đ Hello there,
Welcome to another edition of the Stellar Recap, a weekly newsletter where I share interesting content you may have missed over the week. This issue features 73 bullets.
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đ Business, Economics & Personal Finance
The lawyers who worked to void Elon Muskâs $56B compensation package at Tesla are seeking a $6B legal fee, which is equivalent to an hourly rate of ~$288.9K.
In 2023, recent college grads ages 22-27 who were working full-time earned $24K/yr more than their peers with a high school degree. In 1990, the gap was $15K/yr in todayâs dollars.
Milk production has increased 96% since 1975, reaching an all-time high of 26.4B gal. or ~226.6B lbs in 2023. It would take 10 yrs for that amount to flow over Niagara Falls.Â
Apple was fined $2B by the European Commission for suppressing competition from music streaming rivals like Spotify. Specifically, Apple prevented app developers from informing iOS users of "alternative and cheaper music subscription services."
Bainbridge Island saw the largest % increase in mean household incomes between 2019 and 2022 at 48%. The mean household income there in 2022 was $215K and 57% of households earned >$200K. Los Altos, CA, had the highest mean household income overall at ~$400.8K.
The price for Bitcoin set a new all-time high last week when it hit $69,324 at ~10AM ET last Wed.
TurboTax and H&R Block added AI chatbots to their tax-prep software (đWP) but tests showed that the advice is frequently unhelpful or wrong.
Federal regulators capped most credit card late fees at $8 as part of a broader push by the Biden administration to eliminate junk fees. The CFPB estimated that the change will save US families $10B+/yr.
A new Harris Poll showed that 76% of Americans donât trust car dealerships to be honest about pricing and 86% are concerned about hidden fees.
The son of billionaire Mukesh Ambani â CEO of Reliance Industries and the worldâs 11th-richest person â celebrated his wedding with 3 days of pre-wedding festivities. The partyâs catering contract was worth $25M+ and involved 65 chefs. The total cost of the pre-celebration was estimated to be ~$150M+.
A new study found that, compared to native-born US citizens, immigrants are ~80% more likely to found companies at all scales. Those firms also have ~1% more employees than those founded by US natives, on average.
đ§ Health, Healthcare & Safety
France enshrined abortion rights in its constitution last Mon (đWP). The amendment referring to abortion as a âguaranteed freedomâ passed by a vote of 780 in favor and 72 against, far above the required threshold of 512 votes.
A new study found that, between Jan. 2019-Dec. 2022, Medicare Advantage patients received less home healthcare and exhibited worse outcomes than traditional Medicare patients, including ~2 fewer days of services between hospital admission and discharge and 3% lower odds of improved mobility afterward.
New findings showed that Black Medicaid enrollees are more likely than their white counterparts to be hospitalized for preventable health events relating to heart failure, diabetes, and asthma/chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD).
The first over-the-counter birth control pill, Opill, will be available in-store and online later this month with a suggested retail price of $19.99/mo.
If you have an iPhone or iPad, you can download a free app called Mimi to test your hearing. You can also use your computer to take the National Hearing Test, developed by the NIH, for an $8 fee (free for AARP members).
Nigeriaâs National Assembly has instructed the countryâs health ministry to investigate a âstrange diseaseâ said to have killed 12+ people in the northeastern state of Gombe. The WHO confirmed that 3 deaths were from meningitis.
A study of 200+ people undergoing surgery found that ~60% had microplastics in fatty plaques lining their arteries and those who did were 4.5x more likely to experience heart attack, stroke, or death in the 3 yrs after their surgery than those who didnât.
Between 2019 and 2022, ~11K infants and young children landed in hospital emergency departments because they accidentally ingested melatonin.
A new study found that ~5%â15% of patients taking selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) developed âsexual impairmentsâ after the drug went to market.
The FDA approved Wegovy for serious cardiovascular complications in adults with obesity and heart disease. Studies showed that weekly injections dropped the risk of heart attack, stroke, and death by 20%.
A large study of 25.3K adult twins in Sweden found that a twin who reported 1+ trauma(s) in childhood was 2.4x more likely to be diagnosed with a psychiatric illness (đNYT) than their sibling who didnât experience trauma.
đ Lifelong Learning
AI tokens and context windows are fundamental to how large language models work. Learn how they work.
In 1888, a French photographer named Louis Le Prince created a 2-sec., 24-frame celluloid film titled Roundhay Garden Scene. Itâs believed to be the oldest film in existence.
đ´ Lifestyle & Travel
United Airlines expects to serve >21M passengers from Mar. 8 - Apr. 21, up 10% YoY and marking its busiest spring break ever. The busiest travel day is expected to be Mar. 22, when 500K+ people are scheduled to fly via United.
The average distance between peopleâs homes and their workplaces was 27 mi in 2023 (đNYT), up from 10 mi in 2019. The shift has happened mostly among white-collar workers making $100K+.
The National Park Service forecasted that DCâs cherry blossoms will reach peak bloom between Mar. 23-26. Peak bloom is when 70% of the flowers are open.
Vail Resorts announced a $73 price increase to $982 for its Epic Pass for the 2024-25 winter season. The price of the Epic Local Pass will increase by $55 to $731.
How to find the best cities to watch the solar eclipse (đBloomberg).
The average rate for a car rental in Austin, TX, in Apr. is ~$114/day (đWSJ), up 92.4% YoY, according to Priceline.
đłď¸ Politics, Security & International Affairs
Haiti went into a 72-hr state of emergency last Sun. night after gangs, including ~3.8K prison escapees, attempted to seize control of the airport. At least 15K people have been displaced due to violence.
4 underwater internet cables in the Red Sea were recently cut. ~25% of online data pass through the affected area. Internet providers have since rerouted traffic but repairs wonât begin until at least next month.
A BBC investigation found that Trump supporters are targeting Black voters with fake AI images to create an impression of broad support.
A new poll showed that ~1 in 8 US voters said abortion is the top factor that influences how they'll vote in 2024 election. The issue resonates particularly with Black and Democratic women and those ages 18-49.
In 3 elections from 2018-2022, 43% of eligible white voters consistently casted ballots each year, compared with 27% of Black voters, 21% of Asian American voters, and 19% of Hispanic voters.
Congress passed 6 spending bills to partially fund the government for the rest of the year. Many science and tech agencies remain underfunded, including NSF (-8%), NTIA (-50%+), and NIST (-12%).
Coloradoâs Attorney Generalâs Office logged ~20.4K consumer complaints in 2023, up 14% YoY and the first time that complaints topped 20K. Most complaints were about retail sales.
Sweden has formally joined NATO, ending the countryâs long-standing neutrality in armed conflicts which dates back to the 1800s.
The US Army is experimenting with commercial AI chatbots as battlefield advisers in war game simulations but experts caution that the tech shouldnât be used in high-stakes situations.
Former Honduran president Juan Orlando HernĂĄndez was convicted in a New York court (đWP) for helping drug traffickers send at least 500 tons of cocaine to the US in exchange for bribes that fueled his political career.
⊠Pop Culture, Art, Sports & Entertainment
LeBron James became the 1st player in NBA player in history to reach 40K career pts last Sat.
Caitlin Clark set a new record for the most pts scored by a menâs or womenâs Division I basketball player during the Iowa vs Ohio State game last Sun., after Clark accrued 3,685 career pts. The average cost of a ticket to watch Caitlin play her last regular season home game was ~$571/seat, which is >12x the NCAA average.
Excluding the pandemic years (2020-2022), Feb. 2024 was the lowest-grossing month at the US box office since Sep. 1997.
Dune: Part Two made $81.5M in North America and $97M overseas last weekend during its box office debut. 18% of revenue was from IMAX tickets.
Expenditures by US college athletic departments increased 13% YoY during the 2022-23 season. Much of the growth was in recruiting, which increased 24% over that period. Football saw the biggest increase in recruiting costs at 32%.
Navy Lt. Paul Johnson began a 3,000 mi run from LA to NYC on Mar. 1, which he hopes to complete in 40 days to set a new Guinness World Record. Heâs aiming to run 10-12 mph and at least 75 mi. per day.
Cole Brauer became the 1st American woman to race nonstop around the world alone. The 30,000-mi journey took 130 days.
In the first half of 2023, Netflix subscribers watched 500M+ hrs of Adam Sandler films (đForbes) which is partly how the actor raked in ~$73M and became the highest-paid actor last year.
Singapore struck an exclusive deal to host Taylor Swift concerts. Thailandâs prime minister accused the country of paying as much as $3M/show but Singapore denied it. Analysts estimated that Swifties spent up to $300M on food, lodging, and other tourism-related purchases there, which would bump Singaporeâs GDP by 0.02% in Q1.
đĄ Real Estate
Despite offering a salary of $167K, the city of Steamboat Springs, CO, canât find a head of HR who can afford a place to live there. Since 2020, single-family home prices have increased ~80% to $1.8M on average. All real estate sales, including condos, increased 64% to $1.1M. For existing homeowners, those rising sale prices have caused property taxes to shoot up ~86%.
A 1,744 sq ft property in the Sacramento area (Rancho Cordova) received 147 offers, according to the listing agent. The listing price was $199K and it closed at $425K.
The worldâs largest community of 3D-printed homes is being built in Georgetown, TX, and the neighborhood just unveiled its first completed house. Sizes range from 1.5K-2.1K sq ft and cost $475K-$599K.
An oceanfront penthouse in Miami Beach, FL, is under contract for ~$120M (đWSJ), making it the most expensive condo ever sold in the Miami area. The previous record was half that price.
đ Society
International adoptions by American families fell 93% from their peak of ~23K in 2004 to ~1.5K in 2022. ~40% of children adopted in 2022 were born in 1 of 3 countries: Colombia, India, and S. Korea.
Despite accounting for 29% of the US high school population, Latine students make up only 21% of students in foundational computer science courses and 20% of AP-level courses.
A survey by Mercer found that ~69% of employees said they âtrust their organization to do the right thingâ for employees, down from 80% in 2022. 70% said they trust their employer to do the right thing for the business, down from 85% in 2022.
A preliminary analysis of ~5K papers submitted to the journal Nature over a 5-mo. period showed that, of the 90% of corresponding authors who were willing to disclose their gender, just 17% identified as women. Globally, the female scientific workforce was ~32% in 2021.
Women made up 47% of the US civilian labor force in 2023, up from 30% in 1950. The BLS projected that women will continue to make up less than 50% of the labor force through 2032.
A new report from the World Bank found that no country in the world affords women the same opportunities as men in the workforce. Closing the gap could raise global GDP by >20%.
𧪠Science, Climate, Environment & Technology
According to data from Climate Pulse, the planet just had its hottest Feb. on record. The month's global average surface temp was ~3.2°F above the preindustrial era average from 1850-1900.
A recent analysis of 7.4M+ digital object identifiers (DOIs) for scholarly publications found that 28% are missing from online archives, highlighting the challenges of preservation for e-journals.
Seattle will deploy double-decker eclectic buses with inductive wireless charging tech in 2027 or 2028.
Based on activity data from ~16K Udemy Business customers worldwide, 3.2M learners had enrolled in more ~1.7K generative AI courses on the platform.
Anthropic updated its suite of AI tools. For $20/mo., its premium chatbot Claude 3 Opus can now summarize 200K words, which is 2x its previous cap.
Researchers trained OpenAIâs GPT-4 to autonomously hack websites with a 73% success rate. It cracked 11 in 15 challenges, including manipulating source code to steal info from website users.
NASA is accepting applications for astronauts for the 1st time in 4 yrs.
Geologists have voted down a proposal to end the Holocene and inaugurate a new epoch, the Anthropocene which is believed to have started in 1952. The Holocene is thought to have begun 11.7K yrs ago at the end of the last ice age. A new epoch canât be proposed for another decade.
The company behind Tumblr and WordPress, Automattic, announced itâs selling user data (from blog posts, comments, articles, etc.) to OpenAI and Midjourney.
New data suggests that one of Jupiterâs moons, Europa, produces enough daily oxygen to sustain 1M humans. Yeah, but how many people can stand the -370F to -210F temps. there?
The Voyager 1 spacecraft is ~15B miles away and has been sending confusing messages back to Earth since mid-Nov. The messages are alternating series of 1s and 0s.
Projected new energy demand in N. America is expected to double in 9 yrs., thanks in part to rapid advancements in AI. This is straining existing infrastructure and some cities canât meet demand.
A blind, worm-like caecilian that lives underground is the 1st documented amphibian species that nourishes its young with a milk-like product, which it squirts from the cloaca, a combined rear opening for its reproductive and digestive-excrement systems. Lactation is considered a key characteristic of mammals, but a handful of other animals â including some birds, fish, insects and even spiders â produce nutrient-rich liquid for their offspring.
Wishing you a good week
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