It’s Free for ALL Friday! Each week I keep track of some of the off-the-path things I've found, and work extra-hard to make sure you never hit a paywall. (If you do find links that don’t work, let me know!)
The Neuroscience of Decluttering
When I came across old high school notebooks of mine while helping my mom declutter my childhood home, I knew I should throw them away. Even if I’d wanted to brush up on Latin American history, they would be a poor resource. And yet I didn’t want to let go.
Many of us face clutter when we do our spring cleaning or, far harder, when we deal with a deceased loved one’s things. Americans spend billions of dollars each year on storage, and many live with jam-packed basements and attics.
As a neuroscientist studying how people make decisions, I have also seen that when given the tools, people can choose to work with, rather than against, the brain systems that regulate decision making to help themselves let go of old ideas and behaviors. Knowing how our minds work is the first step to aligning our decision making with our goals and values.
Still, my research told me that holding on to objects like my old notebooks was the wrong approach. My lab studies what happens in people’s brains when they are making choices and how we can use that understanding to make change easier. One way to make change easier is to switch from the standpoint of possessor to buyer.
Instead of asking, “Do I want to keep this?” ask, “Would I buy this today?”
Modifying the decision-making framework allows a neural calculation in reward and self-relevance systems to shift, too. A teakettle becomes something you can choose — or not — rather than something you stand to lose.
Link: New York Times
The Rise of In-Office Remote Work
The alternative to working from home is often logging on in a sea of mostly empty cubicles.
Home Depot, Instagram, Fidelity, and TikTok are just a few of the companies that have recently ordered their employees back to the office five days a week, part of a broader shift toward stricter return-to-office mandates.
These policies cut down on working from home, yet they don’t always cut down on remote work. Many employees now commute to the office only to spend each day on video calls with colleagues who are elsewhere, or even down the hall. They’re in the office but still working remotely.
We are two economists who have spent years studying how remote work shapes learning, productivity, happiness, and career progression. We have been struck by how often people picture the alternative to working from home as an office where nearly everyone is together. The modern office looks very different from that ideal. Today, the alternative to working from home is often working in a sea of mostly empty cubicles.
In a September survey of 1,835 college-educated American workers, we found that, on their most recent day at the office, more than 70 percent of respondents had at least one member of their team who was not in the building with them.
As a result, roughly half of respondents had no fully in-person meetings.
And more than a third had exclusively online meetings because their teams moved meetings entirely online whenever anyone was remote. For these workers, the commute to the office buys little more than a different background on their video calls.
Link: The Atlantic
How to Give Your Kids Money for a House Without Things Getting Weird
There are many potential pitfalls that a good plan can circumvent
A forbidding housing market is pushing many home buyers to bank on their parents for help. The hard part is keeping family money from making things messy.
There are many potential pitfalls. Parents wield their generosity to over-meddle in home shopping. Children stop repaying their parents’ lent money. And then there are unforeseen events like divorce.
“Informal arrangements can create a lot of room for people to remember the same conversation or transactions differently over time,” said Timothy Burke, who has seen it all as chief executive of National Family Mortgage, which provides online informational resources for intrafamily mortgages.
Nearly a quarter of first-time home buyers relied on financial help from family or friends in the form of loans or direct gifts for down payments, according to a 2025 National Association of Realtors report.
Paul Ross, 60, a retiree in Wayne, N.J., and his wife issued two piggyback loans: one for his son who bought a home last month and one for his daughter in 2025. He says they have maintained their relationship by being transparent about money and ensuring his kids still purchase a home they could afford on their own.
“I wanted to replace the bank but not so much that they’re shopping or living above their means,” he said.
Link: Wall Street Journal
Americans Earning $100K Are Still Struggling. This Breakdown Offers Clues as to Why
Dollar General CEO recently said $100,000 earners have adopted the shopping habits of lower-income households
There was a time when a $100,000 salary could create a very comfortable lifestyle - but now those dollars don’t go nearly as far as they used to.
“Earning $100,000 used to be the point where you could say, ‘I can afford to do what I want and live the way that I want,’” Ashley F. Morgan, owner of bankruptcy law firm Ashley F Morgan Law, PC, said in an email to The Independent.
Some 18 percent of U.S. adults earn at least $100,000, according to a 2024 survey from YouGov. And though $100,000 is more than double the national median salary of $46,960, financial stress remains for many six-figure earners.
In fact, those making $100,000 or more have now adopted the shopping habits of lower-income households as they struggle with affordability, Dollar General CEO Todd Vasos said at a recent retail conference. That remark has some consumers second-guessing the value of such a salary.
“I think a lot of people got to six figures and thought, ‘Wait, why doesn’t this feel like as much money as I expected?’” Steve Sexton, owner of financial firm Sexton Advisory Group, told The Independent in an email.
The gap between a $100,000 salary and monthly expenses is even wider in some major cities, where rent, groceries, and insurance tend to be more expensive.
Link: The Independent
A TikTok Tarot Card Reader Accused Me of Murder. My Life Turned Upside Down.
It was a bright blue Thanksgiving Day. I was standing in a park listening to my kids play when I opened a TikTok video of a woman I had never met.
She showed my faculty profile picture and contact information, and said that I had orchestrated the murders of four students at the college where I work, the University of Idaho.
She claimed I was covering up an inappropriate romantic relationship with one of the victims.
I didn’t know any of the students, who had been killed only 11 days before I saw the video. The accuser knew nothing about me, lived in Texas and used tarot card readings as the only basis for her claims.
Over the next several weeks, while I was grieving with the rest of my community, this TikTok influencer uploaded over a hundred videos declaring that I had committed a quadruple homicide. The videos got millions of views.
I was overwhelmed with calls, messages, comments and emails, many of which were disturbing or threatening. And I could have been anyone.
I was not hit by a bus or punched in the face. Yet I saw up close how the online world can come to feel more real than the physical one.
Even after the actual murderer was arrested and convicted, the accusations against me continued. And even though these outrageous claims were made online by someone I had never met, they were amplified by unsuspecting viewers and algorithm-driven platforms, and the harm seeped into every aspect of my life.
I came to realize that all of us are responsible for the online world we inhabit, and all of us must fight its tendency to propagate lies.
Link: New York Times
Scoop: AI Companies Plot “The Day After”
Top executives at Anthropic, OpenAI and other AI companies are privately gaming out scenarios for a public and political revolt after a catastrophic AI event.
Why it matters: These officials anticipate a large-scale event, most likely a cyberattack, that shuts down access to financial services, internet connectivity, or even power and water.
The first example of significant real-world harm caused by unsafe AI would turn an already wary public further against the technology and its leaders, including Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, as well as President Trump for his reluctance to regulate it.
The planning involves red-teaming for worst-case scenarios. It focuses mainly on racing to educate members of Congress.
Company executives know regulation has no chance of passing right now, but still want to shape the legislation and policies U.S. leaders will turn to after a first catastrophic event.
What we’re watching: Many AI industry insiders told Axios they believe a major event will occur in the next six to 12 months.
Link: Axios
Secret Documents Reveal Donors Behind $330 Million for Trump’s Ballroom
The records offer a panoramic view of a fundraising campaign that is extraordinary for its size and opacity.
A list obtained by The Washington Post reveals all the major donors to President Donald Trump’s White House ballroom project, including previously undisclosed contributors who have benefited from regulatory decisions, government contracts and, in one case, a pardon for a family member.
Tech giants Nvidia and Apple each committed $25 million, the top contribution amount, the list shows. The Adelson family, one of the GOP’s largest donor dynasties, committed that sum as well, as did billionaire Charles Ergen, co-founder and chairman of telecommunications company Dish Network.
Absent from the list is Trump himself, who has said that he is helping to pay for the project. “It’s being paid for a hundred percent by me and some friends of mine,” he said last year, days after demolition began on the old East Wing.
The list and other documents offer a panoramic view of a fundraising campaign that is extraordinary both for its size and opacity. Ordinary political giving requires public disclosure and is subject to campaign finance rules. The ballroom donations are collected by a nonprofit and then channeled to the government and into a White House account the president directly controls.
Independent experts and scholars have expressed alarm at the potential the arrangement has for influence buying and coerced giving.
Companies or executives of firms that have had contracts with the federal government during Trump’s second term accounted for about half of the total, The Post found.
White House spokesman Davis Ingle said in part that these are simply “fake conflicts of interests,” and that the Trump administration will “relentlessly pursue those responsible for this cowardly leak while continuing to protect all those who give.”
Link: Washington Post
Thanks for reading and have a great weekend. See you in the comments!