanently because they would not be able to afford as many teachers. That worries Head Start leaders, even though many of them back raising pay for their employees, said Tommy Sheridan, deputy director for the National Head Start Association. The association asked the Biden administration to allow some programs to opt out of the requirements. “We love this idea, but it’s going to cost money,” Sheridan said. “And we don’t see Congress appropriating that money overnight.” While a massive cash infusion does not appear forthcoming, other solutions have been proposed. On Monday, the Biden administration published a letter urging school districts to direct more of the federal money they receive toward early learning, including Head Start. On Thursday, U.S. Reps. Mikie Sherrill, D-N.J., and Juan Ciscomani, R-Ariz., filed a bill that would allow Head Start to hire community college students who are working toward their associate degrees in child development. The stakes are perhaps highest for rural Head Starts. A program outside of Anchorage, Alaska, is closing one of its five sites while struggling with a shortage of workers. Program director Mark Lackey said the heart-wrenching decision allowed him to raise pay for the remaining workers in hopes of reducing staff turnover. “It hurts, and we don’t want to do it,” Lackey said. “But at the same time, it feels like it’s kind of necessary.” Overall, his program has cut nearly 100 slots because of a staffing shortage. And the population he serves is high-need: About half the children are homeless or in foster care. The Biden proposal could force the program to contract further. Amy Esser, the executive director of Mercer County Head Start in rural western Ohio, said it’s been difficult to attract candidates to fill a vacant teaching position because of the low pay. Starting pay at Celina City Schools is at least $5,000 more than at Head Start, and the jobs require the same credentials. But she warned hiking teacher pay could have disastrous consequences for her program, and for the broader community, which has few child care options for low-income households. “We would be cut to extinction,” Esser wrote in a letter to the Biden administration, “leaving children and families with little to no opportunity for a safe, nurturing environment to achieve school readiness.” Arlisa Gilmore, a longtime Head Start teacher in Tulsa, Oklahoma, said if it were up to her, she would not sacrifice any slots to raise teacher pay. She makes $25 an hour and acknowledges she’s lucky: She collects rental income from a home she owns and shares expenses with her husband. The children in her classroom are not so fortunate. “I don’t think they should cut classrooms,” Gilmore said. “We have a huge community of children that are in poverty in my facility.” Milton, the Chicago teacher, wonders why there has to be such a difficult trade-off at all. “Why can’t it be, ‘Let’s help both’? Why do we got to pick and choose?” Milton said. “Do we not deserve that? Don’t the kids deserve that?” ___ The Associated Press’ education coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.
Chicago 'mansion' tax to fund homeless services stuck in legal limbo while on the ballot None - An unusual legal challenge may upend the future of a Chicago ballot measure that would hike a real estate tax on high-end properties sales to pay for services for homeless people Chicago 'mansion' tax to fund homeless services stuck in legal limbo while on the ballot CHICAGO -- An unusual legal challenge may upend the future of a Chicago ballot measure that would hike a real estate tax on high-end property sales to fund services for homeless people. Such citywide ballot measures are rare in the nation's third-largest city, but other cities, including Los Angeles, have approved similar so-called “mansion taxes.” A Cook County judge last month rejected the measure, but backers of the effort, called Bring Chicago Home, hope it will be overturned. Early voting for the March 19 primary in Chicago has already started, so the measure remains on the ballot as it's being settled in the courts. Here’s a closer look at the ballot measure and the issues surrounding it. The referendum asks Chicago voters to support an increase on a transfer tax for properties over $1 million. It’s a one-time buyer's fee. Chicago's rate is currently 0.75% on all property sales. The proposal overhauls the tax structure: 2% for properties over $1 million, 3% on properties over $1.5 million and down to 0.6% on properties under $1 million. Most Chicago property sales are under $1 million, so the majority of home buyers will pay less. Analysis by the proponents shows roughly 95% of homebuyers would see a decrease. The Chicago area’s median sales price is roughly $350,000, according to the National Association of Realtors. A buyer would currently pay $2,625 to the city. That would drop to $2,100 under the new structure. Also, it's a marginal tax, meaning the increased rate applies to only the portion above $1 million. For example, on a $1.2 million property, $1 million would be taxed at 0.6% with the remaining at 2%. Currently, the buyer pays $9,000, which would jump to $10,000. Backers of Bring Chicago Home estimate the change will generate $100 million annually. It will be set aside solely for homeless services, including mental health care and job training. Chicago spends about $50 million of city funds for such services. Advocates say having a bigger dedicated funding source would make a huge difference, including for prevention. "It allows us to move the needle in a way we can’t do now,” said Doug Schenkelberg, executive director of the Chicago Coalition for the Homeless. Roughly 68,000 Chicagoans experience homelessness and racial disparities exist, according to the coalition. Roughly half are Black. The definition of homeless covers people without fixed addresses, whether they are sleeping on a friend’s couch or the streets. Brian Rodgers, 50, struggled with homelessness for years after serving time for a theft conviction. Not knowing where he was going to stay made it hard to find work. “It feels like you are off balance. It feels like you don’t know where or when it is time for you to leave or it is time for you to have a bed to sleep,” he said. “Unstable situations like that create unstable decisions.” About 17,000 of Chicago's homeless population, or 25%, are children. Electa Bey, 66, became homeless when her husband unexpectedly died from illness in 2019. They were evicted. It took months to find public housing for the four grandchildren she’s raising. Family took them in, but it was far from the children’s school. They spent more than two hours each way commuting on public transportation. “They couldn’t play with their friends. Their homework wasn’t always done They were falling asleep on trains and buses,” she said. “Children are affected so profoundly.” Real estate groups say the new tax will disproportionately affect commercial real estate as downtown recuperates from a coronavirus pandemic downturn. Vacancies in downtown offices reached a record high at the end of 2023 at 23.8%, according to CBRE Group Inc., a real estate services company. “We don’t think it’s right to penalize one industry, the real estate industry,” said Amy Masters of the Building Owners and Managers Association of Chicago, one of the groups that is suing. “We need to think about other ways that we can work together to support those who are unhoused.” They call the tax an unfair burden to Chicagoans and say the change will discourage business. After suing in January, a Cook County judge sided with them in February. There isn't much legal precedent in Chicago for ballot questions. For one, such binding citywide ballot initiatives are unusual in the city. The last one was in 1993 and focused on new ward maps, according to the Chicago Board of Elections. Real estate groups argue the proposed change violates state law because it’s asking voters to approve a tax cut and increase simultaneously. However, supporters have questioned how the lawsuit was filed. The lawsuit names the Chicago Board of Elections, which says it isn't the proper defendant. Instead, the board, which prints ballots, maintains it should be the city of Chicago, which put the question on the ballot with a City Council vote in November. Judge Kathleen Burke has rejected Chicago's effort to intervene, which would allow the city to join the lawsuit. The city and Board of Elections have each appealed. In the meantime, the judge’s written order says votes on the measure can’t be counted even as the question remains on the ballot. Those votes are sequestered until the measure is approved by the courts, even if that happens after the election. “Votes are still being collected,” said Max Bever, an elections board spokesman. “They won’t be tabulated, counted or made public at this moment.” The fate of the measure is high stakes for first-term Mayor Brandon Johnson, who championed the effort. “We firmly believe the referendum is legally sound and the final arbiter should be the voters of the city of Chicago,” Johnson’s office said in a statement after the judge’s ruling. Other cities have raised the so-called “mansion tax” with mixed results. In 2019, voters in suburban Evanston agreed to an increase from 0.5% to 0.7% on sales greater than $1.5 million and to 0.9% on sales over $5 million. Leaders there reported little impact on housing sales, noting a steady increase in revenues annually, which is being used in part for reparations to Black residents who faced decades of racist housing practices. Voters in Santa Fe, New Mexico, approved a referendum in November to support affordable housing initiatives. Los Angeles voters backed a similar measure in 2022. But it’s also under a legal challenge. Los Angeles’ measure includes a 4% tax on properties between $5 million and $10 million and a 5.5% tax on those over $10 million. It has generated less than anticipated and some blame it for a drop in luxury property sales. Backers in Chicago say they studied those referendums to determine the city’s proposed rates. “It’s an historic opportunity,” Bring Chicago Home spokesman Jose Sanchez said.
Inexpensive SUVs go toe-to-toe in an Edmunds review of the Chevrolet Trax and the Honda HR-V None - Chevrolet originally launched its Trax extra-small crossover SUV for the 2015 model year. It was inexpensive, yes, but that was just about the only compelling aspect about it. However, the new 2024 Chevrolet Trax kicks off the model’s second generation. The nameplate has undergone an astonishing transformation, going from a frumpy-looking hatchback on stilts to a sleek head-turner. But good looks alone don’t sell cars, and the Trax also needs to appeal to shoppers who favor space, feature content and value. One of the Trax’s biggest competitors is the 2024 Honda HR-V, which also recently entered its second generation. Does the redesigned Chevy have what it takes to challenge a class stalwart? The auto experts at Edmunds compare the two to find out which is the better buy. All 2024 Chevy Trax models get a new turbocharged 1.2-liter three-cylinder engine paired to a six-speed automatic transmission. You might think that means acceleration will be leisurely, but it’s actually not bad for the class. Zero to 60 mph took 9.1 seconds in Edmunds’ testing. That’s by no means fast but still quicker than the HR-V, which packs a 2.0-liter four-cylinder engine and took more than 10 seconds to reach the same speed. When it comes to handling, both SUVs perform similarly well and change direction quickly and predictably. They also ride pretty comfortably over bumps and ruts in the road. The HR-V is slightly better at shutting out wind and road noise, though you’ll still hear some at higher speeds. But the Honda falls short in the seat comfort department, with stiff front buckets with overly firm cushions. The Trax’s front seats are flat, offering little support when taking corners, but they’re nicely padded and comfortable for long drives. Winner: Trax Chevy didn’t need to make the interior of its least expensive vehicle attractive, but it went above and beyond the call of duty, giving the Trax a cabin that looks and feels like one from a more expensive car. The controls are laid out intuitively, and the standard 8-inch and available 11-inch touchscreens are big and easy to use. The Trax is roomy, too. There’s enough legroom and headroom for adults in the back seat, and cargo volume stands at an impressive 25.6 cubic feet, which is more than just about every other entry in the category. Storage throughout the rest of the car isn’t bad either, though there’s a conspicuous lack of cupholders or air vents for rear passengers. The interior in the HR-V is similarly chic and upscale for a subcompact crossover. The touchscreens are smaller — there’s a standard 7-inch touchscreen or optional 9-inch screen — but they’re easy to navigate, and all the controls are arranged thoughtfully. The cabin is also spacious, offering a surprising amount of room in both rows. Cargo space comes in slightly below the Trax at 24.4 cubic feet, but storage for small items is a little better. There are door pockets that can accommodate water bottles and a center console compartment that’s good for stowing your smartphone. You also get cupholders for your rear passengers’ drinks, though rear air vents aren’t available here either. Winner: tie Both vehicles come with an interior that’s nicer than you’d expect from an extra-small SUV, but the Trax is remarkable for offering that interior at such a low price point. Including destination, the Trax starts at $21,495 for a base LS trim, more than $4,400 less than the cheapest Honda HR-V, which starts at $25,950. Trax buyers will miss out on all-wheel drive, which isn’t offered as an option, but they get a better powertrain than the anemic four-cylinder found in the HR-V. The standard and available advanced driver aids are also a little better in the Trax. Edmunds found the Chevy’s adaptive cruise control easy to operate, and the system kept up with traffic without leaving a large gap between the car in front. The HR-V’s adaptive cruise control, on the other hand, was slow to accelerate and too eager to stop. The blind-spot warning system also issued alerts when vehicles in the next lane weren’t particularly close. Neither car offers onboard navigation, relying instead on smartphone integration for that task. The Trax has a slight technology edge as it comes with bigger touchscreens plus standard wireless connectivity for Apple CarPlay and Android Auto smartphone integration — Honda only adds wireless connectivity to the top HR-V trim level. Winner: Trax The Chevy Trax is a compelling small crossover that goes big on interior quality, space and value. Honda’s HR-V does little wrong but it’s been upstaged in this contest. The Trax is the better buy. _____ This story was provided to The Associated Press by the automotive website Edmunds. Alex Nishimoto is a contributor at Edmunds.