Bumpy Ride: Why America’s Roads are in Tatters
Co-published with Harper's. If the roads are failing, it means government is failing.
If We Don’t Focus On Why People Overeat, We Will Never Solve Obesity
Co-published with the Guardian. Emotional, physical or sexual abuse can lie at root of weight problems in later life and, unless targeted, taxes on food types will …
My Small Town is Being Poisoned by Fracking Waste
Co-published with The Guardian. In a tiny south-eastern Ohio town in the Appalachian foothills, the Hazel Ginsburg Well is holding waste from out-of-state fracking operations – a …
Does This Avocado Toast Come With A Side of Gentrification?
Co-published with WNYC Studios. Businesses like Avocaderia are creating jobs in Sunset Park, Brooklyn. But at what cost?
America’s Local Newspapers Might be Broke – But They’re More Vital than Ever
Co-published with The Guardian. Local journalism is doing great work across the country while fighting cutbacks and tight budgets. But we need people to stop expecting news …
Smoked Out
Co-published with The Baffler. The great enclosure of the marijuana commons.
Our New TV Antiheroes Don’t Want to Fall Out of the Middle Class
Co-published with The Guardian. Shows like Ozark, Billions and Empire are a new kind of aspirational television, about a 1% that lives with impunity.
The Socialist Experiment
Co-published with Oxford American, republished in The Clarion-Ledger. A new-society vision in Jackson, Mississippi
Oklahoma Isn’t Working. Can Anyone Fix this Failing American State?
Co-published with The Guardian. Poverty, police abuse, record prison rates and education cuts that mean a four-day school week. Why are public services failing Oklahomans?
Why Social Capital Could Be the Key to Solving America’s Overdose Epidemic
Co-published with The Guardian. Researchers are exploring how community, connection and trust could help protect society’s most vulnerable.
Automation Is a Real Threat. How Can We Slow Down the March of the Cyborgs?
Co-published with The Guardian. Instead of working to give robots personhood status, we should concentrate on protecting human workers – and decelerate the push to automate jobs.
Payday Lenders Kept Me Afloat When I Fell From Middle Class to Poverty
Co-published with Quartz. My odyssey from the middle class to Ace Check Cashing, speaking with a teller through a window of three-inch-thick bulletproof-glass, was simultaneously surreal and …