Key Highlights
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A study of 83 major cities finds that local plans for adapting to extreme heat often fail to properly identify which communities are most vulnerable or address issues of fairness and governance. This means the people who need the most protection from dangerous heat might not get it, highlighting a major gap in urban climate planning.
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Research on Mao-era China reveals that strong social networks and authoritarian structures can be surprisingly vulnerable, as political movements can turn into “collective behavior” that splits groups and undermines the state from within. This challenges the common idea that tightly connected societies and strong dictatorships are always stable.
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A study of U.S. states shows that those more reliant on sales tax revenue had shorter COVID-19 lockdowns for restaurants, bars, and stay-at-home orders. This suggests that the fear of losing tax money may have unintentionally influenced public health decisions during the crisis.
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A large European study finds that immigrants’ views on abortion generally shift over time to match their new country’s attitudes, even if they move to a more conservative place, but deeply religious people of all faiths resist this change. This counters the belief that immigrant attitudes are fixed or only become more liberal, and shows religion can create a shared, transnational viewpoint.
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In China, financial firms that hire former stock market regulators are less likely to have their client companies accused of fraud, mainly because detection drops, not because fraud decreases. This “revolving door” effect benefits the firms and the ex-regulators with higher fees and pay, but retail investors, unlike professionals, don’t seem to account for this bias.
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