• The Federal Reserve will make its next interest rate decision at the end of July.
• Some economists said the economy is ready for the Fed to cut interest rates.
• Still, Powell has focused on moving cautiously and might wait until later in the year.

After years of high interest rates to combat soaring inflation, some economists think the time has finally come for the nation's central bank to give Americans financial relief by cutting those rates.

Lower rates would allow Americans to take out cheaper loans, helping out businesses and consumers.

Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody's Analytics, said that when cuts do come, he expects them to "provide immediate relief" to small businesses, consumers, and lower- and middle-income households. Business owners may find it easier to take out bank loans and consumers who rely on credit cards could end up with cheaper borrowing costs.

But those cuts may not be here just yet. At the end of July, the Federal Open Market Committee will announce its next decision on interest rates. CME FedWatch, which estimates interest rate probabilities based on market trades, forecasts a 93% chance the Fed will hold rates steady — and Fed Chair Jerome Powell has emphasized that the Committee needs to feel confident inflation is cooling enough before the Fed starts to cut.

It's a delicate balancing act between risking a recession and renewed price spikes. "If we loosen policy too late or too little, we could hurt economic activity," Powell said before the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs on July 9. "If we loosen policy too much or too soon, then we could undermine the progress on inflation."

But many long-time Fed watchers and macroeconomists think the war on inflation has been won, and it's time to cut.

Zandi thinks the Fed has "achieved their objective of full employment and inflation at target."

Claudia Sahm, founder of Sahm Consulting and former Fed economist, agrees. "Frankly, it's been time for a while," Sahm told Business Insider. "We have seen the US economy has been getting back on track, normalizing, rebalancing, all of the Fed's catchwords for some time now."

The consumer price index, which measures inflation, rose 3.0% year over year in June — a decrease from May's 3.3% reading — showing that inflation is inching toward the Fed's 2% target. Real US GDP has already been growing at a cooler rate. It increased 1.4% at an annualized rate in the first quarter of 2024 after a 3.4% increase in the fourth quarter of 2023. The labor market has seen the unemployment rate climb to above 4%, and job gains have cooled, though the US remains far from a recession.

As Powell has consistently said, cutting interest rates too early could end up hurting Americans if it requires the Fed to hike again at a later time. But keeping interest rates high for too long also has consequences — it's keeping housing costs high, businesses are struggling to invest, and Americans are finding it more expensive to take out loans and different forms of credit.

While economists who talked to BI described the current economy as good, they also noted that cutting interest rates could give Americans financial relief and help the economy thrive.

"Right now, the Federal Reserve with keeping interest rates high is putting pressure on the economy, is making it harder for consumers to buy," Sahm said. "They have to take out credit. It's making it harder for businesses to invest."

Why economists say it's time to cut interest rates

For months, some Democratic lawmakers have been urging Powell to cut interest rates sooner rather than later to give Americans financial relief. Sen. Elizabeth Warren joined three of her Democratic colleagues in writing a letter in January to Powell saying that "interest rates are still too high for many American families, who already cannot afford to pay rent or buy their first homes."

Some economists have recently been pointing to similar concerns with the Fed keeping interest rates high. "We got inflation under control, but we could end up in a recession, or we could just end up in a much weaker economy than was necessary because it just waited too long," Sahm said.

As Sahm pointed out, it would take time for reduced interest rates to "flow through to the economy."

"You want to begin a process of taking the pressure off of the economy," Sahm said. "The best way to do this would be gradually."

Waiting longer to start this gradual process of cuts could mean being up against unwelcome scenarios, such as the labor market taking "a turn for the worst," Sahm said. In that case, that could mean the Fed may have to make cuts more quickly.

Brian Rose, senior US economist at UBS, told BI that if the Fed doesn't cut rates soon, there could be a "more serious slowdown in the labor market, undesirable rise in the unemployment rate, or more layoffs, and things like that."

"The economy seems like it's already growing below trend, and if you leave rates at this level, which is quite restrictive, you can only expect the economy to slow further," Rose said.

True to form, Powell has not given any indication as to when interest rate cuts might happen, but when they do, it could provide relief to businesses and consumers alike.

Zandi said interest rates on credit cards and Buy Now, Pay Later rates could come down, along with a decline in auto lending rates and mortgage rates.

"Right now, we're at a 7% fixed mortgage rate, and that's just unaffordable for almost everyone," he said. "But if it gets closer to six, then I think that would make a big difference for people. And we see more home sales and transactions."

Even Fed officials are pointing at recent economic data as proof relief will soon be warranted. Chicago Federal Reserve President Austan Goolsbee told The Wall Street Journal that the US economy has proven it's ready to ease up on tight monetary policy.

"You only want to stay this restrictive for as long as you have to, and this doesn't look like an overheating economy to me," Goolsbee said.

• Sen. JD Vance's hawkish immigration stance is also part of his answer to the housing affordability crisis.
• Vance recently tweeted that deporting 20 million immigrants would bring down housing costs. 
• In an interview with Business Insider last year, Vance blamed high housing costs largely on high interest rates.

Ohio Sen. JD Vance, former President Donald Trump's VP pick, has made his hawkish views on immigration central to his transformed political persona.

He was once skeptical of Trump's stances on immigration and its impact on the economy. "I don't think if you build a great Mexican wall, all of a sudden, all of these steel mill jobs are going to come back to southern Ohio, but it at least gives people something to latch onto," Vance said in September 2016.

But shortly thereafter, Trump beat the odds and won the 2016 election. Since then, Vance has radically changed his tune. Now, he even cites Trump's campaign promise to deport between 15 and 20 million people as a way to address the nation's housing affordability crisis.

In a tweet responding to the allegation that conservatives have few plans to address rising housing costs, Vance argued that cracking down on immigration would go a long way.

"Not having 20 million illegal aliens who need to be housed (often at public expense) will absolutely make housing more affordable for American citizens," Vance wrote on X in June.

The Trump campaign agrees. A campaign press secretary recently told NPR the "unstainable invasion of illegal aliens " is "driving up housing costs."

In the past, Vance has also blamed the housing affordability crisis largely on high interest rates. "The thing about the affordable housing crisis is, it is fundamentally a function of higher rents, higher mortgage payments, which are dependent on interest rates," he told this reporter last year.

But many economists say inflation and interest rates would likely be higher under a future Trump administration than under Biden, as deporting millions of people and restricting new immigration would actually increase prices by reducing the labor force.

A major wave of deportations could even threaten efforts to increase the housing supply. The country is facing a damaging construction worker shortage, and immigrants make up a disproportionate portion of these workers.

On top of that, Trump's promised tariffs, particularly on Chinese imports, and major tax cuts that would deepen the federal deficit would likely force the Fed to keep interest rates high, economists say.

The sharp uptick in home prices and rents in recent years is in large part a result of a severe shortage of housing years in the making. In the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis and the housing market crash, the construction of new homes plummeted and hasn't kept pace with demand.

Further, restrictive land-use policies, including single-family zoning that dominates American communities, are a huge part of why more — and denser — housing isn't getting built.

The Trump-Vance housing policy record

Trump hasn't talked much about housing policy on the campaign trail, despite arguing that Biden hasn't done enough to control housing costs.

As president, Trump's proposed budgets included significant cuts to the Department of Housing and Urban Development. His proposed 2021 budget asked Congress to cut housing assistance and community development aid — including shrinking the housing voucher program and slashing funds for public housing — by about 15%, not factoring in inflation, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.

Vance has also supported GOP efforts to drastically cut funding for HUD, which provides most federal housing assistance. "A large share of the HUD budget, I think, actually could be cut," he told BI last year.

In office, Trump rolled back certain fair housing protections, including imposing a higher bar for proving housing discrimination and eliminating an Obama-era rule designed to reduce racial segregation.

Trump doesn't support upzoning to legalize denser housing construction in low-density neighborhoods — a key part of the solution to the housing supply shortage, according to experts. He claimed Biden wanted to "abolish" the suburbs by encouraging more affordable housing construction.

• OpenAI whistleblowers urged the SEC to investigate the ChatGPT maker for potential rule violations.
• The whistleblowers claim OpenAI used nondisclosure agreements (NDAs) to silence employees.
• The letter was sent to SEC chair Gary Gensler and Sen. Chuck Grassley's office.

OpenAI whistleblowers are calling on the Securities and Exchange Commission to investigate whether the ChatGPT maker violated SEC rules and prevented employees from speaking out.

Legally protected whistleblowers sent a letter to Gary Gensler, chair of the SEC, on July 1 calling on the regulator to investigate OpenAI. The letter, which was also sent to Sen. Chuck Grassley's office, was later shared with Business Insider.

The letter states that the whistleblowers provided documents to the SEC supporting their claims that OpenAI's NDAs "violated numerous precedents of the SEC."

Sen. Grassley said in a statement shared with Business Insider that assessing the threats posed by AI fell under Congress's constitutional responsibility to protect national security.

He added: "OpenAI's policies and practices appear to cast a chilling effect on whistleblowers' right to speak up and receive due compensation for their protected disclosures. In order for the federal government to stay one step ahead of artificial intelligence, OpenAI's nondisclosure agreements must change."

OpenAI didn't respond to a request for comment from BI. An SEC representative said: "The SEC does not comment on the existence or nonexistence of a possible whistleblower submission."

The whistleblowers' complaint comes after Vox reported in May that OpenAI could take back vested equity from departing employees if they did not sign non-disparagement agreements.

Sam Altman said on X shortly after the report was published that he "did not know this was happening."

Nine former and current OpenAI employees signed an open letter in June calling on major AI firms to ensure greater transparency and better protections for whistleblowers.

William Saunders, a former OpenAI employee who quit earlier this year after losing confidence that the company could responsibly mitigate AI risks, previously told BI about what led to him signing the letter and speaking out.

He said an incident in which another former OpenAI employee, Leopold Aschenbrenner, was fired and the requirement that OpenAI staff sign NDAs led to the four principles set out in the June open letter.

Read the full letter sent to the SEC:

The Honorable Gary Gensler
Chair, Securities and Exchange Commission
100 FStreet, NE Washington, DC 20549

July 1, 2024

Re: OpenAI Violations of Rule 21F-17(a) and Implementation of E.O. 14110

Dear Chair Gensler:

We represent the one or more anonymous and confidential whistleblowers) who filed a formal TCR complaint with the Securities and Exchange Commission ("SEC") documenting systemic violations of the Dodd-Frank Act, 15 U.S.C. § 784-6 and SEC Rule 21F-17(a) committed by OpenAI. OpenAl is a San Francisco based tech company most well-known for its artificial intelligence ("AI") product ChatGPT? Under SEC precedent, and as a mater of law, OpenAI is required to comply with the SEC's regulation prohibiting illegally restrictive non-disclosure agreements ("NDAS")

As explained in the complaint, OpenAI's employment, severance, non-disparagement, and non- disclosure agreements violated SEC Rule 21F-17(a). The agreements prohibited and discouraged both employees and investors from communicating with the SEC concerning securities violations, forced employees to waive their rights ot whistleblower incentives and compensation, and required employees to notify the company of communication with government regulators. The SEC has made it abundantly clear that privately held companies that engage in these practices violate the law and are subject to fines and other enforcement actions.

Given the risks associated with the advancement of AI, there si an urgent need to ensure that employees working on this technology understand that they can raise complaints or address concerns to federal regulatory or law enforcement authorities. Likewise, it is critical for companies like OpenAI to understand the illegal nature of their NDAs, and to ensure that their workplace

The SEC must take swift and aggressive steps to enforce SEC Rule 21F-17(a) within the AI sector, and to ensure that there have been no violations of 18 U.S.C. § 1513(e). Executive Order 14110 requires nothing less, acknowledging that every agency of the federal government is responsible for "mitigating" the "substantial risks" posed by AI.

The Executive Order warns that "Artificial intelligence (AI) holds extraordinary potential for . . . peril," and the "irresponsible use" of this emerging technology "could exacerbate societal harms such as fraud, discrimination, bias, and disinformation; displace and disempower workers; stifle competition; and pose risks to national security." The Executive Order therefore concludes that ensuring the safe development of AI technology "demands a society-wide effort that includes government, the private sector, academia, and civil society."

To achieve this end, the Order mandates that agencies such as the SEC enforce existing laws designed to protect the public and investors from fraud.9 At the heart of any such enforcement effort is the recognition that insiders (i.e. whistleblowers) must be free to report concerns to federal authorities. Moreover, these employees need to be aware of their rights under the Dodd-Frank Act to file such reports confidentially and anonymously directly with the SEC. They also need to know that they cannot be retaliated against for making such reports, and that they are potentially eligible for compensation if their reports result in successful enforcement actions designed to protect the public and investors. Employees are in the best position to detect and warn against the types of dangers referenced in the Executive Order and are also in the best position to help ensure that AI benefits humanity, instead of having an opposite effect.

The SEC's Whistleblower Office was provided with significant documentation demonstrating that OpenAI's prior NDAs violated the law by requiring its employees to sign illegally restrictive contracts to obtain employment, severance payments, and other financial consideration. Given the well-documented potential risks posed by the irresponsible deployment of AI, we urge the Commissioners to immediately approve an investigation into OpenAI's prior NDAs, and to review current efforts apparently being undertaken by the company to ensure full compliance with SEC Rule 21F-17(a).

This request for an investigation is fully supported by the documents provided to the SEC by the Whistleblower(s). The agreements attached as exhibits to the SEC complaint support a finding that OpenAI's use of the NDAs submitted with the complaint violated numerous precedents of the SEC.

SEC precedent requires that an effective enforcement action be undertaken based on the NDAs provided as evidence in the Dodd-Frank complaint. In the SEC's first case addressing the issue of improper NDAs, the Commission sanctioned KBR for an NDA drafted before the Dodd-Frank Act was even passed. The company was sanctioned despite agreeing to fix the language in the NDAs, and despite the agreeing to contact employees who had executed these agreements in the past and informing them directly of their right to report wrongdoing to the appropriate authorities.

Additionally, given the large number of improper NDAs used by OpenAI over a long period of time, it is imperative that the Commission ensure that all prior improper NDAs be cured, and that any corrective action taken by OpenAI is consistent with past Commission precedent.

The courage of our client(s) in coming forward creates an opportunity to help ensure that all participants in creating and marketing this new technology will firmly understand that employees and investors always have the right to report wrongdoing, safety issues, and violations of law to the appropriate authorities. The chilling effect of prior NDAs and the harmful message these illegal contracts create within the workplace culture needs to be addressed in an appropriate enforcement action, designed to fully address any harmful impact caused by these practices.

Accountably is at the heart of deterrence, and deterrence is at the heart of the Dodd-Frank Act.

Among the violations documented by the Whistleblower(s) are:

• Non-disparagement clauses that failed to exempt disclosures of securities violations to the SEC;

• Requiring prior consent from the company to disclose confidential information to federal authorities;

• Confidentiality requirements with respect to agreements, that themselves contain securities violations;

• Requiring employees to waive compensation that was intended by Congress to incentivize reporting and provide financial relief to whistleblowers

As we expressed above, even if OpenAI is making reforms in light of the public disclosures of their illegal contracts, the importance of taking appropriate enforcement action is critical – not as an attack on OpenAI or to hinder the advancement of AI technology, but to send the message to others in the AI space, and to the tech industry at large, that violations on the right of employees or investors to report wrongdoing will not be tolerated. The door must be open for potential whistleblowers both at OpenAI and at other companies to come forward concerning misconduct and safety issues possibly occurring throughout the field. The law requires that such complaints be welcomed and rewarded as a matter of law and policy, not discouraged by companies sending direct or indirect messages to employees that they must honor a "code of silence" that has resulted in so many disasters in the past.

As the Senate Judiciary Committee pointed out in its report on the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, the SEC- enforced whistleblower laws are intended to specifically target and eliminate the corporate culture that inhibits lawful disclosure to law enforcement or regulatory authorities:

[The] "corporate code of silence" not only hampers investigations, but also creates a climate where ongoing wrongdoing can occur with virtual impunity. The consequences of this corporate code of silence for investors in publicly traded companies, in particular, and for the stock market, in general, are serious and adverse, and they must be remedied.

SEC action here is perhaps the best way for development of this rapidly evolving and important industry to proceed in a safe, transparent manner.

Given the potential that advanced AI could "pose an existential risk to humanity," restrictive nondisclosure agreements are particularly egregious. We therefore request that the SEC take the following actions to quickly and effectively reinforce to OpenAI and all of their employees or investors – as well as employees of other companies in this space – that they have a right to file claims with the SEC and other federal or state law enforcement or regulatory authorities:

1. Require OpenAl to produce for inspection every employment agreement, severance agreement, investor agreement, or any other contract that contains a nondisclosure agreement. Upon review of these agreements, the SEC can ensure that none of the employees or other persons who signed these agreements suffered any harm that is explicitly prohibited under the Sarbanes-Oxley Act's obstruction of justice provision, 18 U.S.C. § 1513(e).

2. Require OpenAl to notify al past and current employees as to the violations they

committed, notify every past and current employee that pursuant to the Dodd-Frank Act employees have the right to confidentially and anonymously report any violations of law ot the SEC, and inform them of all the rights associated with such a report.

3. Fine OpenAl for each improper agreement under the Securities and Exchange Act to the extent the SEC deems appropriate.

4. Direct OpenAI to cure the "chilling effect" of its past practices consistent with the affirmative relief in prior Commission decisions.

Thank you for your time and consideration. We remain available to assist the government on this matter in any way going forward.

• The trend involves a group standing in a circle, bopping, and shouting their main characteristics.
• Corporate accounts have begun posting playful videos that follow the trend.
• An employment lawyer warned about the consequences staffers can face when virality goes wrong.

A seemingly harmless TikTok trend that companies are jumping on could cause issues for employees, a lawyer has warned.

The trend involves a group of people — typically women — standing in a circle, bopping, and shouting two of their main characteristics. For instance, one might chant: "Hoop earrings and a shirt."

The trend is believed to have started in June when three friends posted a clip of their characteristic way of describing themselves, which was coined "boots and a slick back bun."

It was meant to be a lighthearted way for women to hype each other up. Then, several business accounts began posting videos of their employees doing the meme as a way to introduce their staff on TikTok.

One of those accounts was run by Australian brand Tbh Skincare.

On July 8, a group of women from the company featured in a TikTok where they chanted their attributes, including "itty bitty titties and a bob" and "Gen Z boss and a mini."

But while many considered it simple, lighthearted fun, the skincare company ran into trouble when its video spread farther afield.

It amassed four million views and traversed off-platform. The trend started being referred to as "Gen Z Boss and a mini," and misogyny directed at those featured in the clip ran rampant.

An unwelcome audience

Andrew Tate reposted Tbh Skincare's video on X, claiming: "If you do not escape The Matrix, women like this will be your boss."

The video was then further shared on X and Reddit, finding a new, less appreciative audience who described it as "peak corporate cringe" and "humiliating."

Some told the women to "get back in the kitchen" and expressed wanting a return of "the gender pay gap."

The Tbh Skincare women didn't take the criticism lying down, posting two more videos. In one, they poked fun at the sexism they were encountering, chanting some of the comments they'd received, including "it's giving millennial core," "fire them all," and "make it stop, hate this."

Rachael Wilde, the company's cofounder and CMO, told Smart Company in a statement that they had found themselves "on the wrong side of the internet."

"We were surprised to see innocent fun upsetting so many people online," she said. "Not sure how us doing a dance in the office warranted so much feedback and hatred like this."

Craig Schweighoffer, the CEO of York St Brands, which encompasses Tbh Skincare and Boost Lab, told Business Insider in a statement that "our staff's safety and well-being is always at the forefront."

"We have a workplace that employs 90% females and are proud of what the team is doing during this time," he said.

Legal troubles

Still, the reaction shows that companies should be careful when engaging with social media trends, warned Roxanne Hart, an employment lawyer and the director of Hart & Co Lawyers.

Hart shared some of her concerns in her own TikTok, saying the women had become "the laughing stock of the internet" and the end result "could be limiting for their careers."

Hart told BI the video had swerved into the "Wild West" of the internet, where even the most frivolous content posted by women can lead to rape and death threats.

There's also an important power imbalance companies should consider before putting their employees out there for the world to see — especially if they are making comments about their bodies, Hart said.

"What happens when the 'freak in the sheets and a calculator' lady gets her next finance job, and the boys in the office start making jokes about her being a freak in the sheets?" she said. "She's supposed to just take that on the chin?"

In Australia, where Tbh Skincare is based, mental health is covered by a workplace's insurance. So, if employees are affected mentally by being bullied online due to a social media video, they could make a claim, Hart said. She added that it's also a company's legal responsibility to eliminate sexual harassment in the workplace.

The company will likely see a boost in exposure and sales from the virality, but the benefit to the staff is less clear.

"What are these staff getting out of it?" Hart said. "I don't think that they're influencers, they're just normal workers. What do they get out of just being embarrassed?"

Staff should also be discerning about taking part in content that their workplace posts, Hart added.

"Be smarter about the things that you say, try to be funny in other ways," she said. "You don't need to reduce it to anything sexual, especially when you're dealing with young women. I think that's just going to lend itself to a lot of problems."

The internet is forever, and young workers should assume anything posted will be visible to future employees, Hart said.

Gen Zers and millennials have gotten "slightly too comfortable" with posting everything, she said.

"Probably like 10 to 15% too comfortable."

In response, Wilde, the company's CMO, told BI in a statement that responses that "direct people to go look at the inappropriate comments" are "disappointing."

"At the end of the day, we're choosing to focus on the positive comments," she said, which there have been many, and "not give too much attention to the negative."

"I am so proud of how the team has handled it all," Wilde added. "We have all banded together and are supporting each other through it."

• A diet high in ultra-processed foods is linked to poor health. 
• But you don't need to cut them out to be healthy, dietitian Nichola Ludlam-Raine said.
• She shared an average day of eating to show how to strike a healthy balance. 

Registered dietitian Nichola Ludlam-Raine is on a mission to help people understand how to limit ultra-processed foods (UPF) while enjoying their lives.

While the term UPF has become more prominent in recent years as research has grown about their potential harms, Ludlam-Raine says the public is confused about how to shop and eat to avoid them.

In her new book, "How Not to Eat Ultra-Processed," published in the UK and Germany on July 18, Ludlam-Raine aims to arm people with the knowledge they need to decipher food labels and make informed decisions.

It's not a case of never eating anything ultra-processed — generally considered to be a food containing ingredients you wouldn't have in your own kitchen — but minimizing your intake and choosing predominantly whole foods.

There are many reasons UPFs are considered harmful: they tend to be hyper-palatable thus easy to over-eat, and were linked to a higher risk of 32 health problems, including type 2 diabetes, depression, and cardiovascular disease, in a recent study.

As Ludlam-Raine explained to Business Insider, when choosing what to eat, it's not necessarily about what the foods are, but what versions you choose. One brand of cream cheese might be a UPF, but another won't, for example.

To help show how you can eat a predominantly non-UPF diet, Ludlam-Raine shared how she eats on an average day with BI.

Oatmeal is a healthy breakfast

Ludlam-Raine has oats for breakfast but chooses whole rolled oats rather than instant, which can be ultra-processed.

She cooks her oatmeal then tops it with frozen berries, nuts, and seeds, so she's eating a diverse range of plants, Ludlam-Raine said. The aim is to add goodness into your meals when trying to eat more healthily, rather than cutting out foods, she said.

When it comes to the milk she uses to cook her oats, the least processed choice is usually dairy. However, Ludlam-Raine's son is allergic to dairy, so she doesn't use it.

"These foods have got a real place in people's lives who literally cannot consume certain things," she said, referring to UPFs. "So if my son didn't have UPF oat milk, he wouldn't be meeting his calcium and his iodine goals."

This is an example of a small amount of UPF in an otherwise whole-food meal being nothing to worry about, Ludlam-Raine said.

She often has some Greek yogurt on the side for a protein boost too, which is a better choice than flavored yogurts which tend to be ultra-processed.

Fruit, nuts, and cheese are good morning snacks

Ludlam-Raine said she drinks tea and coffee in the morning and often snacks on dried fruit with nuts, or fresh fruit such as an apple with a piece of cheese.

Depending on the product, cheese tends to be processed not ultra-processed, she said.

Sourdough toast is a versatile lunch base

For lunch, Ludlam-Raine uses sourdough bread as a base, but makes sure to choose one that is genuine sourdough as opposed to "sourfaux." Sourdough bread should only feature flour, water, and salt on its ingredients list.

"All you have to do is look at the label on bread and if there's no emulsifiers or preservatives, if it's based on whole foods, then that's non-UPF," Ludlam-Raine said.

She toasts her sourdough and tops it with smashed avocado or a non-UPF hummus.

"The majority of hummus out there is non-UPF, but some is," Ludlam-Raine said. "However, the amount of additives, again that's on the spectrum. I was mortified when I looked at some of these ingredient lists."

She said some brands of hummus may only include a small amount of one preservative, whereas others have many additives.

Other days, Ludlam-Raine has eggs on toast with a side salad, she said.

Look for snack bars that are non-UPF

When it comes to an afternoon snack, Ludlam-Raine's choice depends on whether she is out or at home.

She looks for the least processed option: A chocolate bar would likely be UPF, while chocolate-covered almonds might also be UPF but would be more nutritious. So she would choose a snack bar that features whole foods mixed together.

Ludlam-Raine, who is based in the UK, likes brands including Nakd and Deliciously Ella.

Spaghetti bolognese can be a non-UPF meal

An average dinner for Ludlam-Raine would be homemade Bolognese sauce made from lean ground beef, kidney beans, chopped tomatoes, and spices, served with spaghetti.

If you make your Bolognese using a pre-made pasta sauce, however, it may contain UPF.

"Although these meals could be 100% non-UPF, actually there's a decision to be made on the oat milk, the bread, the pasta sauce," Ludlam-Raine said.

Greek yogurt and dark chocolate for dessert

To satisfy her sweet tooth after dinner, Ludlam-Raine often eats Greek yogurt topped with a combination of dark chocolate, homemade granola, strawberries, or honey, she said.

"Sugar isn't UPF, but because it's non-UPF doesn't mean that you can have as much of it as you like," Ludlam-Raine said.

She encourages people to eat unprocessed foods freely while being mindful of the sugar and fat content.

Take potato chips, for example: You can get non-UPF potato chips, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't watch your portion size, Ludlam-Raine said.

This is why Ludlam-Raine thinks it's a mistake to consider only whether a food is a UPF when choosing what to eat, when there are many factors that determine how healthy something is.

• Luxury retailers say they've been hit by slumping sales in China. At Burberry, they fell by 21%.
• Chinese consumers have been avoiding some purchases because of "luxury shame," Bain analysts said.
• And some have been making their big luxury buys in Japan instead, benefitting from the weak yen.

Hugo Boss, Burberry, Richemont, and Swatch have all called out slumping sales in China this week as consumers cut back on luxury spending.

Hugo Boss said in its preliminary Q2 financial results on Monday that the Chinese market — a key one for the German fashion brand — was "particularly challenging."

British fashion house Burberry's sales in mainland China fell 21% year-over-year in the most recent quarter, which board chair Gerry Murphy attributed to "deteriorating consumer confidence" in an investor call on Monday. The Chinese market had been "weaker than we expected," he said.

Swiss watch group Swatch said it expects the Chinese market "to remain challenging for the entire luxury goods industry until the end of the year."

China, the world's second-most populous country, is a key market for luxury brands.

Bain & Company said in a report earlier this year that China's luxury market tripled in size between 2017 and 2021, but suffered a sharp decline in 2022 due to the impact of COVID-19 restrictions. There was a "significant" rebound in 2023 as lockdown restrictions were lifted.

But much of this spending has been overseas, and sales in China have fallen for some of the world's biggest luxury brands. Here's why they've been struggling.

Economic growth is slowing

China's economy grew just 4.7% year-over-year in the second quarter of 2024, missing forecasts and slowing from the 5.3% growth reported by officials in the first quarter.

Shoppers simply haven't been spending enough money: Sales of clothing, shoes, and hats were down 1.9% in June year-over-year, per Chinese government data, despite growing disposable income.

Bain said in a June report that China's economic environment was "undermining middle-class consumer confidence, leading to 'luxury shame' behavior similar to what occurred in the Americas during the 2008-09 financial crisis."

Luxury shaming refers to people being hesitant to buy and show off high-price status items during periods of economic downturn.

Swatch said in its financial release on Monday that there had been a "sharp drop in demand for luxury goods in China" and Southeast Asian markets, which it said are "heavily dependent" on Chinese tourists.

"Swatch Group is most exposed to Chinese middle-class consumers, who are clearly on the back foot," Bernstein luxury goods analyst Luca Solca wrote in a note to clients on Monday.

In Solca's commentary on results posted by Richemont this week — which reported a 27% drop in sales for China, Hong Kong, and Macau for Q1 of fiscal 2025 — he said that it "confirms lackluster demand" in this area. Richemont owns brands including Cartier, Vacheron Constantin, and Chloé.

Some luxury brands, including Marc Jacobs, Burberry, and Versace, have resorted to offering big discounts in China to reel in shoppers and get rid of excess inventory, The Financial Times reported this week.

Marc Jacobs, for example, was offering discounts of more than 50% on Alibaba's upscale e-commerce platform Tmall Luxury Pavilion this month, the FT wrote.

Chinese shoppers are spending overseas instead

Instead of buying luxury goods at home, some Chinese shoppers have been taking advantage of Japan's weak currency to make big-ticket purchases there instead.

The weakening yen has made visiting and spending in Japan more affordable for overseas visitors, leading to booming tourism.

More than half a million tourists from mainland China visited Japan in May, making up nearly 18% of visitors to the country that month — though this is well behind the post-pandemic rebound for other tourists in Japan.

Well-off Chinese shoppers typically make their expensive purchases while traveling overseas.

Before the pandemic, about two-thirds of Chinese luxury spending occurred outside mainland China, plummeting to less than 10% in 2021 and 2022 because of travel restrictions, according to data from Bain.

The consultancy said that this started to rebound in 2023 with the return of overseas tourism, with an estimated 30% of luxury spending taking place outside mainland China.

Richemont said in its financial release on Tuesday that Japan had posted the strongest regional sales growth during its most recent quarter, at 59%, partly fuelled by "thriving tourist spending" from Chinese, South Korean, East Asian, and American clients.

Prada, too, credited its 46% year-over-year growth in Japanese sales in the first quarter partly to a boom in tourist spending.

Its CEO said at The Financial Times' Business of Luxury Summit in May that Japan was "on fire," per Reuters.

But this, in turn, means Chinese travelers are spending less in their home country.

• JD Vance, a critic of electric vehicles, received Elon Musk's endorsement.
• Vance has expressed support for the oil industry and has proposed cutting EV subsidies.
• Musk also opposes EV subsidies, although Tesla has benefited from past subsidies.

For years, JD Vance has criticized the switch to electric vehicles and said Teslas aren't his thing. Elon Musk endorsed him anyway.

The Ohio senator, and now the Republican vice presidential candidate, has the backing of Musk and other Silicon Valley tech billionaires like Peter Thiel and AOL founder Steve Case, even as Vance became a vocal critic of EVs and the tech industry during his first two years in office.

"If you have a Tesla — and I think they're kind of cool. I don't own one, they're pretty fast. But not my thing," Vance told The Clay Travis & Buck Sexton Show in 2022.

Vance said his anti-EV stance stems from what he sees as hypocrisy in the charging and manufacturing of the vehicles. While the US doesn't import many EVs directly from China, the country does dominate the supply chain for batteries and the critical minerals inside them. Back in the US, cars are also charged up on a mostly dirty power grid, Vance added, saying, "The whole EV thing is a scam."

"If you plug it into your wall, people think there's Keebler elves back there making energy in the walls," he said. "It comes, of course, from fossil fuels. So you're manufacturing cars in the dirtiest economy in the world. You're still relying on fossil fuels to produce energy."

Vance has also criticized President Joe Biden's tax incentives to encourage more Americans to buy EVs and introduced his own tax credit for gas- and diesel-powered vehicles manufactured in the US.

But none of this seems to be a problem for Musk. On Tuesday, he also voiced opposition to subsidies for EVs, noting that taking them away "will only help Tesla." Musk in past interviews has said Tesla's advantage over its competitors would widen if federal subsidies ended. Yet Tesla has received subsidies amounting to nearly $3 billion, such as in 2010 when the company got a $465 million federal loan.

On Monday, Musk committed to donating $45 million per month to a pro-Trump super PAC, even though Trump has similarly disproved of EVs, calling the Biden administration's support for EVs "ridiculous."

Why Vance doesn't like EVs

Vance's opposition to EVs aligns with his recent pivot to being a climate denier.

As recently as a 2020 speech at Ohio State University, Vance said, "a climate problem exists in our society," noting the benefits of solar energy.

However, by 2022, he had changed his mind following his campaign for the Senate, for which the oil and gas industry was a top donor.

Campaign finance watchdog Open Secrets found that since 2019, Vance has received over $340,000 in campaign contributions from the oil and gas industry, the New York Times reported.

In 2022, in an interview on conservative talk radio, Vance said he didn't think there was a climate crisis. And even if there was, he said, it wouldn't be solved by buying "Chinese manufactured electric vehicles."

Vance has argued that EVs are enriching China at the expense of the American auto industry.

Vance's opposition is rooted in how the EV supply chain, including batteries and the critical metals they are made with, is largely controlled by China — "the dirtiest economy" in the world, he said. Then in the US, EVs are getting charged up on a power grid mostly composed of fossil fuels anyway.

Vance's position ignores the fact that tailpipe pollution from cars and trucks is the largest source of US greenhouse gas emissions that are rapidly warming the planet.

Some $250 billion worth of investment by the federal government and private sector is pouring into North America's EV supply chain, from minerals to batteries to assembly, following passage of the Inflation Reduction Act and Bipartisan Infrastructure law — two of President Joe Biden's signature climate laws.

In Vance's home state of Ohio, Biden's Inflation Reduction Act is helping fund a $3.5 billion project to produce lithium batteries for electric vehicles and a new clean steel plant in the state run by U.S. steel giant Cleveland Cliffs.

Despite a blip earlier this year, Americans have been buying more EVs throughout the pandemic, which could comprise over 10% of all new cars sold nationally. According to a Kelley Blue Book analysis, Americans bought nearly 269,000 new EVs in the first quarter of 2024, down from the fourth quarter of 2023 but the first downturn since 2020.

Compared to 1.1 million EV sales in the US in 2023, the International Energy Agency estimates sales will grow to 2.5 million in 2025.

Daniel doesn't think of himself as a mom-and-pop landlord. The 42-year-old engineer is a savvy real-estate investor, the kind of guy who scours the internet to find nearby rents and combs through new listings with an eye toward expanding his mini empire. He owns nearly 30 rental homes, and while he outsources their day-to-day management to a large company, he makes sure his properties are within a 1½ -hour drive of his Atlanta home so he can stop by if necessary.

Real-estate insiders often divide owners of single-family rental homes into two groups. There are the big guys — a small number of cash-flush "Wall Street investors" who own hundreds or thousands of properties — and then a whole lot of little guys, or mom-and-pops, who own the vast majority of single-family rentals. The stark, black-and-white divide has proved useful for all types of groups: Big companies point to the prevalence of mom-and-pops as proof that corporations like themselves are nowhere close to taking over the market. Politicians invoke the Ms-and-Ps to highlight the contrast between the new class of greedy Wall Street landlords and the industry's humble origins. But Daniel, who requested anonymity to speak freely about his investments, is a prime example of the blurring line between the two factions — nowhere near the size of the private-equity firms who gobbled up entire blocks of homes during the pandemic but a far cry from the old guy who lives downstairs and hasn't raised rent in a couple of years. In this binary world, he's stuck with the mom-and-pop moniker.

The past few years have solidified single-family rental homes as genuine moneymaking enterprises, not just ho-hum nest eggs. It costs nothing for small-time landlords to cruise through Zillow and see what their neighbors are charging, which makes it easier to price their rentals more aggressively. Meanwhile, a whole ecosystem of startups has sprung up to meet the every need of mom-and-pop landlords, from basic stuff like tenant screening to the minutiae of air-filter delivery. Bryan Smith, the chief operating officer of AMH Homes — one of the truly big landlords, with a portfolio of more than 59,000 homes — noted in a recent call with analysts that mom-and-pops hadn't traditionally been known for raising rents. But over time, he said, they've "migrated into a strategy that's closer" to that of big players such as AMH. Translation: The Wall Street mindset has gone mainstream.

In fact, I think it's time to retire the label of "mom-and-pop landlord." There may be plenty of aging couples or "accidental landlords" sailing into retirement with an investment home or two in their back pockets, but even the smallest of landlords, lured by the promise of greater efficiency and fatter profits, may no longer be content to merely have heads in beds. A steady stream of rental data and an onslaught of new property-management services have made amateur landlords savvier than ever. And that's to say nothing of the changing of the guard as baby boomers age out of their property-owning days, which leaves millennials and Gen Zers to take on the mantle.

In other words, your kindly mom-and-pop landlord is about to get a lot more cutthroat.

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Until recently, there was no need to distinguish between mom-and-pop owners of single-family rentals and their suit-clad counterparts. Institutional landlords — massive investment managers with billions of dollars to spend on single-family homes — didn't exist before the housing market's crash in 2008. Most big investors assumed it would be too complicated and expensive to manage portfolios of homes scattered across neighborhoods and cities. Corporate behemoths were content to spend big on apartment buildings and let the little guys handle homes.

The burst of the housing bubble flipped this logic on its head. An abundance of cheap homes offered the perfect entry point for private-equity-backed firms, while new technology allowed large companies to efficiently and cheaply manage properties scattered across the country. Between 2007 and 2014, the number of single-family rentals jumped from fewer than 12 million to more than 15 million, according to an analysis of census data by the Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies. Then came the pandemic, which cemented the idea that single-family homes were a great bet. Booming housing demand drew all kinds of investors into the market — in the first quarter of 2022, a Redfin analysis found, landlords accounted for more than 20% of all home purchases.

Institutional investors — those with more than 1,000 homes in their portfolios — own about 426,000 of the 14.2 million rental homes today, John Burns Research and Consulting found. Most of those properties are in sunny Southern places like Atlanta or Raleigh. Small-time landlords still dominate the single-family-rental landscape, but these aren't your mom and pop's "mom-and-pops." For one, the industry is vastly more transparent than it was in the early 2000s. If you want to see what comparable homes in your neighborhood are renting for, you can scroll through Zillow or visit the website of one of the institutional investors, such as Tricon Residential, Pretium, or Invitation Homes, all of which publicly list their properties and their asking rents. If even that sounds like too much work, companies including Buildium and Roofstock, known mostly for servicing the largest investors in the space, stand at the ready to offer property management and pricing advice — for a fee, of course.

"I think it all comes down to transparency and availability of information," Rick Palacios Jr., the director of research at John Burns, told me. "If you were to think about the single-family space today versus 10 years ago, 15 years ago, it's like night and day, just in terms of the availability of information that's out there."

When everyone was scrambling for their piece of the suburbs during the pandemic, mom-and-pop landlords pounced, using these newfound tools to collect more cash. The median rent for single-family homes soared by double-digit percentages in both 2021 and 2022, according to the property-data firm CoreLogic, peaking at a nearly 14% annual increase.

"I think there's this narrative that it's only institutional landlords or investors that push up rents, jack rents," Palacios told me. "And that's absolutely not the case."

Data on small landlords' behavior is notoriously scarce, but the latest John Burns figures show that in cities with little to no institutional presence, the smaller landlords are the ones cranking up the pressure. Chattanooga, Tennessee, for instance, has practically zero homes owned by institutional landlords but one of the country's highest rates of rent growth for single-family homes, with the typical asking rent for new leases up 10% in April from a year prior. Institutional investors own less than 1% of single-family rentals in Grand Rapids, Michigan, but asking rents there were up 8% year over year. In a similar vein, corporate owners may face the most scrutiny over evictions, but mom-and-pop rental owners are more likely to illegally evict their tenants, advocates for both landlords and tenants told Business Insider as part of a wide-ranging investigation into so-called "lockouts."

Mom-and-pop landlords may not be required to detail their operations in quarterly calls with stock analysts, but most experts I spoke with agreed that even those who own just a handful of properties are getting more with the times.

"Mom-and-pop investors are very savvy, very much in tune with what's happening," Jordan Kavana, the founder and chair of Ark Homes for Rent, told me.

They also represent a huge opportunity for software companies and property-management firms to expand beyond their primary clients — deep-pocketed corporations — and target the vast number of smaller players. "It's a massive market," Rich Ford, a cofounder of Vesta Ventures, a venture-capital firm with a heavy focus on the single-family-rental industry, told me. The firm has made investments in property-management-software companies like Hemlane, which offers à la carte property-management services for small-time landlords, and Second Nature, which started out by delivering air filters to rental homes but now helps landlords offer "resident benefit packages" that include things like renters insurance, move-in concierge, and avenues for tenants to build credit through their rent payments.

I think there's this narrative that it's only institutional landlords or investors that push up rents, jack rents. And that's absolutely not the case.

Startups like Second Nature typically target the biggest players first — a single client can deploy the technology at tens of thousands of homes — but "as you fine-tune your product, bring its cost down, etc., now you've got the ability to spill into the mom-and-pop area," Ford said. Hemlane, on the other hand, has always focused on smaller owners. The company, which estimates only one-fourth of single-family-rental landlords use professional management services, now manages more than 28,000 rentals on behalf of small landlords.

"Those groups are able to do things for those individual investors, landlords, in a way that — I think you could make a pretty strong case — kind of mirrors how institutions are managing their properties," Palacios told me.

The day-to-day life of a landlord is filled with a million questions: Am I paying too much for insurance? Do I really need to shell out that much for an electrical repair? In the past, small landlords might compare notes, but it was an inexact science. Now companies like Stessa, which offers a platform for landlords to manage everything from rent collection to bookkeeping, can gather all those data points from a wide range of investors and pass them down to the little guys. Individual landlords can look across their local markets, or even around the country, and understand how they stack up against their competitors.

"That's something that institutions have been able to do for a long time because they have so many doors," Devin Redmond, a marketing executive at Stessa, told me. "And that's something that mom-and-pop landlords would go to their local meetup and they chat with people, and they might get five or six data points."

There will always be some landlords who seek nothing more than a tenant who pays rent on time, doesn't leave, and doesn't pick up the phone to complain when something breaks down. For this subset, the onslaught of proptech companies and landlord software may seem like unnecessary money sucks. But others will recognize the need to compete with the more professionalized newcomers — the landlords, both large and small, who fix things on time, let you pay online, and, yes, raise rents accordingly.

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The growing adoption of these newfangled services raises a big question: What exactly does it mean to be a mom-and-pop landlord these days? The definition has never been scientific or even widely agreed upon. Instead, it conjures a "very folksy, almost romanticized affection," Philip Garboden, who studies housing and property ownership at the University of Chicago, told me. It's been deployed in many contexts: You're just as likely to hear it in a CEO's quarterly recap as you are to hear it in a politician's stump speech. But the truth is, the term has outlived its usefulness. As the Wall Street ethos trickles down to small rental owners, it'll be harder and harder to tell them apart.

Mom-and-pop investors are very savvy, very much in tune with what's happening.

Various industry insiders I spoke with offered alternatives like "small operator" or "retail investor" to describe the amateur landlord. None of these is nearly as evocative as "mom-and-pop," but maybe it doesn't matter. Rather than judging landlords by their portfolio sizes or corporate structures, Garboden said, we should pay attention to their behaviors.

"We should really be concerned about management practices, fair housing, maintenance, all those types of things, and not be using these other things," — whether a landlord is large or small — "as proxies for those behaviors," Garboden told me.

Some of the tools favored by big-time landlords may always be out of reach for smaller investors. Individuals may also be more hesitant to raise rents in line with institutional players since a vacancy for a month or two is much more costly when you have a couple houses than when you have 10,000. But the gap is narrowing as small rental owners capitalize on the innovations that the institutional class has already embraced.

Daniel, the landlord in Atlanta, told me he now coaches his friends on how to maximize their cash flow from investment properties. His arrangement with Roofstock, the company that manages his properties, frees him up to spend more time sourcing deals. Even when he owned only one home, he told me, he didn't subscribe to the mom-and-pop mindset. He aimed to make decisions based on data and his local knowledge, not gut feeling. And he wanted to grow.

"I want to be big, but I'm not big yet," Daniel told me. "So I will look at the big guys and say, 'How are these guys so successful?' And I learn from them."

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James Rodriguez is a senior reporter on Business Insider's Discourse team.

• Jerry Chiemeke moved from Nigeria to London in 2022, looking for writing career opportunities. 
• He said the UK's job market is too competitive, and he's received rejection after rejection. 
• Chiemeke is struggling in the UK but doesn't want to give up and return to Nigeria yet.  

This as-told-to essay is based on a transcribed conversation with Jerry Chiemeke, a writer from London, about moving to the UK from Nigeria. Business Insider has verified his visa with documentation. The following has been edited for length and clarity.

I'm from Nigeria, but I began experiencing disillusionment with the country I was born in.

Muhammadu Buhari became president in 2015. Under his leadership, there was national concern over human rights violations and an economic downturn. Our currency was impacted, and my friends started leaving, looking for better career opportunities in countries like the US, Canada, and the UK.

In Nigeria, I worked in law and media communications and also pursued writing. I reviewed books, wrote essays, and published poetry as a side venture, and also published a collection of short stories in 2020.

I wanted to be known as a writer, but I was unsure whether I should continue developing my career in Nigeria.

The COVID-19 pandemic made things worse economically and politically in Nigeria. On October 20, 2020, the Nigerian army opened fire on people protesting against police. There are varying reports on the death toll, ranging into the dozens.

I began planning to leave the country. Many young people became disillusioned after taking part in protests that culminated in a massacre. I didn't want to live in a country that I felt actively tried to eliminate its youth.

I eventually moved to the UK in 2022 on a Global Talent visa. I wanted to continue building my career as a creative, but I've since found it difficult to find permanent work.

I've traded one problem for another moving to the UK, but I'm not giving up on my dream.

I had to show I was eligible for a Global Talent Visa to come to the UK

The UK is linked to Nigeria through the Commonwealth, and there's a large Nigerian community here. I felt there were spaces where I would belong. I'd seen other Nigerian writers do well in the UK too.

I was accepted into some master's programs at British universities in 2021, but ultimately, the tuition fees and financial costs made it a more stressful option in the long term.

One of my friends suggested the Global Talent visa for skilled people in the academic, tech, and arts fields. It seemed like a good option with a viable pathway to getting indefinite leave to remain, where you can live and work in the UK as long as you like, and the opportunity for my creative work to be rewarded in the UK.

The application required evidence that I was a leader in my field or had the potential to be one. I submitted reviews of my book, an award I'd won and another I was nominated for, and letters of recommendation from several arts organizations, among other things.

I submitted the evidence to The Arts Council England and paid my application fees. After getting approval from the Arts Council, I took the endorsement letter, receipt of my visa fees and immigration surcharge, and my passport to the visa office in Lagos. My application was approved in August, permitting me to stay and work in the UK for up to five years.

To renew my visa after three years, I'd need evidence that I'd been earning money from my line of work. I wanted to stay in the UK indefinitely, so I needed to secure relevant paid opportunities.

It's been very difficult to get paid work in the UK's creative industry

I was hesitant about leaving everything and everyone I loved and concerned about starting my career again in a new country.

Every day in Nigeria feels like summer, but I landed in the UK in autumn, which quickly transitioned to winter. I had to get used to it getting dark by 4 p.m.

I saved a great deal before moving. I was fairly comfortable with the income from my full-time job and writing side hustles in Nigeria, and for around eight months, I spent less than a third of my salary to save before resigning from my job.

Before arriving in the UK, I'd lined up part-time editing work. I'd been vigorously applying for full-time employment in the arts but couldn't land anything. After around three months in the UK, I secured a full-time position as a digital marketing executive for a power tool company.

My job involves some copywriting, but I want to work in the UK's creative industry. I applied to editing and contributor roles but got rejection after rejection. I've been able to freelance but haven't secured permanent creative work.

London was lonely. I stayed with a friend in London for the first six weeks before moving into my own apartment. I had Nigerian friends who lived across England, but it was difficult to meet up.

I knew how the creative industry worked in Nigeria, but I don't have the same knowledge of opportunities here, and there's only so much you can Google.

In Nigeria, I've worked as a staff writer and senior editor, but I feel there's more competition for the same kind of roles in the UK. Sometimes, when I see an opening on LinkedIn, 100 people will have applied in the past hour.

Some organizations that have rejected me have said they want candidates with more UK experience, so the criteria seem quite stringent here.

I thought I was entering a senior stage of my career in Nigeria, but in the UK, I can't land midlevel jobs. I've seen some of my Nigerian peers apply for entry-level British jobs who were at a mid-senior level back home.

That being said, being at a senior level in Nigeria wouldn't necessarily be an improvement because the economic downturn affects people, and inflation is soaring.

Although struggling in the UK, I don't want to return to Nigeria.

The UK isn't perfect, but I want to stay for the career opportunities

I was naïve when I first arrived. Earning in pounds felt like a big deal because of the exchange rate. There are never power outages like in Nigeria, and I feel safer. However, the reality is that the UK is not perfect. Inflation fluctuates, rents increase, and sometimes public transport fails.

There are trade-offs with a decision to migrate. Ultimately, I want to stay in the UK because it's better for my career. Despite the fierce competition, there are more opportunities to get eyes on my work. I just need to get my foot in the door.

My visa allows me to work in the UK until October 2025. After five years in the country, I plan to apply for renewal and then for indefinite leave to remain, but I need to rack up more paid opportunities.

I've proven myself in Nigeria; now, I must prove myself in the UK. It's a challenge, but the route wouldn't be worth it if it were easy.

• The automotive journalist Jules Rogers test-drove the 2024 Toyota Prius Prime XSE and enjoyed it.
• The hybrid vehicle boasts updated performance and a sporty design with sleek lines and 19-inch wheels.
• Rogers says she would splurge for the premium model if she were in the market for a new vehicle.

The 2024 Toyota Prius Prime is not your average hybrid vehicle. Its updated performance and sporty design are bonuses for drivers who want to look cool while driving a compact hybrid.

The 2024 model is extra attractive. Its alluring physique is enhanced by sleek lines, 19-inch wheels, and SofTex vegan leather seats, making it feel upscale. The third generation's good looks match its performance, and the overall ride and feel of the car have been significantly improved compared to previous models.

The 2024 plug-in hybrid has several new features, such as an updated battery pack for added range as an EV and an eight-speaker JBL sound system.

First impressions

As an automotive journalist, I test-drive new vehicles all the time. I drove the 2024 Prius Prime XSE Premium model, which is priced at $39,670, in the highest trim. The standard SE trim costs $32,795.

The Prius Prime has three driving modes: EV, Eco, and Power.

Eco mode still uses fuel, while EV mode won't take any energy from the gas tank and will run solely on the electric battery. In power mode, it changes the throttle to assist acceleration at lower speeds.

I started strictly in EV mode to familiarize myself with its responsiveness. It felt powerful and brawny, and the upgrades to the vehicle were apparent. I enjoyed the easy ride while the car only used its battery to move us along. Honestly, I forgot I was driving a hybrid vehicle because this new model feels so nimble.

When I switched to hybrid mode, I experienced combustion from the four-cylinder engine working in tandem with the battery. I noticed the 220 combined net horsepower gave me added agility to maneuver in traffic.

Drivers can travel with added confidence when driving this Prius, knowing it comes with Toyota Safety Sense 3.0, blind spot monitoring, including rear and cross-traffic alert systems, and lane change assistance.

Interior and exterior

I enjoy the aesthetic lines on the exterior of the Prius Prime XSE Premium. It's fun to look at and very sporty.

The interior of the compact EV is spacious and comfortable. Ventilated front seats allow the driver to self-regulate temperature in the summer months, and in the cold months, you have heated seats to ensure comfort year-round. The heated steering wheel is also a nice touch and adds a high-quality feel to the upscale ergonomics of the interior.

Toyota did a great job giving the operators a wide field of view. Passengers can enjoy the fixed glass roof, which offers 360-degree views all around the car, almost like fishbowl windows.

Soft vegan leather seats inside make it very comfortable, and the vehicle's ergonomics are super user-friendly. Everything in the Prius is easy to use because the JBL infotainment system is quite large.

Driving experience

The driving experience is not what you'd expect from a normal Prius.

With each iteration, Toyota continuously makes the Prius Prime smoother, quieter, and more capable. According to Toyota, the 2024 model has about 99 more horsepower than previous versions, so it's quite a bit faster.

When in EV mode, the acceleration feels perky, but when driving as a hybrid, it's actually faster. You can easily toggle back and forth and feel the Prius Prime respond, although the switchover was a little clunky.

Once I put the Prius Prime into the hybrid mode, I could tell a difference in the drive and it didn't seem as smooth, but it was still a great driving experience — and offers excellent range. This year's model features about a 40-mile range, while last year's had about a 25-mile range. The combustion engine's EPA rating is 48 mpg.

The Prius Prime XSE only has front-wheel drive, but in every mode, it's very quick and smooth to drive. I prefer four-wheel drive for safety reasons because I live somewhere hilly that can become icy in the cold months.

The steering gives great feedback, so you know exactly where your tires are. The 19-inch wheels are slightly larger than average, making it a fun car to ride in.

If I were in the market for a new vehicle, I would absolutely buy a Prius Prime. It's a great price for great fuel efficiency, with comfortable seats for a 5'3" person. Many of its features come standard, but I might even spring for the XSE Premium model since the base price is so affordable.