The NY Times has a great interactive flash feature on the jobless rate for people like you. It should be noted that unemployment is categorized as being unsuccessful in finding work (so if you’re not looking, then you don’t even count).
The NY Times reports on a 20-year study done by research professor, Jerome Kagan, on the development of temperament from childbirth to adulthood.
Temperament is a complex, multilayered thing, and for the sake of clarity, Kagan was tracking it along a single dimension: whether babies were easily upset when exposed to new things. He chose this characteristic both because it could be measured and because it seemed to explain much of normal human variation. He suspected, extrapolating from a study he had just completed on toddlers, that the most edgy infants were more likely to grow up to be inhibited, shy and anxious. Eager to take a peek at the early results, he grabbed the videotapes of the first babies in the study, looking for the irritable behavior he would later call high-reactive.
As a logical and seemingly simple conclusion, it becomes more interesting as Kagan interviewed children at different stages of adolescence and adulthood to see how nuances of their anxiety manifested itself and in what manner it affected them. One baby, Baby 19, in particular, had shown signs of anxiety at birth and continued to question her every decision.
Her voice trails off. She wants to make a difference, she says, and worries about whether she will. “I can’t stop thinking about that.”
I can definitely relate to this near-debilitating anxiety when I try to complete important tasks.
The New York Times reports that a study finds that texting, while driving, raises crash risk 23 times.
In the moments before a crash or near crash, drivers typically spent nearly five seconds looking at their devices — enough time at typical highway speeds to cover more than the length of a football field.
I am guilty of this very dangerous habit and will be keeping this article in mind the next time I feel tempted to text (on my iPhone, nonetheless) while driving.
Much like the recent hype of street vendors like the previously mentioned Kogi Truck, many entrepreneurs have come around to the business of street food. The NY Times covers the growing plethora of fancy street vendor carts and the hostile fight for territory amongst antiquated and unregulated vendor laws and permits.
“You can set your watch by it: park in a new spot, and within 15 minutes someone will come and check you out,” said Kim Ima, a former actress who owns the Treats Truck. Ms. Ima, one of the first upscale mobile vendors, had the tires of her truck slashed near her bakery soon after opening in 2007.
Much of New York City has limitations, and it goes without any surprise that the street vendor market is tightly watched by those who’ve been in the business for many years and vehemently defended when threatened.
The $200 permits are valid for two years and can be renewed indefinitely by mail. Their black-market value is tremendous: up to $15,000 for two years, according to a report released Tuesday by the city’s Department of Investigation.
I’ll welcome more selection, but I can see how it may get real ugly without proper regulation.
Slate reports on the booming industry of counterfeit cigarettes in Yunxiao, China.
But for U.S. consumers, inhaling the knockoff cigarettes may do even more damage than their genuine counterparts. Lab tests show that Chinese counterfeits emit higher levels of dangerous chemicals than brand-name cigarettes: 80 percent more nicotine and 130 percent more carbon monoxide, and they contain impurities that include insect eggs and human feces.
Creepy to think that ‘one in three’ Chinese men under the age of 30 will die from smoking. 2.2 trillion cigarettes annually? The statistics are mind-boggling.
A blog post in the NY Times brings up a study on interracial dating and its correlation to height.
We argue that a simple preference for a taller husband (or shorter wife) can explain part of the gender-specifi c asymmetries across ethnic groups in the propensity to outmarry. Blacks are taller than Asians, and their height distribution is closer to whites. Because they are taller, black men have better prospects on the white marriage market than Asian men. For women, the reverse is true. Because Asians are relatively short on average, women fare substantially better on the white marriage market than black women.
As ridiculous as this study seems, the comments are much more telling. To nobody’s surprise, the first comment is in regards to varying penis sizes amongst men of different ethnicities.
A male is judged fit and competitive not only by his height, but also by the size of his reproductive attributes. I don’t mean to feed stereotypes, but those are statistically proven trends – Black males are more endowed than white males, and Asian males – less (including Southeast Asian). It makes sense, therefore, that a white woman would go up from white to Black, but not down to Asian, and… poor Black women have no higher aim to go for.
- DM
Please don’t be such a size queen. Alas, the hits keep on coming.
OK, maybe it’s a lot to do with culture and diet. But white women are bigger, smoke more, drink more, argue more, play sports more often, take big strides when walking, etc. compared with Asian women. Seriously, a lot of my Thai friends (I’m in Thailand) see foreign women and think that they’re transvestites. As an Asian man, wouldn’t you want someone MORE feminine than you?? Would you date someone that (on the surface) reminds you of a man? Or for black women, wouldn’t you want someone more masculine than you.
- Ryan Coughlin
I’m kind of speechless, but that usually is the case with articles meant to pander to extremely vitriolic comments rather than intellectual discussion.
NY Times gets a hold of a few twenty-somethings struggling to get by in Williamsburg with the slumping economy.
It can be hard to see the signs of financial troubles in Williamsburg because residents are so loath to show that they had money in the first place. Robert Lanham, author of “The Hipster Handbook,” said in an interview that many newer residents tried to blend in with the area’s gritty history and dressed “half the time like they’re homeless people.”
Via @mlproject. (Sup Jack?)
NY Times features the top ten burgers as judged by the Burger of the Month Club. My neighborhood spot, Dumont, comes in at #11.
Since I’ve been on a baseball rampage since the new season started, I’ve had a few baseball articles I’ve been geeking over. An interesting one is from the SF Chronicle contesting the micromanagement of high pitch counts in baseball.
New York Giants pitcher Joe McGinnity, known as “Iron Man,” didn’t start pitching in the major leagues until he was 28. Five times, he pitched both ends of a doubleheader. He worked an astounding 434 innings in the 1903 season, and over his 10-year career racked up 247 wins and 314 complete games. Get this, though: Wandering through the minors until he was 52, McGinnity collected 204 more wins.
It’s interesting how inflated payrolls and contracts changes the perception of stamina and the spirit of the game against the practicality of protecting your financial investment. Pitch count has been an issue, apparently, for major league umpires as well.
Russell Shorto of the NY Times compares the Dutch welfare state to America’s notion of socialism. The author jaunts through a list of perks for paying a heftier income tax, such as the $4,265 that was deposited in his account last May for vakantiegeld, or in English, vacation money.
For that matter, even if you are unemployed you still receive a base amount of vakantiegeld from the government, the reasoning being that if you can’t go on vacation, you’ll get depressed and despondent and you’ll never get a job.
I’ve been having some thoughts about moving out of San Francisco for a little while now, though I’d have to do more research before seriously considering it. I promise I’m not being motivated by the vakantiegeld.
NY Times features SeekingArrangements.com, a dating site for older men, sugar daddies, to find younger women in exchange for money and gifts.
It’s only in the last century that money has been traded — albeit indirectly — for sexual attention from “respectable” unmarried women. In the early 1900s, courtship shifted from girls’ porches or parlors to a commercial venture: a date. Etiquette manuals of the time were explicit — boys were to pay for meals, entertainment and transportation, and in return, girls were to provide well-groomed company, rapt attention and at least a certain amount of physical affection. His money bought not only companionship but also her indebtedness.
The New York Times publishes an op-ed letter of resignation by Jake DeSantis, an executive vice president of the financial products unit at A.I.G..
That is why I have decided to donate 100 percent of the effective after-tax proceeds of my retention payment directly to organizations that are helping people who are suffering from the global downturn. This is not a tax-deduction gimmick; I simply believe that I at least deserve to dictate how my earnings are spent, and do not want to see them disappear back into the obscurity of A.I.G.’s or the federal government’s budget. Our earnings have caused such a distraction for so many from the more pressing issues our country faces, and I would like to see my share of it benefit those truly in need.
It’s nice to see a the other side of the story and recognize how media scrutiny and witch hunts have glossed over the lives in which this recession has affected.
Ramen in Tokyo
The NY Times takes a peek into the craze of ramen noodles.
Be warned: if you read this on an empty stomach, you will crave a heaping bowl of shoyu ramen.