If you’ve been watching the Major League Baseball postseason, you’ve probably been thinking what most of us have: What’s that Strauss decal on the players’ helmets?

MLB is historically and notoriously resistant to change—that is, until the past few years under Commissioner Rob Manfred. During Manfred’s tenure, the league has implemented rule changes to speed up the game and make it more exciting and has leaned into social media and “highlight” culture to engage younger audiences, all with significant results, including setting attendance, viewership, engagement, and revenue records in 2023 and pacing ahead in several key metrics for 2024.

The Strauss logo is the next in that line of big changes.

Strauss is a German workwear brand that first became available in the U.S. late last year. MLB announced a partnership in September with the brand to advertise on postseason gear through 2027. But unless you read MLB press releases in your spare time, you likely didn’t see it until the logo debuted in this year’s postseason.

Less than two weeks into the campaign, it’s unknown how much Strauss paid for the sponsorship, but it’s already reaping the benefits.

Strauss, for the win

The Strauss decal debuted during the most-watched MLB Wild Card round ever, with ratings soaring 25% above last year’s figures. This generated nearly $800,000 in media value from live game telecasts alone, according to media intelligence firm Hive, per Sportico. Strauss decals were also added to MLB The Show 24 last week, adding to the brand’s presence, while social media exposure added another $214,000 in media value to the pot.

And that’s just the beginning. Depending on how many games are played this postseason, Hive projects Strauss could score a total of roughly $17 million in media value across TV and digital platforms by the end of the playoffs.

With four teams from MLB’s top five media markets represented in this year’s postseason—and with New York and Los Angeles still alive—along with superstars like Shohei Ohtani and Aaron Judge still in action, the draw could not have worked out better for Strauss.

A (brief) history of MLB gear sponsorships

In 2023, the San Diego Padres became the first team in the MLB’s nearly 120-year history to sell an area of its uniform to a sponsor when they added a Motorola patch to their sleeve. This came on the heels of the most recent collective bargaining agreement, which opened the door for jersey sponsorships in an effort to increase deal volume and revenue across the league.

Since then, 23 of MLB’s 30 teams have signed uniform patch deals. The league average for patches is roughly $7 million to $8 million per year, with the Boston Red Sox commanding $17 million and the New York Yankees and Toronto Blue Jays landing the largest deals in the low-to-mid $20 million range, according to The Athletic. Sponsors range from Motorola to MassMutual, Kroger, ADT, QuikTrip, and more.

As far back as 2021, MLB itself dipped into the sponsored patch game, becoming the first major sports league to partner with a cryptocurrency exchange company. This deal added sponsored patches to umpires’ uniform sleeves.

One problem . . . the sponsor was FTX, which was later revealed as a crypto Ponzi scheme orchestrated by founder Sam Bankman-Fried. The league pulled the patches before the 2023 season. This is just another reason MLB has eased into this new era of gear sponsorships.

Now, it appears to be picking up steam.

What’s next in MLB sponsorships

The Strauss decal isn’t going away once the postseason ends. It will remain on helmets during MLB’s postseason through 2027 as part of its four-year partnership. It will also don the helmets of all 120 Minor League Baseball clubs for the entire regular season beginning in 2025, as well as MLB helmets for all games played in Europe in the next three years.

It’s the next step in MLB catching up to other major American sports leagues, which have just caught up to their European counterparts that have featured sponsors on jerseys for decades.

After years of hesitation, the NBA led the charge in 2017-18, followed by the NHL in 2022-23 and MLB in 2023-24. The moves are already paying dividends, as team sponsorship revenue has grown 7% year-over-year for the NBA and 10% for the NHL this past season, according to data from SponsorUnited, via Modern Retail.

As American leagues continue to embrace this new revenue stream, expect to see more creative sponsorship integrations that balance tradition with financial opportunity. It’s unlikely that MLB—or any major American sports league—will go the international football route and replace team names on the fronts of jerseys with sponsors, or roll out NASCAR-like uniforms crowded with brands. The reality will likely land somewhere in between. Either way, it’s a trend that’s not going away any time soon.

As an award-winning scientist, Peter Dodge had made hundreds of flights into the eyes of hurricanes—almost 400. On Tuesday, a crew on a reconnaissance flight into Hurricane Milton helped him make one more, dropping his ashes into the storm as a lasting tribute to the longtime National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration radar specialist and researcher.

“It’s very touching,” Dodge’s sister, Shelley Dodge, said in an interview Thursday with the Associated Press. “We knew it was a goal of NOAA to make it happen.”

The ashes were released into the eye of the hurricane Tuesday night, less than 24 hours before Milton made landfall in Siesta Key near Sarasota, Florida. An in-flight observations log, which charts information such as position and wind speed, ended with a reference to Dodge’s 387th—and final—flight.

“He’s loved that aspect of his job,” Shelley Dodge said. “It’s bittersweet. On one hand, a hurricane’s coming and you don’t want that for people. But on the other hand, I really wanted this to happen.”

Dodge died in March 2023 at age 72 of complications from a fall and a stroke, his sister said.

The Miami resident spent 44 years in federal service. Among his awards were several for technology used to study Hurricane Katrina’s destructive winds in 2005.

He also was part of the crew aboard a reconnaissance flight into Hurricane Hugo in 1989 that experienced severe turbulence and saw one of its four engines catch fire.

“They almost didn’t get out of the eye,” Shelley Dodge said.

Items inside the plane were torn loose and tossed about the cabin. After dumping excess fuel and some heavy instruments to enable the flight to climb further, an inspection found no major damage to the plane and it continued on. The plane eventually exited the storm with no injuries to crew members, according to NOAA.

A degenerative eye disorder eventually prevented Dodge from going on further reconnaissance flights.

Shelley Dodge said NOAA had kept her informed on when her brother’s final mission would occur and she relayed the information to relatives.

“There were various times where they thought all the pieces were going to fall in place but it had to be the right combination, the research flight. All of that had to come together,” she said. “It finally did on the 8th. I didn’t know for sure until they sent me the official printout that showed exactly where it happened in the eye.”

Dodge had advanced expertise in radar technology with a keen interest in tropical cyclones, according to a March 2023 newsletter by NOAA’s Atlantic Oceanographic and Meteorological Laboratory announcing his death.

He collaborated with the National Hurricane Center and Aircraft Operations Center on airborne and land-based radar research. During hurricane aircraft missions, he served as the onboard radar scientist and conducted radar analyses. Later, he became an expert in radar data processing, the newsletter said.

Dodge’s ashes were contained in a package. Among the symbols draped on it was the flag of Nepal, where he spent time as a Peace Corps volunteer teaching math and science to high school students before becoming a meteorologist.

An avid gardener, Dodge also had a fondness for bamboo and participated in the Japanese martial art Aikido, attending a session the weekend before he died.

“He just had an intellectual curiosity that was undaunted, even after he lost his sight,” Shelley Dodge said.

—By John Raby, Associated Press

Rafael Nadal’s tennis career will be remembered because of the numbers, yes—the 14 French Open trophies, the 22 Grand Slam titles overall, the nearly two decades in the top 10, and so on—and, without a doubt, because of his riveting rivalries with Roger Federer and Novak Djokovic.

Also, indelibly, because of the all-out effort and energy Nadal brought to the court every time. So long, that is, as his body allowed. His style of play was so rigorous and unforgiving that it contributed to a series of injuries over the years (even his Roland Garros debut as a teen was delayed 12 months, and his last triumph there came thanks only to painkilling injections).

Perhaps not surprisingly, it was his health that eventually forced Nadal to announce his retirement on Thursday after competing only sparingly the past two seasons. If anything, it is remarkable that he lasted as long as he did; the 38-year-old Nadal said his farewell will come next month when he represents Spain in the Davis Cup finals.

“Really, everything I have experienced has been a dream come true,” Nadal said in a video posted on social media that included a montage of clips from his career, including handshakes at the net after matches against Federer and Djokovic, the other members of the so-called Big Three of men’s tennis. “I leave with the absolute peace of mind of having given my best.”

Before Nadal begins speaking in the video, he takes a deep breath and exhales, as if signifying just how difficult it was for him to make this inevitable decision public and real.

His exit follows that of Federer, who left the game at age 41 in 2022 after 20 Grand Slam titles and plenty of remarkable on-court contests against Nadal, none more noteworthy than their 2008 Wimbledon final. Nadal won that one, 9-7 in the fifth set amid the dying evening light, part of the left-hander’s supremacy head-to-head. Nadal and Djokovic, who is 37 and still on tour with 24 major championships, met more times than any other two men in the Open era (60; Djokovic went 31-29), and their lung-searing, court-covering, mirror-image relentlessness was something to behold.

“Your tenacity, dedication, fighting spirit is going to be taught for decades. Your legacy will live forever. Only you know what you had to endure to become an icon of tennis and sport in general,” Djokovic wrote on social media, aptly capturing Nadal’s essence. “Thank you for pushing me to the very limit so many times in our rivalry that has impacted me the most as a player.”

Djokovic promised to be in Malaga, Spain, to see Nadal’s “adios” in Davis Cup.

Wouldn’t be surprising if Federer is there, too, as a spectator. After all, Nadal was there for Federer’s last match: They teamed together in doubles at the Laver Cup, and who could forget the image of the two of them sitting side-by-side afterward, holding hands while tears flowed for both.

“What a career, Rafa! I always hoped this day would never come,” Federer posted Thursday. “Thank you for the unforgettable memories and all your incredible achievements in the game we love. It’s been an absolute honor!”

A few months after that Laver Cup, Nadal hurt his hip and eventually would have surgery in June 2023. He kept trying to come back, seeking the form that once made him as feared by opponents as any player, particularly on red clay. Others respected, and admired, his heavy topspin forehand, his returns of serve, his two-handed backhand, and, above all, his indefatigable nature. They also found his humility inspiring.

“Your legacy won’t be matched,” Carlos Alcaraz, who is widely seen as Nadal’s heir in Spanish tennis, said on social media.

Nothing about Nadal, of course, stands out as much as his unparalleled French Open résumé—which is why a larger-than-life steel statue of him was erected outside Court Philippe Chatrier in 2021. He went 112-4 in the Slam held at Roland Garros, with titles arriving in 2005-08, 2010-14, 2017-20 and 2022.

During a news conference at his tennis academy in Manacor, Spain, in May 2023, Nadal said he would miss that year’s trip to Paris, the first time he sat out the tournament since entering it for the first time—and, naturally, claiming the championship—in 2005, just two days after turning 19.

“You can’t keep demanding more and more from your body, because there comes a moment when your body raises a white flag,” Nadal said in Manacor. “Even though your head wants to keep going, your body says this is as far it goes.”

He reached that point Thursday.

—By Howard Fendrich, Associated Press tennis writer

Associated Press writer Joseph Wilson contributed to this report.

When we talk about email tools, we typically talk about apps or services that help you tame the wild jungle of your ever-overflowing inbox.

Today’s tool is a twist. It’s about email, through and through—but it’s actually a smart new service that adds something to that environment.

And as counterintuitive as that may sound, it’s become one of the best and most useful additions my rusty ol’ inbox has seen in ages.

Psst: If you love these types of tools as much as I do, check out my free Cool Tools newsletter from The Intelligence. You’ll be the first to find all sorts of simple tech treasures!

No listening required

All right—so, see if you can relate to this:

In theory, I enjoy podcasts.

I reality, I rarely have the time to keep up with all the interesting-seeming podcasts I encounter—both regular shows I enjoy for pleasure-based listening and random audio interviews I run into that seem like they could be enlightening in some way.

The problem, for me, is I generally find it to be faster, more efficient, and all-around easier to read something than to listen to it. Listening is a luxury. I like it—I just rarely have the time to do it, especially considering the endless mountains of material I’d ideally want to beam into my ears.

➜ And that, m’dearie, is precisely where a tastily named service called ​PodSnacks​ comes into play.

PodSnacks has actually been around for a while. I remember looking at it a couple of years back, when it was a simple newsletter​ with handpicked snippets from different podcasts each week.

I lost track of the service for some time and then recently rediscovered it—and discovered it had pivoted to a whole new focus within that same general domain.

✨ Now PodSnacks relies on AI to programmatically generate summaries of the specific podcasts you’re interested in—and then email those summaries to you each and every time a new episode arrives.

It’s one of the rare cases when artificial intelligence is actually being used in a thoughtful way that adds something valuable to a product instead of just awkwardly being tacked on for the sake of marketing.

⌚ And it couldn’t be much easier to use, either. In fact, you’ll need only about two minutes to get your personal PodSnacks menu up and running:

• First, open up the PodSnacks website​ in any browser, on any device you’re using.
• Click or tap the Get Started for Free button at the top of the screen.
• Select whatever podcasts you want to keep up with—either by tapping them in the selections that show up initially or by using the category chips or search box at the top of the screen to find exactly what’s on your mind.

Once you’ve got everything you want selected, click the Confirm button at the top of that same screen.

You’ll then have to enter your email address, so the site can send you the summaries you want as they become available. And you’ll have to look for and click on a onetime verification email to confirm your address.

From that point forward, anytime one of the shows you selected has a new episode available, you’ll get a simple, single email with all the high points from the entire episode—along with a link to scan, search, or read through a complete transcript, if you’re so inclined.

It’s a handy way to keep up with all sorts of info you’d otherwise end up missing. Even when you do find the time to listen, it’s a nice little preview and heads-up of what’s on the way.

• PodSnacks exists primarily over email, with the initial sign-up and setup taking place on the web​. You don’t download or install anything, and it works in a completely device- and platform-agnostic way.
• The service is free for up to 25 podcasts per email address—which oughta be plenty for most people. If you want summaries for even more different shows, you can bump up to 50 for $10 a month.
• PodSnacks does inevitably require your email address in order to do what it needs to do, but the company doesn’t share or sell info in any shady-seeming way. In all the weeks I’ve been using it, I’ve yet to receive a single email beyond the show-specific summaries I requested.

Hungry for more efficiency-elevating goodness? Check out my free Cool Tools newsletter for an instant introduction to an AI-powered supertool that transcribes your brain—and a new off-the-beaten-path gem every Wednesday!

How do we acquire wisdom? We start by acquiring knowledge. But we can’t stop there, any more than we can build a Maserati by simply extracting iron ore from the earth. We acquire wisdom through the refinement of knowledge, but also the refinement of ourselves.

That’s the message outlined in the classic philosophical treatise Ethics of Fathers. In one foundational teaching, the sages of ancient Judea exhort us to develop 48 distinct attitudes and practices in our pursuit of higher wisdom.  The list includes the following: 

Love people, love charity, love uprightness, and love rebuke. 

The first three are self-evident. We can all appreciate the virtue of loving our fellow human beings, of cultivating compassion for those in need, and for aspiring to act honestly and justly in every aspect of our personal conduct. 

But how many of us love rebuke? Do we honestly look forward to criticism, even when we ask for it? Are we not inclined to lash back defensively when anyone, no matter how well-intentioned, presumes to find fault with us? 

Intellectually, we know that we need correction if we want to improve. The music teacher shows us how to finger the keys or draw the bow across the strings. The fitness trainer warns us against overstraining our muscles when we work out.  The tennis coach guides us to perfect our backswing. 

Why is it so difficult for us to accept even gentle guidance to improve our learning style, business performance, or personal character? 

Perhaps the problem is with the language we use. Rebuke seems to focus on what we have done wrong. What we need is a better way to communicate the message of how we can do better looking ahead. 

Fortunately, there is a useful synonym for rebuke, and it is our current entry into the Ethical Lexicon: 

Reprove (re·prove/ ri-proov) verb 

To express disapproval or censure in response to improper behavior. 

At first glance, this doesn’t seem to solve our problem, since dictionary definitions of reprove and rebuke are virtually identical. If so, what’s the difference between them? 

Consider the respective etymologies.  Rebuke comes from the old French for beat or cut down, implying shame, defeat, and disgrace.  In contrast, reprove suggests a second chance to prove our quality or ability.  Indeed, the Hebrew for reprove shares the root meaning of validate – to reassure, make good, and rise above. 

Often, the ease with which we receive reproof has more to do with how it is given.  When the intent is clearly for our benefit when the one giving reproof offers it in a way that projects genuine concern for our welfare and desire to guide us toward self-improvement, we’re much more likely to not only accept criticism but even appreciate it. 

Of course, we aren’t in control of how others choose to communicate their suggestions to us.  But we can be more thoughtful about how we convey uncomfortable information to others. 

First, choose the right time and place: Criticism should always be given in private, and at a moment when the receiver is not pressed for time, harried, or distracted.  It is best eased into by asking permission: “Would it be okay if I discussed a matter that needs attention?” 

Second, give the receiver an opportunity for self-reflection:  Even a simple “why” question might be interpreted as an attack: “Why did you do that?” can imply blame, no matter how gently it is asked. Instead, you might try: “I noticed that you did such-and-such.  Could you help me understand your intention?” 

Third, focus on the future rather than the past: “If next time you handled the situation this way, do you think that might produce a better outcome?” 

Either implicitly or explicitly, we need to make every effort to communicate confidence in both attitude and aptitude as well as appreciation for commitment to the job.  Others will naturally respond to positive expectations; conveying a sense of shared higher purpose provides a worthy goal that is encouraging and aspirational. 

We can use the same techniques in our self-talk. Beating ourselves up over mistakes might be better than making excuses for ourselves. But better still is talking ourselves up by committing to do better next time and contemplating just how to make that happen. 

By reproving ourselves and others the right way, we contribute to a culture in which every misstep sets the stage for us to prove that we can recover from failure and move steadily forward on the road to success.  

To-do lists, time-blocking, and Pomodoro sprints are all great techniques for getting things done. The best productivity tool, however, may be staring back at you in the mirror. It’s cultivating a sense of self-reliance, and it’s a powerful method for moving forward, says Maha Abouelenein, author of 7 Rules of Self-Reliance: How to Stay Low, Keep Moving, Invest in Yourself, and Own Your Future.

“Self-reliance is a superpower,” Abouelenein explains. “It’s about giving yourself the tools and the skills to succeed in your personal life and your professional life. For example, I rely on myself to educate myself. I rely on myself to create the right opportunities. It’s making yourself valuable and resourceful so that you can bring value to others.”

Self-reliance, however, isn’t always our default system. Most of us tend to expect things from others, Abouelenein says. For instance, you might expect your employer to make decisions that are in your best interest or to define your pathway to growth. 

“Give yourself a competitive advantage by relying on yourself instead of expecting people to do things for you,” says Abouelenein. “Take the driver’s seat and push yourself forward to create value.”

Here’s how you can become more self-reliant to get more done:

Stay Low and Keep Moving

One of Abouelenein’s rules of self-reliance is “stay low and keep moving.” This philosophy helps you better manage your time. 

“If you’re sitting in front of your inbox all day just fielding incoming emails, those are priorities that are important to other people,” she says. “They interrupt and disrupt your day.” 

Distractions are a normal part of work and in life. When you become more self-reliant, though, you understand the importance of ruthlessly setting your own priorities and focusing on your goals. You understand that if you constantly bend to everyone else’s wishes, you do so at the expense of your own.

“Keep your head down and put on blinders to work hard and put in effort,” says Abouelenein. “There will be setbacks. Keep moving through them so that your productivity can be focused on the big goals that you want to achieve.”

Move from ‘Waiter’ to ‘Creator’

Early in her career, someone told Abouelenein that she was a “waiter,” meaning she was too reliant on others. It opened her eyes on what it takes to build your dream life.

“I was assuming people would see my work, my value, and my worth and good opportunities would just land in my lap,” she says. “I discovered very quickly that you can either be a waiter—waiting for people to invest in you, promote you, and put your career in overdrive—or you can be a creator, creating opportunities by building great relationships, getting access to information, building your personal brand, and learning to add value for others.”

Instead of waiting for others to bring you what you want, Abouelenein recommends being proactive and taking initiative. Rely on yourself instead of others when it comes to what’s important. And don’t be afraid to take charge, make decisions, and share your accomplishments. 

Understand Your Gaps

Self-reliance isn’t about going it alone all the time. It’s also having self-awareness of the things you’re good at and the gaps you need to fill, says Abouelenein. This isn’t about expecting others to do things for you. It’s about mutually beneficial relationships with other value creators. 

“Self-reliant people come to the table having skills, having knowledge, and having something to offer a value,” she explains. “You have to rely on other people to help with gaps because nobody gets anywhere alone.” 

When building relationships, focus on the long-term. Instead of thinking in transactions, such as “I will do this for you, so you will do that for me,” add value first, leading with goodwill and good intentions. 

“Do goodwill and good intention first,” says Abouelenein. “Add value first and see how that plays out. Bring value to multiple parties, because that’s good for your reputation. It’s good for your relationships, and it might be a long-term move to get you future business opportunities with one or both of those parties.” 

Learn, Unlearn, Relearn

Finally, being self-reliant means being a lifelong learner. “What do you need to unlearn that’s no longer serving you?” asks Abouelenein. “What do you need to relearn? What do you need to do to invest in yourself? It’s not up to your employer to make you smarter and stronger. It’s up to you.”

For example, Abouelenein suggests attending events, learning from others through mentoring or formal education, listening to podcasts, and reading books. When you seek new information and are willing to change yourself and your way of working, the world becomes a place of opportunities instead of obstacles. 

“Times are changing,” says Abouelenein. “Make sure that you’re up to speed to stay relevant. Investing in yourself will lead to more happiness, new ideas, and a greater sense of purpose and power.”

When you become self-reliant, you’ll have the attitude you need to stick to your plan, maintain relentless focus, and move forward faster. You’ll prioritize action and stop wasting time on things that don’t matter.

Sometime in the mid 1980s, my stepfather was in need of a 15mm socket. At Sears, he discovered that it would cost about $8 to purchase the specific socket he needed. But a 299-piece socket set cost him about $200. He proudly pointed to the 15mm socket in his new set and told us it had only cost him 67¢. This was my earliest introduction to “spaving”–although no one called it that at the time.

Spaving–a portmanteau of spending and saving–describes the act of spending more money in order to save money. If you’ve ever added an item you didn’t really want to an online order so you could qualify for free shipping, then you have given spaving a try.

Situations like the great socket wrench conundrum of 1986 may seem to clearly exhibit more spending than saving behavior. (Though to be fair, my stepdad still has the “new” set, which was nicer and more durable than his old socket wrench kit.)

But how do you know when spending more to save money is a good idea and when it’s just parting you from more of your money? Here’s what you need to know about making the right spaving decisions for your budget.

Why spaving feels good

There’s a reason why my stepdad came home with 298 more parts than he was looking for: it irritated him to spend nearly $10 for a part that probably cost pennies to manufacture. By spending $200 on an entire set–which got him the part he needed for less than 70 cents–he felt like he was getting his money’s worth and being a savvy consumer.

This is exactly what marketers are going for when they set pricing that encourages buying more to save more. Making a purchase already gives our brains a hit of dopamine. But adding a splash of self-congratulation for making a “money-saving” financial decision can short-circuit the part of our brains that reminds us that $200 > $8.

These pricing schemes also trigger your fear of making the wrong financial decision. Online retailers share the exact dollar amount you need to spend to qualify for shipping (or bonus points or a gift-with-purchase) to get you to worry that you’re losing money if you refuse the deal. So you buy something you don’t need to feel like you’re putting one over on the retailer–which you are not, unfortunately.

Sales events tend to trigger spaving

The insidious nature of spaving is why sales like Black Friday can be such budget-killers. You may not have even realized that various sale items existed, but the fact that they are offered at deep discounts tempts you to pull out your wallet. You are being led astray by your brain’s reward center and not giving full thought to whether you need another gaming console.

Even financial experts fall victim to this. Just this week, I was distracted from an Amazon search for shampoo by the Prime Day deals on new Kindle readers. My old device no longer holds a charge, and Amazon helpfully let me know I could get an additional 20% off plus a $5 gift card, on top of the discounted prices for new Kindles, if I returned my old one. Even though I much prefer to read physical books, I took the deal and patted myself on the back for saving 60 bucks–by spending $110.

When does spaving make sense?

Though spaving is usually just a marketing trick, there are times when you actually can use this strategy to your advantage. Specifically, if you are already planning to make a purchase that aligns with a deal.

For example, my kids both needed new shoes, so we went shoe shopping at a store offering a buy-one-get-one-half-off deal. Both of the kids got the new kicks they needed and I saved money on the transaction. But if only one of my kids had outgrown his shoes, it would have been better to ignore the BOGO deal, because we may have gotten carried away with the idea of saving money and bought a second pair of shoes we didn’t need.

If you already have the intention of buying the number of items (or spending the amount of money) to get the deal, then spaving really can help your bottom line. But if it didn’t occur to you to add the extra items to your cart until you realized that buying more meant saving more, then back away slowly from the deal. You want to be making these decisions, not the marketers.

Spending and saving should be distinct categories

The human brain is easily distracted by dopamine, self-congratulation, and the fear of missing a deal–not to mention shiny new sockets. Which is why it’s smart to decouple the idea of spending from saving, because we’re just not wired to make the best decisions when we combine them.

To keep your money in your wallet, avoid sales events, which can trigger spaving behavior, and commit to only taking advantage of deals if they coincide with purchases you already planned.

Coincidentally, this is also the best way to avoid being teased about 15mm sockets for 40 years.

How do you account for the hours in a day? Even when my workday isn’t consumed by meetings, I often look up and feel surprised to find that it’s already afternoon and I don’t have nearly as many things crossed off of my to-do list as I planned. Distraction is a big culprit. The constant pings of emails and Slack notifications certainly feel like work, but I’m usually left with little to show for attending to them.

Over the years, I’ve found a few things that work for me when I need to focus: instrumental music in big headphones, shutting off notifications and using a timer to stay on task, and taking a 10-minute walk outside.

Here are a few ways to figure out your personal productivity style:

Figure out your cognitive style

Fast Company contributor and business consultant Carson Tate says there are four distinct productivity styles: Prioritizer, Planner, Arranger, and Visualizer.

1. Prioritizers prefer logical, analytical, fact-based, critical, and realistic thinking. A Prioritizer is at their best when processing data and solving complex problems.
    
2. Planners like organized, sequential, planned, and detail-oriented thinking. They budget the time required to complete projects, organize tasks, create detailed project plans, and complete work ahead of deadlines. 
   
3. Arrangers prefer supportive, expressive, and emotional thinking. An Arranger likes to partner with people to get work done and is good at building relationships, and selling ideas. 
   
4. Visualizers think strategically about projects and can manage multiple ideas simultaneously. They see the big picture and don’t want to spend time on the details. They can serve as a catalyst for change, brainstorm solutions to problems, and drive innovation.

Knowing your strengths and weaknesses can help you figure out the best way to work, both on your own and with your colleagues. 

Get the timing right

According to neuroscientists, your brain goes through 90-minute active cycles, so they suggest scheduling a work session for that length of time. Then within those 90 minutes, you can break down your time further:

• First 20 minutes: Perform the hardest tasks in the first 20 minutes. This is when your mind is at its freshest.
• Next 40-70 minutes: Do slower, easier work.
• Next 10 minutes: Take a break.

Researcher Dr. Mithu Storoni advises that if you have multiple tasks to get done, it helps to rank them from taxing to easy and do them in that order. If your hardest task takes longer than 20 minutes, he suggests putting it aside for the start of your next 90-minute work session when your mind is refreshed.

These timing recommendations come with a few caveats. First, don’t expect to pack your day with back-to-back 90-minute work sessions with 10-minute breaks in between. Storoni says you should limit intense mental work to no more than four hours a day in total. You should also modify it depending on how tired you feel, the time of day, and the kind of work you are doing.

Speaking of the time of day, everyone has a time when they are most productive, based on their circadian rhythm. Daniel Pink, author of When: The Scientific Secrets of Perfect Timing, calls this your “chronotype.”  You can figure out your chronotype (whether you’re a morning person, night person, or somewhere in-between) by finding the midpoint between the time you usually go to sleep and the time you wake. Knowing your chronotype helps you identify the stages of your day—peak, trough, and rebound—and allows you to plan your focused work accordingly. 

Write it down

A to-do list is the simplest and most common productivity tool, but there are as many ways to write one as there are brands of pens. Explore what works best for you. Google’s executive productivity advisor Laura Mae Martin suggests using the Daily Plan road map, which breaks out tasks into how important they are and how long they take to do. It also includes a daily schedule. She recommends filling it out the night before, so you can start your day with a plan. That’s good advice for any type of to-do list.

Other experts suggest writing an “anti-to-do list” or a “done” list to highlight all the things you did accomplish. This can be especially valuable on the days where it feels like you didn’t get enough done.

And while there are tons of apps and systems for keeping track of what you need to do, it’s been proven that taking the time to write things out by hand (and cross them off!) can make you slow down, focus more, and improve your memory—something we all need, regardless of your productivity style. 

Google Japan has just released a new type of hardware keyboard. It calls it Gboard Double-Sided, aka the “Infinity Keyboard.” I call it the Krispy Kreme because it looks like a donut. The device is actually an infinite loop with keys on both sides. (Also, it’s a joke, built to promote the real software-based Gboard that you can use on Android and iPhone devices.) But even though it’s just a stunt that started as an April’s Fools back in 2019, the keyboard actually works and you can build one yourself following the open-source schematics, 3D printable STL files, and firmware, all available on GitHub. 

The Google Japan team wanted to build a keyboard that can be used both on its front and back sides, in any position, and by multiple people—because why the heck not? The keyboard is two-sided, following the geometry of a Möbius strip. There’s no clear top or bottom, and there’s a slant on the surface so you can actually use it with your hands in an (almost) practical way. Users can type from 360 degrees around the device, holding it in any way they want. Indeed, from the demo video, it really looks that you can type from any orientation imaginable, earning yourself instant carpal tunnel syndrome.

The USB-C Gboard Double-Sided specifications include 208 mechanical keys arranged in an ortholinear (meaning that the keys are arranged in a grid pattern, as opposed to the staggered layout typically found on keyboards) double-sided layout. The keys are Cherry MX-compatible switches, the popular standard in mechanical keyboards favorited by keyboard fans for their solid tactile feedback, durability, and distinct clickity-clack feel. Its weight, Google Japan says, is “20.8 doughnuts.” Given that the average weight of a Krispy Kreme Original Glazed Doughnut (the golden standard) is 1.7 ounces, this means the Gboard Double-Sided version may weigh approximately 2.2 pounds (you’re welcome). The radius is 4 inches, so you can comfortably carry it anywhere—on your head or on one of your arms—and still have two hands free to carry a cup of coffee and a real doughnut.

A Google Japan tradition

The Double-Sided keyboard is part of Google Japan’s history of experimental input devices, which has created a limited series of four impractical keyboards so far. On April 1, 2019, Google Japan introduced the Gboard Bending Spoon. Users selected characters by actually bending the spoon, with a sensor detecting the pressure to determine the desired letter (you can build your own with the firmware and schematics available here).

The following year, in 2020, the company released the Gboard Bar (note: it’s worth noticing the URL). This long stick keyboard featured all keys lined up in a single straight line, creating a one-dimensional QWERTY layout, with a total length of approximately 5 feet. “Designed for simplicity and collaboration,” Google Japan joked, it encouraged two users to work together by typing simultaneously, just like this new doughnut. You can download all the building specs here.

Then, on September 30, 2021, Google Japan introduced the Gboard CAPS, a wearable keyboard that looked like a baseball cap(ish). With this one, you could type through head gestures. It’s probably the most surrealist and (literally) mind-bending of them all, and you can GitHub the hell out of this one, too. Enjoy the fun and the neck pain afterward.

If anything, this ongoing keyboard joke shows that there’s nobody in the world like the Japanese to create the quirkiest, most fun designs on the planet. Nobody else can compete with their imagination, but here I humbly submit two final words for the next Gboard, Google Japan: hula hoop.

Dōmo arigatōgozaimasu!

China’s exports slowed sharply in September as global demand weakened, adding to worries over how to recharge growth in the world’s second-largest economy.

Exports rose 2.4% in dollar terms from a year earlier last month, down from 8.7% year-on-year growth in August, the Chinese customs office reported Monday. Imports rose just 0.3% in September.

Economists had estimated that exports would rise about 6% and that imports would climb about 0.9%.

China recorded a trade surplus of $81.7 billion in September, down from $91 billion in August.

China’s leaders have been struggling to rev up the economy since the COVID-19 pandemic ended.

The U.S. and Europe recently raised tariffs on China’s exports of electric vehicles and other products, darkening the outlook for China’s trade as an engine of growth. The weak growth in imports reflects slack demand, partly due to a prolonged slump in the property industry, a major driver of sales of all sorts of products.

Other data released Monday showed weakening in inflation and falling wholesale prices for manufacturers.

Policymakers in Beijing have announced a slew of measures to boost the economy, including frontloading 200 billion yuan ($28.2 billion) from next year’s budget for spending and construction projects. Over the weekend, Finance Minister Lan Foan reiterated that the government is considering still more moves to drive faster growth.

But Lan and other officials have not yet delivered stimulus on the scale economists say is needed to pull the economy out of its funk.

So far this year, up to the end of September, China’s exports have risen 4.3% year-on-year, helped by increased shipments of autos, which rose more than 20%, according to a report by ING Economics. But overall exports are slowing.

“With this engine of growth stalling, other areas of the economy such as investment and consumption will need to step up to complete this year’s growth objectives,” the report said, referring to the government’s target of about 5% annual economic growth this year.

If the government follows through on promises to increase spending, that could fuel stronger imports of various goods including industrial materials, Zichun Huang of Capital Economics said in a note.

Earlier in the year, China’s export sector was the main factor supporting its manufacturers.

“We think shipments will stay strong in the near term, supported by gains in export competitiveness,” said Zichun Huang of Capital Economics in a note. “Further ahead, though, growing trade barriers are likely to become an increasing constraint.”

—Zen Soo, AP Business Writer

SpaceX just pulled off an audacious, successful launch of its Starship rocket booster. The event, which occurred Sunday, is a massive moment for Elon Musk’s space exploration firm, and could kick-start the next phase of the space revolution.

But California’s Coastal Commission won’t be playing any role in it. Last week the organization rejected a proposal to give SpaceX permission to launch up to 50 rockets daily from an Air Force base under its jurisdiction. (The decision of the Coastal Commission can, and likely will be, overruled by others, but it’s an important stake in the ground.)

The issue wasn’t anything to do with SpaceX as a company, or its technical prowess. SpaceX was, after all, days away from launching and landing a rocket in the same place for the first time when the commission issued its rejection.

Instead, it was the company’s figurehead at fault. “Elon Musk is hopping about the country, spewing and tweeting political falsehoods and attacking FEMA while claiming his desire to help the hurricane victims with free Starlink access to the internet,” California Coastal Commissioner Gretchen Newsom said when she passed down the rejection notice. Newsom, who bears no relation to California Governor Gavin Newsom, didn’t mince her words, and her comments highlight just how toxic the Musk brand can be—to the extent of stymying development by his companies.

This isn’t the first time Musk’s abrasive personality and eagerness to foist his own political beliefs onto people have gotten his companies in trouble. The U.K. government decided not to invite Musk to an investment summit held today that has otherwise attracted many big business leaders. The decision was made last month, with the BBC reporting Musk was deliberately snubbed because of his public comments about race riots that roiled the country over the summer. And it can be easy to forget that Musk recently lost an appeal to remove his so-called “Twitter sitter,” a company lawyer that oversees every post he makes on social media about Tesla, following an agreement he made with the Securities and Exchange Commission over allegations that Musk posted fraudulent tweets that misled investors into his company.

Musk had sought to appeal that decision in the Supreme Court and to lift the need for his posts to be checked, but the appeal was immediately dismissed out of hand by the court in April this year. Given Musk’s abrasive behavior toward authority, it’s likely that decision wasn’t an altogether difficult one. “I think Musk’s image has been damaged,” says Cary Cooper, professor of organizational psychology at the University of Manchester business school. The way in which Musk has so stridently stepped behind Donald Trump, and the antagonistic way in which he interacts with others, is having a negative impact on his business pursuits, says Cooper.

“He’s both a liability and an asset, and it is hard to know which outweighs the other,” adds Anupam Chander, professor of law and technology at Georgetown University.

The issue of Musk’s polarizing personality hasn’t escaped the notice of others, either. “Tesla can’t sell its cars due to Elon’s behavior,” wrote investment advisor Ross Gerber in April. “Let’s stop blaming the Houthi rebels or German environmental terrorists. Or a recession that never came. Or interest rates. Only one person is responsible for this.”

Yet the same qualities that put some partners—including government representatives and courts making judgements on what he can and can’t do—are the same ones that help energize much of his base, and have resulted in some of the extraordinary developments his companies have been responsible for.  “Even while Musk might put off some customers and politicians, it’s not clear that if Tesla or SpaceX were not run by someone else they would still draw the same ardent followers and attract loads of free press,” says Chander.

But it’s consumers and colleagues alike that are being put off by what Musk does and how he interacts. Cooper says he’s heard people who say they won’t buy a Tesla because of its links to Musk anymore. And his interactions with government have become much more strained. “Government likes to deal with people who are fairly stable,” says Cooper—suggesting Musk isn’t. “They know what to expect from them. In the past, he’s been so entrepreneurial that was fine with government, and he stayed away from the political arena, and now he’s firmly engaged in the political arena.” That has put people off.

It all adds up to a complicated legacy, and one that continues to be written with every step back and advancement. “He has also pressed both companies to achieve things that many of us thought impossible—but he’s also promised stuff he’s never delivered,” says Chander.

Casio, the Japanese maker of watches, calculators, and other electronic goods, is the latest company to fall victim to a major data breach.

Last Monday, the company issued a brief statement announcing that its network had been “illegally accessed by a third party” on October 5, which resulted in a “system failure.” That first announcement assured customers that the hack had been reported to authorities and was being investigated by an external agency, but was fairly sparse on further details.

Then, on Friday, Casio released an updated memo sharing more information on the attack. Here’s everything we know about the breach so far:

When did this happen?

On October 5, several Casio servers experienced “system failures.” That day, the company reports that it “took measures to shut down the servers” because it suspected a cyberattack using ransomware, which was confirmed later in the week. 

“The Company consulted with the police on October 6 and with the Personal Information Protection Commission on October 7, and reported the matter by October 9,” Friday’s release reads. 

This is far from the first data breach of the year. In fact, as Fast Company has previously reported, 2024 is a good year to be an identity thief and a bad year to be pretty much anyone else. According to a midyear report from the Identity Theft Resource Center, the number of data breaches in the first half of 2024 (about 1.1 billion) marked a 490% uptick over the first half of the year prior. Other notable attacks this year include breaches on Change Healthcare and Ascension, AT&T, and MoneyGram.

Who has been affected by the data breach?

According to the company, parties impacted by the breach include employees (both full-time and temporary/contract), business partners and affiliated companies, certain individuals who have interviewed with the company in the past, and “some customers who use services provided by the Company and some of affiliated companies.” 

Friday’s press release does not go into detail on how many customers were impacted, and the company did not respond to Fast Company’s request for comment at the time of this writing.

What kind of information was stolen?

Unspecified “personal information” from all of the above parties may have been leaked. Additionally, the company suspects that documents like contracts, invoices, and sales information associated with business partners may have been taken, alongside internal documents like legal and financial information.

Who is responsible for the attack?

Casio has yet to officially confirm the party behind the attack. However, according to reporting from TechCrunch, the ransomware and extortion group Underground has claimed responsibility for the breach on its dark web leak site. 

If I may have been impacted by the breach, what are my next steps?

The company has not yet provided actionable next steps for impacted parties. As a general rule, experts recommend immediately replacing your important passwords, scanning your devices for malicious software, and enabling two-factor authentication on your devices as a few first steps. Check out our full guide on protecting yourself from data hacks here. 

Correction: An earlier version of this story incorrectly stated that CrowdStrike suffered a data breach this year. It suffered an outage related to a software update.

Inside a converted warehouse in one of Philadelphia’s poorest neighborhoods, students circle around Jackie Robinson as he quizzes them about a 1980s furnace. Although they’ll encounter older equipment like this, the program is cutting edge, aimed at training people to work on homes in ways that address climate change and make clean energy affordable.

More than 3.3 million people work in the clean energy industry and the number is growing fast. But Robinson, a building trades instructor, is concerned that’s not widely understood.

“A lot of low income people don’t even know these jobs exist . . . it’s all about getting the word out,” he said.

In addition to expanding an important workforce, solid career opportunities also reduce recidivism. Robinson’s own transition into the clean energy workforce and ultimately to this nonprofit, the Energy Coordinating Agency, came during his time in prison.

EDITOR’S NOTE: This is part of an occasional series of personal stories from the energy transition—the change away from a fossil-fuel based world that largely causes climate change.

He was locked up for 27 years on a drug trafficking conviction.

“I was a top student in school, no question. But then sometimes you think you’re slick and you fall in with the wrong people . . . and you’re thinking, ‘hey, it’s great money, easy money, but . . . there’s no good ending in it,'” he said.

His three young children were the motivation to use all that time inside to learn new skills so he could take care of them when he got out.

Robinson took courses in welding, carpentry, accounting, fashion merchandising and Arabic. “If it was a free class that educated me on something, I took it,” he said.

“They got the body, fine,” he said, referring to incarceration, and raising his hands to his eyes, “but I could go a lot of places in my mind.”

Johnson Controls, the international building equipment company, also offered classes inside the prison system. That’s where Robinson first got a look at the energy field and had the chance to work on refrigerators and heating and air conditioning equipment. Johnson Controls hired some people when they were released from prison, and Robinson was one.

After working there and at another organization that offered apprenticeship programs, Connection Training Services, he came to this equity-focused nonprofit housed in a sprawling warehouse in Philadelphia’s Kensington neighborhood. Where Civil War uniforms were once sewn, a life-size roof sits on the floor for students to practice installing solar panels, and mazes of walls display exposed piping.

With his keys jingling and cane gently tapping on wood floors, Robinson, 59, leads a group into a back classroom to study circuits. Above a window, painted on the wall, there is a quote by Benjamin Franklin that Robinson said is one of his favorites: “He who hath a trade, hath an estate.”

It speaks to his reason for wanting to teach these skills. “It changes the financial structure of his whole family,” he said. “As people in the community make more money, the standard of the community raises up. We improve housing and everything in process.”

That’s the dream for Quenton McClellan, 61, who heard about the training from his workforce advisor at Narcotics Anonymous. He was working as a bartender and struggling with alcohol and drug abuse. “I was drinking, you know, tremendously … I took a long look at myself and I went and got some help,” he said.

Today McClellan is going on two years drug- and alcohol-free. “It feels good, ’cause now I can think, and at one time I couldn’t even think. And it’s just a wonderful feeling . . . I want to learn. I want to advance.” The students also look out for each other, McClellan said, in a way no one ever looked out for him before.

He is getting certified to install heat pumps, a climate-friendly replacement for old furnaces and air conditioners.

“These types of workers are absolutely and desperately needed right now, and organizations that can train them up are in high demand,” said Bob Keefe, executive director of Environmental Entrepreneurs, also known as E2, a nonpartisan business group that advocates for clean energy.

The Inflation Reduction Act of 2022, with its tax credits for heat pumps, solar panels and clean energy manufacturing incentives, is expected to create more than 109,000 new jobs, Keefe said. Heat pumps can be installed anywhere, creating a need for workers in every state.

“When I was trying to put heat pumps in my house several years ago, I couldn’t even find a contractor who knew how to do it. I eventually had to end up doing it myself,” he said.

As he gives a lesson on installing this type of heating and air conditioning, Robinson notes a couple of students at the back of the room on their phones, and makes a mental note to connect with them later. He often texts students to check on them, he said, to give guidance, life advice.

The Energy Coordinating Agency trains more than 200 people each year as building analysts, solar panel installers, and commercial heating, ventilation and air conditioning technicians. It offers the classes free, with funding from grants. Low-income people from the neighborhood can also come in for help with their utility bills and budget counseling.

Seeing students who have felt “left out of the equation” start careers and support their families is what brings fulfillment, Robinson said.

“This work that I do is just my legacy. I learned I know how to do something, and I can pass it on to the next generation, and we use it to earn a living and increase generational wealth,” he said.

The Associated Press’ climate and environmental 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.

—Isabella O’Malley, Associated Press

A healthcare spending surge looms in the new year, and Business Group on Health is helping employers understand it.

The nonprofit found in a recent survey that large employers expect the cost to treat patients will jump nearly 8% next year before they make coverage changes to address it. That’s the highest growth rate in a decade.

Business Group on Health CEO Ellen Kelsay expects employers to react by being more selective about the care that people receive. They also will try to manage the use of expensive treatments for obesity and diabetes.

Kelsay’s nonprofit advises employers on healthcare cost and policy issues. The CEO spoke recently with The Associated Press.

Q: Big employers expect a jump in healthcare costs next year. How will they address it?

A: They’re going to be focused on the quality of services provided to their workforce. You might hear of high-performance networks or centers of excellence. Those are efforts where employers are looking for the highest quality providers and trying to encourage their workforce to seek services through those providers.

Q: Does this mean employees might see fewer choices for care?

A: They’ll see more curated, designed networks with perhaps fewer providers in them. But they will be higher quality.

Q: Your annual survey also found that better mental healthcare access is a big priority for large employers. Why do they care about this?

A: It’s foundational. A human being who is struggling with an issue at work or outside of work is not going to be as engaged, as productive or as healthy.

Q: How will employers manage expensive and popular weight loss drugs like Wegovy?

A: Most view them as a tool in their overall weight management strategy . . . not the only tool. (They) are going to be really focused on who is the appropriate population to be receiving these medications. Is a provider recommending this? Does the individual have certain co-morbidities? Does the individual have a (body mass index) that meets a certain threshold? And then also is the individual taking part in a lifestyle and behavioral modification program to ensure long-term success?

Q: Eight out of your 10 company leaders are women. How does that shape vision or direction?

A: I think we’re highly collaborative. We focus on inclusion of belonging, constructive discourse, encouraging different perspectives.

Q: You have studied employee benefits trends for more than 20 years. What has surprised you the most?

A: It’s this sobering continued increase in fundamental healthcare costs. It’s something we have been talking about for decades. There’s certainly a lot of good work happening, but it’s not enough.

The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Science and Educational Media Group. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

—Tom Murphy, Associated Press health writer

By the time Hurricane Helene made its way hundreds of miles inland on September 27, it had been downgraded to a tropical storm. But Helene remained unusually expansive and strong, fueled by the warm waters in the Gulf of Mexico. The storm brought high winds and catastrophic flooding, knocking out power for more than 2 million Duke Energy customers in the Carolinas, and tearing through a region of the country that wasn’t widely seen as vulnerable to hurricane damage: the Mountain South. Asheville, North Carolina, the city hardest hit, had even appeared on lists of “climate havens” considered comparatively safe from the natural disasters whose impacts are intensified by global warming.

Over the following week, more than 50,000 utility workers, with crews from 41 U.S. states and Canada, set about restoring power. In some areas, they even transported power poles by helicopter where roads remained impassable. By Saturday, service had been restored to more than 90% of the customers who lost power. But some of the remaining outages may be harder to repair, because they require the complete replacement of complex power infrastructure equipment. These repairs “will take potentially many weeks,” said Jeff Brooks, a Duke Energy spokesperson.

The unprecedented devastation has brought renewed attention to the problem of ensuring the resilience of America’s power grids in the face of climate change, and to the massive transformation that decarbonization, electrification, and a projected growth in electricity demand bring. Global shortages of crucial electrical equipment like transformers and circuit breakers don’t make that question any easier to figure out.

Electrical equipment and water don’t mix, so heavy flooding presents a serious threat to power grids that aren’t prepared for it. “There has been a dramatic miscalculation of risk factors here,” said Tyler Norris, a Duke University doctoral fellow and former special advisor at the Department of Energy. “So this event is going to have to prompt a wide range of new analysis on the vulnerability of various parts of the power system.”

But western North Carolina has significant geographic differences from regions where alternative solutions have been tested. Norris described the region as “a mountainous area that still has a relatively decent population density.” In low-lying coastal areas that are more accustomed to hurricanes, for instance, some utility companies have begun moving power lines underground to avoid the problems that hurricane-force winds pose. But in Duke Energy’s service area, “you have this really far-flung set of distribution lines going up into the hills and serving different communities,” Norris continued.

A September 29 report from North Carolina congressman Chuck Edwards claimed that 360 substations in North Carolina were “out” because of flooding. It caused a minor panic among grid experts, who worried that there simply weren’t enough transformers in reserve in the U.S. to rebuild that many substations.

Transformers are the pieces of electrical equipment required to shift an electric current from one voltage to another. They’re needed at either end of a transmission line—the massive power lines that transmit electricity at a high voltage between power plants and the lower-voltage distribution lines that power homes and businesses. They’re housed in substations, the junctions between the transmission and distribution systems.

It turns out that the crisis wasn’t so dire. Of the 360 substations that were reported down, most “were out because of damage to the transmission system that supplies them with power, not necessarily damage to all those substations,” said Brooks, the Duke Energy spokesperson. But even a handful of destroyed substations is no small matter. At at least two sites, the utility has trucked in temporary “mobile substations” that will power nearby communities until the equipment can be repaired.

In normal times, said John Wilson, a vice president at the consulting firm Grid Strategies, it takes over a year to build a new substation from scratch, including drawing up a site-specific design and procuring the equipment. Rebuilding can be significantly shorter when the designs are already complete, and utilities keep some amount of equipment in reserve. But the depletion of those reserves would only add to the potential supply chain bottleneck for future crises.

Global demand for transformers is growing, in part because the transition to renewable energy will require many more sites of power generation than the old fossil fuel-powered system—and each new power plant requires its own equipment. With few manufacturers of transformers operating in the U.S., utilities must wait an average of 150 weeks for an order to arrive.

While it’s unclear whether the storm recovery will be directly impeded by the transformer shortage, it may breathe life into solutions that have been recently proposed. In September, the president’s National Infrastructure Advisory Council recommended that the federal government create a strategic reserve of transformers to bypass the industry’s long lead times. And in an August report, Grid Strategies recommended that utilities band together in a collective procurement organization—ideally with federal loan backing—to make large orders and share the costs. “That would help deal with the construction backlog; right now, manufacturers are hesitant to build new factories to build this equipment in the U.S. or North America because they aren’t confident that the market will be there,” said Wilson.

The reconstruction of the power grid in the Appalachian areas wrecked by Helene will ultimately offer a chance for the utility industry to rethink how the electricity system should be structured. “​​In areas where there could be more extreme weather events like this, it’s going to be more and more difficult to maintain far-flung distribution systems,” Norris said. “And the cost of service is going to rise, and you either have to muddle through that or think about other measures.”

There are ways to build grid resilience that could be implemented on a more local level—although they’re costly. One is microgrids—local electric grids that are disconnected from the wider power system. Norris said this could be extended further by allowing individual homes and businesses to power themselves with rooftop solar when the grid is down. Most solar arrays aren’t configured to produce power when there isn’t a wider grid to feed them into, in order to protect the line workers repairing power lines from a live current. But this can be prevented by a technique called solar islanding, which effectively disconnects the solar array from the grid.

Last week, Duke Energy used one such microgrid, in the flooded resort town of Hot Springs, North Carolina, to keep the lights on downtown for days using only batteries and solar power. For towns like Hot Springs, microgrids could be much more than temporary patches. 

—Gautama Mehta, Grist

This article originally appeared in Grist, a nonprofit, independent media organization dedicated to telling stories of climate solutions and a just future. Sign up for its newsletter here.

Fears that shares of Trump Media (Nasdaq: DJT) could collapse, following the end of a lockup period have pretty much vanished. Just weeks after the parent company of Truth Social hit 52-week lows in late September, DJT stock is now on a bull run that could make other businesses jealous. 

Shares of DJT were up again in midday trading Monday, climbing another 17% to more than $29.50. That’s far ahead of the recent low of $11.75 on Sept. 23. Since the beginning of October, shares have jumped more than 80%. And in the past 30 days, they’re up more than 71%.

What’s powering this surge in trader interest? Here’s what you need to know.

Why has investor sentiment in Trump Media stock turned so positive?

DJT investors are increasingly confident Donald Trump will retake the White House on November 5. While most polls show the race between Trump and Kamala Harris to be a virtual dead heat, Trump has been gaining ground in some voter assessments. An NBC poll saw Trump win back some of the support he lost after his rough debate performance. In September, Trump was seen as getting just 44% of the vote, but the company’s October poll raised that number to 48%.

The company did announce the release of the Truth+ streaming app for Android devices on October 10, but that was likely not a driver of the stock increase. 

While the presidential race could still go either way, investors believe a Trump victory could give the stock (and Truth Social) a big boost, given Trump’s activity on the social media platform. (Trump has remained incredibly active on Truth, using it as his primary form of social media when making announcements or declarations. While his ban on Twitter was lifted by Elon Musk, Trump’s posts there have been few and far between.) Conversely, if he should lose, the stock could potentially fall further than its recent lows, though the former president’s loyal supporters, who hold many of the public shares, will likely keep it from collapsing.

How much is Trump’s stake in Trump Media now worth?

Trump owns 114.75 million shares of Trump Media’s DJT stock and is, by far, its largest shareholder. As of 1:00 p.m. ET, that put the value of his holding at $3.3 billion

That’s $1.5 billion more than two weeks ago, when his holdings were worth $1.8 billion.

Have any more insiders sold DJT stock?

Trump Media has not reported any significant sales of stock to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) since United Atlantic Ventures, a partnership of former Apprentice contestants Andrew Litinsky and Wes Moss, unloaded 11 million shares in late September.

Are short sellers influencing the price of Trump Media’s DJT stock?

That remains difficult to determine, but short interest remains high in the company. As of September 30, short interest in DJT stood at 11.4 million shares, down just 3.1 million shares from mid-September. The next report showing short interest on Oct. 15 will be issued at the end of trading on October 24, which should show how much short-covering has helped the stock’s recent gains.

Has there been any change to Trump Media’s fundamentals?

There has not. The DJT stock, from an earnings and revenue standpoint, is still massively overvalued. Trump Media, in its most recent earnings in August, reported a net loss of $16.4 million and revenues of just $837,000. The company does have $344 million in cash on its balance sheet and no debt, it added.

What else is happening with the stock?

Prosecutors in New York, on Friday, asked a New York federal judge to sentence Michael Shvartsman and Gerald Shvartsman to prison for their involvement in an insider trading scheme involving the blank-check company that merged with Trump Media to take DJT public. 

The brothers received nonpublic information about Trump Media being a potential target of a merger after signing nondisclosure agreements. They then purchased shares of Digital World Acquisition Corp. and sold them as soon as news of the planned merger was released. 

Both men have pleaded guilty in the case. Prosecutors say Michael Shvartsman made more than $18 million in illegal profits, while Gerald Shvartsman earned $4.6 million. The brothers, who are from Ukraine, could also be deported once their sentences are completed. 

Former President Donald Trump‘s campaign is using GoFundMe to rally its network of deep-pocketed backers and everyday donors around the survivors of his July assassination attempt and Hurricane Helene’s destruction, bucking more traditional avenues of emergency relief.

The two high-profile fundraisers — organized by the Republican nominee’s national finance director — have drawn more than $14 million. They do not violate campaign finance laws, according to legal experts. Nor is the campaign allowed to pocket any proceeds for its own political ends; a GoFundMe spokesperson told the Associated Press that the majority of the Butler, Pennsylvania funds have been disbursed.

But the use of a crowdfunding platform marks an unorthodox response to crises from a political campaign. Never before has a major party’s presidential candidate turned to the for-profit company — which usually features desperate appeals for help covering tuition costs or medical bills — to mobilize their base toward outside charitable causes.

“It’s pretty unusual and actually quite odd,” said Brett Kappel, a longtime campaign finance attorney with Harmon Curran who has advised both Republicans and Democrats.

It’s more typical to see candidates contribute campaign funds to IRS-approved nonprofits during natural disasters, Kappel said. He pointed to Federal Election Commission filings that show U.S. Sen. Tim Scott’s 2022 campaign gave to the American Red Cross after Hurricane Ian hit South Carolina.

Trump campaign spokesperson Brian Hughes said the motivation arose from “the president wanting to help find a way for his supporters to give as much direct support as they can.”

The finance team only got involved because of their “great expertise in working with large accounts,” according to Hughes, and “not one penny of this funding is going anywhere but to those impacted.” Hughes said more than $6.5 million of the $7.7 million raised for organizations helping with Hurricane Helene recovery had been disbursed as of October 11.

“The president has an amazing movement of supporters,” Hughes told AP. “With the experience in Butler generating millions of dollars of support, he saw the same opportunity to be a direct conduit for a philanthropic effort from his supporters.”

Longtime Trump associates, conservative celebrities and right-wing groups gave tens of thousands of dollars. Bill Ackman, the CEO of the Pershing Square investment firm who endorsed Trump shortly after the assassination attempt, donated $100,000 for hurricane relief. UFC President Dana White also pitched in $100,000. Republican U.S. Sen. Rick Scott said on X that he donated $50,000 from his congressional salary for the Butler, Pennsylvania victims. Also contributing was The Heritage Foundation, the conservative think tank behind Project 2025.

GoFundMe collects a transaction fee of 2.9% plus 30 cents for every donation to cover credit and debit charges. Its global Trust & Safety team has been communicating closely with organizer Meredith O’Rourke to ensure the safe distribution of donations from the Butler, Pennsylvania, page, according to a company spokesperson. O’Rourke also provided a verified distribution plan, the GoFundMe spokesperson told AP, which the company routinely requires in cases where organizers are withdrawing money on behalf of other recipients.

It’s not advisable for campaign finance officials to run crowdfunding pages “at the same time they were writing your money for your camp,” according to Andrew Herman, a Washington lawyer specializing in campaign finance. Because online crowdfunding is less regulated, he said, it would’ve been “more palatable” to direct supporters toward a recognized nonprofit.

“But people get into trouble when they try to ascribe rationality or any degree of what we would generally consider best financial practices to campaigns,” Herman said.

“There’s no black letter law that says they can’t do this,” he added. “Should they? Of course not.”

The bulk of the Pennsylvania disbursements were made earlier this month and more payouts will come while the page remains active, according to Hughes. The “vast majority” has gone to the families of the three people shot, he said. Some funds also compensated a local crane rental company after the owner said he lost business when the ensuing police investigation left him unable to retrieve equipment he’d donated for the rally.

Money raised for Hurricane Helene victims has gone to four nonprofits. Samaritan’s Purse spokesperson Gabrielle Bouquet said the Christian humanitarian aid organization is grateful for Trump’s “steadfast support of the work we do in Jesus’ name.” Bouquet declined to share the exact amount of the donation.

Water Mission, a Christian engineering nonprofit that builds safe water solutions in disaster areas, confirmed that the Charleston-based ministry had also received funds. Public relations director Gregg Dinino did not specify the total.

Mtn2Sea Ministries, which delivers generators and supplies in the immediate aftermath of weather events, said on Facebook that it received $25,000 on Monday. The disaster relief group posted that the proceeds were used to buy South Georgia businesses’ gift cards because “the best way to help those in need is to get resources directly into their hands.”

It makes sense that Trump’s team gravitated toward crowdfunding, said Benjamin Soskis of the Urban Institute’s Center on Nonprofits and Philanthropy. The campaign “has often been premised on a suspicion of institutions,” he said, and GoFundMe “drew some of its attraction by serving as an alternative to institutional charitable giving.”

But crowdfunding also brings less accountability, Soskis said. Crowdfunding pages don’t have the same disclosure requirements as public charities that must divulge their finances in annual tax filings.

Soskis said Trump’s checkered philanthropic ventures has likely brought increased levels of scrutiny. A judge fined Trump $2 million in 2019 for using his since-dissolved charitable foundation to advance his interests.

“It is a combustible dynamic when you combine campaigning and charitable giving,” Soskis said. “The extra dynamics of crowdfunding and Trump’s own history with philanthropy itself adds more fuel to that fire.”

Associated Press coverage of philanthropy and nonprofits 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. For all of AP’s philanthropy coverage, visit https://apnews.com/hub/philanthropy.

—James Pollard, Associated Press

Lilly Ledbetter, a former Alabama factory manager whose lawsuit against her employer made her an icon of the equal pay movement and led to landmark wage discrimination legislation, has died at 86.

Ledbetter’s discovery that she was earning less than her male counterparts for doing the same job at a Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. plant in Alabama led to her lawsuit, which ultimately failed when the Supreme Court ruled in 2007 that she had filed her complaint too late. The court ruled that workers must file lawsuits within six months of first receiving a discriminatory paycheck—in Ledbetter’s case, it was years before she learned about the disparity through an anonymous letter.

Two years later, former President Barack Obama signed into law the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, which gave workers the right to sue within 180 days of receiving each discrimination paycheck, not just the first one.

“Lilly Ledbetter never set out to be a trailblazer or a household name. She just wanted to be paid the same as a man for her hard work,” Obama said in a statement Monday. “Lilly did what so many Americans before her have done: setting her sights high for herself and even higher for her children and grandchildren.”

Ledbetter died Saturday of respiratory failure, according to a statement from her family cited by the Alabama news site AL.com.

Ledbetter continued campaigning for equal pay for decades after winning the law named after her. A film about her life starring Patricia Clarkson premiered last week at the Hamptons International Film Festival.

The team behind the film, Lilly, issued a statement of condolence on social media.

“Lilly was an ordinary woman who achieved extraordinary things, and her story continues to motivate us all. We will miss her,” the team said.

In January, President Joe Biden marked the 15th anniversary of the law named after Ledbetter with new measures to help close the gender wage gap, including a new rule barring the federal government from considering a person’s current or past pay when determining their salary.

Ledbetter had advocated for the measure in a January opinion piece for Ms. magazine penned with Deborah Vagins, director of the Equal Pay Today advocacy group. But Ledbetter and other advocates for years have been frustrated that more comprehensive initiatives have stalled, including the Paycheck Fairness Act, which would strengthen the Equal Pay Act of 1963.

The sense of urgency among advocates deepened after an annual report from the Census Bureau last month found that the gender wage gap between men and women widened for the first time 20 years. In 2023, women working full time earned 83 cents on the dollar compared with men, down from 84 cents in 2022. Even before then, advocates had been frustrated that wage gap improvement had mostly stalled for the last 20 years despite women making gains in the C-suite and earning college degrees at a faster rate than men. Experts say the reasons for the enduring gap are multifaceted, including the overrepresentation of women in lower-paying industries and weak childcare system that pushes many women to step back from their careers in their peak earnings years.

In 2018, at the height of the #MeToo movement, Ledbetter wrote a opinion piece in the New York Times detailing the harassment she faced as a manager at the Goodyear factory and drawing a link between workplace sexual harassment and pay discrimination.

“She was indefatigable,” said Emily Martin, chief program officer at the National Women’s Law Center, which worked closely with Ledbetter. “She was always ready to lend her voice, to show up to do a video, to write an op-ed. She was always ready to go.”

Ledbetter was a manager at the Goodyear plant in Gadsden, Alabama, and had worked there 19 years when she received an anonymous note saying she was being paid significantly less than three male colleagues.

She filed a lawsuit in 1999 and initially won $3.8 million in backpay and damages from a federal court. She never received the money after eventually losing her case before the Supreme Court.

Although the law named after her didn’t directly address the gender wage gap, Martin said it set an important precedent “for ensuring that we don’t just have the promise of equal pay on the books but we have a way to enforce the law.”

“She is a really an inspiration in showing us how a loss does not mean you can’t win,” Martin said. “We know her name because she lost, and she lost big, and she kept coming back from it and kept working until the day she died to change that loss into real gains for women across the country.”

—Alexandra Olson, Associated Press business writer

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Heading into 2024, ResiClub noted that the key metric to watch for home price momentum was monthly active inventory levels compared to the same month in pre-pandemic 2019. Today’s analysis shows that this metric is still very much the key metric to watch for next year as well.

Generally speaking, housing markets where active inventory has returned to pre-pandemic 2019 levels have seen home price growth soften or even decline outright from their 2022 peak. Conversely, housing markets where active inventory remains far below pre-pandemic levels have generally seen home prices remain more resilient since 2022.

Among the nation's 250 largest metro areas, 57 markets had active housing inventory in September 2024 that was higher than in September 2019 (see interactive chart above). Of those 57 markets, 41 have seen home prices fall at least somewhat since their 2022 peak.

The interactive chart below is the same as the one above, but the color scheme has been changed to indicate which markets have active inventory below or above pre-pandemic levels.

Why is active inventory such a great metric for following home prices? Think of active inventory and months of supply as the local housing market’s equilibrium of supply and demand.

If housing demand surges and homes start selling quickly, local active inventory may begin to fall. If that demand surge goes beyond what's seasonally typical, it may suggest a heating-up housing market. That’s exactly what we saw during the pandemic housing boom from summer 2020 to spring 2022.

Conversely, if housing demand pulls back and homes are no longer selling as quickly, local active inventory may begin to rise. That suggests a cooling housing market, and if it cools enough, home prices could fall. We’ve seen this in some housing markets since the pandemic housing boom fizzled out in 2022.

If you look at the map above (inventory now compared to pre-pandemic 2019) and then at the map below (home prices since their 2022 peak), you’ll see the relationship between the two metrics. For instance, in the Northeast, where inventory has generally fallen, prices are up.

A rule of thumb in real estate is that anything below a 6-month supply of housing inventory is considered a "seller's market," while anything above a 6-month supply is a "buyer's market." However, that hasn’t always held true this cycle. In many housing markets—including Austin’s metro area, where house prices began to decline in June 2022 with only 2.1 months of inventory—that rule hasn't applied.

In fact, despite Austin's months of housing inventory only reaching a high of 4.8 as of August 2024, house prices have already dropped by 19.8% from their 2022 peak in Austin. A better measure of this incoming pricing weakness was the abrupt active inventory jump that occurred in Austin in spring and summer 2022 (going from 0.4 months of inventory in February 2022 to 2.1 in June 2022), which quickly pushed active listings above pre-pandemic levels.

That's why ResiClub conducts a monthly metro and county-level inventory analysis in addition to a monthly metro and county-level home price analysis.

Over time, this metric (monthly active inventory levels compared to the same month in pre-pandemic 2019) may prove less effective for determining home price momentum; however, heading into 2025, we expect it to retain its effectiveness.

Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris, concerned about slipping support from Black voters, unveiled new policy proposals aimed at Black men on Monday that include forgivable small business loans and access to a new legal recreational marijuana industry.

The Harris campaign and Democrats – including former President Barack Obama – have expressed deep concern about whether Black men will turn out on Nov. 5 in numbers seen in past elections and whether they will support Harris or her Republican rival, former President Donald Trump.

The new slate of policy proposals is part of an effort pushed by Harris to make a direct pitch at Black men and make them a more central part of her campaign during the final stretch. Reuters was first to report the plan.

The new policies include 1 million loans that are fully forgivable of up to $20,000 to entrepreneurs in underserved communities, and a promise to legalize recreational marijuana and help ensure Black entrepreneurs have access to the new industry.

A number of advocacy groups have called for reducing criminal penalties for drug use, while pushing equal access to the growing legal marijuana business as a way of restoring communities disproportionately targeted by law enforcement. But some in predominantly Black communities have said they do not want the businesses in their communities.

Other Harris proposals include boosting access to the cryptocurrency industry for Black Americans and launching a national health equity initiative focused on Black men that addresses diseases like sickle cell anemia which disproportionately affects the community.

While the plans are intended to cater to the Black community, Harris is seeking to emphasize how her economic proposals benefit all men.

Harris is traveling to Erie County, Pennsylvania, on Monday for a campaign rally, along with a stop at a local Black-owned small business.

A statement from the campaign announcing the plan said Harris “knows that Black men have long felt that too often their voice in our political process has gone unheard and that there is so much untapped ambition and leadership within the Black male community.”

If elected, Harris would be the second Black president and first Black woman in the office. Some Democrats view the vice president’s relatively soft support from Black men as a significant concern in the election.

Over a quarter of young Black men say they would support Trump in the election race, according to a September poll by the NAACP, the nation’s largest civil rights organization. President Joe Biden got about 80% of the Black male vote in 2020.

The policy rollout comes a day before Harris is expected to be interviewed by Charlamagne tha God, a comedian and author whose nationally syndicated radio show is popular with Black millennials. He is also an influential critic of the Biden administration.

—Jarrett Renshaw and Nandita Bose, Reuters