Parenting Woes, Student Loans, Retirement, & Corn Sweat
August 29, 2024
Hello, readers – happy Thursday! Today, we’ll be talking about the woes of parenting (or not), the West Bank, a U.K.-Germany treaty, Germany’s immigration, student loans, 401(k)s, and corn sweat.
Here’s some good news: Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library book giveaway program, which hopes to improve literacy for children, has expanded to 21 states, allowing all children under the age of 5 can enroll to have books mailed to their homes monthly. Also, salmon will soon have free passage along the Klamath River and its tributaries for the first time in over a century thanks to a dam removal project.
“Keep your face always toward the sunshine – and shadows will fall behind you.” – Walt Whitman
More Mud On His Mud-Caked Mug
JD Vance just can’t stop getting his dirty laundry aired out. This time, the Republican vice presidential nominee was caught criticizing more people for not having children, including “leaders on the left” and Randi Weingarten, the president of the American Federation of Teachers.
“Randi Weingarten, who’s the head of the most powerful teachers’ union in the country, she doesn’t have a single child. If she wants to brainwash and destroy the minds of children, she should have some of her own and leave ours the hell alone,” Vance said during a 2021 speaking event at the Center for Christian Virtue.
Meanwhile, a new report from Surgeon General Vivek Murthy shows that four in 10 U.S. parents say they’re so stressed they can’t function most days, with two-thirds of all American parents saying they’re in some form of financial distress. While the Harris campaign has put forth a solid platform showing it would set up thousands of dollars worth of tax credits for parents, the Trump campaign has yet to announce any real plans for making parenting easier.
What’s Happening In The West Bank
Yesterday, the IDF carried out large-scale raids on multiple targets in the West Bank, killing at least 10 Hamas fighters. The operations were focused on the city of Jenin, long known as a militant stronghold.
Meanwhile, the U.S. announced sanctions against various Israeli settler groups in the West Bank for their continued (and state-backed) acts of violence against Palestinians. One group, Hashomer Yosh, allegedly attempted to seize control over a Palestinian village after its residents were evacuated. Another sanctioned individual “led a group of armed settlers to set up roadblocks and conduct patrols to pursue and attack Palestinians in their lands and forcefully expel them from their lands.” Israel responded with venom to the sanctions, stating that it “views with utmost severity the imposition of sanctions on citizens of Israel. The issue is in a pointed discussion with the US.”
The On-Again, Off-Again European Romance
- On Wednesday, the U.K. and Germany agreed to hammer out the details of a wide-ranging treaty that would mark a reset of British relations with the E.U. The deal would encompass various areas including trade and defense, but U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer has emphasized that the deal most definitely does not mean the U.K. is looking to undo Brexit.
- In a joint press conference with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, Starmer said that achieving economic growth was his government’s “number one mission,” and that “building relationships with our partners here in Germany and across Europe is vital to achieving it.” The two countries said they expect to sign the cooperation agreement “by early next year,” and a new defense agreement between the powers is expected to be signed by next July as well.
Deutschland In Dire Straits
- Germany is facing a massive skilled labor shortage. Experts say that the country will need to hire about 400,000 skilled immigrants each year to maintain its economy, thanks to demographic decline and a shrinking workforce. Unfortunately, some parts of German society don’t care what the experts say. The far-right AfD party, which has focused on whipping up anti-immigrant sentiment to boost its support base, has garnered a massive amount of support, especially from rural Germans.
- “Even when there are no majorities so far, there are considerable minorities who vote for the AfD, either to express their protest or to openly express anti-immigration and anti-liberal positions,” said one German policy researcher. According to a recent poll of over 900 German firms, a majority of companies see the AfD as a risk to their workforces and garnering new investments in Germany. Recently, the International Monetary Fund rated Germany as the world’s worst-performing developed economy, adding to the economic worries in Berlin. The solution? Nobody knows, but it probably doesn’t involve scaring off immigrants looking for work.
More Mixed Nuts
- Biden aims for farewell call with China’s Xi Jinping (Politico)
- Telegram CEO Pavel Durov transferred to French court for ‘possible indictment’ (NPR)
- A Russian missile hits the Ukrainian president’s home city as it mourns deaths in an earlier attack (AP)
- Namibia plans to kill more than 700 animals including elephants and hippos — and distribute the meat (CNN)
- Maduro opponents take to streets to revive protests disputing Venezuelan election results (ABC)
- Stolen photos of European influencers used to push Trump propaganda on X (CNN)
The Supreme Court Won’t SAVE Us
- Yesterday, the Supreme Court turned down a request from the Biden administration to reinstate Saving on a Valuable Education (SAVE), a student loan repayment plan that allows for lower monthly payments and a faster journey to loan forgiveness. There were no noted dissents in the brief order.
- The ruling won’t impact those already enrolled in the program – about 8 million people – and the Department of Education had already placed the borrowers in an interest-free forbearance last month. Still, given the emphasis placed by the Biden-Harris ticket on student loan forgiveness in 2020, this might cast a shadow on the 2024 Harris-Walz ticket.
Almost 500K 401(k) Millionaires
- Retirement saving is one of those “I’d rather wait to think about it” topics for many of us, but maybe this story will give you some encouragement: a new data analysis released Wednesday by Fidelity Investments found that the number of so-called 401(k) ‘millionaires’ rose to a new record high in the second quarter of the year.
- As of June 30, nearly half a million 401(k) accounts (497,000) had balances of $1 million or more, up 2.5% from the prior quarter. Things aren’t terrible for the rest of us, either – Fidelity found that participants’ average savings rate was 14.2% of their income in the second quarter, on par with where it was in the prior quarter.
- Here’s some not-so-good news: among all Gen Xers – the oldest of whom will retire in about a decade – with a 401(k), regardless of how long they’ve saved, the average balance was $182,100 and the median balance was just $55,500. Maybe one of the millionaires can loan them some cash?
More Nuts In America
- RFK Jr. won’t be able to remove himself from ballots in Michigan and Wisconsin (NBC)
- Trump charged in superseding indictment in election interference case following SCOTUS ruling (ABC)
- Heat dome brings extreme temps and humidity to the East, prompting early school dismissals (NBC)
- Michael Sparks: First January 6 rioter to breach US Capitol is sentenced to more than 4 years in prison (CNN)
- Teen arrested in first violation of New York county’s controversial mask ban (NBC)
- Trump, without evidence, blames Biden and Harris for assassination attempt (Guardian)
Corn Sweats Make The Midwest Wet
- Corn, like many other plants, can sweat. Plant sweat, also known as transpiration, can increase when temperatures get too hot or the atmosphere gets too dry. In the American Midwest, where most of the country’s corn is produced, corn sweat in the late summer can actually cause spikes in humidity as the heat makes the rolling fields of corn start to perspire more. While most Midwesterners are used to the concept, humidity from corn sweat is becoming more and more impactful thanks to – you guessed it – climate change.
- Thanks to global warming, the Midwest is experiencing higher temperatures and warmer nights, allowing the atmosphere to hold more moisture. Warmer weather also allows farmers to plant corn further north, meaning more and more farmland is being turned into corn fields. In some places, hot weather has combined with corn sweat to push dew points as high as 70 or 80 degrees Fahrenheit, meaning things are so humid that water begins condensing even at around midday summer temperatures. That humidity, combined with high temperatures, can push heat indices (basically how hot it feels outside) as high as 105 to 115 degrees F.
More Loose Nuts
- Google’s custom AI chatbots have arrived (The Verge)
- ‘Injured’ Missouri bald eagle actually ‘too fat to fly’ after gorging on raccoon (Guardian)
- After months on the run, a murder suspect falls through the ceiling and into custody (NPR)
- ‘I couldn’t believe it was my son who did it’: boy, 4, smashes bronze age jar in Israel museum (Guardian)
- NASA has to be trolling with the latest cost estimate of its SLS launch tower (Ars Technica)
Team Thoughts
Kayli – I’m choosing to read the retirement savings story as “inspirational” rather than “panic-inducing.”
Marcus – I didn’t realize that Germany’s immigration situation was this bad until I saw the IMF report, but most other European countries will likely have to deal with the same problem in the near future anyway.
