• Korean Air is ending its cabin service earlier due to increased turbulence concerns.
• It follows Singapore Airlines in changing protocols following a fatal incident in May.
• The carrier said turbulence incidents had doubled over the last five years.

A second airline has changed its cabin service due to increased concerns about turbulence.

Korean Air announced Monday that it would finish cabin service 20 minutes earlier on medium and long-haul routes.

This means cabin service will end 40 minutes before landing, starting from Monday. Korean Air said the change will allow inflight services to end before the plane descends for landing.

One of just 10 airlines to be rated five stars by Skytrax, Korean Air's decision could influence other carriers to make similar moves.

It comes after Singapore Airlines — also rated five stars — changed its cabin service protocol. That followed a severe turbulence incident on one of its aircraft in May, in which a 73-year-old man died and dozens more were injured.

Days later, Singapore Airlines said it would no longer serve meals when the seatbelt light is on.

In Monday's announcement, Korean Air said turbulence "has become a persistent and growing problem in recent years." It added that the number of incidents had doubled in the first quarter of this year compared to the same period in 2019.

The carrier also suggested that the climate crisis has an impact. "Turbulence is becoming more frequent, especially as the aircraft descends, due to large temperature differences between altitudes," it said.

Turbulence is created by friction between air molecules, caused by differences in wind speed. The warming climate imparts more energy into the air, which creates more friction.

This is especially notable around the jet streams, where clear air turbulence is most common.

In a 2023 study, researchers from the University of Reading found that turbulence was getting more common over the North Atlantic, around the north polar jet stream.

Over a typical point, the most severe type of clear air turbulence increased by 55% between 1979 and 2020, the study found.

• Canada faces a severe housing affordability crisis with home values doubling since 2011.
• Last year, the federal government launched the Housing Accelerator Fund to boost home construction.
• The program has helped incentivize looser land-use policies and other measures to increase home supply.

mebbe we do a trudeau thumbnail? kinda hard to tell that house is indeed canadian. i'm surprised they don't have a bilingual for sale sign and i'm pretty sure that's illegal.

Canada is facing a housing affordability crisis even more severe than the US's housing woes. But the federal government is starting to aggressively throw its weight behind fixing the home shortage.

Like the American federal government, Canada's national government doesn't have a lot of control over housing policy. Instead, provincial and municipal governments create land-use policies and control building and demand-side subsidies that shape the housing landscape.

Despite the federal government's limited control over housing policy, it's gotten a lot of the blame for skyrocketing costs, said Mike Moffatt, a senior director at the Smart Prosperity Institute at the University of Ottawa. That public sentiment pushed officials in Ottawa to warm to a more hands-on approach. "Canadians just want to be able to afford a home — they don't really care about the intricacies of constitutional law," Moffat said.

So last year, the federal government launched an initiative — called the Housing Accelerator Fund — that incentivizes local governments to legalize denser housing construction, including by mass transit, and otherwise stimulate more home building. In exchange, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his Liberal party have opened up billions of dollars in infrastructure funding — from water to transit — to support that new housing.

The program pushes provinces and cities to create more pro-housing policies, including ending single-family zoning, loosening restrictions on how tall and close together residential buildings can be, opening up government land for housing, and eliminating parking mandates. The federal government first made deals directly with all of the country's major cities, which the government estimates will allow 750,000 more homes to be permitted than otherwise would have been.

In April, Trudeau announced an additional $5 billion in infrastructure grants for provinces and territories that implement pro-housing policies, including legalizing "missing middle" homes, which includes medium-density housing like duplexes, triplexes, and small apartment buildings. The most recent push is part of Trudeau's larger housing plan, which aims to get 3.9 million new homes built by 2031.

Overall, the federal push has already been quite successful in changing the housing policy landscape across the country, Moffat said. For example, as a result of their deals with the government, all of the major cities now allow at least four units to be built on single-family lots. Certain provinces, like British Columbia, have been much more willing to push pro-housing policies. Local governments in places like Ontario and Alberta have put up more of a fight. However, the approach creates some political cover for policymakers facing anti-housing constituencies.

"Uptake hasn't been universal, but overall it's been quite strong," Moffat said. "We have seen some municipal changes that, even 20 months ago, I would have said were highly, highly unlikely."

But just because denser housing is legal doesn't mean it will get built. Building missing middle housing and other more affordable homes needs to be attractive to developers. And with home construction costs way up, that's a steeper ask, said Matti Siemiatycki, who heads the Infrastructure Institute at the University of Toronto's School of Cities. "With the rising interest rates with rising construction costs, a lot of the product that used to be finance is now becoming much harder," he said.

City governments have long been "biased towards homeowners and not towards renters," Mosche Lander, a Concordia University economist, told BI late last year, and support policies that limit homebuilding and keep home values elevated.

Like in the US, the housing affordability crisis in Canada is driven by a lack of housing and rising demand. Over the last several years, an influx of new immigrants, rampant investor speculation, and rapidly rising construction costs have also sent prices up. The average home value in Canada has more than doubled since 2011. Rents are up more than 20% over the last two years. And a ballooning number of Canadians are spending more than they can afford on housing.

At this point, most of Canada's housing landscape looks like California's supply-starved and deeply unaffordable market.

"The difference is that California makes up about 12 or 13% of the United States, whereas Ontario and BC combined are over half," Moffat said. "Half to two-thirds of the country is unaffordable."

Siemiatycki said there's been a "subtle but noticeable change" in how Canadians view residential density. Many homeowners who previously opposed densification are starting to realize, "even if it's not them that rising prices and skyrocketing impact, it might be their children, or their colleagues, or their elders," he said.

Pro-housing policies are increasingly popular across Canada's ideological spectrum. The federal opposition leader, Pierre Poilievre of the Conservative Party, argues Trudeau's government hasn't gone far enough and has proposed his own plan that would require cities to increase the number of new homes built by 15% each year or lose out on federal grant money. It would also impose a fine on cities that tolerate "NIMBY" — the anti-development "Not in My Backyard" philosophy — opposition to housing construction.

Under President Joe Biden's 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, the US federal government is providing states and cities across the country with hundreds of billions of dollars in funding for transportation and other infrastructure projects. Some American fans of Canada's Housing Accelerator Fund suggest it could be a model for US efforts to incentivize denser and more abundant housing construction.

• Uber and Lyft settled to pay Massachusetts drivers $32.50 per hour for time spent completing a ride.
• The settlement includes paid sick leave, accident insurance, and health plans for drivers.
• Drivers remain independent contractors, and some are concerned about competition and wage impacts.

Many Uber and Lyft drivers in Massachusetts are about to be paid more for their work — and it may be a sign of what's to come in other states. Still, some drivers are not fully satisfied.

After a four-year legal dispute over the status of ride-hailing drivers in Massachusetts, Uber and Lyft agreed via a settlement to pay a minimum rate of $32.50 an hour for time spent completing a ride. The settlement will pay $175 million to the state and drivers, many of whom claimed both companies violated Massachusetts wage and hour laws.

Massachusetts also won paid sick leave, improved accident insurance, and a health insurance plan for drivers who work 15 or more hours a week. Both companies said they would stop supporting a ballot initiative to set drivers' classification as contractors in stone.

However, there are some limitations. The new minimum rate only applies to time spent actively picking up a rider or taking them to their destination, meaning if a driver waits for a ride for half the time, their pay drops to $16.25 an hour. Also, Massachusetts drivers will be considered independent contractors, meaning they will not receive all the protections of employees. Sergio Avedian, senior contributor at The Rideshare Guy, said up to 80% of drivers prefer to remain independent contractors, citing driver surveys he helped run.

Four Massachusetts Uber and Lyft drivers said that while the settlement is a win for drivers in many ways, they fear it could increase competition and may not be as significant a wage increase as many think. Still, the settlement could be a sign of what's to come in other states with lobbying efforts underway.

Uber will pay $148 million and Lyft will pay $27 million to Massachusetts. Of this total, $140 million will go to drivers.

Both companies said in statements that the agreement is a step forward in balancing the benefits many drivers requested and the flexibility of drivers to start and end their shifts whenever they want.

Over the last few years, minimum pay and benefits legislation has passed in New York, California, Washington, and Minnesota.

"The recent agreement reached in Massachusetts before the ballot initiatives were decided by Massachusetts voters is a favorable outcome for most Massachusetts drivers," Avedian said. "The agreements in New York State, Minnesota, and now Massachusetts demonstrate that drivers uniting and campaigning for higher pay and benefits" are having success getting ride-hailing companies to negotiate.

What Massachusetts drivers say

Avedian said for the majority of drivers, this settlement is a big step in the right direction. He said the settlement may hurt the top echelon of drivers, but it will allow less experienced drivers to make more and feel safer on the road.

Mark McInerney, 60, who drives for Lyft in Boston, said he's pleased with the settlement, noting it "will make a good model for national policy" concerning compensation and flexibility for drivers.

He noted these changes will benefit his wallet, as he's had frustrations about how Lyft "frequently underestimates the time required to complete a trip mostly due to conditions beyond the platform's control, such as waiting for a passenger at the pickup and traffic conditions like congestion from construction and accidents."

"They rarely adjust the fare to reflect the extra time required to complete a trip, even when the time goes 40% or more over the estimate," he said. "For that reason, I drive only when incentives are offered and focus on short trips with nearby pickup locations."

Boston driver Matt R., who has done over 4,000 rides on Uber and Lyft with a 5.0 rating, said he was initially skeptical about the decision but thinks this is one of the better settlements he's seen. The $32.50 per engaged hour is an improvement for many drivers, he said, though he had concerns about how drivers and passengers might not understand that wage doesn't factor in time waiting to accept a ride, with three potential impacts:

"First, luring new drivers to the space, slowing demand, reducing utilization rates, and watering down average hourly online earnings for current drivers. Secondly, there's a very high likelihood we'll see tips dry up. Why tip someone making $32.50 an hour, right? Finally, increased fares may reduce demand. I believe Uber and Lyft have a good understanding of how to do this with minimal impact on demand, but it remains to be seen."

Matt added this decision could hurt top-earning drivers like himself but could benefit drivers in slower, lower-earning markets. He wished the agreement addressed other issues like unpaid travel time due to rider cancellations, unapplied surge payments, or app glitches impacting earnings.

Ronald Banks, who has driven for seven years in Texas and Massachusetts, said the paid time off is a plus, but as his active hourly rate is as high as $49, he fears this decision could hurt his earnings.

Jen, a full-time driver in Boston, said the settlement may be a net positive, though she isn't sold this will benefit everyone.

"Many drivers believe Uber will make adjustments in other ways to secure their current profit margins," Jen said. "However, I am glad full-time drivers will get some sort of sick pay and a healthcare stipend as unpaid time off caused by illness and healthcare insurance borne entirely by drivers are both extremely expensive for self-employed drivers."

How minimum wage legislation is working in other states

A handful of states have already agreed with Uber, Lyft, and other ride-hailing and delivery companies on citywide or statewide plans. Lobbying efforts by drivers are underway in Chicago, Portland, and Virginia, Avedian said.

In 2020, California passed Proposition 22, which kept drivers as independent contractors but gave them benefits such as guaranteed pay. California drivers receive at least 120% of minimum wage, which is now $16 an hour, and $0.35 a mile while completing a ride or delivery. Qualifying drivers can get up to $489.54 a month for healthcare insurance costs, and drivers get additional insurance covering medical expenses and lost income resulting from job-related illness or injury.

The California Supreme Court is challenging the legality of Proposition 22 over concerns about classifying drivers as independent contractors.

Research from the UC Berkeley Labor Center and the Center for Wage and Employment Dynamics suggests even with these guarantees in place, drivers in Los Angeles and San Francisco had net hourly earnings well below minimum wage, even with tips — net hourly pay with tips for passenger drivers in California is $9.09, while for delivery drivers it's $13.62. Similar results were found in the Boston, Chicago, and Seattle metros.

As of early June, the minimum hourly rate for Uber and Lyft drivers in New York outside of New York City was raised to $26.78. Drivers in New York City receive the pay rates decided on by the Taxi and Limousine Commission. Drivers also received new benefits like sick leave, training, and chat support.

This came after Uber and Lyft paid New York $328 million over wage theft claims, though both companies denied wrongdoing. The companies have been under fire recently after Uber reportedly locked out New York City drivers in the middle of their shifts in opposition to a minimum wage rule, a decision Lyft said it's considering as well.

In May, Uber and Lyft struck a deal to pay Minnesota drivers $1.28 per mile and $0.31 per minute minimum. The two companies threatened to pull out of Minneapolis, which has a minimum wage for large businesses of $15.57.

Are you a gig driver who is struggling to make ends meet? Are you driving into your retirement years? Reach out to this reporter at nsheidlower@businessinsider.com.

A handful of products define the collective memory of the pandemic's early days. There were the weeks that toilet paper flew off the shelves, to the point you had to barter for more than a roll or two. For a while, everyone was buying yeast, because it seemed critical we all bake sourdough. And then there was lumber mania, when lumber prices soared to records.

Once we all were cooped up in our homes, many people looked around, realized they hated their abodes, and decided it was time to make a (sometimes drastic) change. This meant a lot of moves, even more makeover projects, and a whole lot of lumber. Unfortunately for the motivated remodelers, the supply side of the equation was caught flat-footed: Sawmill operators had scaled back operations under the assumption the pandemic would mean less activity, not more. The price of Western SPF two-by-four lumber — an industry benchmark — shot up from under $400 per thousand board feet in January 2020 to over $1,600 in May 2021.

But what comes up often comes down, and lumber prices came down hard as demand decelerated and supply ramped up to a speed that's no longer necessary.

"It's low and slow, and it's kind of been that way for a while," said Stinson Dean, the CEO of Deacon Lumber, a lumber trading company.

A large part of the industry is losing money at these prices right now.

After peaking in spring 2021, lumber prices briefly collapsed before jumping back up to $1,400 in early 2022. Later that year, prices nose-dived to the $300-to-$400 range, and they've stuck there. While these prices are similar to the pre-2020 levels, Dustin Jalbert, a senior economist on wood products at Fastmarkets RISI, told me that changes to the industry and the higher cost of production meant lumber suppliers were getting squeezed.

"A large part of the industry is losing money at these prices right now," Jalbert said. He joked that lumber was having another "moment" in the media, "but for the opposite reasons."

Supply and demand were the culprits when prices were soaring, and they've helped fuel the tumble, too. Let's start with the demand side: The Federal Reserve has jacked up its key interest rate over the past few years, bringing mortgage rates along for the ride. The average 30-year mortgage rate was under 3% just a few years ago but now sits at about 7%.

High interest rates mean less housing is being built, and existing-home sales are down to levels not seen since the Great Recession. If you own a home and are looking to move, the idea of doubling your mortgage rate is a tough pill to swallow, leading people to stay put.

Remodels and repairs have also slowed down. A lot of activity was pulled forward during the pandemic — those who wanted to build a new deck or an addition already did so in 2020 and 2021. Even if people do have projects they'd like to undertake in their homes, they're not really jazzed about tapping into their home equity to do it, given interest rates. Homeowners also tend to do the most work on their houses within a few years of buying them, so if they're not moving, they're not renovating either.

Paul Jannke, a principal at Forest Economic Advisors, said this housing-market malaise is a big problem for the lumber industry. He said residential construction — including new builds, renovations, and repairs — makes up 70% to 75% of actual lumber consumption. Housing starts are down 18% from where they were in the first quarter of 2022 to the first quarter of 2024, and spending on residential improvements are off by 21%, adjusted for inflation, he said. Given the weakness there, you get the demand issue.

On the supply end, the long and short of it is that producers got a bit out over their (wooden) skis. The amount of lumber being produced might have been nice in 2021, but not so much now.

Those pandemic-era high prices got a lot of people investing in sawmills (aka the place where a tree goes to become a stick of lumber), particularly in the southern US. Some have closed, but on net, US sawmills are producing about 4 billion more board feet than they were in 2022, Jannke said. It's not just an American problem: Suppliers in British Columbia have historically exported a lot of wood to China, but the Chinese property market has collapsed, so that lumber isn't being shipped overseas and instead is being diverted into the already swamped US market. Tariffs on lumber coming from Canada into the US are expected to increase this summer, so Canadian mills are keeping maintaining production before that happens.

"There's so much wood," Jannke said.

Some of this is a classic bullwhip effect, a phenomenon where changes in consumer demand cause outsize fluctuations in the supply chain. It's also classic greed — people saw lumber's eye-popping prices in 2021 and 2022 and decided it was time to get in on the production game or build out existing operations.

"A lot of people got optimistic," Jalbert said. "The thing to think about is the lead time to start up a sawmill. It takes two to three years to ramp up that supply — let's call it 18 to 24 months from breaking ground on the project to when it is fully ramped up to full capacity."

All that new production capacity became operational right as things started to turn.

"There was a lot of investment in new supply that was planned before COVID, and then that was supercharged during COVID," Dean said. Some of those projects were paid for with cash, but others were financed with debt, and sawmills are still pumping out supply in order to pay those debts. Instead of scaling back and waiting for prices to bounce back, they're stuck producing lumber for a market that doesn't need it.

It's a prisoner's dilemma, but for wood.

"They have cash-flow stresses, they've got the debt to service, and they've just got this brand-new facility, so they can't really afford to not have any kind of cash flow," Dean said. "They'd rather lose money and run their new facility."

The path to higher prices likely runs through sawmill closures, but many in the industry aren't ready to pack it in. Some mill operators feel like they've done their fair share to slow operations and now it's someone else's turn. It's a prisoner's dilemma, but for wood. Many lumber producers, like a lot of people, came into the year expecting the Fed to cut interest rates sooner, triggering a new wave of demand. That hasn't happened. Mill operators also remember the experience of not having enough supply to meet a spike in demand, and they know that ramping back up takes time, so they may be hesitating to ramp down.

Long term, there's room for optimism. The US needs to build more housing, so the long-run fundamentals look good, and interest rates are likely to come down eventually.

"Lower interest rates fixes this thing in a hurry, because demand can come back pretty quick," Dean said. He told me that for the moment he's taking it easy, "posting a lot of fishing pictures and waiting for the market to figure itself out," and getting ready to work a lot harder once things get moving again.

While those in the lumber industry may not be having a fantastic time, if you're in the market for lumber, it's a good time to buy. Dean said that if lower prices haven't filtered down to stores yet, he expects them to soon.

"If you've been putting off a remodel for three years, a deck, a fence, right now — and you need to be watching prices — this summer will be the best time to secure materials for that in four-plus years," Dean said.

If you really want to get into the weeds on this — and I suppose if you're considering a big project you do — there is some wonkiness. While framing-lumber prices have come down, the costs of a lot of other building materials haven't. If you're building a deck, for example, the deck planks won't be cheap, though the framing will be. Building a house is still a lot more expensive than it was in 2020. Robert Dietz, a senior vice president and chief economist at the National Association of Home Builders, said the costs of residential construction materials were up by more than 46% since May of that year. They've been roughly flat over the past two years, in part because of the lumber decline.

"Other prices remain elevated for material costs, meaning home prices will remain elevated," Dietz said. The silver lining here is that building a new house isn't as expensive as it could be if lumber hadn't come down — lumber's decline has helped prices stay relatively stable over the past couple of years.

Jannke said that while the lower lumber prices hadn't resulted in lower housing costs, "homebuilder margins are at or near record levels." If you're paying a contractor for your project, they may not be too keen to pass the price savings on to you. They're paying for other factors like labor, maybe wiring and sheeting. They also are running a business where they'd like to make as much money as possible.

"They're not quoting the job lower because the dimensional-lumber price is lower," Jalbert said. "They quote a job because they look at what people's income is at and they look at what home prices are at and they say, no, this is the price for that job, regardless of what the inputs are."

That doesn't mean you have to accept the quote with no questions asked. You can try to negotiate — hey, maybe even show them this article and argue that things should be getting cheaper for them. Or, if you dare, you can always buy wholesale and try to do it yourself.

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Emily Stewart is a senior correspondent at Business Insider, writing about business and the economy.

I spent my summer afternoons as a tween at my local public pool in Milwaukee with a gaggle of neighborhood kids. I was there for Marco Polo, water tag, and proudly modeling the matching purple nose plugs and goggles that I'd bought with my allowance. My girlfriends, a year or two older, were most interested in catching the eye of the male lifeguards.

I would gamely follow along as they made conversation with our tanned and fit overseers. The teenage and 20-something guards held celebrity status in our eyes. And, as far as I can remember, they were reasonably good sports about getting pestered by a bunch of hormonally charged grade schoolers. By the time school started back up at the end of August, my dark-brown hair would be tinged with orange, proudly earned proof of my participation in the storied summer tradition of chlorine and sun.

Too many kids growing up in America today, however, won't know what any of that was like — the lifeguard is now on life support. The American Lifeguard Association reported last year that one-third of the country's 309,000 public swimming pools would either close for the summer season or operate in a limited capacity, marking the third year in a row for dramatically reduced pool access nationwide. My childhood pool — where my grandfather worked as a locker-room attendant in the 1940s and my dad learned to swim in the 1960s — has been closed to the public since 2020. Public beaches share the struggle.

This year, the predicament continues. Some cities have turned to creative measures such as recruiting and training retirees for seasonal positions or lowering age requirements for certification. In many cases, it hasn't been enough.

Once an emblem of summer — and the object of poolside fawning — the American lifeguard has somehow become an endangered species.

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The national lifeguard crisis isn't entirely unprecedented: Intermittent shortages have befallen the nation's pools and beaches since at least the '20s. But my peak pool patronage took place in the late '90s, which happened to coincide with an unusually long stretch of high lifeguard recruitment and retention. And somehow this was happening at a time when many US cities were prioritizing public spending on law enforcement at the expense of other public services, including recreational amenities such as parks and pools.

What brought on this age of lifeguard plenty? Cue the opening montage to "Baywatch."

The popular syndicated TV series, which centered on a crew of impossibly good-looking Southern California lifeguards saving lives and breaking hearts in high-cut, tomato-red swimsuits, aired from 1989 to 2001. "It showed lifeguarding as a glamorous lifestyle and made it look like a great profession," Wyatt Werneth, a spokesperson for the American Lifeguard Association, said. Werneth became a professional lifeguard in the early '90s — aka peak "Baywatch" — and told me that the show had a direct impact on the public's perception of his industry: "It was prestigious. You wore your lifeguard uniform with pride."

The people I spoke with who lifeguarded in their teens and 20s remembered it fondly. "I enjoyed lifeguarding because it was what I considered a 'professional job,'" said Jessi Adler, who lifeguarded at various pools throughout her high-school and college years in Michigan between 1995 and 2003. "While many of my friends were working at a fast-food joint, I had learned a real skill and was responsible for people's lives."

Now a public-relations director in Central Texas, Adler and her husband were recently volunteering as tour guides and maintenance workers at Lyndon B. Johnson State Park when park officials offered to pay for her lifeguard recertification so she could pitch in with an occasional pool shift. The request was deferred because of pool renovations, but the need hasn't gone away: The park issued a plea for lifeguard applicants on its community Facebook page in early June.

The scenario presents a sharp departure from Adler's youth, when lifeguarding seemed like the ultimate summer job. "I remember being so excited when I was old enough to be eligible to take the certification test," she said.

Fewer swimmers means fewer prospective lifeguards. And this problem feeds on itself.

Most lifeguards in the US are under the age of 25. Jason Russell, a professor of history and labor studies at SUNY Empire State, told me that the idea of lifeguarding as a young person's job keeps it from becoming professionalized — which makes it more prone to ebbs and flows. Instead of a career with long-term advancement opportunities that's compensated accordingly, it's seen as entry-level service work for kids. This poses a variety of staffing challenges. In beach-resort communities, for example, there's often a lack of nearby housing available to low-wage seasonal workers who may or may not have the means of getting to work from more-affordable accommodations further afield.

"On 'Baywatch,' they never had any problems finding places to live," Russell said. "They were driving around in cars. The material circumstances of their lives were much different than the average actual lifeguard."

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Despite its glossy portrayal of the job, the "Baywatch" effect could only last so long. By the 2010s, lifeguard shortages had resurfaced as a widespread concern. When the pandemic came along, the predicament ratcheted up to a full-blown crisis.

Werneth told me that when pools shut down in 2020, prospective lifeguarding recruits missed out on training and certification opportunities and found work elsewhere. Others say the shortages stem from an increased demand for lifeguards at commercial aquatic facilities — waterparks have grown by nearly 50% in the US and Canada since 2014, according to the World Waterpark Association, a global trade group. But those explanations ignore the fact that a lot of Americans simply can't swim; according to the American Red Cross, more than half of Americans either can't swim at all or lack the basic water skills to swim safely. That's a startling plummet from the 93% of men and 74% of women who said they knew how to swim in a 1991 survey published by the American Journal of Public Health. Fewer swimmers means fewer prospective lifeguards. And this problem feeds on itself: A lot of Americans can't swim because of poor access to public swimming facilities and lessons, and those training opportunities get harder to find thanks to the shortage of qualified lifeguards.

The crisis is a stark contrast to our nation's past when swimming was seen as a beloved pastime. In his 2007 book, "Contested Waters: A Social History of Swimming Pools in America," Jeff Wiltse cited a 1933 survey that found that many Americans prized swimming in public pools as much as going to the movies. "Pools became emblems of a new, distinctly modern version of the good life that valued leisure, pleasure, and beauty," Wiltse wrote. "They were, in short, an integral part of the kind of life Americans wanted to live." Between 1933 and 1938, some 750 public pools were constructed under the New Deal. The art-deco splendor of some surviving pools of this era such as the grand Astoria Park pool in New York City, serve as poignant reminders of this public-swimming heyday.

But the romance did not last. As white Americans moved to the suburbs in the middle of the 20th century, public pools began their long and steady decline. In the wake of the Civil Rights Movement, many cities opted to close public swimming facilities instead of complying with desegregation mandates, which sharply reduced access to swimming lessons. Suburbanites, meanwhile, preferred the privacy of backyard pools and private clubs. By the second half of the 20th century, a person's race, socioeconomic status, and whether they lived in a city or suburb became key predictors of their ability to swim. That pattern persists to this day, narrowing the pool of prospective lifeguards to draw from.

The swim disparities also influenced the scope of a lifeguard's job. My younger brother, who worked as a lifeguard at several Milwaukee city pools in the late 2000s and early 2010s, recalled having to make numerous rescues at one particularly high-traffic pool and waterpark. Adler, meanwhile, recounted her rescues in suburban Michigan as "very minimal and never serious." (Though she did notice that people's swimming skills were more of a mixed bag at her college pool, where patrons came from a variety of backgrounds, than at her community's country club and high school.)

"There's a problem, period, with a decline in swimming lessons," Russell, the labor historian, told me, adding that the inability to swim was more pronounced in communities of color because of a legacy of segregation and diminishing access to public facilities. While the lack of qualified lifeguards may partly stem from this problem, getting more lifeguards on stands could turn things around.

Russell has some ideas. "As a labor academic, I tend to think that paying more money helps," he told me. "Employers lament, 'Nobody wants to work.' But there is a solution: Pay more money." In fact, wage bumps have already helped curb lifeguard shortages in several US cities, including Chicago, Denver, Baltimore, and San Antonio.

As we enter our fourth year without enough lifeguards, it's hard to imagine them retaking the podium as the cultural idol of American summer. Even Hollywood's 2017 "Baywatch" revival film couldn't respark a love affair with the red suit. But while times and tastes may change, the attributes that make a summer job worthwhile stay more or less the same. When more cities prioritize safe water access for the masses — and pay lifeguards accordingly — the mighty lifeguard just may rise again.

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Kelli María Korducki is a journalist whose work focuses on work, tech, and culture. She's based in New York City.

• Sources close to the White House say that Joe Biden is overly insulated by a close group of advisors.
• Anonymous sources told Politico that information is carefully curated before being presented to him.
• The sources accused Biden of being difficult to please, and that "people are scared shitless of him."

As new explanations pop up to explain President Joe Biden's poor showing in the presidential debate last Thursday, a group of Democrats and White House staffers have pointed the blame at the people helping to run the house.

Speaking to Politico, anonymous sources close to the White House revealed that Biden is cloistered and insulated by his closest aides, which has isolated him from the rest of his party.

That group of aides includes Biden's senior advisor, Anita Dunn; her husband, Bob Bauer, Biden's personal attorney; and Biden's former chief of staff, Ron Klain, among others.

A senior administration official told Politico: "He doesn't take advice from anyone other than those few top aides, and it becomes a perfect storm because he just gets more and more isolated from their efforts to control it."

Politico's sources added that the aides feed him information and advice that he will react well to and block out the rest.

One source close to Biden's campaign told Politico: "If I'm talking to Anita, and I say, 'what about X?' She's quick to say, 'The president's not going to do that. No chance.'"

A separate Politico source said that people who express dissent tend to not be invited to the next call or meeting.

A senior administration official Politico spoke to also accused Biden of being unpleasant to be around when he's being briefed. Staffers work hard to curate the information for briefings in a way that will not set him off.

"It's like, 'You can't include that, that will set him off,' or 'Put that in, he likes that,'" the official told Politico. "It's a Rorschach test, not a briefing."

"It's very difficult, and people are scared shitless of him," the official added.

The White House denied the claims that Biden is "isolated," telling Politico that he regularly gets input from multiple sources and has eight to 10 people in briefings.

Others have criticized Biden's top aides

The anonymous staffers are not the only ones assigning blame to Biden's top advisors.

Democratic megadonor John Morgan echoed these sentiments, telling Politico he thinks the president has a "cabal" of close aides.

"I think he has misplaced trust in these three people, and I believe he has from the inception," Morgan told Politico.

Morgan also took to X on Sunday to express his displeasure with the aides.

"Biden has for too long been fooled by the value of Anita Dunn and her husband. They need to go… TODAY," he wrote.

Biden's family members have also pinned the blame for his bad debate showing on his inner circle, saying they failed to prepare him adequately to go on the offensive, per an earlier report by Politico.

Representatives for Biden didn't immediately respond to requests for comment from Business Insider sent outside regular business hours.

• I'm American but have been living in Germany with my family for over a decade. 
• Here grocery stores are closed on Sundays and close at midday on Saturdays. 
• You have to bag your own groceries while being mindful of not taking too long. 

If you are planning a trip, a long-term visit or even a move to Germany, I have some advice for you. I'm American, but have been living in Germany with my family for over a decade.

One thing you'll probably notice early on is that your trip to the grocery store to stock up on supplies might look a little different than what you're used to in the United States. Here is why.

There are less brands and varieties of products

Given that the United States is simply much bigger than Germany as a country, it stands to reason that German grocery stores have less of a selection when it comes to brands and varieties within products.

A great example is orange juice. At a typical US supermarket, you can find a range of highly specific types of orange juice, like "added calcium," "some pulp," or "heart-healthy with Omega-3's." Not so in Germany for the most part: you'll typically have a selection between a couple of brands, perhaps narrowed down by being with pulp or without pulp. Although larger grocery stores will offer a bigger variety, it generally won't be as vast as an American supermarket.

Within Germany, brands are often somewhat regional as well. When you buy milk in Bavaria, the brand selection is likely to be exclusively Bavarian companies. And of course, some of it comes down to space. For instance, urban grocery stores in Germany simply don't have the physical capacity the way many American grocery shops do, allowing American shops to stock numerous brands and types of the same product.

Speaking of space, given that many people do get around without a car in German cities, you'll also have to keep in mind that not every German grocery store will have a parking lot or easy street parking if you're in a major city like Frankfurt or Hamburg.

You have to bag your own stuff

At most major American grocery stores, your groceries generally get bagged for you as you check out. When you shop in Germany, be prepared for a bit of a workout: the checkers scan the items rapidly while you are in charge of bagging them up yourself, sometimes with a lengthy line of people behind you during busy times.

It's almost an art form, as shoppers have to be quick and strategic to prevent their groceries from piling up before the next customers starts scanning. The only other effective strategy is to try to shop for groceries during more obscure times of day — or grocery delivery.

There's a range of grocery store types, from health food shops to discount grocers

Similar to the US, options in Germany are greater in larger urban areas than rural villages and towns. Most Germans do their grocery shopping at standard and discount grocery stores. In fact, some German discount grocery stores have achieved international success, so many Americans are familiar with Aldi and Lidl in particular. There are "mega" markets more comparable to bigger American supermarkets as well, such as Hit, V-Markt and Kaufland.

Organic and biodynamic groceries are very popular in Germany, so there are a number of organic grocery stores throughout the country, including some national chains. Certified organic products tend to be less expensive in Germany than in the US, although they still tend to have a higher price tag than non-organic products. Most cities and towns offer farmer's markets on a regular basis, where locals can get fresh produce, dairy and meat from nearby farms. Germany has a large Turkish community, and there are many Turkish grocers throughout the country. In urban centers you can also find other international grocery stores.

A unique German element are some long standing traditional department store grocery sections or gourmet grocery shops that are legendary in certain cities. These stores have been around for generations and tend to be quite expensive and exclusive. Some famous examples are Kadewe in Berlin and Kafer in Munich.

Opening times at German grocery stores may seem short in comparison to US stores

Many Americans who visit Germany are surprised to find that German grocery stores have more limited opening times than they are used to. For starters, throughout the country, almost all grocery stores are completely closed on Sundays. It's the same story on public holidays.

If you're absolutely stranded, most major cities will still have a few grocery stores that operate on Sundays at places like the main train station or the airport, and gas stations sell a number of basic goods, but for the most part your options will be very limited or non-existent.

For Americans who live in cities or towns where grocery stores are open till 10 p.m. or run 24 hours, don't expect to find that in Germany. Most German grocery stores close at 8 p.m., and small shops in rural areas close even earlier, such as 6 p.m. on weekdays and 1 p.m. on Saturdays.

This as-told-to essay is based on a transcribed conversation with 29-year-old Pete Ballmer, a standup comedian and former product manager in San Francisco and one of the sons of billionaire and former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer. It has been edited for length and clarity.

As a kid, I liked computers. I used to subscribe to PCWorld Magazine because I liked reading about new products. I took computer science classes at my high school and really enjoyed them.

I majored in computer science with a concentration in human-computer interaction at Stanford. Many people told me I was doing what my dad, Steve Ballmer, did, but he wasn't a programmer. He was a business guy familiar with the subject but didn't push me into it.

My dad always told my brothers and me that he just wanted us to do what we were passionate about. He made it clear that he didn't have specific expectations for our achievements, but he did harp a lot on working hard and doing our best. He would always say, "If you're going to do a job, do a job. And if you're not going to do a job, don't do a job." The rhetoric was, if you're going to do something, do it to the fullest extent.

I worked a few internships

The summers after my junior and senior years of high school, I did a software engineering internship at a small startup called Dashwire.

I then did a software engineering internship at Expedia the summer after my first year of college. I kind of hated it. I was fine as a programmer but wasn't the best, and I learned that I didn't love programming.

During my sophomore year, I heard one of my friends talk about his product management internship. The nature of the role appealed to me; it's a people-oriented job while still being analytical and creative.

The next summer, I got a product management internship at a startup called Travelnuts, which I liked. After my junior year, I interned at TripIt.

I never considered not working a full-time job after college

During my junior year, I was told I would inherit a six-figure sum from my grandfather when I turned 25. When I graduated from college at 22, I didn't have that money yet and needed a job.

I had done some standup comedy in college and knew I wanted to do more, but I also knew the odds of "making it" were low. I didn't have a lot of material, and the material I had wasn't very good, so trying to pursue comedy full-time would've been a very risky move.

My parents paid for my college education, and it was unfathomable that I not get a full-time job after graduating. There was no way they would've paid for me to live in San Francisco and do open mics. Neither my brothers nor I have ever asked my parents for a notable sum, nor have our parents given us a significant amount of money.

I applied and was hired as a rotational product manager at Zynga, the company that made games like Words with Friends and Farmville. I was excited about having a product management job that paid well.

Working at Zynga was fantastic. It was a very fun environment with smart people, a good culture, and happy hours all the time with homemade beer. I respected my boss and liked the nature of my work.

I think there are two ways you can get fulfillment from a job: either the day-to-day work is enjoyable — that was true for me — or you have a long-term sense that what you're doing matters. I knew I wasn't making a massive impact on the world by making Harry Potter: Puzzles & Spells games, but I wasn't looking to get that out of my job, so that was fine.

I got all of my jobs without connections

I got all of my internships and jobs — I feel it's important for me to say — without leveraging my family connections.

My dad, however, did go to Stanford, and I don't think I would've gotten in if he didn't because I was a good student but not exceptional. I didn't want my family connection to influence my college acceptance, but I also really wanted to go to Stanford. I couldn't escape the fact that my connections helped me, so I decided to make the most of it.

I agree that it's kind of pathetic for rich kids to use connections to get everything they have. My parents had money, I went to good schools, and I had enough given to me that I should be able to then turn that into something on my own.

I did learn about my high school internship opportunity from a friend of my mom's, but my boss specifically told me that I was the strongest applicant they had and I didn't receive preferential treatment because of my family.

I wasn't entirely qualified for my job at Expedia, but my boss from my high school internship, who had moved to Expedia, put in a good word for me because he'd enjoyed working with me and I'd done a good job.

There were a couple of people at Expedia who made comments about my family, like, "Did he really deserve to get this job, or did he just get hired because of who his dad is?" That was frustrating because I did feel like I didn't deserve the job, but it wasn't because of who my dad was. That sucked.

I didn't know anyone at Zynga before getting the job, so I got it without any connections. Once I was working at Zynga, some coworkers would make little comments like, "Oh, you're using a Mac!" occasionally, but not a ton. Nobody made me feel uncomfortable.

I decided to focus on comedy in 2021

Four years into my time at Zynga, I'd been promoted twice, the game I was working on was doing well, and I'd accomplished enough in product management that I felt I could go back and do it again if I wanted to. By then, I'd also inherited the money from my grandfather.

I'd been doing comedy on the side, performing at open mics after work, and producing some shows. I'd gone from thinking of myself as a product manager who does comedy at night to a comedian with a day job as a product manager.

In 2021, I quit my job to pursue comedy full-time. I'm now a paid regular at some comedy clubs in the Bay Area. I do around five shows a week and an open mic or two. I've also done some festivals and produced Don't Tell Comedy shows.

I don't find it difficult to write relatable jokes. I joke about gossip, my dog, being red-green colorblind, and high school. It's all stuff that's just part of the human experience.

My family background is still a part of my perspective, so I have a few jokes about growing up rich or inheriting money. Once I have a following of people coming explicitly to see me at a show, I'm happy to do standup about growing up as a billionaire's son because I have a unique perspective.

My greatest fear is excuse-less failure

It's sad that some people have to stop pursuing comedy to earn money elsewhere, but at the same time, they can ask themselves, "Who knows what would've happened with my comedy career if I hadn't had to quit?"

I don't have that option.

My money allows me the luxury of time and choice to pursue my passion, but it also allows me to purely fail at it. At a certain point, maybe I'll plateau or stop progressing, and I'll have to choose to stop because I'm just not good enough.

I'm not saying that my situation is harder than being a comic without financial backing, but it would be really hard to fail so profoundly.

My dad has said that once someone is 35, their career trajectory is pretty set. I'm 29 now, so the idea that in about five years, I'm supposed to roughly know my trajectory kind of haunts me.

Would I ever be a product manager again? Maybe, but at the same time, I don't know if I'd choose to work 40 to 60 hours a week doing a job that I wouldn't need to work for the money, even if I enjoy it enough.

I'm pretty confident in my comedy, so I'm full speed ahead on being a comedian. I've continued to improve, and I don't see any reason that wouldn't continue. I'll keep going with this as long as I keep honing my skillset and moving up the ladder.

If you had a unique experience growing up with money and would like to share your story, email Jane Zhang at janezhang@businessinsider.com.

• When it was time for my 5-year-old to start school, I knew the public school setting wasn't for him.
• We've decided to pay for his private school, but not for his college. 
• We don't know if he'll even attend college, and there are scholarships he can apply to. 

As we entered the kindergarten room on a tour of our local public school, the entire class was wearing headphones and engrossed in their tablets.

Seeing my eyebrows rise in surprise, the teacher said, "Don't worry, they're only on devices for 20 to 30 minutes each day."

"And how long are they outside for recess?" I asked.

"Half an hour per day," came the response.

I couldn't imagine my energetic son thriving in an environment where he had daily tablet time and only 30 minutes a day outside at such a young age. Like most 5-year-olds, he was constantly on the move exploring, making up games, and figuring out life by doing. At the time, he attended a play-based preschool where imagination and play led to learning and discoveries.

I knew that moving him into our local public school setting would be at odds with who he is naturally and would be like trying to fit a square peg in a round hole. After talking with my husband, we decided to enroll him in a Montessori school, where he has flourished.

We are not paying for his college tuition

The notion of sending a child to private school isn't entirely out of the ordinary, but what usually surprises people is our decision to pay for his early education but not for college.

We arrived at our decision because we truly believe that by setting the groundwork for a love of learning early in life, our son will ultimately be more successful. He is an outside-the-box thinker, a hands-on learner, and thrives in smaller environments. Unfortunately, the local public school system prioritizes teaching to the standardized state test, continuously makes cutbacks to the arts and music programs, and has burgeoning class sizes with too few teachers.

Investing in his education during these crucial formative years makes more sense for our family than paying college tuition, which he may or may not even attend.

There are options when it comes to college

If he does attend college, there are ways to reduce the tuition price, from scholarships — over $100 million worth go unclaimed yearly—to work-study programs to attending a community college for the first couple of years. It is also naive to think that the educational landscape will look the same when he is 18. Gaining knowledge outside the traditional classroom setting is easier than ever before and is only becoming more accessible.

While we will not pay for his college education, we have set up a custodial account for him, which he will have complete control of upon turning 18. Each birthday and Christmas, we deposit $500 and any financial gifts from family into his account, which we invest in an index fund. We are not stipulating what he does with this money, which is why we opted for a custodial account rather than a 529 account, which must be used for higher education.

Even if we did decide to help him with college expenses, rising tuition costs would make our contributions negligible. We believe using the money now will have a more significant impact on his educational experience than saving it for later.

The yearly tuition cost for my son's school is $9,000, and while we are comfortably considered middle class with both of us working, we are not wealthy. Rather than getting caught up in the lifestyle creep, we continue to live much as we did when we made less money. From owning one paid-off car to cooking at home to buying clothes from thrift stores, we have enabled ourselves to save the extra money we have made over the past few years.

Putting that money toward our son's primary education was an easy decision for our family.