With Americans spending so much of their time online - over 1,300 hours a year on social media alone - state lawmakers have increasingly focused on consumer data privacy in recent years. Much of their efforts have been channeled into comprehensive data privacy...
In show of just how powerful cultural issues can be, hot-button legislation dealing with the transgender community has emerged in dozens of statehouses in recent months, even though transgender people account for less than 1 percent of the nation’s adult...
The COVID-19 pandemic has laid bare any number of societal vulnerabilities, perhaps none more so than a growing shortage of health care workers some observers say is fast reaching crisis levels. With that shortfall expected to only get worse in the coming years...
If you’re a sports fan, you could be forgiven for thinking that sports gambling is now legal everywhere in the United States. These days, the logos for gambling brands are plastered all over sporting arenas, betting lines are frequently incorporated into...
After at least a decade of debate and dashed hopes, advocates for paid family leave in Maryland have finally seen their efforts rewarded as majority Democrats easily overrode Gov. Larry Hogan’s (R) veto of a measure that makes the Old Line State the 10 th...
Savannah Palmira’s heart sank when her 64-year-old mother announced over Christmas dinner that she had met a man online. “I just knew she was being scammed,” said Palmira, who lives in her hometown of Las Vegas. “She’s been scammed...
A growing number of states have joined the U.S. government and a host of allied nations around the world in imposing sweeping sanctions on Russia over its invasion of Ukraine. Several states, including California, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Connecticut, Colorado...
Among the many changes Americans experienced during the COVID-19 pandemic was the sudden, widespread adoption of telehealth services when visiting medical professionals in person became effectively impossible. The dramatic surge in telehealth usage became possible...
Like it or not, artificial intelligence and the computer algorithms it uses are determining the outcome of more and more of your life’s most significant events. Like whether you get a job . Or a home loan . Or get into college . Or get a vaccine , or perhaps...
A car’s catalytic converter is probably pretty low on the list of things most people think about when managing their hectic schedules. But these days the otherwise anonymous car part is all over the news. “ Catalytic converter thieves continue to...
Some of the biggest issues of 2021 – police accountability, the infrastructure bill, climate change and, of course, the pandemic – are expected to top policy agendas once again as state legislatures head into session in 2022. Here’s a look at...
When then-Gov. Jerry Brown signed SB 826 in 2018, it made California the only state to require corporate boards to have a minimum number of women directors. Almost four years later, California is still mostly going it alone – only Washington has adopted...
It’s been a year of hope and uncertainty in the states — and the prospect is for more of the same in 2022. Hope has been spurred by the economic rebound: sales tax revenues swelled as Americans bought taxable items at pre-pandemic levels while also...
There is almost no part of our lives these days that is not impacted by technology. Virtually every step we take, every song we listen to, everything we do online, every show we watch on TV and on and on and on has become a data point to be bought and sold and...
Health care has been one of the industries most impacted by the pandemic over the last 22 months, and the new year is not likely to see a slowing of the challenges and opportunities it faces. In this issue, we lay out a number of the questions and issues we think...