☕️ Jensanity

The future of congestion pricing... June 07, 2024 [View Online]( | [Sign Up]( | [Shop]( [Morning Brew]( PRESENTED BY [Beehiiv]( Good morning, and happy National Donut Day. While the sugary treat has been much maligned in recent history, a donut can still reveal a lot about a person. Here’s what your favorite kind of donut says about you. Boston creme = you have good taste Cake with sprinkles = you plan every office happy hour Jelly = you’re a mom Icing filled (not w/ Boston creme) = there is a warrant for your arrest in at least one state Powdered donut hole = you are trying to sell your Peloton on FB Marketplace One with a piece of bacon on top = you have 800 Hinge matches Cronut = you can’t be trusted to keep a secret —Matty Merritt, Cassandra Cassidy, Molly Liebergall, Sam Klebanov, Adam Epstein, Neal Freyman MARKETS Nasdaq 17,173.12 -0.09% S&P 5,352.96 -0.02% Dow 38,886.17 +0.20% 10-Year 4.281% -1.0 bps Bitcoin $70,348.74 -1.32% GameStop $46.46 +47.17% Data is provided by *Stock data as of market close, cryptocurrency data as of 4:00pm ET. [Here's what these numbers mean.]( - Markets: Stocks were [little changed]( on Thursday ahead of today’s big jobs report. Meanwhile, GameStop took flight yet again after a YouTube account belonging to meme lord Keith Gill (aka Roaring Kitty) scheduled a livestream for this afternoon.  TRANSPORTATION [If NYC can’t get congestion pricing, who can?]( [NYC traffic]( Hershorn/Getty Images A New York politician hasn’t received this many nasty emails since Michael Bloomberg tried to ban Big Gulps. Governor Kathy Hochul [announced]( this week that the city’s congestion pricing plan, which was expected to go into effect at the end of this month, will be paused indefinitely. Public transit supporters, economists, and environmental advocates are livid about the reversal—and the giant hole it could leave in funding for buses and subways. What happened? For nearly 15 years, congestion pricing debates have swirled around New York’s state legislature, angering car-driving suburbanites and exciting subway enthusiasts. In 2019, former Governor Andrew Cuomo signed off on a plan to charge vehicles $15 to enter Manhattan below 60th Street during its busiest hours. - The plan was meant to decrease traffic by around 17% (or 120,000 cars per day) and improve air quality. - The tolls were [expected]( to generate nearly $1 billion a year for the Metropolitan Transit Authority (MTA), which would use the money for transit infrastructure upgrades, like much-needed repairs and improved accessibility. Honk if you hate congestion prices The governor ultimately sided with the critics who cited fears that high tolls could hurt working families and delay the city’s post-pandemic recovery. Supporters of the program were shocked by Hochul’s drastic change in tune: She had said a few weeks ago that congestion pricing was vital to make “cities more livable.” It’s hard to see an immediate future for congestion pricing…and not just because there’s been a huge bread truck parked in front of it for the last 35 minutes. NYC’s program was the first of its kind in the US, and climate advocates hoped a successful rollout would spread to other parts of the country. It was seen as the US’ best shot to finally join places like London, Milan, and Singapore in reducing gridlock. But inflation means that politicians are unlikely to greenlight a policy that imposes further costs on residents.—MM PRESENTED BY BEEHIIV [Borrow the Brew’s toolbox]( [Beehiiv]( With [beehiiv]( the tools that powered Morning Brew’s breakout success are now available to all. It’s a platform built by early Morning Brew employees that makes it dead simple for anyone to create a massively successful newsletter, just like the one you’re reading right now. It has everything you need: - no-code website builder - beautiful newsletter templates - referral program for readers Plus, beehiiv even helps you monetize with premium sponsors. Yup, just like this advertisement right here. Thousands of publishers and professionals—from the Boston Globe to Arnold Schwarzenegger—are already using beehiiv to [publish newsletters, grow readership, and drive revenue](. And because we go waaaaay back with the beehiiv team, they’re hooking you up with a free account and 20% off for three months when you upgrade with code BREW. [Start publishing for free](. WORLD [Tour de headlines](#) [SpaceX launch]Chandan Khanna/Getty Images SpaceX celebrates Starship test launch. For the first time, the Elon Musk-run company launched the world’s most powerful rocket into space and [successfully returned]( it to Earth. The Starship space vehicle stayed (mostly) in one piece during the fiery reentry into the atmosphere, losing just some protective components. It splashed down in the Indian Ocean, while the rocket booster landed in the Gulf of Mexico. The 397-foot rocket, designed to transport large quantities of cargo, satellites, or up to 100 people, is contracted to ferry NASA astronauts to the moon in 2026. Musk wants it to one day bring Earthlings to Mars. The FDA lifted its Juul ban. The Food and Drug Administration said yesterday that it [rescinded]( its 2022 order for Juul to pull its vapes from store shelves. The agency had issued the ban amid concerns that many kids were becoming habitual vapers. But Juul’s vapes never vaporized, continuing to appear in stores and school bathrooms as the ban was suspended pending an appeal. Now, the FDA has reconsidered Juul’s application to get its products greenlit pending review of additional health data and related court cases. Antitrust regulators are on AI’s case. The Federal Trade Commission and the Justice Department agreed to [divide their roles]( in investigating Microsoft, OpenAI, and chipmaker Nvidia for potential anticompetitive practices, the New York Times reported yesterday. The FTC has been looking into tech giants’ deals with AI upstarts like OpenAI, which Microsoft plugged with $13 billion. The agency is also closely scrutinizing Microsoft’s tech licensing deal with Inflection AI and its move to hire almost all of the startup’s staff, per the WSJ. Meanwhile, the DOJ will examine Nvidia’s contracts for AI chips. AI [Everything’s coming up Jensen]( [Jensen Huang]( Images The number of cultural phenomena named after a Taiwanese American man changing the future of their craft is now [two](. Nvidia surpassed $3 trillion in market cap on Wednesday, pushing its already popular CEO Jensen Huang into the limelight and fueling what the tech world is calling “Jensanity” ahead of the company’s stock split today. On a roll: Nvidia has added a whopping $2 trillion to its valuation since the start of the year as investors realized there is no AI boom without Nvidia chips. And there is no Nvidia without Huang, who has officially reached pop star status in Taiwan. The CEO made headlines this week at [Computex]( a tech conference in Taipei, where he, like your cool comp-sci TA, talked about graphics cards while holding a plastic [cup of beer](. Unlike your comp-sci TA, crowds and paparazzi followed him around the island. While a member of the $3t club, Nvidia passed Apple as the [second]( largest company in the world (behind Microsoft). Fun fact: The last time Nvidia was worth more than Apple was in 2002, five years before the iPhone came out, Bloomberg reported. Splitsies? The company will execute a 10-for-1 stock [split]( today after markets close, dividing each individual stock into 10, pushing down the share price. The split doesn’t impact the value of the company, but it will make the stock much more accessible to traders.—CC TOGETHER WITH MISO ROBOTICS [Miso Robotics]( Automate or fail. Between the 3m-person labor shortage and $20/hour minimum wages, the $1t fast-food industry needs a win. That’s why top brands like White Castle automate with Miso Robotics. [Nvidia’s even collaborating with Miso]( on leveling up AI for their kitchen robotics. With the potential to 4x fast-food profits, Miso’s looking at a $3.5b revenue opportunity. [Invest before Miso cooks your next meal](. ENTERTAINMENT [Pat’s last spin]( [Pat Sajak hosting Wheel of Fortune]( Benc/Getty Images After 41 seasons of making small talk with contestants before they blow their shot on “D,” Wheel of Fortune frontman Pat Sajak will sell his final vowel tonight, [ending]( one of the most prolific TV hosting careers in history. Sajak’s successor, serial host Ryan Seacrest, has some big shoes to fill: - Wheel was a daytime program when Sajak [joined]( in 1981 and Vanna White came on board in 1982. The following year, the show got nationally syndicated and switched to evenings, where it continued to grow. - Now, it’s the second-most popular syndicated show on TV (behind sister show Jeopardy!), with an average of ~8 million viewers per week, according to Nielsen. - Sajak holds the Guinness World Record for the longest-running host of one game show. Vanna White isn’t going anywhere…for now. Everybody’s favorite letter revealer extended her contract through the 2025–2026 season and earned her first pay raise in 18 years, Fortune [reported](. White had reportedly made ~$3 million/year since 2005, while Sajak pulled in $15 million, Forbes estimated in 2016. RSTLNE. For Sajak’s bonus round, he’s pivoting to theater: He’ll be in a mystery-thriller play next summer at Honolulu’s Hawaii Theatre, Variety [reported]( yesterday.—ML STAT [Prime number](#) [Graphic of a Joro spider flying through the air]Francis Scialabba Who’s ready for Flying Spider Summer? The Joro spider, an eight-legged eldritch horror native to East Asia, is coming to the Northeast US and other parts of the country soon, researchers predict. The invasive species can travel up to 100 miles by “ballooning,” in which they literally [ride the wind]( with their silk webs acting as parachutes. Adult females can grow up to eight inches with their legs stretched. If that all sounds like nightmare fuel, don’t fret: The Joro might look like something out of a David Cronenberg movie, but it’s not dangerous. They don’t often bite humans, and when they do, it’s not deadly. TBD if they give you superpowers. QUIZ [Quizard of Oz]( [New Friday quiz image]( The feeling of getting a 5/5 on the Brew’s Weekly News Quiz has been compared to getting free lunch at work. It’s that satisfying. [Ace the quiz](. NEWS [What else is brewing](#) - [Suzanne Collins]( is writing a new Hunger Games novel, Sunrise on the Reaping, that’s due for release in March 2025. - [Robinhood]( bought the crypto exchange Bitstamp for $200 million as part of the trading platform’s push into digital assets. - [A man in Mexico]( died from a type of bird flu that had never been seen in humans before. - [The NHL]( is getting a behind-the-scenes docuseries on Amazon Prime Video from the producer of Drive to Survive. - [Humane]( the company whose AI pin was ripped to shreds by reviewers, is reportedly trying to sell itself to HP for $1 billion. RECS [Friday to-do list] Eat: The many [nutritional benefits]( of avocados. Discover: The [private letters]( of George Mallory, who died attempting to summit Mount Everest in 1924. Watch: The weirdest and possibly best [cover of “Bridge over Troubled Water”]( you’ve ever heard. Dine finely: Spain boasts three of the top four [best restaurants in the world](. Save up to 90% on every flight—for life: For the next 12 hours, Dollar Flight Club’s [lifetime membership]( is $129 (normally $1,690). Fly round-trip to Las Vegas from $40, Rome from $291. [Start exploring]( Routine revamp: Check out these tips for creating + sustaining your ideal routine—from fitness and work to nutrition and mental wellness. [Read the full article]( sponsored by Jarrow.* *A message from our sponsor. GAMES [The puzzle section](#) Jigsaw: The NBA Finals have tipped off—see if you can complete this [Jigsaw puzzle of Mavs star Luka Dončić](. Friday puzzle What do the following words all have in common? HUBS, ABOMA, TRACER, DOMAINS, ANTRUM, AIRHORNS SHARE THE BREW [Share Morning Brew]( with your friends, acquire free Brew swag, and then acquire more friends as a result of your fresh Brew swag. We’re saying we’ll give you free stuff and more friends if you share a link. One link. Your referral count: 0 [Click to Share]( Or copy & paste your referral link to others: [morningbrew.com/daily/r/?kid=4904f90a]( ANSWER They’re all anagrams of the last names of US presidents. HUBS = Bush ABOMA = Obama TRACER = Carter DOMAINS = Madison ANTRUM = Truman AIRHORNS = Harrison [Source]( Word of the Day Today’s Word of the Day is: eldritch, meaning “strange or unnatural in a way that inspires fear.” Thanks to Emily from Frederick, MD, and others for the spooky suggestion. Submit another [Word of the Day here](. ✳︎ A Note From Miso Robotics This is a paid advertisement for Miso Robotics’ Regulation A offering. Please read the offering circular at [invest.misorobotics.com](. Written by [Adam Epstein]( [Matty Merritt]( [Cassandra Cassidy]( [Molly Liebergall]( Sam Klebanov, and [Neal Freyman]( Was this email forwarded to you? Sign up [here](. Interested in podcasts? - Check out ours [here]( [ADVERTISE]( // [CAREERS]( // [SHOP]( // [FAQ]( Update your email preferences or unsubscribe [here](. View our privacy policy [here](. Copyright © 2024 Morning Brew. All rights reserved. 22 W 19th St, 4th Floor, New York, NY 10011