Nonrival

Expert analysis from think tanks and academia, on public policy, economics, and technology.
Human experts. AI summaries.

America Can't Escape Chinese Supply Chains Just by Shifting Where It Buys From

peterson

• Even as the US has tried to reduce direct imports from China, Chinese value added is deeply embedded throughout global supply chains — meaning goods labeled "Made in Vietnam" or "Made in Mexico" often still contain significant Chinese content.
• Using detailed trade data from 2007–2024, the authors find that US decoupling efforts have largely reshuffled where Chinese inputs enter the supply chain rather than actually reducing dependence on them.
• The authors argue the US needs a more targeted strategy: identify true chokepoints, build genuinely competitive alternative suppliers, and coordinate with allies rather than fragmenting global trade into parallel blocs.

States That Banned Affirmative Action for Contractors Saw Minority-Owned Businesses Shrink — But Not Disappear

the_conversation

• An economist studied nine states that banned affirmative action in government contracting and found that minority- and women-owned businesses cut their workforces by about 11% over five years, with Black-owned firms hit hardest at 19% — worse than early COVID-19 layoffs.
• Counterintuitively, these businesses were no more likely to shut down entirely after bans took effect, though their productivity fell roughly 9% and their overall value dropped about 10%.
• With Trump now eliminating affirmative action federally — affecting roughly 10% of U.S. GDP in government contracting — this state-level record offers a preview of what's likely coming, though researchers still don't know how many contract dollars these businesses actually lost.

AI's Future Is Being Decided Without You — Here's a Plan to Change That

noema

• The economists, researchers, and tech leaders sounding alarms about AI consistently call on elites to manage the crisis, treating the public as beneficiaries rather than participants in decisions that will reshape their lives.
• A Yale political theorist proposes a three-tier global deliberation process: first, a rapid AI-mediated consultation through platforms like ChatGPT and Gemini (which already reach billions); then real-time online deliberation among humans; and finally, in-person citizens' assemblies feeding into a global constitutional convention.
• The resulting document wouldn't be legally binding, but could carry moral weight similar to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights — and the author makes direct appeals to Altman, Amodei, and Zuckerberg to use their platforms to make it happen.

In the News

The Supreme Court Said Trump's 'Shithole Countries' Comments Weren't Racial. The Rest of the World Disagrees.

scotusblog

• The Supreme Court's conservative majority ruled that Trump and Noem's comments about Haitians — including references to 'poisoning the blood,' 'leeches,' and 'shithole countries' — were not overtly racial, allowing the administration to end Temporary Protected Status for hundreds of thousands of Haitians and Syrians.
• The majority quietly rewrote existing equal-protection doctrine in the process, shifting from asking whether racial animus was 'a motivating factor' in a decision to effectively requiring that no race-neutral justification exist.
• The author argues the ruling is embarrassingly out of step with global norms, pointing to a near-simultaneous international uproar over a Paraguayan senator's comments about Kylian Mbappé — comments that were universally condemned as racist despite being equally susceptible to 'race-neutral' reinterpretation.

Analysis

AI Can Now Map the Patchwork of Small Business Regulations Across Every Level of Government

hoover

• Researchers used large language models to build a first-of-its-kind database of small business regulatory exemptions across 48 states, federal law, and over 3,000 municipalities — work that would have been impossibly labor-intensive without AI.
• The data confirms that industries with more small business exemptions show greater economic dynamism, with more new businesses and jobs being created.
• Local regulations turn out to be a wild card: municipal definitions of 'small business' vary far more widely than state or federal ones, creating a fragmented landscape that's hard for businesses to navigate.

Also Worth a Look

• AI Companions May Make Lonely People Even Lonelier, Stanford Study Finds (stanford_hai)
• Russia and Iran Are Running a Two-War Military Partnership — and It's Getting Deeper (atlantic_council)
• Automation does not lower the labour share (voxeu)
• AI-generated junk science is polluting the research record — and the problem will only compound itself (issues)
• Green Procurement Rules Are Good for the Climate — and Great for Big Cement Companies (promarket)
• Iraq's New Prime Minister Wants to Disarm the Militias, But Iran's Shadow Makes It Nearly Impossible (atlantic_council)
• Investors Could Profit from Saving Bats — and the Math Actually Works Out (yale_som)