Wednesday Morning Links

Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading.

- Daron Acemoglu highlights the dangers of a new gilded age - particularly as increasingly large concentrations of wealth are taken for merit or wisdom. Amanda Marcotte writes that anybody who actually cared about the future would seek to rein in climate change - not deny its reality like JD Vance and the rest of the right. And Emile Torres calls out the highly selective "longtermism" being used by the uber-wealthy to justify sacrificing most of humanity in the foreseeable future. 

- Meanwhile, Andre Mayer reports on the corporate conglomerates who are breaking their already-insufficient climate promises even as the climate breaks down in front of our eyes. And Amanda Buckiewicz reports on Richard Thompson's recognition that we're not moving anywhere near quickly enough to address the known harms of microplastics.

- Sam Levine reports on the employees who died after a plastics manufacturer reportedly ordered them to stay on site in the midst of Hurricane Helene. And CBC News reports on the multiple employees injured by an explosion at an Alberta oil site.

- Rupendra Brahambhatt discusses how the hype surrounding AI seems to serve little purpose other than to excuse increased energy consumption and environmental degradation. 

- Finally, Gabriela Calugay-Casuga notes that full-time work is getting harder to find - making raw job numbers an incomplete indicator of income and security.

Saturday Afternoon Links

Assorted content for your weekend reading.

- Seth Wynes et al. survey climate scientists about their expectations for global climate policy - and it's telling that there's no apparent optimism about anything being accomplished until half a century down the road.

- Rickman et al. examine how banks are continuing to lend immense amounts of money for fossil fuel extraction and development - even as they know that action makes it impossible to meet the world's Paris targets. Josephine Moulds and Wil Crisp expose how Citigroup helped funnel billions to the UAE's state oil company while avoiding counting the loan against its climate commitments. And Dara Kerr reports on Elon Musk's plan to operate a massive, highly-polluting AI supercomputer in Memphis with no regard for residents who have already faced generations of environmental racism.

- Meanwhile, Zoe Kleinman discusses Stephen Fry's observation that Musk and Mark Zuckerberg have polluted the information ecosystem at least as much as any industrial operation has ever polluted the physical environment. Marc Edge argues that the developing Russian disinformation scandal could turn the tide against Pierre Poilievre and the party benefiting from Vladimir Putin's favour. And Freddy Brewster reports on J.D. Vance's plans to trash any remaining restrictions against full and unaccountable private ownership of the U.S.' political system.

- Finally, the Pandemic Acountability Index examines the gendered impacts of COVID-19, including a disproportionate burden on women already stuck with unpaid care responsibilities. And Matthew Kupfer reports on the numerous social ills caused by the federal government's decision to order employees back to their offices.