Prof. Jonathan Gruber writes for WBUR about health care reform in Massachusetts. Gruber notes that reforms, "raised insurance coverage, improved health and financial security, improved the efficiency of health care, lowered premiums in the non-employer market, and had no meaningful impact on employer-provided insurance coverage or premiums.”
Grad student Michael Stepner speaks with Peter O’Dowd of Here & Now about his research examining how the life expectancy gap between the rich and poor has grown. Stepner explains the research suggests an opportunity for local “policies to address these gaps and improve life expectancies for low-income Americans.”
Emily Badger and Christopher Ingraham write for The Washington Post about a study by MIT researchers that examines how poverty impacts life expectancies across the country. “What's especially striking is that the poor live even shorter lives in some places than others. They have longer life expectancies in affluent, cities with highly educated populations,” they explain.
A new study co-authored by MIT researchers finds that people who live in expensive, well-educated cities tend to live longer, reports Jim Zarroli for NPR. Zarroli explains that “the study suggests that the relationship between life expectancy and income is not iron-clad, and changes at the local level can make a big difference.”
Bloomberg News reporter John Tozzi writes about a new study co-authored by MIT researchers that finds a growing disparity between the life expectancies of rich and poor Americans. The researchers found that, “top earning Americans gained 2 to 3 years of life expectancy between 2001 and 2014, while those at the bottom gained little or nothing.”
In an article for Reuters, James Saft writes that MIT researchers have found that analyzing Twitter sentiment can provide useful information for investors. “We exploit a new dataset of tweets referencing the Federal Reserve and show that the content of tweets can be used to predict future returns,” Prof. Andrew Lo and grad student Pablo Azar explain.
Scott Malone of Reuters writes that Prof. Lester Thurow, a former dean of MIT Sloan, has died at age 77. Malone writes that Thurow’s, “policy recommendations focused on promoting education and long-term investment in companies and economies.”
Former Sloan School of Management Dean Lester Thurow has died at age 77, the Associated Press reports. “Thurow became a leading public voice in examining the defining features of globalization, including the competitiveness of national economies at a time of industrial change, and worker welfare.”
Prof. Emeritus Lester Thurow, a former dean of MIT Sloan who was known for his research on income inequality, died on March 25, reports Bryan Marquard for The Boston Globe. Marquard notes that Thurow “addressed topics that resonate as loudly in today’s political debates as they did when he was a professor and dean.”
New York Times reporter John Koblin highlights the work of Prof. Lester Thurow, a former dean of MIT Sloan and a prominent economist, who died on March 25. “He was one of the first important economists to suggest that too much inequality is bad for society,” said Jared Bernstein, of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.
New York Times reporter Penelope Green speaks with Prof. Sherry Turkle about a new Facebook tool aimed at making breakups easier. “It’s not to say that Facebook shouldn’t make it easy to click that button to avoid certain painful memories,” she said. “But the reason we’re looking through those old love letters is we’re trying to work through our past.”
In an article for The Washington Post, Lydia DePillis speaks with Prof. David Autor about how a large part of the labor force has been left out of job market growth in recent years. "Our main labor market challenge is not a lack of high wage jobs; it’s rather the weak or non-existent wage growth in non-college jobs," says Autor.
In an NPR piece about diversity in sci-fi, Jeff Young highlights a study by Prof. Edward Schiappa that found TV viewers became more accepting after watching shows that introduce them to different cultures. "At this point, it's a pretty unequivocal finding that TV can affect how people feel and think about others," says Schiappa.
Postdoc Heather Lee speaks with NPR’s Maria Godoy about how a law that allowed Chinese business owners to travel to China and bring back employees fueled a rise in the number of Chinese restaurants in America. "The number of Chinese restaurants in the U.S. doubles from 1910 to 1920, and doubles again from 1920 to 1930," explains Lee.
Writing for The Boston Globe, Jill Terreri Ramos explores research by MIT political scientists into the political leanings of all 50 states over the past eight decades. “To understand national politics, we can learn about state politics,” explains Prof. Chris Warshaw.