On Our Radar

It was unclear whether the Biden administration would remove Laura Wertheimer after separate leadership changes last week at the Federal Housing Finance Agency

Many Native people were forced into the most undesirable areas of America, first by white settlers, then by the government. Now, parts of that marginal land are becoming uninhabitable.

Blueacorn and Womply processed one-third of all Paycheck Protection Program loans this year, stepping in when big lenders wouldn’t.

To justify its big investment in the L.I.R.R., New York needs to force Long Island communities to make room for more housing.

There’s something to be said for talking, and listening, to even unreasonable antagonists

Washington, D.C.’s children should learn about Black history in the District.

No part of President Biden’s agenda has been as ambitious as his attempt to place concerns about equity squarely at the center of the federal government’s decision-making

Black and Hispanic families in the United States are far less likely than white families to own their own homes. It’s been that way for decades, but the gap is wider today than it was before passage of the 1968 Fair Housing Act.

Fintech and P2P lending have been around for almost a decade now, but in the context of Covid-19 and mass unemployment in the USA, their impact is being felt more than ever. This is because many of the startups in the Fintech sector are focused on closing the opportunity gap by providing alternative sources of finance to people who find it difficult to borrow through traditional channels.

Temporary moratoriums have protected up to 40 million coronavirus-battered U.S. residents against a catastrophic spread of potential evictions. But without immediate, dramatic action, the protections offered by a national moratorium will soon end, exposing millions of U.S. residents to the national housing epidemic that pre-dated the COVID-19 pandemic — and that has only grown in size and scope. To stop that from happening, we need to act now. (The moratorium is currently set to expire at the end of June, although the federal officials are now reportedly looking to extend it.)

The federal moratorium on evictions due to non-payment was extended by one month, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced on Thursday.

The U.S. Federal Reserve’s interest-rate decisions have big repercussions for the country and the world. Yet the short-term interest rate it targets- known as the federal funds rate- no longer plays a meaningful role in the economy, and requires occasional fiddling to keep it in line. 

A high school dropout, she earned her GED at 19 while pregnant with twins, who were later born prematurely. Carless, she took the bus with her children to follow-up medical appointments for her babies, who were less than 2 pounds at birth. Inspired, she decided to become a nurse and later, a union representative and community activist.

Visa has agreed to acquire Swedish startup Tink, which allows banks and startups to access consumer financial data and handles payments outside of traditional card networks like Visa’s, in a $2.1 billion deal (€1.8 billion). 

With one week to go before the nationwide ban on evictions expires, the White House is acknowledging that the emergency pandemic protection will have to end at some point. The trick is devising the right sort of “off-ramp” to make the transition without massive social upheaval.