Tuesday morning news drop
Top Canadian museum to be imminently gutted in the name of 'decolonization' With little notice and even less transparency, the Royal B.C. Museum is demolishing some of Canada's most iconic exhibits with no idea of what's going to replace them (National Post)
Why Canada gets less for more when it comes to building transit The reason is that Canada pays a higher price to build light-rail transit compared to our international counterparts, driven chiefly by the depth of underground tunnels, the grandiosity of the stations and labour costs. But several experts agree it has just as much to do with something else: politics. (Toronto Star)
Canada wasn't prepared for natural disasters in 2021 — and next year threatens a repeat Ottawa plans to release first national climate adaptation strategy by end of 2022 (CBC)
Canadians eager to be nurses facing tougher entry requirements, fewer training spots Wave of aspiring nurses a silver lining to dark cloud of a profession stretched to the limit, says RNAO CEO (CBC)
Wall Street Ends Crazy Year With Existential Angst and Big Bonuses The biggest U.S. banks are making more money than ever, but finance veterans are ‘unsettled and ill at ease.’ (Bloomberg)
Thinking About Life I got an email two weeks ago that stopped me in my tracks. Times are tough right now, but we have so much to be thankful for. (Irrelevant Investor)
How McDonald’s Made Enemies of Black Franchisees The company, once celebrated in Black entrepreneurial circles, is settling with Black owners who say they were blocked from the best and most profitable locations. (Businessweek)
Instant gratification: The neuroscience of impulse buying It’s arguably never been harder to resist impulse buying. Online stores have taken the sales tactics of brick-and-mortar stores to new manipulative heights, barraging browsers with an arsenal of psychological tactics to get you to spend as much money as possible. Odds are you have encountered these tricks aka “dark patterns.” (Big Think)
How Shopify Outfoxed Amazon to Become the Everywhere Store Tobi Lütke transformed the Canadian upstart into an e-commerce giant by being the anti-Bezos. How long can the formula keep working? (Businessweek)
The Real Story of Pixar: How a bad hardware company turned itself into a great movie studio By definition, The Movie could incorporate no hand drawing. The tools to build it emerged piecemeal. First came the software that enabled computers to create two-dimensional images and, later, virtual 3D objects. Then we figured out how to move those objects, shade them, and light them before rendering them as frames of a movie. (IEEE Spectrum)
The Tomb Raiders of the Upper East Side: Inside the Manhattan DA’s Antiquities Trafficking Unit Over the past decade, more than 3,600 antiquities, valued at some $200 million have been impounded. They’ve raided art fairs on Park Avenue, and Christie’s in Rockefeller Center. They arrested a dealer at the five-star Mark Hotel and seized statues on display at the five-star Pierre. Tips from scholars, dealers, and other informants have repeatedly led to the Upper East Side. The enclave of old-money families along Fifth Avenue’s Museum Mile is America’s worst neighborhood for antiquities crime. The problem with “these gentlemen of stature and breeding,” he told one judge, is that they “would never be so gauche” as to check the legal status of ancient art before buying it. (The Atlantic)
The Race to Secure Water in the Western U.S.: How four cities are trying to survive future droughts, from expanding reservoirs and tapping neighboring watersheds to pushing conservation efforts. How four cities are trying to survive future droughts, from expanding reservoirs and tapping neighboring watersheds to pushing conservation efforts. (Bloomberg)
Work for yourself? Canada has fewer and fewer people like you — and here's why Self-employment dropped to its lowest level in more than a decade during the pandemic (CBC)