The gap between the wealthiest Americans and the poorest is bigger than at any time since the 1920s — just before the Depression. According to an analysis this year by Edward Wolff of New York University, the top 20% of wealthy individuals own about 85% of the wealth, while the bottom 40% own very near 0%. Many in that bottom 40% not only have no assets, they have negative net wealth.

A gap this pronounced raises the politically divisive question of whether there is a need for wealth redistribution in the United States. This central question underlies such hot-button issues as whether the Bush tax cuts should be allowed to expire and whether the government should provide more assistance to the poor. But before those issues can be addressed, it’s important to understand how Americans feel about the country’s increasing economic polarity.

We recently asked a representative sample of more than 5,000 Americans (young and old, men and women, rich and poor, liberal and conservative) to answer two questions. They first were asked to estimate the current level of wealth inequality in the United States, and then they were asked about what they saw as an ideal level of wealth inequality.

In our survey, Americans drastically underestimated the current gap between the very rich and the poor. The typical respondent believed that the top 20% of Americans owned 60% of the wealth, and the bottom 40% owned 10%. They knew, in other words, that wealth in the United States was not distributed equally, but were unaware of just how unequal that distribution was.

When we asked respondents to tell us what their ideal distribution of wealth was, things got even more interesting: Americans wanted the top 20% to own just over 30% of the wealth, and the bottom 40% to own about 25%. They still wanted the rich to be richer than the poor, but they wanted the disparity to be much less extreme.

But was there consensus among Americans about their ideal country? Importantly, the answer was an unequivocal “yes.” While liberals and the poor favored slightly more equal distributions than conservatives and the wealthy, a large majority of every group we surveyed — from the poorest to the richest, from the most conservative to the most liberal — agreed that the current level of wealth inequality was too high and wanted a more equitable distribution of wealth. In fact, Americans reported wanting to live in a country that looks more like Sweden than the United States.

So, if Americans say they want a country that is more equal than they believe it to be, and they believe that the country is more equal than it actually is, the question becomes how we lessen these disparities. Our survey didn’t ask what measures people would be willing to support to address the wealth gap. But to achieve the ideal spelled out by those surveyed, about 50% of the total wealth in the United States would have to be taken from the top 20% and distributed to the remaining 80%.

Few people would argue for an immediate redistribution of 50% of the nation’s wealth, and such a move would unquestionably create chaos. In addition, despite the fact that individual Americans give large amounts to charitable causes each year — in effect, a way of transferring wealth from the rich to the poor — the notion of government redistribution raises hackles among many constituencies.

Despite these reservations, our results suggest that policies that increase inequality — those that favor the wealthy, say, or that place a greater burden on the poor — are unlikely to reflect the desires of Americans from across the political and economic spectrum. Rather, they seem to favor policies that involve taking from the rich and giving to the poor.

Michael I. Norton is an associate professor of business administration at the Harvard Business School; Dan Ariely is the James B. Duke Professor of Behavioral Economics at Duke University and the author of “The Upside of Irrationality: The Unexpected Benefits of Defying Logic at Work and at Home.”

Coleraine manager Ruaidhri Higgins says “the honeymoon period is over” after his side’s 2-1 loss against Larne at the Coleraine Showgrounds.

Leroy Millar and Sean Graham scored late in the first half to give the away side the lead with Conor McKendry coming close to netting Larne’s third before the half-time whistle.

Despite Matthew Shevlin’s late goal, Coleraine couldn’t create a dramatic late comeback with Higgins labelling the performance from his side as “unacceptable”

This result means that, for the first time this season, Ruaidhri Higgins’ side suffered back-to-back defeats after losing against Cliftonville on Saturday.

“That is what I said in there, the honeymoon period is over,” Higgins told BBC Sport NI.

“We have to step up, all of us, and we will see in the coming days what we are made of really and it is important that we respond in the right manner to a bad four days.

“I demand that we respond in the right manner, get back on the horse and start winning football matches.”

After Higgins was appointed late last season, Coleraine made a bright start to this campaign and were top of the table coming into the match against the Inver Reds.

However, now it is Gary Haveron’s side are top of the table, two points clear of the Bannsiders with a game in hand.

“You can take getting beaten, but the manner of the defeat was unacceptable really,” Higgins added.

“There is collective responsibility there. We are all responsible, I think.

“I think they did a number on us. They came, sat in and countered on us.

“We were weak in certain parts of the game which is extremely disappointing, and it is an unacceptable performance really.”

A special counsel team on Wednesday demanded a 15-year prison term for former Prime Minister Han Duck-soo on charges of abetting former President Yoon Suk Yeol’s imposition of martial law.

Special counsel Cho Eun-suk’s team made the request during the final hearing of Han’s trial at the Seoul Central District Court, making him the first of dozens of defendants in the martial law case to receive a sentencing recommendation.

“Though the defendant was, in fact, the only person who could have stopped the insurrection situation of this case, he abandoned his duty as a servant of the entire nation and took part in the insurrection crime through a series of acts before and after the declaration of martial law,” a member of the special counsel team said.

Han has been indicted on charges of abetting the ringleader of an insurrection, playing a key role in an insurrection and perjury, all in connection with the martial law imposition.

In addition to attending a Cabinet meeting shortly before Yoon declared martial law on Dec. 3, he allegedly revised the proclamation afterward to enhance its legitimacy, discarded it and lied under oath at the Constitutional Court.

The special counsel team asked the court to consider the immense damage to the nation and the people and his uncooperative attitude in the investigation process.

“This case was an act of terror on the democracy of the Republic of Korea, and the nation and the people as a whole were the victims,” the team member said.

“By strictly punishing the defendant, we must ensure this unfortunate history of the Republic of Korea does not repeat itself,” he added.

Han is expected to be the first to receive a verdict in the martial law case as the court previously stated plans to deliver its ruling on Jan. 21 or 28 next year.

Copyright (c) Yonhap News Agency prohibits its content from being redistributed or reprinted without consent, and forbids the content from being learned and used by artificial intelligence systems.

The Navy is ending its commitment to build the troubled Constellation class frigates, service secretary John Phelan announced today on social media. The move is the first of what Phelan said will be several changes designed to speed up Navy ship production.

“From day one, I made it clear: I won’t spend a dollar if it doesn’t strengthen readiness or our ability to win,” Phelan explained. “To keep that promise, we’re reshaping how we build and field the Fleet—working with industry to deliver warfighting advantage, beginning with a strategic shift away from the Constellation class frigate program.”

“The Navy and our industry partners have reached a comprehensive framework that terminates for the Navy’s convenience the last four ships of the class, which have not begun construction,” Phelan said in a video he posted on X. “We greatly value the shipbuilders of Wisconsin and Michigan. While work continues on the first two ships, those ships remain under review as we work through this strategic shift.”

The Navy first announced in 2020 that it had picked Marinette Marine in Wisconsin, a wholly owned subsidiary of Italy’s Fincantieri, to build the Constellation class, which was to be based on an off-the-shelf design. Construction of the USS Constellation began in August 2022. The Navy currently has a total of six of the ships on order, out of what was expected to be an initial tranche of at least 10 of the frigates. The first example was slated to be delivered in 2029, however, Phelan’s decision means the last four ships in this class will no longer be built.

As we have noted in the past: “Major changes to the Constellation‘s configuration compared to its parent Franco-Italian Fregata Europea Multi-Missione (FREMM) have already led to serious delays and cost increases, and there are growing questions about the program’s future. A key program goal had been to take an in-service design that would only need relatively minor modifications to make it ready for Navy use, which would help keep the work on schedule and budget. The opposite has now happened.”

The design changes have also contributed to major delays and cost growth. The original plan was for USS Constellation to be delivered in 2026. The Navy had also been aiming for a unit cost of $1 billion, or potentially even less, as production of the frigates ramped up. More recent estimates have put the price tag for each of the ships at around $1.4 billion.

In an exclusive interview with The War Zone in April from the sidelines of the Sea Air Space conference in Maryland, Mark Vandroff, senior vice president of Government Affairs at Fincantieri Marine Group, confirmed that little progress had been made on the first frigate of the class.

“First ship is under construction up in Marinette, roughly 10 percent done,” Vandroff said at the time. We’re “working to finalize the design with the Navy. That has been progressing. We’ve made a lot of progress in the last year, and we expect to have the functional design wrapped up here in late spring, early summer.”

“What I would say is, with the Navy, we’re converging the design,” Vandroff added when asked specifically for an update on changes to the Constellation class design from the parent FREMM. “You know, we’re responsible for producing the functional design. The Navy has to approve the functional design. So, as we go back and forth to get our design to be fully approved by the Navy, we’re converging on that final design.”

A big part of the problems with the Constellation class were the constant design changes, which prompted concerns about expected performance.

As far as what comes next, Phelan didn’t offer any specific examples.

“Shipbuilding is a foremost concern,” he posited. “The Navy needs ships, and we look forward to building them in every shipyard that we can. A key factor in this decision is the need to grow the fleet faster to meet tomorrow’s threats.”

“This framework,” he continued, “puts the Navy on a path to more rapidly construct new classes of ships and deliver the capability our war fighters need in greater numbers and on a more urgent timeline. This is an imperative, and I hope to have more to share very soon.”

We’ve reached out to the Navy for more details. 

Update: 5:03 PM Eastern –

A senior Navy official offered some additional context about what might come next.

“The Navy will work with Congress in the coming weeks to seek the reappropriation of a portion of the unspent frigate funds on more readily producible ships in Marinette,” an official confirmed to us. “We do hope to retain the unspent frigate funds, as I mentioned, and have them reallocated to other ships that can be built in Marinette and delivered to the fleet faster.”

Update: 5:16 PM Eastern –

Fincantieri provided the following statement on the program cancellation.

“As part of a general fleet review launched by the U.S. Navy, aimed at transitioning towards a future model focused on technological excellence, manned and unmanned vessels, and long-term sustainability, Fincantieri and the U.S. Navy have reached a significant agreement that provides for reshaping the future of the Constellation class Program, currently under construction at Fincantieri Marinette Marine (FMM), in Wisconsin. In this framework, Fincantieri is consolidating its strategic partnership with the Navy, confirming its role as a key player in defining the future of American maritime defense through advanced industrial capabilities and long-term investments.

Working closely with the U.S. Navy, the Group will help deliver new classes of vessels. Fincantieri is expected to receive new orders to deliver classes of vessels in segments that best serve the immediate interests of the nation and the renaissance of U.S. shipbuilding, such as amphibious, icebreaking and other special missions. Fincantieri is in fact ready to execute the contracts planned in coordination with the U.S. Navy. Entering the future and in alignment with the Group’s industrial capabilities and potential, Fincantieri will support the U.S. Navy as it redefines strategic choices in the Small Surface Combatants segment, manned or unmanned.  

Considering the above, the agreement encompasses the continuity of work for two Constellation class frigates currently under construction and provides for the discontinuity of the contract for the four other Constellation class frigates already under contract, reflecting the evolving strategic priorities of the U.S. Navy. On top of the aforementioned award of future orders, in order to cover the above, the agreement indemnifies Fincantieri Marine Group on existing economic commitments and industrial impacts through measures provided by the U.S. Navy, and as a result of the contractual decision made for its own convenience. 

This new arrangement guarantees continuity and workload visibility for Fincantieri’s personnel and the Wisconsin System of Yards – a vital pillar of the U.S. maritime industrial base – capitalizing on the investments and expertise developed to date. Over the past years, Fincantieri has invested more than $800 million in its four U.S. shipyards, including Marinette, Green Bay, Sturgeon Bay, and Jacksonville with the aim of ensuring maximum production efficiency, flexibility, and technological innovation. These investments have enabled the consolidation of an advanced industrial supply chain, capable of meeting the U.S. Navy’s new priorities, including rapid delivery, modularity, and scalability of naval platforms.

Fincantieri Marine Group currently employs approximately 3,750 highly skilled workers in the United States, having recently increased its workforce by 850 workers to meet demand and strengthen its industrial base. This significant expansion underscores the Group’s commitment to supporting the local economy and the broader national maritime supply chain.”

In addition, George Moutafis, CEO of Fincantieri Marine Group, also weighed in.

“The agreement reached with the U.S. Navy marks a new chapter in our strategic partnership, built on mutual trust, a shared vision and commitment to excellence. The path forward defined on the Constellation class program provides for the necessary stability for our teams and the entire Wisconsin System of Yards, allowing us to continue investing in innovation and skills. As the Navy transitions to new vessel types, we stand ready to support their evolving needs, leveraging the strength of our American facilities and the expertise we have fostered. Our investments in the U.S. shipyards are a testament to our long-term vision: to be a cornerstone of the U.S. maritime industrial base and a driving force to sustain the momentum of the national shipbuilding renaissance, the American shipbuilding renaissance.

In the future development model, Fincantieri positions itself as one of the reference shipyards for the U.S. Navy, confirming its strategic role in supporting the Navy’s evolving needs. The Group is looking forward to working with all stakeholders in the supply chain on the execution of the new redefined path forward, further developing the skills and expertise cultivated in its American facilities and supporting the sustainable growth of the sector.”

This is a developing story.

Contact the author: [email protected] 

Liberty X singer Michelle Heaton had a kitchen disaster during the latest episode of Celebrity MasterChef.

Michelle Heaton admitted she was “absolutely gutted” after completely burning her dish on Celebrity MasterChef.

The Liberty X star is amongst the celebrities battling it out on the latest series of the BBC show, alongside Love Island’s Chris Hughes, writer Dawn O’Porter, soul icon Jaki Graham and actor Jamie Lomas.

She was creating a halloumi burger with sweet chilli jam and sweet potato fries when disaster struck. The singer left her sweet potatoes in the oven too long and discovered they had burnt to a crisp when she checked on them.

She let out a gasp as she retrieved the charred chips, before burying her face in her hands, reports Wales Online.

“Oh, no!” she cried out. “I actually can’t believe it. Burned my sweet potato fries.”

Dawn had been granted an additional 10 minutes cooking time after triumphing in an earlier taste challenge, and witnessing Michelle’s mishap, she offered to share it with her.

“Can I gift it?” she asked. But judge Grace Dent informed her: “I am sorry, but you can’t.”

Michelle refused to surrender and swiftly prepared some tiny sweet potato cubes to present instead.

She declared that she would simply have to “hope for the best” during judging, confessing: “I am absolutely gutted.”

“You had a bit of a disaster,” judge John Torode observed as she presented her creation.

“I had a massive one,” she acknowledged, though he reassured her: “You picked yourself up and you went and sorted it out. That’s what MasterChef is all about, Michelle. Good on you.”

The singer received some positive feedback for her dish in the end, with John commenting that the halloumi was “cooked really nicely”. However, he felt her brioche bun was “on the edge of too sweet”.

Reflecting on her performance, Michelle said she had been feeling tearful after the mistake.

But she went on: “I am feeling OK considering I had a massive disaster.

“I was about to cry, but I didn’t, because I usually do. And I just ploughed on. And I’m really, really happy that I did, because I learned something about myself.”

Celebrity MasterChef airs on BBC One.

SACRAMENTO — “This is one of the most obscure issues the California voter has ever been asked to decide.”

That was how Fred Main, vice president and general counsel for the California Chamber of Commerce, described Proposition 162 on the Nov. 3 ballot, a measure that would give governing boards of public employees retirement systems more authority and independence.

Obscure though the initiative may be, supporters say it is needed to protect the $70-billion Public Employees Retirement System (PERS) fund and other public employee pension funds from political “raids.”

They cite the deal that allowed Gov. Pete Wilson and the Legislature to use $1.9 billion in supplemental pension funds to balance the 1991-92 state budget and also to Wilson’s attempt last year to place more gubernatorial appointees on the PERS governing board.

However, opponents argue that the measure does little to prevent raids but instead makes pension fund governing boards more autonomous and less accountable to the Legislature and other elected bodies.

Proposition 162 would change the state Constitution to:

* Give the governing board of a public employee pension fund “sole and exclusive authority” over investment decisions and management of the system.

* Require governing boards to place more emphasis on providing benefits to the system’s participants and less on the costs to taxpayers. The state, using taxpayer funds, makes an annual contribution to PERS.

* Allow the PERS board to hire its own actuaries–experts who calculate the contributions needed to keep the fund sound–instead of using those named by the governor, as state law requires.

* Maintain the present composition of PERS and other public pension fund governing boards.

The measure is supported by the California State Employees Assn., the state School Employees Assn. and other public employee unions. It is opposed by the California Taxpayers Assn., the state Chamber of Commerce and the League of California Cities.

Backers of the initiative raised $1.6 million by Sept. 30, Common Cause reported, while there is no organized financial effort in opposition.

Although there are more than 100 public employee pension systems in the state, most attention is focused on PERS because of last year’s budget maneuvering.

Jeff Raimundo, communications director for Californians for Pension Protection, said giving governing boards sole authority to manage the funds would “keep it away from the Legislature, keep their hands out of the cookie jar.”

Raimundo acknowledged that future governors, Legislatures and PERS governing boards still could reach agreements similar to last year’s $1.9-billion deal but said the Legislature “won’t be able to grab these funds unilaterally. They’ll have to negotiate with the governing board whether this use of the money is in the best interests of the trust fund.”

Ron Roach of the California Taxpayers Assn. said the change would “create a lack of accountability and give public employee pension boards–which often are dominated by public employee unions–control over the amount of taxpayer contributions, which are in fact taxpayer dollars.”

Wilma Krebs, a retired economics professor and a supporter of the initiative, said restoring the PERS board’s right to name its actuaries was important because “if the governor makes the appointment, we feel that spells political control.”

The actuaries study the pension system’s assets and liabilities each year and determine what the state contribution to the fund should be.

Wilson was given the authority, subject to approval by the Legislature, to name the PERS actuaries in legislation passed last year. Wilson’s nominees were approved by the Senate but rejected by the Assembly, and the pension system has continued to use its own actuaries.

“Over time, there could be a big cost to taxpayers” if PERS names the actuaries, Roach said. “The fund is so large that a change in the estimate (of state contributions) by one-half of 1% could mean hundreds of millions of dollars.”

SAN FRANCISCO — Maybe it’s time to worry.

Some uneven play from UCLA over the season’s first few weeks could be shrugged off as a team filled with new players finding its footing.

But there was no reasonable explanation for what happened Tuesday night.

Playing a former Pac-12 rival in a matchup that should have stirred some intensity, the Bruins instead looked like they had little interest in being here.

Passion wasn’t a problem for California. The Golden Bears were the tougher and more determined team in handing the No. 18 Bruins an 80-72 loss in the Empire Classic at Chase Center.

Things bottomed out with about two minutes to go when UCLA point guard Donovan Dent went down with an apparent lower leg injury and limped off the court.

The Bruins’ comeback hopes formally ended when Cal’s Dai Dai Ames unleashed a crossover move that he followed with a three-pointer to give the Golden Bears an eight-point lead with 1:24 remaining.

Most concerning for UCLA were the continued struggles of Dent. The transfer from New Mexico who arrived with great fanfare has hardly looked like a top-level player through the season’s first month.

His showing Tuesday represented a new low. He never looked comfortable on the court while making just one of eight shots on the way to three points and committing nearly as many turnovers (six) as assists (seven). His season-long shooting woes are particularly acute at the three-point line (10%) and free-throw line (56.7%).

UCLA’s Trent Perry scored 19 points and Eric Dailey Jr. had 17, but it wasn’t nearly enough as the Bruins (5-2) allowed the Golden Bears (6-1) to make 11 of 22 three-pointers (50%).

Big trouble loomed for the Bruins when Chris Bell (22 points) rose for a corner three-pointer that gave Cal a 65-53 lead with 9:29 left, prompting UCLA coach Mick Cronin to go to his only reliable tool, a timeout.

His team rallied, pulling within 71-67 with a little less than five minutes to play on a corner three-pointer from Jamar Brown. UCLA center Xavier Booker then got the large contingent of Bruins fans roaring with a ferocious block. That was as good as it got for the Bruins.

UCLA forward Tyler Bilodeau, the team’s leading scorer, missed his second consecutive game with a knee sprain that could keep him out another week or so. But he appeared to be moving well while getting in some pregame dribbling work with assistant coach David Singleton.

An entertaining, if not crisply played, first half ended with UCLA holding a 41-36 lead. With Dent’s funk deepening with a one-point effort in which he missed all three shots, Perry stepped up with 12 points off the bench to lead the Bruins.

Aggressively attacking the basket, Perry rewarded fans who had unleashed a loud “U-C-L-A!” chant with an old-fashioned three-point play on a driving layup in which he was fouled. The Bruins went with a four-guard lineup for a stretch late in the first half that seemed to stabilize things after Dailey struggled with his shot selection and forward Brandon Williams picked up two fouls.

Dent, the guard that UCLA needs most, still has not showed up this season in the fashion expected. Now there’s an injury to add to the list of worries.

Nov. 25 (UPI) — A coalition of 19 attorneys general and two state governors sued the Trump administration on Tuesday over changes to funding allocations and conditions at the Department of Housing and Urban Development that they say threaten thousands of formerly homeless people and families with eviction.

The lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court for Rhode Island, alleges new restrictions and funding cuts announced by HUD earlier this month to its Continuum of Care program threaten housing stability and disadvantage services for people experiencing homelessness, including those with mental disabilities and substance use disorders.

The Democratic-led states allege that the changes have thrown CoC into “chaos” and that HUD was holding congressionally approved funds and vulnerable people hostage.

“Communities across the country depend on Continuum of Care funds to provide housing and other resources to our most vulnerable neighbors,” New York Attorney General Letitia James said in a statement.

“These funds help keep tens of thousands of people from sleeping on the streets every night. I will not allow this administration to cut off these funds and put vital housing and support services at risk.”

Founded by Congress in 1987, the CoC program provides states, local governments and nonprofits with funds to provide housing and support services to those experiencing homelessness.

Earlier this month, HUD Secretary Scott Turner criticized the CoC for prioritizing funds for organizations with Housing First policies, which provide housing to individuals without preconditions, such as sobriety or minimum income.

Turner said the policy ran counter to the department’s objective of selecting the most effective and innovative programs, and it would be instituting changes, including requiring that 70% of projects to be selected through competition.

In a statement, HUD said 90% of CoC awards went to support projects with “failed” Housing First ideologies, which the department said “encourages dependence on endless government handouts while neglecting to address the root causes of homelessness, including illicit drugs and mental health.”

Changes to be implemented are to increase competition for grants, advance public safety, focus on self-sufficiency, encourage personal accountability and crack down on gender ideology, use of taxpayer dollars on undocumented migrants and diversity, equity and inclusion policies.

“Our philosophy for addressing the homelessness crisis will now define success not by dollars spent or housing units filled, but by how many people achieve long-term self-sufficiency and recovery,” Turner said.

In their lawsuit, the states allege that the changes mean only 30% of CoC funds may be used for permanent housing, a drop from roughly 90%.

HUD has also revised the scoring system used to grant awards. According to the lawsuit, the previous system encouraged CoCs to address needs of minority groups, such as the LGBTQ+ community, and the new changes arbitrarily disadvantage programs that provide supportive services for mental disabilities and substance use disorder

The policies also bar funding for applicants that acknowledge the existence of transgender and gender-diverse people and penalize homeless-service providers that pursue approaches to homelessness that do not align with the Trump administration.

In total, the changes will threaten housing stability and disadvantage services for people with mental disabilities and substance use disorder, the lawsuit states.

“This program has proven to be effective at getting Americans off the streets, yet the Trump administration is now attempting to illegally slash its funding,” California Attorney General Rob Bonta said in a statement. “Those caring for our unhoused neighbors need the federal government’s continued support. Absent judicial intervention, the Trump administration’s actions would only worsen the homelessness crisis.”

Taiwan has unveiled a T$1.25 trillion (US$39.9 billion) supplementary defence budget, marking one of its most significant military spending increases in recent years. The announcement comes after a sustained period of Chinese military pressure, including near-daily incursions into Taiwan’s air defence identification zone and expanding naval activities. Beijing continues to assert that Taiwan is its territory, while Taipei rejects these claims and argues that China’s actions threaten regional stability. President Lai Ching-te, who has previously signaled a desire to strengthen Taiwan’s defences, aims to increase military expenditure to 5% of GDP by 2030 a major shift for an island long reliant on the United States for support. The new spending plan reflects Taipei’s conclusion that the security environment has deteriorated to a point requiring a rapid buildup of deterrence capabilities.

WHY IT MATTERS

This defence package is significant because it signals that Taiwan is preparing for a prolonged period of heightened tension with China. By raising spending above 3% of GDP for the first time since 2009, Taiwan is accelerating efforts to modernize its armed forces and expand asymmetric capabilities a key strategy for countering a much larger Chinese military. The move also has implications for broader Indo-Pacific security, as Taiwan sits at the center of major global supply chains, especially semiconductors. Any conflict involving the island would have worldwide economic repercussions. Additionally, the announcement tests the United States’ commitment under its legal obligation to help Taiwan defend itself, particularly as the Trump administration has so far approved only a limited number of arms sales this year. The overall decision underscores the growing sense in Taipei that deterrence, rather than diplomacy alone, is essential for survival.

A range of actors will be directly affected by Taiwan’s expanded defence spending. For Taiwan itself, the budget reflects both political determination and public concern, as leaders balance the urgency of national security with domestic expectations about economic priorities. China stands on the opposite end of the debate, condemning the move as wasteful, provocative, and orchestrated by foreign powers, and warning that it will only destabilize cross-strait relations. The United States remains a pivotal player, as Taiwan’s primary security partner and arms supplier, and its actions in the coming months will shape Beijing’s and Taipei’s strategy alike. Regional governments such as Japan, South Korea, and Southeast Asian nations are also stakeholders, because escalation in the Taiwan Strait would directly affect their own security and trade routes. Beyond governments, the global technology sector especially companies dependent on Taiwan’s semiconductor production is intricately tied to the island’s stability and therefore to its defence posture.

WHAT’S NEXT

The supplementary defence budget will now move to Taiwan’s legislature, where it is expected to pass given the governing party’s support for military strengthening. Once approved, the government is likely to detail specific procurement plans, which may include new air-defence systems, long-range missiles, drone platforms, and naval upgrades aimed at deterring a potential blockade or invasion. Attention will also focus on Washington, where upcoming decisions on arms transfers will indicate the level of U.S. engagement in Taiwan’s defence strategy. China is expected to respond with a combination of military signaling such as increased air and naval patrols and sharper rhetoric accusing Taiwan of escalating tensions. Regionally, allies and partners may adjust military planning and enhance coordination as they assess the implications of Taiwan’s defence buildup for broader Indo-Pacific stability. Over the next several months, the situation is likely to remain fluid as each stakeholder reacts to the shifting balance of power across the Taiwan Strait.

With information from Reuters.

JESSIE J has taken a leaf out of Jennifer Lopez’s book and taken aim at her Hollywood ex on her new music.

Earlier this year, J-Lo slammed Ben Affleck on track Wreckage of You after her marriage to the actor broke down.

Now Jessie has let rip at Channing Tatum, who she dated from 2018 to 2020, on her album Don’t Tease Me With A Good Time, which is out on Friday.

On the not-so-subtle track Threw It Away, Jessie brands a former flame a “beast”.

She sings: “I put my heart out on the table, that’s when it got uncomfortable. But oh that karma is gonna come one day, ’cause I gave you my love and you threw it away.”

She later adds: “Don’t you dare rewrite the story. I’m the beauty, you’re the beast.”

WHO SHE IS

Inside Jessie J’s journey back to health after cancer battle before Kate hug

CANCER FIGHT

Princess Kate & Jessie J hug as they bond over brave cancer battles

‘I’m better person’

Taking to the stage at an exclusive listening party for the album in West London, Jessie did not mention the Magic Mike star by name.

But she left little doubt among fans who the track is about.

She said: “This next song I wrote in 2020 with Ryan Tedder, and you can figure out who I was dating.”

After taking time out over the summer to undergo treatment for breast cancer, Jessie is working at full pace.

Opening up about her health battle, Jessie said: “I’m grateful for the lessons and grateful for the connectivity it’s given me with so many people having cancer.

“And I’ve been a better parent, I’ve been a better person.”

It’s been a while since I’ve struggled into damp neoprene of a morning. It’s the second day of a wintry weekend in Croyde, north-west Devon; I’m stiff from an hour in the sea the previous afternoon, and the upper part of the super-thick wetsuit won’t budge past my elbows. Together, my husband, Mark, and I jiggle and pull and yank it over my limbs. Finally, five minutes later, I am in a silver-blue sea, entirely empty, save for us. White-crested waves roll in, broiling and foaming, rocketing us forward towards the empty swathe of sand. For once there are no other boarders to dodge, no surfers whisking past: it’s exhilarating, extraordinary and … really rather cold.

Croyde has long been a family favourite, but visiting in November does feel a bit of a gamble. It has a reputation as something of a ghost town in the off-season, with a large number of second homes and rentals that stay dark from October to April. But when an unexpected email landed from Endless Summer Beach House offering a 20% discount on winter stays, it seemed the ideal 30th birthday treat for my nephew, Ben. So, together with his girlfriend, Tasha, best mate, Rob, and my sister Caroline, we decided to take the plunge and find out what off-season Croyde is actually like.

When Mark and I arrive, the sky is unexpectedly blue, and we pull on our wetsuits and head straight for the sea. One of the joys of Croyde is that it doesn’t really change: the dunes that separate the beach from the village are strictly protected, saving both from the development that has scarred nearby resorts such as Westward Ho! and Woolacombe. Instead, the fields that flank the dunes are alive with rabbits grazing quietly, scampering away in white-tailed flashes as we pass.

At first, it feels strange to find the beach so deserted, but seeing it free of windbreaks, ballgames and pop-up tents renders its raw, natural beauty even more dramatic. It’s no wonder the place gets overrun in the summer months, when the sea froths with hundreds of bodyboarders and surfers, red and yellow lifeguard flags billowing in the breeze. Today there is nothing but sky and sea: a jagged patch of blue above the long curve of Hartland Point, a curtain of misty rain slowly dissipating Lundy island into the flint-grey wash of the ocean.

Later, when I nip into the village to pick up some bread, the narrow main street is almost as deserted as the beach. The Saltrock surfwear shop is open, as is The Hub, beloved by Ben for its lemon crunch ice-cream (and all of us for the pasties). The Post Office shows distinct signs of life, as does The Thatch pub, but otherwise most places are closed until spring. As I stroll back, I think about how it takes 15 minutes to queue for an ice-cream in summer, with the Post Office out of anything fresh by about 9.30am.

Not everything is shrouded in silence. When we head to The Thatch for dinner on Friday night, the place is packed and buzzy (I had feared it might just be us), although I suspect almost everyone else is local. As ever, the food is fantastic: crisp salt and pepper squid and a Balinese seafood curry, tangy with lemongrass and galangal, served with a heap of coconut sambal that adds up to the best dish I’ve eaten out all year. The boys find room for banoffee pie and apple tart.

There are plenty of other signs of life, too. On Saturday, we head to Braunton (15 minutes’ drive) for the annual firework display, heading down pretty lanes we didn’t even know existed – we never usually get much further than the car park and the Co-op. It’s lovely to get a sense of the place as it really is, with all the flummery and frenetic pace of summer stripped away. On the walk to the beach, the few people we pass are smiley and friendly – a shared delight at having Croyde’s gorgeous dunes and coastline pretty much to ourselves.

Coming away out of season has other benefits too: we don’t expect good weather, so a sunny Saturday is an absolute boon. When it rains all day Sunday, we pull on wet weather gear and stride out around Baggy Point, where the sea – now a palette of steel, platinum and foaming white – is just as spectacular as under blue skies. Once it’s dark, we play board-games, watch old films, eat hearty curries and bolognese – with no squabbling over why the barbecue won’t light and whether the sausages are cooked through.

The problem with tagging places such as Croyde as “ghost towns” in the off-season is that it deters people from visiting – the very thing our seaside resorts need most. The village was quiet, but far from dead – and, frankly, if you go with a group, you make your own atmosphere anyway. By the time we were packing the cars on Monday lunchtime (another off-season bonus is that accommodation owners are often more flexible about arrival and departure times), we were already talking about booking a return visit next November. Some might call Croyde a ghost town, but it had all the spirit we needed for an early winter break.

Endless Summer Beach House, sleeps 10, from £920 for a three-night break. For a 15% discount on four-night stays or longer, until March 2026, use the code EndlessSummer15

Stocks around the world whipped higher Wednesday, riding a wave of optimism on encouraging data about a possible treatment for COVID-19.

The upswell of hope was so strong that investors completely sidestepped a report showing the coronavirus outbreak drove the U.S. economy to its worst quarterly performance since the Great Recession. The Standard & Poor’s 500 index jumped 2.7%, extending a rally that has brought the U.S. stock market to the brink of its best month in 45 years.

The spark for Wednesday’s rally was a report that an experimental drug proved effective against the coronavirus in a study run by the National Institutes of Health. The nation’s top infectious diseases expert said the drug reduced the time it takes patients to recover, raising hopes that life around the world may eventually tiptoe back toward the way it was before the pandemic.

The S&P 500 index rose 76.12 points to 2,939.51. It has surged 13.7% in April, and it’s a day away from closing out its best month since late 1974.

The Dow Jones industrial average rose 532.31 points, or 2.2%, to 24,633.86. The Nasdaq climbed 306.98 points, or 3.6%, to 8,914.71.

What’s happening now is a “debate between optimism and realism,” said Adam Taback, chief investment officer for Wells Fargo Private Wealth Management.

The Federal Reserve said Wednesday that it expects the health crisis to weigh on the economy “over the medium term,” as it promised to keep in place massive amounts of aid and interest rates at nearly zero. Oil prices, bonds and other markets besides stocks have also been dominated in recent weeks by worries about the economic effects of the virus outbreak.

“Everything except equities is telling you things are not great,” Taback said. “This market is overly optimistic.”

Gilead Sciences’ release about its drug remdesivir hit markets at the same moment as a government report showing that the U.S. economy shrank at a 4.8% annual rate in the first three months of the year.

Job losses have exploded since early April, as layoffs sweep the nation following widespread stay-at-home orders, and economists expect to see even worse numbers for the second quarter of the year.

The first-quarter figure was “merely the tip of the iceberg,” said Michael Reynolds, investment strategy officer at Glenmede.

But stocks have been rallying over the last month as investors look beyond the current economic devastation and focus instead on the prospect of economies gradually reopening. Some U.S. states, as well as some nations around the world, have laid out plans to relax restrictions keeping people at home and businesses bereft of customers. Any new treatment for COVID-19 could also lower the dread so prevalent among households and businesses around the world.

But what got the 31.4% rally for the S&P 500 started in late March was massive aid from the Federal Reserve and Congress. The Fed said Wednesday that it wouldn’t pull back on the aid anytime soon.

The market’s easing pessimism about the economy’s path is perhaps most clear in how the smallest stocks have been performing.

When recession worries were at their height, investors punished small-cap stocks and sent them to sharper declines than the rest of the market, in part on worries about their more limited financial resources. But the Russell 2000 index of small-cap stocks jumped 4.8% on Wednesday. It’s up 10.4% this week alone, more than twice as much as indexes of bigger stocks.

The market’s gains were widespread and accelerated through the day. Big tech and communications stocks helped lead the way after Alphabet, Google’s parent company, said its revenue was stronger in the first three months of the year than Wall Street expected.

Alphabet shares jumped nearly 9%. That helped communications stocks in the S&P 500 rise 5%, one of the biggest gains among the 11 sectors that make up the index.

Gilead Sciences shares climbed 5.7%.

In Europe, the French CAC 40 rose 2.2% after being down before the Gilead report. The German DAX returned 2.9%, and the FTSE 100 in London added 2.6%. In Asia, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng added 0.3%, and the Kospi in Seoul advanced 0.7%.

Many professional investors are skeptical of the U.S. stock market’s big rally. There’s still a lot of uncertainty about how long the recession will last.

Stocks’ vigorous rise over the last month also implies investors see a relatively quick rebound for the economy and profits after the current devastation. But it may take awhile for households and businesses to get back to how things used to be.

“My concern is that the market is starting to get a little bit more focused on the rewards and less focused on the risks right now,” said Sal Bruno, chief investment officer at IndexIQ. “Maybe investors are getting a little too enthusiastic.”

“I don’t think you just flip the switch and everybody goes back to work right away,” he said.

The yield on the 10-year U.S. Treasury rose to 0.62% from 0.61%. Yields tend to rise when investors are upgrading expectations for the economy and inflation.

Oil prices are continuing their extreme swings after a collapse in demand has sent crude storage tanks close to their limits. Benchmark U.S. crude oil for June delivery jumped $2.72, or 22%, to $15.06 a barrel Wednesday. Brent crude, the international standard, climbed $2.08, or 10.2%, to $22.54 a barrel.

A problem with luggage in Germany meant the plane carrying the Leverkusen team had to return to the departure gate on Monday afternoon, delaying their arrival in Manchester.

A day later, City’s glut of alterations on matchday left one senior member of Bayer Leverkusen’s staff – in his own words – “shocked”, telling BBC Sport they had made due preparations for the contest but were not expecting that particular line-up.

Another staff member pointed to key players such as defender Edmond Tapsoba, former Real Madrid man Lucas Vazquez and Argentine duo Exequiel Palacios and Equi Fernandez being unavailable as a sign that they may struggle in the game, with six players from the under-19 side named on the bench.

Star man and goal machine Erling Haaland, Phil Foden and Rayan Cherki were all substitutes for City in the opening period and when later called upon they were ultimately unable to perform a rescue act in the second half.

Omar Marmoush failed to take his chance up front and attempted to rouse a home crowd that were often as flat as the team, while Savinho and Oscar Bobb were both on the periphery of the game.

City were slow, ponderous and the changes left them disjointed and this could end up being a damaging defeat in the competition – the loss means they head to European giants Real Madrid on 10 December under pressure to get some sort of result.

“They tried to do it [perform] but when you are in a big team you have to show off,” said Guardiola. “Everyone – [including] the guys who came from the bench – were the same. Every shot was blocked, they slipped 10 times.

“Maybe with the players who played regularly lately, maybe we would have had confidence. I always like to be too nice and involve everyone because I have the feeling after the international break there are games every three or four days hopefully and there is no human being can sustain that.”

Guardiola became just the third manager to take charge of 100 or more Champions League games for an English team after Sir Alex Ferguson and Arsene Wenger, but the landmark occasion was one to forget.

“The message from a lot of people will be, why didn’t you play a stronger team?” asked former City midfielder Michael Brown on BBC Radio 5 Live. “Win the game and then make the changes, that is what people will say.

“There was almost an expectation that it was just going to be routine but what it did do with those changes was give that away side a massive lift. If you’re walking on to the pitch looking across you’d be thinking we’ve got a great chance with all those players sat on the bench. That gave them the belief.

“That said, you still feel like the performance could have been a lot better from City with the players they had.”

Immigration rights advocates says the new policy aims to ‘bully some of the most vulnerable’ people in US society.

The administration of United States President Donald Trump has confirmed that it will retroactively vet refugees who have already been admitted into the country, prompting concern from immigrant rights groups.

“Corrective action is now being taken to ensure those who are present in the United States deserve to be here,” Department of Homeland Security spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement on Tuesday.

The Associated Press and Reuters news agencies had reported on Monday that they obtained a government memorandum ordering a review of more than 230,000 refugees who were legally resettled in the country under former President Joe Biden.

The memo, signed by US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) Director Joseph Edlow, said that refugees who are found to have failed to meet the standards for resettlement would have their legal status revoked.

“Given these concerns, USCIS has determined that a comprehensive review and a re-interview of all refugees admitted from January 20, 2021, to February 20, 2025, is warranted,” the memo stated.

“When appropriate, USCIS will also review and re-interview refugees admitted outside this timeframe.”

In 2024, the US admitted more than 100,000 refugees. The leading countries of origin for refugees were the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Afghanistan, Venezuela and Syria.

Unlike asylum seekers who apply for protections once they arrive in the US, refugees apply for legal status while they are outside of the country.

They are allowed to enter the US with the presumption that they will be longterm residents, safe from persecution in their home countries.

Refugee admission also offers a path to US citizenship, with newcomers able to apply for a legal permanent residency one year after arrival in the country.

Applicants for refugee admission undergo multiple levels of screening and interviews. That process often starts with a third party – usually the United Nations – referring them to the US refugee admissions programme.

Then, US immigration authorities rigorously vet the applicants, who must show they faced persecution for their race, religion, nationality, political beliefs or membership in a particular social group.

Sharif Aly, the president of the International Refugee Assistance Project (IRAP), said refugees are the most highly vetted immigrants in the country.

“This order is one more in a long line of efforts to bully some of the most vulnerable members of our communities, by threatening their lawful status, rendering them vulnerable to the egregious conduct of immigration enforcement agencies, and putting them through an onerous and potentially re-traumatizing process,” Aly said in a statement.

Mark Hetfield, president of the humanitarian organisation HIAS, called the Trump administration’s move “unnecessary, cruel and wasteful”. His group assists new refugees in the US.

“Refugees have already been more vetted than any other group of immigrants,” Hetfield told Reuters.

Trump drastically reduced refugee admission during his first term and all but gutted the programme after his return to the White House in January.

The second Trump administration set a historic low of ​7,500 as the refugee admission cap for next year.

The president also ordered the programme to “primarily” resettle white South Africans, whom he says are facing discrimination by their government.

Overall, Trump has pushed to restrict new arrivals to the US and crack down on noncitizens in the country.

China’s Foreign Ministry said Trump initiated call with Xi Jinping and that communication was crucial for developing stable US-China relations.

Chinese President Xi Jinping has “more or less agreed” to increase purchases of goods from the United States, President Donald Trump said, a day after a phone call between the two leaders was described by Beijing as “positive, friendly and constructive”.

Speaking to reporters on board Air Force One on Tuesday evening, Trump said he asked the Chinese leader during the call to accelerate purchases from the US.

“I think we will be pleasantly surprised by the actions of President Xi,” Trump said.

“I asked him, I’d like you to buy it a little faster. I’d like you to buy more. And he’s more or less agreed to do that,” he said.

Trump’s upbeat forecast on trade with China comes after Beijing announced last month that it would resume purchases of US soya beans and would halt expanded curbs on rare earths exports to the US amid detente in the tariff war with Washington.

US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said that China had pledged to buy 12 million metric tonnes of soya beans from US farmers this year, but the Reuters news agency reports that the pace of Chinese purchases had been less than initially expected.

China has so far ordered nearly two million metric tonnes of US soya beans, according to data by the US Department of Agriculture, Reuters reports.

The call on Monday between Trump and Xi comes just weeks after the two leaders met in South Korea, where they agreed to a framework for a trade deal that has yet to be finalised.

“China and the United States once fought side by side against fascism and militarism, and should now work together to safeguard the outcomes of World War II,” Xi was quoted as telling Trump in the call, China’s official Xinhua news agency reports.

Xi also told Trump that “Taiwan’s return to China is an integral part of the post-war international order”.

China regards Taiwan as part of its territory and has not ruled out the use of force to unite the self-ruled, democratic island with the Chinese mainland.

The US has been traditionally opposed to China’s potential use of force to seize Taiwan and is obligated by a domestic law to provide sufficient military hardware to Taipei to deter any armed attack.

But Trump has maintained strategic ambiguity about whether he would commit US troops in case of a war in the Taiwan Strait, while his administration has urged Taiwan to increase its defence budget.

Trump made no mention of Xi’s comments on Taiwan in a later post on Truth Social, where he spoke of a “very good” call with the Chinese leader, which he said covered many topics, including Ukraine, Fentanyl and US farm products.

“Our relationship with China is extremely strong! This call was a follow up to our highly successful meeting in South Korea, three weeks ago. Since then, there has been significant progress on both sides in keeping our agreements current and accurate,” Trump said.

“Now we can set our sights on the big picture,” he said.

The US leader also said that he had accepted Xi’s invitation to visit Beijing in April, and had invited Xi for a state visit to the US later in the year.

China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said on Tuesday that Washington had initiated the call between Trump and Xi, which spokesperson Mao Ning called “positive, friendly and constructive”.

Mao also said that “communication between the two heads of state on issues of common concern is crucial for the stable development of China-US relations”.

Additional reporting by Bonnie Liao.

Great documentaries are sometimes lucky accidents, the product of being at the right place at the right time and then having the wherewithal to produce something extraordinary out of those unlikely circumstances. When director Julia Loktev traveled to Russia in October 2021, all she wanted was to chronicle a handful of smart, dogged journalists trying to tell the truth who, for their trouble, had been branded foreign agents by Vladimir Putin’s vindictive government. She didn’t know she would be arriving mere months before Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. But thanks to a quirk of coincidence, she ended up having a front-row seat to history.

She made the most of it: Running five-and-a-half hours without a minute wasted, “My Undesirable Friends: Part I — Last Air in Moscow” takes us inside TV Rain, one of Russia’s last independent television channels. Divided into five chapters, the documentary begins as Loktev, who was born in the former Soviet Union before leaving when she was 9, returns to her homeland armed with an iPhone to shadow veteran TV Rain reporter and host Anna Nemzer. Over the next four months, a period that ended shortly after the invasion began, Loktev embedded herself not just with Nemzer (who is credited as the film’s co-director) but several other journalists as they fear being arrested for their reporting.

Loktev hasn’t completed a film since 2011’s “The Loneliest Planet,” which starred Gael García Bernal and Hani Furstenberg as soon-to-be-wed lovers backpacking through the Georgian countryside, their seemingly close bond shattered after a harrowing encounter. In that movie and her previous feature, 2006’s “Day Night Day Night,” a spare procedural about a nameless suicide bomber in New York, Loktev explored the mysteries of human behavior under pressure. But with “My Undesirable Friends,” she takes that fascination to a new level, introducing viewers to a group of compelling subjects, many of them women in their 20s, who open up in front of her camera while hanging out at TV Rain, their apartments or in cafes, candidly processing their country’s terrifying descent into authoritarianism in real time.

These intrepid journalists couldn’t foresee the invasion that was coming, nor the brutal local crackdown on free speech in its wake, but Loktev makes those dire certainties clear from the start, solemnly intoning in voice-over, “The world you’re about to see no longer exists.” Since its premiere at last year’s New York Film Festival, “My Undesirable Friends” has been compared to a horror movie and a political thriller but perhaps more accurately, it’s a disaster film — one in which you know the characters so intimately that, when the awful event finally occurs, you care deeply about the outcome. (“My Undesirable Friends” bears the subtitle “Part I” because Loktev has nearly finished a second installment, which catches up with the women after they fled Russia.)

In its avoidance of interviews with experts or historians, the documentary offers a kind of personal scrapbook of Loktev’s subjects, showing what everyday life is like in an oppressive society: strikingly banal with a constant background hum of paranoia. Each woman comes into empathetic focus. Nemzer, who is a little older than her colleagues, balances her demanding job with marriage and motherhood. Meanwhile, her younger co-worker Ksenia Mironova keeps diligently filing stories despite her fiancé, journalist Ivan Safronov, being imprisoned for more than a year. (He would subsequently be sentenced to 22 years.) Investigative reporter Alesya Marokhovskaya has a girlfriend, whose face we never see, and eventually details grim memories of a violent childhood. And then there’s Marokhovskaya’s best friend and partner Irina Dolinina, who combats anxiety while her politically unconscious mother harangues her about not being able to find a man now that she’s been labeled a foreign agent.

The stress and uncertainty of these conversations is palpable but, remarkably, so is a spiky sense of humor. When a co-worker is temporarily locked up, Mironova cracks jokes outside his prison while awaiting his release. The journalists wear their foreign-agent designation as a badge of honor, mocking the comically lengthy disclaimer text they’re forced to run with their broadcasts, a pitch-black coping mechanism to make sense of their tense, surreal moment.

“My Undesirable Friends” captures dark times with some of the funniest people you’d ever hope to have as sisters-in-arms. Defiant, emotional and life-affirming, the film presents us with endearing patriots who love their country but hate its leaders, sucking us into a riveting tale with a powerful undertow.

The audience anticipates the frightening future that awaits these journalists, which makes their relentless advocacy all the more moving. If our 20s are a period of unbridled optimism — a hopefulness that slowly gets beaten out of us as we grow older — “My Undesirable Friends” stands as a touching display of the resilience of youth. There is nothing naive about these women who came of age during Putin’s cruel regime, but they nonetheless believe they can change things. While Loktev rarely inserts herself into this epic, we feel her admiration from behind the camera. The film inspires while it challenges: What were any of us doing at that age that was comparably heroic or meaningful? What are we doing now?

Those questions should stick in the craw of Americans who watch this masterwork. Loktev has made a movie about Russia but its themes spread far beyond that country’s borders. During a year in which the worst-case scenarios of a second Trump presidency have come to fruition, “My Undesirable Friends” contains plenty of echoes with our national news. The canceling of comedy shows, the baseless imprisonment of innocent people, the rampant transphobia: The Putin playbook is now this country’s day-to-day. Some may wish to avoid Loktev’s film because of those despairing parallels. But that’s only more reason to embrace “My Undesirable Friends.” Loktev didn’t set out to be a witness to history, but what she’s emerged with is an indispensable record and a rallying cry.

Reporting from Sacramento — Two of California’s leading candidates for governor say they’re going to end the housing shortage, a driver of the state’s affordability crisis.

Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom and former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa both have said they want developers in California to build a half million homes in a year — something that’s never happened, at least in modern history. And they want builders to do it for seven straight years, resulting in 3.5 million new homes from the time the next governor takes office through 2025.

Those numbers are so out of scale with California’s history that they might be impossible to achieve. Practical concerns, including developers lining up enough financing and construction workers to build so many homes so quickly, could stymie the effort. Meeting the goals could also require rolling back decades of popular state policies on growth, taxation and the environment, according to housing academics and economists.

Without specific plans to transform how housing gets approved in California, said Christopher Thornberg, founding partner of Los Angeles-based consulting firm Beacon Economics, Newsom and Villaraigosa’s promises are empty.

“You’re just saying it,” Thornberg said of the homebuilding goals. “You don’t really mean it.”

Newsom and Villaraigosa said in separate statements to The Times that setting the 3.5-million home goal ensures they’ll be held accountable to whatever needs to be done to attain it.

Here’s why the two candidates’ goals will be so difficult to achieve and how they say they’re going to do it.

How many houses are we actually talking about?

For decades, not enough homes have been built in California to accommodate a growing population, leading to a spike in housing costs. Since 2011, for instance, the Bay Area has added about 627,000 new jobs but only 138,000 homes, according to the Building Industry Assn. of the Bay Area.

Newsom and Villaraigosa’s homebuilding goals would address that problem, but they’re without precedent.

Only twice since 1954 — the year the state building industry began tracking permits — have developers built more than 300,000 homes in a year. The highest year on record is 1963, when 322,018 home permits were issued.

To reach 500,000 homes in a year, the state would need to replicate its largest production in modern history plus an additional 178,000 homes, a number the state has surpassed just three times in the past 27 years.

Overall, the state’s rate of homebuilding would have to triple the historical average, quadruple last year’s production and reach nearly seven times the pace of building in the last decade.

Where do these numbers come from?

The goal of 3.5 million homes originated in a 2016 report on California’s housing problems by the McKinsey Global Institute, a private think tank.

The report found that California ranked 49^th in the country in housing production per capita and estimated the state would need 3.5 million new units through 2025 to build homes at a per capita rate equivalent to New Jersey and New York.

California could achieve that goal, the report said, through a dramatic increase in development near transit, increasing building on parcels already zoned for apartments and condominiums and adding some units to single-family parcels.

But there’s a crucial difference between the McKinsey report and the pledges from Newsom and Villaraigosa. The McKinsey report sets a goal for California to build 3.5 million homes from 2015 through 2025, an 11-year period. The gubernatorial candidates want to do it in only seven years, a period that would begin when the new governor takes office in 2019.

How do they plan to get there?

Housing affordability has emerged as one of the most prominent issues in the gubernatorial campaign, and all major candidates have pledged to address the problem. State Treasurer John Chiang, also a Democrat, has set a goal of having developers build 1.6 million homes for low-income Californians by 2030 through a mix of state bond funding, tax credits and other subsidies.

Newsom and Villaraigosa, however, are the only ones to have set the 3.5-million home goal.

Newsom’s proposal relies on spending hundreds of millions of dollars more on low-income homes, approving some development through regional governments rather than solely at the local level and financially rewarding cities and counties that approve housing, especially near transit, and punishing those that don’t.

Villaraigosa emphasizes sequestering property tax dollars to finance low-income housing, making loans to homeowners who want to build a second unit on their lots and making unspecified changes to the California Environmental Quality Act, or CEQA, the 1970 law that requires developers to analyze and lessen a project’s effect on the environment.

Neither of them, though, have specified how many homes they expect each part of their housing plans to produce to add up to 3.5 million homes. Instead, they contend that simply setting a bold goal will require them to allocate funding and reduce the red tape needed to meet it.

“A crisis of this magnitude requires ambitious goal setting matched with focused leadership and bold, innovative policy initiatives,” Newsom said in a statement responding to questions from The Times. “It requires an affordable housing ‘moonshot.’”

“Housing has to be delivered at the local level, and building consensus is the only way to get there,” Villaraigosa said in a statement. “It comes down to having the courage and experience to lead on this issue, and I am committed to getting it done.”

What would it actually take?

As governor, Newsom or Villaraigosa would have to reshape how housing gets permitted to make the process faster and more likely to result in approval.

Doing so, experts said, could require taking on three of the most substantial barriers to large-scale housing production, all of which have had long enjoyed broad support

Proposition 13, the 1978 ballot initiative that restricts property tax increases, which gives cities incentives to approve commercial and hotel development instead of housing because those projects generate more local tax revenues. It has also helped protect homeowners from rising taxes.

— The California Environmental Quality Act, which creates a lengthy process for assessing the effects of new housing and leaves projects vulnerable to litigation. Environmental groups also credit the law with preserving the state’s natural beauty.

— Local control over development decisions. Cities and counties determine what is built in their communities, and desirable coastal locales often prefer restrictions on growth. Los Angeles, for instance, had in 1960 zoned enough housing to accommodate 10 million people, a figure that’s since been reduced to a little over 4 million. Residents like to shape how their neighborhoods look.

Michael Lens, an associate professor of urban planning and public policy at UCLA, said the candidates would need to make substantial changes to all three policies, potentially even scrapping them, if they wanted to reach the homebuilding targets.

“You could take away one of those pillars and have a wobblier table of housing resistance,” Lens said. “But [removing] all three would be more useful.”

The housing production goal also could conflict with other promises. Newsom and Villaraigosa support California’s ambitious greenhouse gas reduction targets, which require concentrating homes near jobs and transit so people drive less. That means the state couldn’t count on large, single-family developments, such as suburban projects built during an early 2000s surge in production, to meet the 3.5-million home target.

Even if it were politically possible to supercharge housing production, there are practical problems that the candidates would have less control over. After a long period of growth, Gov. Jerry Brown has warned that the state economy should expect a slowdown in the coming years, which could also decelerate development.

In addition, it takes time for builders to secure land and financing, no matter how quickly a government approves blueprints and permits. Changes implemented on the first day of a Newsom or Villaraigosa administration might take years before they’d lead to ribbon cuttings for new homes.

“Depending on the size of the project, the stuff that starts in 2019 might not even come online until somewhere around 2025,” Lens said.

There have to be enough construction workers to build all those homes, too. California contractors already are having trouble finding labor, and that’s before spending ramps up on more than $5 billion annually in road repairs and transit upgrades coming after the Legislature approved a gas tax hike last year, said Peter Tateishi, CEO of the Associated General Contractors of California.

“We don’t see a path to building 500,000 homes in one year on top of all the other infrastructure projects that are on the docket,” Tateishi said.

[email protected]

Twitter: @dillonliam

ALSO

Gov. Brown just signed 15 housing bills. Here’s how they’re supposed to help the affordability crisis

California won’t meet its climate change goals without a lot more housing density in its cities

California lawmakers have tried for 50 years to fix the state’s housing crisis. Here’s why they’ve failed

Updates on California politics

The Lakers made two announcements Tuesday, saying that center Deandre Ayton was out for the game against the Clippers at Cyrpto.com Arena because of a bruised right knee and that they had signed forward Drew Timme to a two-way contract.

The team also announced that it had waived two-way center Christian Koloko.

Timme had played for the Lakers’ G League team, the South Bay Lakers, and posted averages of 25.5 points, 7.5 rebounds and 4.0 assists in 25.5 minutes during six games.

The 6-10 Timme played his college basketball at Gonzaga.

“I talked to [Lakers president of basketball operations] Rob [Pelinka] and everyone yesterday, last night and they told me,” Timme said after the Lakers’ shootaround Tuesday. “I was just super excited. It’s super cool.”

Jaxson Hayes will start at center in place of Ayton in the NBA Cup game.

Nov. 25 (UPI) — The families of hundreds of U.S. citizens killed or injured by Hamas on Oct. 7, 2023, accuse cryptocurrency exchange Binance of supporting terrorism.

The families of 306 U.S. citizens harmed or killed during the attack filed a 272-page federal lawsuit in the U.S. District Court of North Dakota on Monday.

They say Malta-based Binance marketed its services to “terrorist organizations, narcotics traffickers and tax evaders” by emphasizing that Binance is “beyond the reach of any single country’s laws or regulations,” the lawsuit says, as reported by The New York Times.

The plaintiff families accused Binance of conducting transactions that totaled more than $1 billion on behalf of Hamas and other terrorist organizations.

Binance officials handled the transactions despite being warned of potential illegality by its compliance vendors and did not use common security checks, according to the lawsuit.

The plaintiffs also claim Binance willfully handled at least $50 million in transactions for Hamas, Hezbollah, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps of Iran, the Palestinian Islamic Jihad and other terrorist organizations after the Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israeli civilians that killed 1,200 and kidnapped 254 others.

The lawsuit was filed a month after President Donald Trump pardoned Binance founder Changpeng Zhao after he earlier pleaded guilty to money laundering charges, according to CNBC.

Zhao is named as a defendant in the lawsuit, along with Guangying Chen and Binance Holdings Ltd., who are accused of intentionally creating Binance to serve as a “criminal enterprise to facilitate money laundering on a global scale.”

The plaintiffs say the Binance officials knew Hamas and other designated foreign terrorist organizations regularly used the cryptoexchange and actively assisted them “at a time when Hamas, in particular, was publicly directing its donors to send funds” to its Binance cryptowallets.

Binance officials also disregarded filing required suspicious activity reports and manipulated how qualifying transactions were reported to prevent any scrutiny by U.S. banking regulators, the plaintiffs argue.

Binance “actively tried to shield its Hamas customers and their funds from scrutiny by U.S. regulators or law enforcement — a practice that continues to this day,” the plaintiff families say.

The plaintiffs seek compensatory damages in amounts to be determined at trial, treble damages due to alleged international terrorism-related activities, legal costs and other damages.

Binance officials told UPI they are aware of the federal complaint but cannot comment on active litigation.

The crypto exchange said it fully complies with internationally recognized sanctions laws and in 2025 had a direct exposure to illicit flows of less than 0.02% of platform volume, which it said is significantly below the industry average.

“We have invested hundreds of millions of dollars, expanded our global compliance-related workforce to over 1,280 specialists (22% of our entire workforce), and built real-time intelligence-sharing partnerships with law enforcement worldwide,” Binance said.

“We remain steadfast in our commitment to working with regulators, law enforcement and our users to protect the integrity of the global digital-asset ecosystem.”

Nine of the top 10 mega-cities are in Asia, with Bangladesh’s Dhaka projected to be the world’s largest city by 2050.

A new United Nations report has found that Indonesia’s capital Jakarta is the world’s largest city with 41.9 million people living there, followed by Dhaka in Bangladesh, which is home to 36.6 million.

A low-lying coastal city located in the west of the densely populated island of Java, Jakarta rose from second place to replace Tokyo, which had been named the world’s largest city in the UN’s most recent assessment published back in 2000.

The Japanese capital’s relatively steady population of 33.4 million saw it fall to third place behind Bangladesh’s densely populated capital, Dhaka, which jumped to second place from ninth and is now projected to become the world’s largest city by 2050.

The World Urbanization Prospects 2025 report from the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs also found that the number of megacities – urban areas with more than 10 million inhabitants – has increased to 33, four times more than the eight megacities that existed worldwide in 1975.

Asia is home to 19 of the world’s 33 megacities, and nine out of the top 10. In addition to Jakarta, Dhaka and Tokyo, the other Asian cities in the top 10 are: New Delhi, India (30.2 million); Shanghai, China (29.6 million); Guangzhou, China (27.6 million); Manila, Philippines (24.7 million); Kolkata, India (22.5 million); and Seoul, South Korea (22.5 million).

With a population of 32 million people, Egypt’s Cairo is the only city in the top 10 that is outside Asia, according to the UN.

Sao Paulo in Brazil, with 18.9 million people, is the largest city in the Americas, while Lagos in Nigeria also grew rapidly, making it the largest city in sub-Saharan Africa.

Still growing

Dhaka’s rapid growth has partly been driven by people from rural areas moving to the capital, searching for opportunities or fleeing hometowns due to problems including flooding and rising sea levels, made worse by climate change.

Jakarta is also facing problems due to rising sea levels. It is estimated that up to one quarter of the city could be under water by 2050.

The problem is so serious that Indonesia’s government is building a new purpose-built capital city in Nusantara in Borneo island’s East Kalimantan province. Yet while the city’s officials and parliamentary buildings will have a new home, the UN estimates that 10 million more people will be living in Jakarta by 2050.

The city’s growing population will also have to contend with concerns over inequality and affordability, which saw thousands of people take to the streets of the Indonesian city earlier this year, reflecting rising anger over the conditions of low-income workers, including app-based motorcycle ride-share and delivery riders.

Meanwhile, according to the UN report, Iran’s capital Tehran, which is facing water rations because it is close to running out of water, currently has a population of nine million people.

The new assessment also saw changes as the UN adopted new measures to try to address inconsistencies in how different countries defined urbanisation.

The UN also said that in most cases its report reflected the size of individual cities, rather than two cities that have grown together, with a small number of exceptions.

The new definition defined a city as a “contiguous agglomeration” of one-kilometre-square grid cells with a density of at least 1,500 inhabitants per square kilometre and a total population of at least 50,000.

Shona McGarty’s family appeared to give Aitch their seal of approval amid romance chatter as the pair arrived for I’m a Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here! in Australia

Eagle-eyed I’m a Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here! fans spotted a subtle clue they believe a jungle romance is on the cards.

Tuesday night’s show opened with Aitch play fighting with Lisa Riley in the camp, scenes witnessed by former EastEnders star Shona McGarty. Viewers noticed the actress even lick her lips as Aitch, a rapper, stood topless in front of her.

Shona, 34, also shot a playful glance toward Aitch as she watched him and Lisa argue, catching him mid–muscle flex. We reported this week chatter of a potential Jungle romance between Shona and the 25-year-old musician, speculation of which her family appeared to approve.

And I’m a Celeb viewers also appeared to back the romance, with many taking to social media during last night’s episode and into this morning. One posted: “Shona, we see you checking out Aitch there.” Another shared: “OMG Shona is licking her lips at Aitch topless. Did anyone else see?”

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A third commented: “Shona licking her lips when Aitch is topless is no coincidence.” Another wrote: “Were my eyes deceiving me when I saw Shona then making faces at Aitch when he was flexing at Lisa? Haha” And a further fan said: “Not Shona licking her lips at aitch’s sight ahahha.”

Shona, who played Whitney Dean in EastEnders for 15 years, broke up with her musician fiancé, David Bracken, earlier this year. Insiders say the split is amicable, and he recently wished her all the best for the jungle on social media platforms.

Aitch is also single after splitting with Lois Cottam before going into the Jungle. Dec previously said he was shell-shocked by Aitch’s comments when watching the scenes shortly before they aired, on Friday night.

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And, after arriving at Brisbane Airport, the actress’ sister Camila delivered her verdict on the rapper. She said: “He is a nice guy…I would definitely have him around for Christmas.” Aitch confessed his feelings about Shona to Angry Ginge at the end of last week, admitting: “I’ve got a bit of a soft spot for Shona, me.”

Aitch, real name Harrison Armstrong, sparked hopes of a jungle romance on last Friday’s episode. The star, from Manchester, took a dip in the Aussie camp’s creek, and said: “I’ve got a bit of a soft spot for Shona, me.”

His pal and co-star Angry Ginge replied: “I think she’s really nice, if that’s what you mean, yeah…” Aitch said: “Yeah, that’s what I mean.” Ginge responded: “Yeah, she is.”

Things are getting complicated. In the same week that a black man clinched the Democratic nomination for president, the current white, Republican vice president was forced to apologize for making a crack that played on the myth that poor white folks like having sex with their cousins.

It probably wouldn’t have been a big deal had Dick Cheney not singled out West Virginia, the bluest of the red states. He was talking about having Cheneys on both sides of his family and, he said, “we don’t even live in West Virginia.” As director John Waters said in 1994, talking trash about “white trash” is “the last racist thing you can say and get away with.” After all, there’s no political action committee for hillbillies. (And no, the National Rifle Assn. doesn’t count.)

It turns out that West Virginia officials did protest the vice president’s remarks. Democratic Sen. Robert Byrd lamented Cheney’s evident “contempt and astounding ignorance toward his own countrymen.” But he and other politicians were clearly more offended by the targeting of their state than with the fact that Cheney was propagating the old canard that poor white Southerners were biologically tainted by inbreeding. That a generally humorless vice president would dare make such a joke in an election year shows how acceptable it really is to disparage lower-class whites from the South and beyond. But why?

Think of it this way: If a black politician made fun of poor blacks, or a Latino official made fun of poor Latinos, he’d likely be roundly denounced as a sellout. Indeed, politicians and all other upper-middle-class Latinos and blacks are generally assumed to bear a responsibility to improve the lot of the most downtrodden among them. So why do privileged white people like Cheney have greater license to distance themselves from poor whites? Aren’t they also responsible for helping to lift their brothers and sisters up the socioeconomic ladder?

The term “white trash” seems to have emerged in the 1820s in Baltimore. It was slang, used by both free and enslaved blacks, to put down the poor whites with whom they sometimes found themselves in economic competition. Middle-class and elite whites then borrowed and popularized the term for their own purposes, one of which was to solidify their racial dominance.

That process started with the ideology of black inferiority, which emerged as a justification for slavery, and the concomitant ideology of white supremacy. In pre-Civil War Southern society, the presence of poor, uneducated and uncouth whites presented something of a problem for the advocates of slavery: They were living, breathing proof that whiteness and superiority were not the same.

By the 1850s, poor whites found themselves caught in the debate over slavery. In 1854, abolitionist author Harriet Beecher Stowe argued that “white trash” were the victims and byproducts of slavery, in which the planter class monopolized tillable soil and left poor whites struggling to survive. For their part, pro-slavery advocates retorted that the source of the white underclass was not slavery but the tainted blood that ran through these depraved people’s veins.

In other words, in order to maintain the idea of white supremacy, white elites had to de-racialize their poor — remove them from the group. They were “white” in skin color only. Just as the one-drop rule — which held that any person with any amount of African blood would be considered black — kept the white racial category “pure,” so did the creation and disowning of “inferior” whites. “The term ‘white trash’ gave a name to people who were giving ‘whiteness’ a bad name,” said Matt Wray, a Temple University sociologist and the author of “Not Quite White: White Trash and the Boundaries of Whiteness.” “It meant that they were behaving in ways that didn’t suggest that they were the master race.”

By the turn of the century, eugenicists were studying poor rural whites and documenting their social dysfunctions. They eventually made the fatuous connection between Southern white poverty and “consanguinity,” or shared blood — which meant incest. The accusation stuck, and many poor whites were labeled feeble-minded and became the victims of the forced-sterilization programs that began in the 1920s.

Cheney was probably not fully aware of the whole sordid history he conjured. But his casual joke suggests not only that political correctness does not apply to all groups equally but that there are corrosive, nonracial social divisions in this nation that are easily ignored and even tolerated. For too long, we’ve spoken of social tensions almost exclusively in terms of race. Perhaps the nomination of a black man for president will let that story line fade so that we can finally focus on the ever-present, easy-to-miss issues of class.