Three news stories summarized & contextualized by analytic journalist Colin Wright.
Note: My new book about aging and growing older with intention, How To Turn 39 (howtoturn39.com), is available for pre-sale :)
Four killed in Guangdong floods, sparking concerns over extreme weather defenses
Summary: Heavy weekend rains triggered floods in the heavily populated Pearl River Delta in China, leading to four confirmed deaths, the evacuation of around 110,000 people, and 25,800 people in emergency shelters earlier this week.
Context: Officials in Guangzhou said they’ve tallied the highest cumulative rainfall figures since 1959 this April, and that flash flood and other storm-related warnings are still in effect for many of the region’s cities, including the tech-hub megacity, Shenzhen; this part of China is prone to seasonal flooding, but as is the case in many parts of the world right now, floods have become less predictable and on average more potent, and as a result local infrastructure meant to protect locals from the impacts of flooding are proving to be less effective.
—The Guardian
FTC issues ban on worker noncompete clauses
Summary: The US Federal Trade Commission announced on Tuesday that employers, except in rare cases, can no longer prevent their employees from going to work at rival companies after quitting or being fired using a type of contract called a noncompete.
Context: Noncompetes allow employers to say, for instance, that once you’ve left our company, you can’t work for another company in the same industry for a given number of years, which helps protect said company at the expense of the employee’s career options; the FTC decided that this was bad for the economy and for workers, and that it is often coercive, as employers tend to have enough leverage to force people to sign these contracts if they want to work in their industry of choice; this decision will almost certainly see court challenges by businesses and the US Chamber of Commerce, which argue noncompetes help them protect their intellectual property and trade secrets from rivals.
—The New York Times
Senate sends sweeping foreign aid package to Biden's desk
Summary: As predicted, the US Senate voted on Tuesday, 79 to 18, to pass a foreign aid package that was recently passed by the House; yesterday, the President signed the bill into law.
Context: This package contains about $61 billion in assistance for Ukraine, $26 billion for Israel and Palestinians, and $8.12 billion for Taiwan and other Indo-Pacific interests; it also includes a provision that will require Chinese company ByteDance divest itself of its US assets, like TikTok, or face a ban in the country.
—Axios
US energy markets (and consequently, the energy markets of many US allies) have largely (though not entirely) defied expectations of disruption over the past few years, despite several land wars and burgeoning conflicts in the Middle East that previously—before the US became the biggest oil producer in the world on the strength of its shale oil fracking efforts—would have caused a whole lot of tumult and economic discomfort.
—Financial Times
34,183
Number of confirmed people killed in Gaza following Israel’s invasion of the Strip, according to the Gaza Ministry of Health.
That’s alongside 77,084 people who have been wounded, the around 7,000 people who are missing, and the 1.1 million people who are facing a “catastrophic” lack of food, which is the IPC’s (a global hunger watchdog organization) worst hunger rating, at which point people are actively starving to death.
—Al Jazeera
One Sentence News / April 25, 2024