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☆ America's broken housing market is making millennials and Gen Z lonelier
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-30 | by ( Eliza Relman | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +9 min

Loneliness is a perceived lack of connection — the discrepancy between the social connection someone has and the connection they want. Holt-Lunstad's widely-cited research has found that loneliness and social isolation have health impacts comparable to smoking 15 cigarettes a day. People who live in communities with more walkable neighborhoods, shared space, greenery, and diverse types of housing, feel more socially connected and less lonely. In her work, Peavey has come up with six design strategies for creating third spaces — places that aren't home, work, or school — to facilitate social connection. But neighborhoods need to be dense and walkable in order for people to easily access these places because cars and physical distance get in the way.

☆ Dianne Feinstein's ongoing absence allowed Senate Republicans and Joe Manchin to overturn a Biden rule reducing pollution from large trucks
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-27 | by ( Eliza Relman | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

Senate Republicans and Sen. Joe Manchin voted to roll back an EPA regulation on truck pollution. Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna argued it wouldn't have passed had Sen. Dianne Feinstein been present. Senate Republicans and Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin took advantage of Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein's ongoing medical leave to roll back a significant environmental regulation on Wednesday. Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna argued in a tweet on Thursday that Feinstein's prolonged absence from the Senate has repeatedly blocked Democrats' ability to succeed in crucial votes, including the EPA rule vote. Supporters of the EPA rule say it's a reasonable and cost-efficient change that's well-worth the lives it's expected to improve and save.

☆ Kevin McCarthy's bill to raise the debt ceiling squeezes by in the House after a series of contentious last-minute changes to secure enough GOP votes
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-26 | by ( Ayelet Sheffey | Juliana Kaplan | Eliza Relman | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

Under the legislation — which still has a long road to becoming law — the debt ceiling would rise by just $1.5 trillion, or until March 31, 2024, depending on whichever comes first. Democratic senators insisted on Wednesday that the House bill is dead on arrival in the Senate. "I don't think it will have any impact on what happens in the Senate," Sen. Chris Coons, a Delaware Democrat, told Insider of the House bill on Wednesday afternoon. But GOP Sen. Ron Johnson told Insider that he thinks House Republicans "are doing the right thing." That means that both parties need to come to an agreement on an approach to raise the debt ceiling before the country hurdles into a default, expected early this summer.

☆ Republicans want to cut billions of dollars for energy projects as part of their legislation to raise the debt ceiling
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-26 | by ( Eliza Relman | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

House Republicans want to strip billions of dollars in funding for energy projects as part of their debt ceiling bill. These latest changes are part of a last-minute effort by Republican leadership to get their members on board with a debt ceiling vote. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy insisted on Wednesday morning that the House will vote on the debt ceiling limit on Wednesday, despite several GOP House members publicly voicing their opposition to the legislation. In exchange, it would increase the debt ceiling by $1.5 trillion, or through March 31, 2024, whichever comes first. Whenever Republicans manage to pass their debt ceiling legislation, it'll be just a first step in negotiations with the White House, which is demanding to raise the limit without conditions.

☆ Half of households in New York City don't make the $100,000 or more needed to afford living there
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-26 | by ( Eliza Relman | Madison Hoff | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

New York City is experiencing a rapidly worsening affordability crisis, according to a major new report. Half of all of New York City's working-age households can't afford their basic needs, the study found. Households in all parts of the city need to make at least $100,000 to afford the cost of living, according to the TCL. New York City has failed to build enough affordable housing and keep costs reasonable for its diverse array of residents, experts say. And city's worsening affordability crisis is driving some out.

☆ A Maine senator lays out why everyone should be a YIMBY: Building more housing could bring families extra income and help solve the labor shortage
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-22 | by ( Eliza Relman | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

Sen. Angus King, a Maine independent, told Insider the lack of affordable housing is "a national crisis." Maine is facing a severe shortage as it's welcomed a surge of new residents in recent years. The law also eliminated all single-family zoning, eliminates some regulatory restrictions on multi-unit homes, and incentivizes the construction of affordable housing. New Mainers, though welcomed in an aging state in need of more workers, have exacerbated the housing shortage. A lack of affordable housing is central: the state housing authority reported last year that the average price of a house in nearly every county in Maine was unaffordable for the average household income.

☆ The guy AOC crushed in her first election is back on the Hill — and this time he's trying to save TikTok
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-21 | by ( Eliza Relman | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

TikTok has hired Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's predecessor to lobby on Capitol Hill. Former Rep. Joe Crowley reportedly helped TikTok's CEO set up meetings with lawmakers in DC. Ocasio-Cortez has come out against banning TikTok, breaking with the Biden administration. But this time, Crowley finds himself on the same side as Ocasio-Cortez, who recently announced her opposition to banning TikTok. The Trump administration similarly called for TikTok to be sold to an American buyer and former President Donald Trump signed an executive order in 2020 banning TikTok.

☆ A New York woman lost all her belongings to a moving company scam. She got a $10,000 settlement, but is living with her parents and scraping together 5 part-time jobs to make ends meet.
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-19 | by ( Eliza Relman | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +8 min

The 45-year-old lactation consultant won about $10,000 by suing the moving company. There weren't a lot of options available when it came to moving companies, but she eventually found Gold Standard Relocation. Everything seemed normal on Wagner's moving day — until the movers didn't show up and the company wouldn't answer the phone. She'd already paid the moving company about $4,300 to transport and store more than 70 boxes of her things and many furniture pieces for six months. Fraudulent moving companies will often offer customers a low estimate and deposit price, and then demand additional exorbitant fees after taking their belongings hostage.

☆ Want a fixer-upper in Japan? You could nab one of millions of country houses for sale for just $25,000.
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-17 | by ( Eliza Relman | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Japan has a glut of abandoned homes in rural areas and small towns. Japan has a glut of older, abandoned homes in rural areas, as Insider has previously reported. The country has at least 8.5 million such "akiya," the Japanese word for unoccupied home, according to government data from 2018. They're increasingly buying up these houses and restoring them, the New York Times reported. In 2020, he co-founded a real estate consultancy, called Akiya & Inaka, that markets and sells akiya and other traditional homes, the Times reported.

☆ Montana Republicans are appealing to anti-California sentiment to pass a slew of bipartisan pro-housing policies
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-14 | by ( Eliza Relman | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +7 min

Montana Republicans are aligned behind zoning reform and other pro-housing policies. And everybody in Montana is asking this question of, you know, how can we keep Montana feeling like Montana?" Preventing a 'California-style housing crisis'Montana's ultra-conservative GOP governor, Greg Gianforte, recently called the housing crisis "probably the number one issue faced by working Montanans." Conservative supporters of pro-housing policies in the state have successfully tied anti-California sentiment to anti-sprawl and pro-housing policies. "The fear is that in 25 years, we're going to have a California-style housing crisis," Cotton said.

☆ The mayor of a rich New York suburb says wealthy communities 'are losing their minds' over Gov. Kathy Hochul's plan to increase housing
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-12 | by ( Eliza Relman | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Affluent suburban communities around New York City are denouncing the proposal. The mayor of Bronxville, NY told Bloomberg some wealthy communities "are losing their minds." But many of the wealthiest suburban communities around New York City aren't having it. "People in Nassau and Suffolk are losing their minds," Mayor Mary Marvin told Bloomberg. Marvin told Bloomberg that Hochul wouldn't have been elected last fall if she'd campaigned on her housing plan.

☆ Florida is ground zero for moving scams where companies demand extra fees — or steal your stuff
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-12 | by ( Eliza Relman | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +7 min

Moving company scams are on the rise, and almost half originate in Florida. But the Sunshine State is also increasingly home to scammers operating fraudulent moving companies targeting Florida residents and people across the country. No one's regulating," Susan Chana Lask, a New York-based consumer rights attorney who settled a lawsuit last year with a Florida-based moving company, told Insider. Her office announced last November that it had shut down 19 fraudulent moving companies and recovered $27 million in fines and restitution from the scammers. The sharp increase in moving scams across the country has also prompted the Biden administration to announce it's taking action.

☆ Why Paris is one of the few cities in the world banning rental e-scooters
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-09 | by ( Eliza Relman | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +10 min

Transportation experts say the Paris ban doesn't necessarily mean much for the growth of micromobility. The diverging approaches to rental e-scooters by major cities around the world reflects the technology's chaotic rollout over the last few years and an inability for cities to keep up with sufficient regulations, experts say. Either way, experts say the regulatory environment in Paris and many other places just hasn't been able to keep up. Transportation experts say Paris' ban isn't necessarily reflective of how the public in that city — or any — feels about e-scooters. Despite the setback in Paris, transportation experts say electric vehicles of all sorts, from e-scooters, to e-bikes, to electric buses, are the future of transport in cities around the world.

☆ A composer of classical music blasted in the LA metro to force unhoused people out of a station demanded the system stop using his work, saying 'no form of art should be used to discourage or limit fr
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-07 | by ( Eliza Relman | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

The LA Metro blasted classical music in one of its stations to deter people from hanging out there. But the composer said he wasn't informed his music was being used and demanded Metro stop using it. But that came to an end when one composer was informed his work was being used as a deterrent. But it faced pushback when news outlets reported that it was blasting music, including Barcelona-based composer Adrián Berenguer's four-minute piece "Immaterial", which it played on loop. The Westlake/MacArthur Park station played different classical music by long-dead composers, including Beethoven and Bach, at lower volumes on Thursday, L.A. Taco reported.

☆ The most and least deadly big US cities for bicyclists
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-05 | by ( Eliza Relman | Madison Hoff | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

Tucson, Arizona; Detroit, Michigan; and Jacksonville, Florida, were the deadliest big cities for cyclists in 2020. Florida, Louisiana, and Arizona were the deadliest states when it came to cyclist crashes with motor-vehicles. Tucson, Arizona, was the deadliest big city for cyclists with 1.26 deaths per 100,000 people, according to NHTSA data on US cities with more than 500,000 people. Beata Zawrzel/Getty ImagesThe vast majority of cyclist deaths — 79% — happen in urban areas, according to a fact sheet from NHTSA. The League ranks Massachusetts, Oregon, and Washington as the best states for cyclists, and Wyoming, Nebraska, and Mississippi as the worst.

☆ Biden could help save cars, bicyclists, and pedestrians from being pulled under trucks in an accident with a simple fix, advocates say
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-04 | by ( Eliza Relman | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +6 min

Side guards can also stop people and cars from being crushed by a truck's rear wheels. A man stands on a truck's rear underride guard in Mexico City in 2021. Isaac Guzman/Getty Images'A catch-22'The US government and road safety experts have known for at least 50 years that underride guards save lives. Rear underride guards have been mandatory for most trucks in the US since the 1950s. Cahalan blames the trucking industry for "delaying and fighting against common sense safety reforms," not just with regard to underride guards.

☆ Mitt Romney calls new bike lanes 'the height of stupidity' as bicyclists press Congress to make roads safer and e-bikes cheaper
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-03 | by ( Eliza Relman | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

Sen. Mitt Romney said making room for bike lanes is "the height of stupidity" and opposes e-bike credits. "Removing automobile lanes to put in bike lanes is, in my opinion, the height of stupidity, it means more cars backing up, creating more emissions." "There is a widespread suspicion on the right today that liberals want to take away their way of life," Carney told Insider. That is in the background of the mind of every conservative, and so when they hear more bike lanes, they think, 'Okay, what is that code for?'" Carney told attendees at the annual National Bike Summit in Washington last week to frame their efforts as building safer and more interconnected communities.

☆ Bicyclists are getting killed on American streets, and they want Congress to fix it
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-01 | by ( Eliza Relman | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +8 min

They're asking for e-bike tax credits and road safety funding, among other things. He's brought that message to Minnesota and federal lawmakers as part of his pro-bicycle advocacy for the last 20 years. This week, bike advocates from all 50 states descended on DC as part of the League of American Bicyclists' National Bike Summit. My kids tease me — please teach me how to ride a bike,'" Grilley said. Lindsey Nicholson/Getty ImagesElectrifying bike transportAdvocates for e-bike tax credits say they reduce the number of car trips people take, cutting emissions and congestion, and boosting public health.

☆ Republicans are starting to split over exactly how — and whether — to ban TikTok
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-30 | by ( Bryan Metzger | Eliza Relman | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +7 min

Republicans generally support banning TikTok, but they're beginning to disagree on how. Sen. Rand Paul has also come out against a TikTok ban, blocking a bill from Sen. Josh Hawley. But even among Republicans who favor a TikTok ban, there are growing concerns about the RESTRICT Act — arguably the most prominent proposal put forward to deal with the issue. "So, I think we should ban TikTok. "It's worse than banning TikTok, because it can be applied to lots of other companies," said Paul.

☆ It's not easy being a bicyclist in the US. Better infrastructure could help.
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-30 | by ( Eliza Relman | Juliana Kaplan | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +8 min

Advocates are asking for more funding for bike safety measures, in addition to e-bike tax credits. The best way to address biking safety concerns, advocates say, is to build better bike infrastructure, including a robust system of bike lanes. If passed, the law wouldn't directly address the most pressing safety and infrastructure concerns facing bicyclists, but advocates say it could help. At the same time, this growing community of new bicyclists would likely demand better bike lanes and other infrastructure. Ultimately, advocates say it's about return on investment: More bikes, and better bike infrastructure, could lead to big savings for commuters and a rethinking of how everyone navigates their landscape.

☆ Democrats want to make electric bikes much cheaper by giving you up to $1,500 to buy one
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-27 | by ( Eliza Relman | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

A new bill would give Americans up to $1,500 off the purchase of an electric bicycle. The Senate cut this legislation out of the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act, but included subsidies for electric cars and SUVs. Biking advocates argue that electric bikes should be subsidized just as electric cars have been for years. Electric bikes have boomed in popularity in the US over the last several years. E-bike tax credits introduced by cities and states around the country have become hugely popular in recent years.

☆ Sunlight in your bedroom could become a luxury as cities debate allowing landlords to rent windowless rooms in former office buildings to alleviate the housing crisis
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-25 | by ( Eliza Relman | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

Housing advocates are debating whether windowless bedrooms are the solution to the housing crisis. Enter windowless bedrooms. Journalist Matt Yglesias argued last year that windowless bedrooms would "save downtowns" by facilitating the mass retrofitting of office buildings into apartments. Supporters argue that building apartments with windowless bedrooms could both help alleviate the severe housing shortage and affordability crisis and repopulate urban business districts. But in recent years, windowless bedrooms have become somewhat normalized on college campuses.

☆ Trump's plan to build 10 new American cites is a right-wing dream of 'trad havens for beautiful families,' the internet's favorite architecture critic says
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-23 | by ( Eliza Relman | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +8 min

Architecture critic Kate Wagner says Trump's plan to build "freedom cities" is nothing new. There's a whole eco-system of classical architecture proponents on Twitter with Roman statues as their avatars who decry modernism. The order made classical architecture — think columns, marble, symmetry — the preferred style for federal buildings. Wagner says Trump's embrace of classical architecture echoes the right-wing war on modernism that began in the 1980s. "For some reason, there also emerged alongside of those advocates a group of people who started to make statements that people neurologically prefer classical architecture."

☆ It took a progressive Virginia suburb 8 years to let developers build apartments instead of single-family houses. It shows how hard it is to build middle-class housing in the US.
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-21 | by ( Eliza Relman | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +12 min

Arlington, Virginia, is finally set to pass a "missing middle" housing policy after years of debate. Arlington is just the latest community to address missing middle housing as a part of a broader national reckoning. Across the country, critics of increasing housing density in single family neighborhoods are disproportionately older, wealthier, white homeowners. Advocates of missing middle housing say there's a deep generational gap when it comes to housing density. Despite the massive effort it took to come to the verge of passing missing middle housing, Arlington officials predict change will be slow and limited.

☆ The 10 US cities where it's hardest to build affordable housing
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-21 | by ( Eliza Relman | Madison Hoff | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Restrictive zoning, often originally designed to exclude people of color, persists in metros across the US. Restrictive zoning policies are a major obstacle to building more housing, particularly affordable housing for lower and middle-income Americans, amid a national housing shortage. But restrictive zoning isn't limited to major coastal cities. And it prevents neighborhoods from becoming more dense, worsening the national housing shortage and limiting the supply of much-needed affordable housing. Multi-family homes, apartment buildings, and other more affordable housing are illegal to build in vast swaths of the nation's residential neighborhoods.

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