The struggles of caretaking are nothing new, but there’s a trend emerging as baby boomers get older: More and more younger adults are becoming part of the “sandwich generation.” That means they’re caring for young children and aging loved ones at the same time, and this change is exposing gaps in eldercare policy. More than half of Americans in their 40s and a quarter of adults overall are becoming part of this growing cohort. This week on The Weeds, we sat down with Vox senior correspondent Ann...
Oct 25, 2023•38 min
Open enrollment is around the corner, which means soon it will be time to pick your health insurance again. And you may ask yourself: Why do we do it this way? In 2022, almost 55 percent of Americans got their insurance through an employer, meaning that your employment status and where you work are major factors in the kind of coverage you get. This week on The Weeds, we go back in time with Senior Correspondent Dylan Scott about why our insurance is so tied to where we work. Read More: The Vox ...
Oct 18, 2023•45 min
What will American politics look like after Trump? Sean Illing is joined by Sohrab Ahmari to discuss his new book, Tyranny, Inc. Ahmari is one of the conservative intellectuals trying to map out a post-Trump future for the Republican Party, and his book is an attempt to justify a form of democratic socialism from the right. The two discuss whether his vision could ever be the basis for a broader coalition. Host: Sean Illing (@seanilling), host, The Gray Area Guest: Sohrab Ahmari (@SohrabAhmari),...
Oct 11, 2023•56 min
Congress narrowly avoided a government shutdown when it passed a bill funding the government for the next 45 days. And while keeping the government open is a good thing, Congress just kicked the can down the road. The bill didn’t actually resolve the big-picture budget fight, and certainly didn’t solve the inevitable problem of political fights delaying the appropriations process. Molly Reynolds, senior fellow at The Brookings Institution, explains why Congress does the budget this way and what ...
Oct 04, 2023•46 min
Earlier this month, New York City Mayor Eric Adams said the current migrant crisis would “destroy the city.” Since April 2022, more than 115,000 migrants have arrived in New York City, many fleeing hardship from their home countries. In response, the Biden administration granted Temporary Protected Status to Venezuelan migrants. But while the move may provide some immediate relief to migrants seeking work authorization, some experts worry that it won’t fix the root of the problem: the broken US ...
Sep 27, 2023•52 min
Summer is over, school is back, and the Supreme Court is getting ready for a new term. The term starts in early October, and the docket is stacked. Host Jonquilyn Hill sits down with Vox senior correspondent Ian Millhiser to get into the major cases the court will hear this term. Read More: The Supreme Court will spend its new term cleaning up after rogue MAGA judges — Vox Submit your policy questions! We want to know what you’re curious about. Credits: Jonquilyn Hill, host Sofi LaLonde, produce...
Sep 20, 2023•44 min
No matter where you live in the US, this summer was hot. Extremely hot. Temperatures soared all over the country, breaking records almost daily. Even Arizona saw unprecedented heat: Phoenix baked under 110º heat for 31 days straight, with little to no relief at night. The extreme heat poses a grave threat to workers in America, both indoor and outdoor, because there are few to no heat-related protections for workers. It asks the question: Whose responsibility is it to keep us cool? Read More: Ex...
Sep 13, 2023•47 min
The problem of school lunch debt is not a new one. But during the early days of the Covid-19 public health emergency, Congress had a solution: universal free school lunch. Suddenly, federal waivers were available to public schools around the country, and food insecurity in at-risk households dropped by 7 percent. But, like many other Covid-era policies, it lapsed. And while some states moved to make universal free lunch permanent, many didn’t. Vox senior correspondent Anna North (@annanorthtweet...
Aug 30, 2023•38 min
In case you missed it, Donald Trump was indicted once again, this time for his attempts to overturn the results of the 2020 election in Georgia. But this indictment is different from the others, because it involves a RICO charge. RICO, short for Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations, is most commonly used to prosecute organized crime. These cases can also be exceedingly complicated, and often take months to even make it to trial. Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis wants to see ...
Aug 23, 2023•47 min
In early July, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott installed a chain of buoys and barbed wire in the Rio Grande as part of his “Operation Lone Star” plan to crack down on illegal border crossings. Then, a few days later, the Justice Department filed a lawsuit in response to the floating buoy border. The DOJ is using an obscure 1899 law called the Rivers and Harbors Act as the legal basis for this suit, claiming the border obstructs navigable waterways. Will that be enough for the DOJ to force Abbott to remov...
Aug 16, 2023•44 min
Finding a therapist can be exhausting. Between connecting with a clinician you like and locating someone who takes your insurance, it can be a daunting process. And despite a 2008 law that requires parity between mental and physical health care, insurers have found workarounds. Now, the Biden administration is moving to strengthen the parity law to make it easier for folks to access mental health care. Will it work? Vox’s Dylan Scott explains. Read More: Why it’s so hard to get health insurance ...
Aug 09, 2023•41 min
For the first time ever in America, a birth control pill will be available over the counter. In July 2023, the Food and Drug Administration approved Opill, a progestin-only form of daily oral contraception. This move could open the doors to millions of people who need, and want, to use birth control. To understand the court rulings that got us here, the potential obstacles to equal access, and what Opill means for the future of contraceptives in the US, host Jonquilyn Hill speaks with Dr. Raegan...
Aug 02, 2023•51 min
Last month, the Supreme Court struck down President Biden’s student loan forgiveness program. Student loan debt these days weighs in at about $1.7 trillion. Leah Litman and Josh Mitchell join us on the latest episode of The Weeds to dive into the legal landscape and discuss how we got this student loan system in the first place. Read More: The Supreme Court’s student loan decision in Biden v. Nebraska is lawless and completely partisan | Vox The Supreme Court put itself in charge of the executiv...
Jul 26, 2023•52 min
Many states have extremely punitive policies around cannabis and pregnancy. But researchers don't actually have great data on cannabis's harms. This episode of Unexplainable originally aired in May 2023. Read More: Weed in pregnancy: Is it safe? - Vox Submit your policy questions! We want to know what you’re curious about. Want to support The Weeds? Please consider making a donation to Vox: bit.ly/givepodcasts Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Jul 19, 2023•43 min
If you’re buying a new home, there’s a good chance it’s part of a homeowners association. HOAs are a form of common interest housing, and roughly a quarter of Americans live in communities with one. These private entities work as a pseudo-government in many neighborhoods, and they’re shaping housing policy across the country. Read More: When your neighbors become your overlords Submit your policy questions! We want to know what you’re curious about Credits: Jonquilyn Hill, host Sofi LaLonde, pro...
Jul 12, 2023•51 min
A popular saying is that public libraries are the last bastion of true democracy. But in recent months, Republican state lawmakers and local elected boards in states including Texas and Missouri have threatened libraries as a way to control what materials patrons can and cannot access. But these funding threats didn’t come out of nowhere. They often start with book bans in public schools. In today’s episode of The Weeds, we dig into threats to defund public libraries and the growing movement to ...
Jun 28, 2023•48 min
In this live taping of The Weeds from TruCon 2023, host Jonquilyn Hill sits down with Linda Thomas-Greenfield, the US ambassador to the United Nations, for a conversation about the role of Africa in the current geopolitical landscape. They discuss the ongoing conflict in Sudan, Uganda’s new anti-LGBTQ law, South Africa’s move to supply weapons to Russia, and take some audience questions. Submit your policy questions! We want to know what you’re curious about. Credits: Jonquilyn Hill, host Sofi L...
Jun 21, 2023•35 min
For many Black children, their first encounter with the discrimination that will trail them their whole lives comes from the school system — a system where they are five times more likely to attend a segregated school than their white counterparts. This early exposure to segregation is one of many possible factors contributing to what’s known as the racial achievement gap — the gap between Black and white students’ test scores. Education experts have looked to a number of factors as root causes ...
Jun 14, 2023•52 min
Do Montanans have a constitutional right to a clean and healthy environment? According to the state constitution they do. And a group of young people are using that language to sue the state over its energy policies. The case is called Held v. Montana, and the plaintiffs want to prove the state’s energy policies directly harm the Montana environment. In today’s episode of The Weeds, we’ll dig into the case with Amanda Eggert (@amandaleggert), environmental reporter at the Montana Free Press, and...
Jun 07, 2023•42 min
Summer is around the corner, which means the latest rulings from this Supreme Court are as well. Two cases will take on affirmative action. In this episode of The Weeds we go on a deep dive with Vox reporters Fabiola Cineas and Ian Millhiser and look at the man behind both cases, the current state of affirmative action, and what a future without this policy would look like. Read More: Everything you need to know about the Supreme Court affirmative action cases - Vox The Supreme Court discovers t...
May 24, 2023•59 min
The first child labor law in America went on the books almost 200 years ago, and federal labor protections were enshrined in the Fair Labor Standards Act nearly 100 years later in 1938. So almost a century after the passage of the FLSA, why are we seeing reports of children working in factories, slaughterhouses, and even at McDonald’s? Meanwhile, state legislators are introducing bills across the country that further weaken child labor protections. Historian Beth English and Vox senior policy re...
May 17, 2023•53 min
In recent years, there’s been a dramatic increase in the number of anti-LGBTQ bills introduced in state legislatures across the country. The ACLU is currently tracking 474 such bills, the majority of which target transgender rights. Meanwhile, trans people are over four times more likely than cisgender people to be the victims of violent crime. And according to a 2022 report from the Trevor Project, 45 percent of LGBTQ youth seriously considered suicide in the past year, including more than half...
May 10, 2023•46 min
Question: What is the world’s largest habitat? Here’s a hint: It also takes up about half of the Earth’s surface. Any guesses? It’s the high seas, the parts of the open ocean outside any single country’s jurisdiction. And for the first time ever, there is a plan to protect it. Read More: The largest habitat on Earth is finally getting protection | Vox The High Seas Treaty, Explained | Reuters The BBNJ agreement and liability | ScienceDirect Journal Credits: Jonquilyn Hill, host Sofi LaLonde, pro...
May 03, 2023•44 min
On this week’s episode of The Weeds, we sit down with Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg to talk about transportation policy in America. From subways and buses to cars and safer roads, listen for more about the future of public transportation and the policies that can curb traffic deaths. Plus, more from Vox’s Marin Cogan and her reporting on the deadliest road in America. Related Reading: How a stretch of US-19 in Florida became the deadliest road for pedestrians - Vox Cars transformed Ame...
Apr 26, 2023•53 min
It’s been 10 days since a federal judge in Texas issued an unprecedented ruling that nullified the 2000 Food and Drug Administration approval of mifepristone, the first medication in a two-pill combination for medication abortion. A confusing legal battle ensued, and now we are waiting to hear from the Supreme Court. But we still want to know: What does this mean for the future of FDA drug approval? Vox’s Keren Landman (@landmanspeaking) explains. References: Abortion pill ruling: Why mifepristo...
Apr 18, 2023•37 min
Sean Illing speaks with Matthew Jones, historian of science and technology, and co-author (with data scientist Chris Wiggins) of the new book How Data Happened. They discuss the surprisingly long history of data from the 18th century to today, in service of explaining how we wound up in a world where our personal information is mined by giant corporations for profit. They talk about how the allure of measurement and precision spread from astronomy to the social sciences, why advertising became s...
Apr 11, 2023•55 min
After the shooting at the Covenant School in Nashville in late March, President Biden once again called for reinstating the federal assault weapons ban. The United States banned new sales of assault weapons from 1994 to 2004, but the law was easy to skirt, and the data we do have about its effectiveness is complicated. Is an assault weapons ban where advocates should spend their political capital? References: America's unique, enduring gun problem, explained The Secret History of Guns Gun Policy...
Apr 04, 2023•46 min
On April 1, 2023, a Covid-era Medicaid policy called continuous enrollment will end. The policy allowed recipients to retain their benefits, even if they were no longer eligible, throughout the federal public health emergency and prevented lapses in coverage. Now that that’s coming to an end, state Medicaid offices need to audit their enrollees. But that process isn’t so simple, and millions are expected to slip through the cracks. Vox senior correspondent Dylan Scott (@dylanlscott) explains. Re...
Mar 28, 2023•48 min
This month, the Illinois Supreme Court heard oral arguments in a case examining the Safe-T Act. The legislation would bring sweeping reform to the state’s criminal justice system, but one policy in particular has caught the eye and the ire of prosecutors: the elimination of cash bail. Proponents say ending cash bail bonds will get rid of inequities that favor the rich; opponents say it will lead to a rise in crime. What does the fight over cash bail in Illinois tell us about criminal justice in ...
Mar 21, 2023•54 min
You’ve probably heard by now that President Joe Biden released his 2024 budget proposal. You’ve also probably heard that it has almost no chance of passing through both chambers of Congress. What is likely to come to pass is more drama over a recurring problem: the fight over the debt ceiling. If the US doesn’t raise the ceiling and defaults on its debt, financial catastrophe would ensue. What does that mean for the country’s fiscal future? References: What’s in Biden’s new White House budget - ...
Mar 14, 2023•44 min
