By Jeremy Beck
Polling done for the release of our national study found that “sizeable majorities of Americans feel strongly about the need to protect farmland and natural habitats for themselves, for their fellow Americans, for posterity, and for the nation’s wildlife.” “Large majorities also indicated it was important to have ready access to natural areas and open … Continued
By Jeremy Beck
“About every five feet, there was a body….it was the Hunger Games.” – Life in America’s National Parks, 2022 Three out of every four Americans feel an “emotional or spiritual uplift” from spending time in natural areas, and 85 percent of Americans say it is important to be able to access them. From our study: … Continued
By Jeremy Beck
Some of the fastest-growing cities in the US are among those being roasted by record temperatures that are baking more than 100 million Americans under some sort of extreme heat warning. The sprawl of concrete for new housing has helped heighten temperatures in many of these growing cities. The spread of hard surfaces has also … Continued
By Jeremy Beck
America’s growing population is leading to the unilateral loss of farmland to make way for housing, office parks, shopping plazas, and more. The looming paradox is that as development consumes farmland to accommodate more people, the demand for food also grows. America’s capacity to provide basic resources (water, food, fiber) to its citizens is on … Continued
By Jeremy Beck
The water shortage in the West is very real and is intensifying year after year. Colorado, New Mexico, Utah, Wyoming, Arizona, California, and Nevada all receive water from the Colorado River, and are seeing a marked decrease in their water supplies due to the ongoing drought that has gripped most of the Western U.S. We … Continued
By Jeremy Beck
There is perhaps no greater warning sign for America than the lack of trust Americans have in our institutions. Trust in the media, which has become “a giant finger-wagging machine,” in the words of Matt Taibbi, has fallen to yet another all-time low. Americans are losing faith in our institutions for good reasons, but the … Continued
By Jeremy Beck
A friend shared this timelapse video of Las Vegas’ increasing sprawl and Lake Mead’s decreasing water levels. The video’s caption reads: As the city of Las Vegas grows, Lake Mead, its water supply, shrinks. In the mid-1980s, the Vegas metropolitan area was home to 438,000 people, and today that population has ballooned to upwards of … Continued
By Jeremy Beck
Americans are living more densely, on average, than we were 20 years ago, but we’ve paved over the equivalent of more than five Yellowstone National Parks – or roughly eleven-and-a-half million acres during that same period of time. Some of that loss was due to regional differences in land consumption per person; a majority of … Continued
By Jeremy Beck
Worker power, loose borders: pick one (hat tip, Oren Cass) Worker Power! Loose Borders! Batya Ungar Sargon: “I think working class people think about the economy in terms of jobs, because you get meaning from your job….Bring those factories back. The people who are benefitting from mass immigration, benefitting from these trade deals, they’ll be … Continued
