Hi, Quartz members!
While the well-heeled discussed the state of the world in Davos, Switzerland this week, we on the home front kept our eye on other matters: how American shale country turned the US into the largest crude pumper in the world, why Hyundai is offering Americans cash to buy its SUVs, and what the heck is going on with Spirit Airlines.
We’ve also been receiving texts from Davos containing photos of Sting, but we’re not bitter. There’s been plenty of news to keep us busy this week, and below are our picks for your weekend reading. Enjoy, and drop us a line anytime. (But do note, we’ve hit capacity on Sting pics.)
5 things we especially liked on Quartz
🏔️ Davos 2024. Our on-the-ground, in-the-Alps coverage of the World Economic Forum at Davos this year was something special, with Heather Landy’s interview with KPMG US chief Paul Knopp, rundown of the Gates Foundation’s record-breaking budget plan, and comparison of OpenAI head Sam Altman and musician Will.i.am’s differing visions of the future. But where her Davos-ing really shines is the daily newsletter—read the back issues for Volodymyr Zelenskyy appeals, hot cocoa finds, and more. If you couldn’t be there in person (or, really, even if you could), it’s the only way to Davos.
😬 The great severing. It felt like a traditional first-quarter, new budget reprieve was on its way, but the waves of tech sector layoffs seem to just keep coming. Laura Bratton and Michelle Cheng put together this explainer to help make sense of it all, including a handy chart, a timeline of events from January alone (that part is tough to read), and then, finally, a bright spot among the layoff clouds.
🍟 Burgers with a side of litigation. As a society, we’ve grown to treat our fast food brands with an unhealthy level of distrust. No one really expects what we’re handed at the drive-thru to look anything like what we saw on the ad. But some consumers are getting tired of the bait-and-switch. Laura Bratton talks to attorney Anthony Russo, whose law firm has made a name for itself by helping clients sue big names like Hershey, McDonald’s, Wendy’s, Arby’s, Burger King, and Taco Bell for not delivering on appearances.
👋 In Sheryl’s wake. When Sheryl Sandberg was elected to Meta’s board in 2012, she was the only woman on an all-male board. This week, she announced she would be stepping down. Ananya Bhattacharya took a look at how things have changed since, giving the corporate board—and the company at large—somewhat of a scorecard for both gender (much, much better) and racial (still not good) diversity.
🦸 Faster than a speeding bullet! Often, the economy behaves in ways that are difficult to understand, even for economists. With the help of an old Superman cartoon from 1942, Melvin Backman explains why the US retail sales data for December was stronger than expected. Sure, the analogy is a little nonsensical—but hey, he points out, sometimes, so is the economy.
5 great stories from elsewhere
🪱 Memory wormhole. At Tufts University, one biologist thinks we might store learning and cognition not just in our brains, but our bodies. Scientific American follows the fascinating work of Michael Levin, whose experiments on planarians—or flatworms that regenerate body parts when cut in half—suggest some creatures can hold onto memories even if they’ve lost their heads.
🚚 Trucking on. The supply chain and logistic industries have long rung alarm bells about a shortage of American truckers. So why are the millions of people trained to drive trucks unwilling to take on the work? For Harper’s Magazine, Emily Gogolak takes a firsthand look—by tossing herself into commercial driving school. “I once tried to read Greek before fully understanding its alphabet,” she writes. “That’s what it felt like to study the rules of operating a big rig before ever having popped the hood or climbed behind the wheel.”
⚖️ Scales of justice. In 1990, juror Estella Ybarra was pressured to convict a man of child rape, despite her reservations about his guilt. In a February cover story for Texas Monthly, executive editor details the extraordinary actions she undertook three decades later to reverse her verdict. Ybarra is, as the longread names her, the juror who found herself guilty.
👠 When the girl bullies grow up. As the Mean Girls musical smashed movie box offices this weekend, one of its creators flew under the red carpet’s radar—Rosalind Wiseman, whose book Queen Bees and Wannabes inspired the original cult film. The New York Times looks at where she is now: Coaching the adults who never managed to shake their bullies.
🏔 The end of their world. “Before they disappeared into the mountains—before they broke the foremost rule of womanhood: Keep the children alive—Becky and Christine Vance lived together in Colorado Springs.” Elizabeth Weil pens an unsettling investigation for New York Magazine about the questions left behind when a family picks up and vanishes.
🗓️ What to watch for this week
Here’s what our newsroom will be keeping an eye on:
- Tuesday: Netflix will have its latest earnings to report, as will Kia…
- Wednesday: …which is closing the EV gap with Tesla, also on deck to report earnings.
- Thursday: One of the world’s richest men may have some updates on how his company LVMH is performing in its latest quarterly financial results. Hyundai will also have its latest earnings out. Plus, the US will have a look into how new home sales are going, and the first release of its fourth-quarter GDP.
Thanks for reading! Here’s to the week ahead, and don’t hesitate to reach out with comments, questions, feedback, hot cocoa recommendations, and Sting lyrics. Sunday Reads was brought to you by Susan Howson, Gabriela Riccardi, and Morgan Haefner.