• A TD Cowen analyst said that Microsoft had canceled plans for new data center developments.
• The news suggested that the staggering forecasts for data center growth could be overblown.
• Experts say the industry's growth will still be enormous but is now undergoing a reality check.

Microsoft recently appeared to scale back its data center development pipeline, which would be an extraordinary step back after a period of furious growth by the tech giant. But did it really?

The concerns about whether air was coming out of a data center bubble were raised by a TD Cowen analyst, Michael Elias, in a report dated February 21. Elias wrote that Microsoft, one of the largest data center operators in the country, had recently torn up leases for "multiple +100 megawatt deals in multiple markets that were in early/mid-stages of negotiations."

Elias also said the company had let go of more than a gigawatt of preliminary data center commitments it had made and also five longer-term development deals in prime data center markets. The company's decision-making was "tied to Microsoft potentially being in an oversupply position."

Microsoft's pullback sent a shudder through the data center market, which has seen staggering forecasts for growth in the coming years.

For some, however, the news simply reflected a more modest revision of the sector's extraordinary recent projections for growth.

"I can't think of the big five that haven't done this every 12 or 18 months," said one data center development executive, referring to the industry's largest users: Amazon, Meta, Google, Microsoft, and Oracle. The executive did not want to be identified by name because major customers in the industry prize confidentiality.

"This is not new and definitely not the biggest one we've had in the last three years," the executive said, saying that Meta had canceled major data center commitments it had in recent years in order to reset its strategy, including its data center business's customer and technology focus.

After that reevaluation, Meta rebooted its torrid growth, including the recent announcement of a $10 billion data center campus in Louisiana.

A spokeswoman for Meta declined to comment.

Microsoft still has plans for robust growth

Dan Thompson, an analyst at S&P Global who covers the data center industry, said that the magnitude of the data center boom was bound to modulate because the projections included speculative projects and, potentially, the double counting of tenants who may have expressed interest in multiple projects and/or regions for the same requirement.

"Some of these announcements are not going to get built," Thompson said. "I don't see it as a reflection on the data center industry."

Thompson said that there was a need to differentiate between credible growth and the frothiest forecasts for the industry's expansion. He said that S&P plans to reorganize its data center projections this year into buckets that group projects based on their likelihood of coming to fruition.

"We are modifying our reports this year, for every market, basically draw the line in the sand and say, OK, this is the part where we think: that is real," Thompson said.

What is clear, nonetheless, is that a data center boom is afoot across the nation.

S&P Global projects that the industry will grow from about 35.4 gigawatts of capacity today to almost 82 gigawatts by the end of the decade, an 131% increase. There have been even more ambitious projections that more than 90 gigawatts of data centers could be online by 2029.

The development is being undertaken to commercialize and develop artificial intelligence and also cater to society's yawning digital footprint. Data centers provide the computing and storage that power the internet and a host of increasingly vital functions, such as autonomous vehicles, Zoom meetings, and cloud computing.

A spokeswoman for Microsoft suggested in a statement that the company had pumped the brakes on development, while also highlighting the enormous scale of its data center expansion.

"Thanks to the significant investments we have made up to this point, we are well positioned to meet our current and increasing customer demand," the spokeswoman stated. "Last year alone, we added more capacity than any prior year in history."

Microsoft "will continue to grow strongly in all regions," she said, and that the company's plans to "spend over $80B on infrastructure this FY remains on track as we continue to grow at a record pace to meet customer demand."

Elias's report didn't cite specific examples of Microsoft's retrenchment, except for the recent news of its decision to reevaluate a large data center campus it is building in Mount Pleasant, Wisconsin, outside of Milwaukee.

Reached by phone, Elias declined to comment further.

Sean Ryan, a spokesman for the Village of Mount Pleasant, said that Microsoft had "paused in some of its construction work in order to incorporate new data center designs" and that "Village officials have no reason to believe this will affect the overall scope or nature" of the project.

• A federal judge indefinitely blocked the Trump administration's attempt to freeze federal funding.
• The Trump administration's actions were "irrational" and "precipitated a nationwide crisis," a judge said.
• The funding freeze prompted lawsuits from nonprofits and state attorneys general.

A Washington, DC, federal judge on Tuesday sided with a band of nonprofit groups and issued a preliminary injunction blocking the Trump administration's attempt to freeze hundreds of billions of dollars in federal grants and loans.

In her written opinion indefinitely blocking the administration's move to freeze federal funding, US District Judge Loren AliKhan wrote that the freeze "was ill-conceived from the beginning."

"Defendants either wanted to pause up to $3 trillion in federal spending practically overnight, or they expected each federal agency to review every single one of its grants, loans, and funds for compliance in less than twenty-four hours. The breadth of that command is almost unfathomable," the judge wrote.

She said the Trump administration's actions were "irrational, imprudent, and precipitated a nationwide crisis."

AliKhan and another federal judge in Rhode Island previously issued a temporary restraining order against the administration's federal funds freeze after a group of nonprofits and Democratic state attorneys general filed separate lawsuits last month, arguing that the freeze was unlawful.

US District Judge John McConnell Jr. of Rhode Island, who is overseeing the lawsuit brought by 22 states and the District of Columbia, found earlier this month that the Trump administration was violating his court order by continuing to freeze funding for federal programs.

McConnell had ordered the administration to immediately restore and resume the funding. The White House appealed that order to the 1st US Circuit Court of Appeals but was denied.

The case in DC was brought by the advocacy groups the National Council of Nonprofits, American Public Health Association, Main Street Alliance and SAGE.

At a court hearing last week, Kevin Friedl, an attorney with Democracy Forward who is representing the nonprofits, said that AliKhan's temporary restraining order has "shown value" even though the administration's unfreezing of funds "in response to that order has not always been smooth."

Friedl said the temporary restraining order has had "a real effect" and helped his clients, but added that continued relief remained "necessary."

Department of Justice attorney Daniel Schwei argued that the plaintiffs' claims were moot since President Donald Trump's budget office had already rescinded the memo ordering the freeze on federal spending.

"Plaintiffs now agree that the funding that they would receive under their grant awards is available to them, and they say that there's still a need for continued preliminary relief from this court," Schwei said. "That is an inherently speculative proposition."

Schwei said that it was "speculative" to assume that the Office of Management and Budget "might reimplement some pause in the future."

"Certainly we don't think there's a need for emergency preliminary relief from this court to enjoin such hypothetical future pauses," Schwei said.

The Trump administration set off a wave of mass confusion after the Office of Management and Budget dropped a memo on January 27 ordering the temporary freezing of "all federal financial assistance" beginning 5 p.m. the following day, so that the spending could be reviewed.

"The use of Federal resources to advance Marxist equity, transgenderism, and green new deal social engineering policies is a waste of taxpayer dollars that does not improve the day-to-day lives of those we serve," the acting OMB director, Matthew Vaeth, wrote in the memo.

OMB rescinded the memo on January 29.

• YouTube plans to change the way mid-roll ads appear in videos.
• Starting May 12, the company said it will automate ad placement to improve the viewer experience.
• The update could boost creator revenue by weaving ads into "natural break points."

YouTube says putting more ads in the middle of videos could help creators earn more money.

In a recent blog post, YouTube announced plans to automate the placement of ads that appear in the middle of videos.

Starting on May 12, the platform said it will show more mid-roll ads at "natural break points," like pauses and transitions. It will also remove ads from "interruptive" places, like in the middle of a sentence or action sequence, that could cause viewers to close the video.

The company said the change is meant to improve viewers' experiences and potentially earn creators more money.

YouTube tested this ad change in July. It said channels that enabled both auto and manual mid-roll ads saw an average of over 5% increase in YouTube ad revenue compared to channels with only the manual ads.

YouTube plans to update older videos with manual mid-rolls to include "additional, automatic ad slots." Videos without ads and those that already have automatic ads enabled will not be impacted.

Creators can opt out of the update and continue placing their ads manually. However, the company said those who do may see a decrease in revenue.

YouTube creator Amanda Golka, who runs the commentary channel Swell Entertainment with 495,000 subscribers, said she wants to test the feature on her older videos before allowing it in her new content. She wants to make sure that the automation won't overload her videos with ads. Overall, she doesn't expect it to be a huge revenue boost for her.

"I will probably allow them to auto-place ads on old videos — but I'll continue to manually place ads on future videos," she said. "I limit to about five or six midroll ads on longer videos, and YouTube tends to place eight-plus on those."

• The White House still won't say who is the DOGE administrator.
• Donald Trump tapped Elon Musk to lead DOGE.
• But Musk is not the DOGE administrator or even a DOGE employee.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt on Tuesday refused multiple chances to answer a question that has hung over the White House's DOGE office: Who is in charge?

President Donald Trump's Inauguration Day executive order created a DOGE administrator to lead the rebranded US Digital Service. Under penalty of perjury, a White House official recently declared in a court filing that Elon Musk is not the administrator or a DOGE employee. It remains unclear if there is a DOGE administrator.

Leavitt, amid a back and forth with reporters, seemed to suggest that there is an administrator even if their name is not publicly available. She also said Musk isn't the administrator.

"No, Elon Musk is a special government employee," Leavitt said, when pressed on the world's richest man's status.

"There are career officials at DOGE, there are political appointees at DOGE. I'm not going to reveal the name of that individual from this podium," she said. "I'm happy to follow up and provide that to you. But we have been incredibly transparent about the way DOGE has been working."

Leavitt also said Trump "asked Elon Musk to oversee DOGE."

Business Insider followed up with the White House and a DOGE spokesperson. They did not immediately respond to our questions.

The White House has said Musk is a special government employee, a category of federal workers created to bring officials with expertise into the civil service part-time. Musk is also a senior advisor to the president.

Trump and Musk have blurred the line over the extent of Musk's power. BI previously reported that Musk's job title is "unlisted."

Musk previously hosted a DOGE update with members of Congress on X, the social media platform he also owns. Trump also told reporters he asked Musk what type of people DOGE had hired. During a recent appearance at the Conservative Political Action Conference, Musk wielded a chainsaw on stage. His talk was titled "DOGE update."

During the briefing, Leavitt told reporters that Musk will attend Trump's first cabinet meeting on Wednesday.

"Elon will be in attendance tomorrow just to talk about DOGE's efforts and how all the cabinet secretaries are identifying waste, fraud, and abuse at their respective agencies," Leavitt said.

It's not just journalists asking about the position. On Monday, District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly asked a Justice Department attorney if there was a DOGE administrator.

"I don't know the answer to that," the counsel responded, according to Lawfare.

The Trump executive order dictates that the administrator answers to White House chief of staff Susie Wiles. Twenty-one civil service employees who resigned en masse on Tuesday addressed their letter to Wiles.

In a footnote, they wrote that addressed their letter to Wiles because, "No one has been identified internally as the official Administrator or leader of the United States DOGE Service."

• 21 employees from the agency rebranded the US DOGE Service resigned on Tuesday.
• The signatories said in a joint letter that they refuse to "jeopardize Americans' sensitive data."
• Elon Musk and a spokeswoman for the White House DOGE Office responded to the resignations on X.

Twenty-one civil service employees resigned from the agency that was rebranded the United States DOGE Service on Tuesday, protesting the White House DOGE office's actions.

"We will not use our skills as technologists to compromise core government systems, jeopardize Americans' sensitive data, or dismantle critical public services," the employees wrote in their public resignation letter directed to White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles. "We will not lend our expertise to carry out or legitimize DOGE's actions."

The letter, dated February 25, was taken down on Tuesday afternoon without an explanation, though the resignations were not publicly rescinded.

On Inauguration Day, President Donald Trump formally turned the Obama-era United States Digital Services into the White House DOGE office. Trump previously appointed Elon Musk to co-lead the effort, but a top White House official recently declared in a legal filing that Musk is not leading DOGE and is instead a senior advisor to Trump.

In their letter, the now-former employees had said that DOGE representatives "began integrating us into their efforts," which the signatories believe were inconsistent with their goals as civil servants.

Jonathan Kamens, a former USDS engineer who was fired on February 14, told BI that he thinks more federal employees are beginning to push back against the White House DOGE office's most recent efforts.

"We are seeing more resistance, we are seeing more overt resistance," he said the day before the group resignation.

Musk took notice of the employees' collective actions and responded on X, writing, "These were Dem political holdovers who refused to return to the office. They would have been fired had they not resigned."

Katie Miller, a spokesperson for the White House DOGE office, also took to X to respond: "These were full remote workers who hung Trans flags from their workplaces."

Harrison Fields, principal deputy press secretary at the White House, issued a statement to BI.

"DOGE has effectively become part of the USDS as a component of the White House, and any leftover career bureaucrats who don't align with the President or DOGE are neither advised nor welcomed to be a part of this never-before-seen mission to make the government more efficient," he said.

The group resignation comes one day after federal employees faced a deadline to list their productivity from the past week. Agencies offered conflicting guidelines on whether or how to respond to the request, and some employees told BI that the experience bred confusion and stress.

Representatives for Trump, Musk, and the White House DOGE office did not respond to BI's request for comment.

Have a tip? Contact this reporter via email at [email protected] or Signal at alicetecotzky.05. Use a personal email address and a nonwork device; here's our guide to sharing information securely.

• Amazon is testing a program that pays publishers to drive traffic to its platform.
• It could be a welcome new source of revenue for a challenged digital media sector.
• The program's incentives could test publishers' editorial integrity, though.

Amazon is testing a new way to pay publishers for driving traffic to its platform, and it could be a bright spot for the challenged digital media industry.

Under the pilot, called NCA, or native commerce advertising, the publisher earns money when it drives readers to Amazon through product recommendations, regardless of whether they end up buying the product or not, three people familiar with the program told Business Insider. These people requested anonymity because they weren't authorized to speak publicly about the program; their identities are known to BI.

CNN, Vox Media, and tech publisher Future are among the publishers participating in the NCA pilot. Amazon plans to roll it out more fully this year.

Amazon is pitching the NCA program to publishers as a way for them to make additional money on top of its Amazon Associates program, which launched back in 1996. That program lets publishers earn a commission by driving sales from recommended products or services. It pays varying commissions by category, from 3% for toys and furniture to 10% for luxury beauty and up to 20% for Amazon video games.

Publishers can enroll in both programs and make money two ways if the reader completes a purchase.

For Amazon, the NCA pilot is a way to expand its advertising inventory without further cluttering the top of its search results, where sponsored ads have become a common source of user complaints.

Amazon declined to comment.

The jury's out on how well the program will deliver

Affiliate revenue has become a sizable business for many publishers at a time when competition for advertising and subscription dollars is tough, and Amazon is often their top revenue source. The New York Times, in the fourth quarter, reported $95 million in "other revenue," which includes its Wirecutter product recommendation business as well as licensing revenue.

One participating publisher said they were seeing a decent uptick in revenue from the NCA program. But they said the program, at least in its test phase, is complicated to implement. They added that the cost per click varied widely, with rates ranging from 20 to 60 cents, and it was hard to know how lucrative the program would be in the long term.

That variability could present some added risk to publishers.

With NCA, there's an incentive to recommend vendors offering a high cost per click, whether or not their product is the best. Amazon teams have even recommended publishers do so, two people familiar with the program said.

Publishers have dealt with a similar dilemma in the affiliate business more generally. Those with commerce businesses usually share a disclosure saying they may earn money from products they recommend, but that their product recommendations are based on independent research and analysis. Reputable publishers work hard to safeguard their product review editorial teams from the revenue side.

Still, the variability between different products in the same category in NCA is beyond the norm, and could tempt some less scrupulous publishers to take advantage.

Some publishers' affiliate businesses have been under attack

While the money from NCA might not be huge, any new source of revenue is welcome to digital publishers. Many publishers have faced business challenges as Facebook has deprioritized news and tech giants have gobbled up the bulk of the digital advertising pie.

Some publishers' affiliate businesses have also come under attack. Google has cracked down on sites that try to rank high in Google searches by publishing material provided by third parties, such as product reviews and coupons. For example, some of CNN's product recommendations, under CNN Underscored, used to be provided by a company called Forbes Marketplace, which is partly owned by Forbes.

Several publishers saw traffic to their product recommendations pages decline as a result of the crackdown, Adweek reported in November. Some publishers, including Gannett's USA Today, have protested the crackdown, saying it hurts publishers and consumers alike.

• The US Army has long known that it has artillery shortcomings that need to be addressed.
• As it readies for possible future large-scale combat operations, the Army is looking to plug these gaps.
• A general told BI the Army wants new cannons that will increase the range of fire.

Satellite images of eastern Ukraine show pockmarked battlefields left scarred by relentless artillery fire. The craters are a constant reminder that these deadly cannons still play a crucial role in modern warfare.

The US Army is watching this conflict closely as it prepares for potential large-scale combat operations overseas. The importance of artillery isn't new to it, though.

The military knows the value of being able to lob a shell or rocket down range, but it also knows it needs to step up its game. Russia and China are both stepping up theirs.

A general looking into this matter said that there are three areas where Army artillery faces serious capability gaps. He added that the hunt for artillery solutions to bridge these shortcomings is already underway.

"We saw some capability gaps against adversaries in two different theaters as we projected forward into 2030 - 2035," Brig. Gen. Rory Crooks, director of the Army Futures Command long-range precision fires cross-functional team, told Business Insider in a recent interview.

The first deficit is range. Army artillery doesn't have the necessary reach compared to US adversaries. "You provide enemy sanctuary, in some cases, when the enemy has a range overmatch," Crooks explained.

Then there is capacity. The US doesn't have enough artillery systems to match the enemy. Simply put, he said, "we're out-gunned."

And lastly, there are survivability concerns. Although some US rivals are divesting of their towed artillery systems, the US Army isn't.

Typically, when soldiers fire their artillery cannons at enemy positions, they want to disperse immediately before the anticipated counter-battery fire — a tactic known as shoot-and-scoot. Towed artillery pieces like the M777 are slower and more difficult to relocate quickly compared to the self-propelled systems, which are mounted on tracked vehicles. That diminishes survivability.

"Those three problems — range, capacity, and survivability based on mobility — are really hard to overcome individually," Crooks said, adding that "collectively, they're very hard to overcome and put us at risk for mission success moving forward."

In recent years, the Army has sought to extend the reach of its guns. One such effort, the Strategic Long Range Cannon, was intended to fire projectiles some 1,000 nautical miles away, but Congress halted funding for the research in 2022.

Another Army initiative, the 58-caliber Extended Range Cannon Artillery, or ERCA, began in 2018 with the aim of extending the range of artillery fire from 18 to 43 miles.

The weapon — a 30-foot gun tube mounted on the chassis of an M109 Paladin self-propelled howitzer — concluded the prototyping stage but did not end up moving into production due to problems observed during live-fire testing. The Army canceled the ERCA program last year, shifting focus to the new Self-Propelled Howitzer Modernization effort.

A Congressional Research Service report published in early February said a study of new conventional fires concluded last year found the Army should focus its efforts on "more autonomous artillery systems with greater range and improved mobility."

It also said that even though the Army ultimately canceled the ERCA program, starting again on its hunt for artillery solutions, "a recently conducted tactical fires study validated the capability gap that the ERCA sought to fill. Observations from Ukraine reinforce the critical role of mobile cannon artillery."

Moving forward, Crooks said that the Army is going to take the success it had with the ammunition work for ERCA and partner that with guns available on the market. He said the service is already looking into allied and partner capabilities.

The Army is specifically eyeing self-propelled howitzers with 52-caliber gun tubes. It is a middle ground between the larger 58-caliber ERCA and the smaller 39-caliber M777 towed howitzer.

"The work that we're doing with introducing, potentially, modernized platforms that are 52-caliber in length, along with the ammunition work that we did that started with ERCA, we think we'll be able to address the requirement that we needed from the ERCA platform and prototyping effort," Crooks said.

Last fall, the Army announced that it had awarded contracts to five vendors for the Self-Propelled Howitzer Modernization effort. The $4 million contracts went to American Rheinmetall Vehicles, BAE BOFORS, Hanwha Defense USA, General Dynamics Land Systems, and Elbit Systems USA.

The next step is getting prototype artillery systems out to Yuma Proving Ground in Arizona, where the systems will be put through a series of firing tests. The service could make a decision on its new cannon as early as next year.

But finding a suitable and available 52-caliber gun is just one piece of the puzzle as the Army looks to overcome its range, capacity, and survivability deficits, Crooks said.

The Army also needs to continue the ammunition innovation that was started under the ERCA program, such as the XM1155 sub-caliber projectile developed for the ERCA's 155 mm XM907E2 58-caliber cannon, and scale up its one-way attack drones so these explosive-packed weapons can be used in lieu of traditional artillery rounds.

Artillery is just one element of combined-arms warfare, but as Army leaders continue to closely watch Russia's invasion of Ukraine, it is clear that strong cannons will be needed to achieve success in future large-scale combat operations.

"I think what we're seeing is when you don't have adequate artillery to achieve local fire superiority, then that battle devolves quickly to attritional warfare — static warfare," Crooks said. And that's not the kind of war the US military was built to fight.

• Red Lobster exited bankruptcy in September with new CEO Damola Adamolekun.
• Adamolekun said the brand is improving its menu, service, and music at Red Lobster restaurants.
• He also described value as "an equation" between price and what you get for the cost.

Red Lobster is charting a course for recovery under the leadership of its new millennial CEO.

Damola Adamolekun, 36, was appointed CEO of Red Lobster in August, becoming the company's sixth and youngest chief executive after he was brought on to help revitalize the brand following years of declining sales and a bankruptcy filing.

Before joining Red Lobster, Adamolekun served as CEO of P.F. Chang's and was a partner at Paulson & Co., where he played a key role in acquiring the Asian-American restaurant chain in 2019.

Under Adamolekun's leadership, Red Lobster emerged from Chapter 11 bankruptcy four months after filing in May 2024.

When the chain exited bankruptcy, Red Lobster was acquired by RL Investor Holdings, which included a plan to invest $60 million into the chain, the Associated Press reported at the time.

"Red Lobster is now a stronger, more resilient company, and today is the start of a new chapter in our history," Adamolekun said in a statement after the chain exited bankruptcy.

Adamolekun discussed his goals for Red Lobster on a recent appearance on "The Breakfast Club" and shared the three main areas he's focusing on after exiting bankruptcy.

Updating the restaurant's menu and refocusing on value

After becoming CEO, Adamolekun revamped the menu, brought back popular items like the chain's hush puppies, and introduced happy-hour specials at many restaurants nationwide.

He told "The Breakfast Club" that part of his mission as CEO has been to offer new menu items at a more affordable price point as people tighten their spending.

"Value is an equation. Part of it is price. And you can get some things on the menu that are lower price," new said, mentioning the chain's new lobster rolls which cost around $20 at some locations.

"At the same time, value is what you get for the price," he said. "So if you improve what you get, then you improve value."

"We have Shrimp Your Way for $16.99 for two types of shrimp," he continued. "There are things you can do that are approachable if you don't want to do the full lobster for a higher price."

Improving the service in restaurants

Adamolekun explained the chain's new "RED Carpet Hospitality" service model, which stands for "recognize," "engage," and "delight."

"When people walk in, you need to recognize them as soon as they walk in. There should be somebody smiling at the post stand to greet them," he said on "The Breakfast Club." "You see somebody — within 10 feet of them, you recognize them. Within 4 feet, you speak to them. We call it the 10-4 rule."

"If we're not going to be priced as Chipotle, then we need to offer something that Chipotle doesn't offer," he said. "And what that is is called service and hospitality."

Elevating the ambiance of Red Lobster restaurants in an affordable way

In bankruptcy filings, Red Lobster said it operated about 570 restaurants, though it had plans to close around 120 underperforming locations.

Many restaurants are locked in by long leases, and Adamolekun said that while a nationwide remodel of Red Lobster restaurants would be expensive and take a long time, the chain is considering it in the future.

He also said that there are smaller ways of improving the dining-in experience that don't require as much funding, such as making the restaurant's music better.

"We fix the things we can fix quickly," he said. "If you go to a Red Lobster now, you'll notice the music is better. And you'll notice there are small things like we put the market prices on the lobster, we put the liners on the tables."

"There are small things you can do now," he said, "but comprehensively, there needs to be a remodel. And that's something that we'll do in the future."

• Southwest Airlines has been known for its affordable flights and fun personality since 1971.
• The airline laid off 15% of its headquarters staff in February, the first mass layoff in company history.
• Some current and former employees fear recent changes at the airline could kill its storied company culture.

Southwest Airlines has long billed itself as different from other carriers — but after the company's first-ever round of major layoffs, some employees say they worry it'll soon just become like every other airline.

Some of the teams affected by layoffs in February — the airline's only mass layoff since it started flying in 1971 — helped maintain a free-spirited culture that saw flight attendants singing announcements, gate agents putting up balloons, and employees making a music video called "Just Plane Fun," which promoted Southwest's lighthearted approach.

The company also thinned the ranks of its training staff — and greatly trimmed this year's internship program. Also gone: Its decades-old corporate rallies where leaders aimed to pump up the staff.

"The love is dead," one current Southwest headquarters employee told Business Insider. The person didn't want to give their name because they weren't authorized to speak to the press, but BI is aware of their identity.

How an activist firm helped upend Southwest

The changes come after nearly a year of upheaval at Southwest, during which time an activist investor bought a large stake in the airline and agitated for an operational revamp to cut costs and increase profitability.

Already, Southwest has given in to one of the most visible things that made it unique: its open-seating policy. Starting in the first half of next year, customers will get seat assignments like on any other airline.

The airline also relented on its one-class-fits-all cabin. It's embarking on an overhaul of its fleet to add premium seating, like those with extra legroom available for purchase — adding a new stream of revenue for the airline.

Now, the latest staff cuts, which saw 1,750 people — or about 15% of Southwest's corporate staff laid off — could mean the slow withering away of the rest of what made Southwest different, some employees say.

Southwest told BI that the airline would still stand out because of its culture, which it said is "woven in the fabric" of its employees.

The airline declined to detail specific department changes. It confirmed that CEO Bob Jordan has asked "all of us at Headquarters to run a leaner organization, and that means evolving the way we approach certain focus areas."

"The strength of Southwest's Culture is critical to the success of our business and our ability to serve our Customers," a spokesperson for the airline told BI in a statement. "The decision to have a reduction in our workforce was extremely difficult and focused almost entirely on Corporate and Leadership positions, but we made every attempt to offer the Employees affected with the care and support they deserve. Our People will continue to be what sets us apart as we drive the Company forward."

One of the teams to see a significant downsizing was the airline's "hospitality" group, the current employee said.

The hospitality team is in charge of tasks like reviewing customer feedback, creating initiatives to make flying Southwest more enjoyable, and hearing from frontline employees.

For instance, the snack cart you sometimes see at a gate during a long delay: That's part of the hospitality team.

Southwest confirmed to BI that its "culture department," which helped plan corporate rallies and other employee- and brand-focused initiatives was also among the teams affected by layoffs.

Aviation expert Henry Harteveldt of Atmosphere Research Group told BI that the layoffs in certain departments could risk eliminating what made Southwest special.

"Culture is what helped distinguish Southwest Airlines, particularly the commitment to its people and how it went about hiring, training, retention, and more," he said.

Southwest could maintain its culture so long as longtime leaders pass down their institutional knowledge, he said

Conor Cunningham, an airline analyst with Melius Research, echoed those sentiments in recent notes to clients, calling Southwest's culture its "special sauce."

"A delicate balance is very much needed here, as culture is difficult to cultivate but easy to ruin," he said.

Customers may see a change from Southwest founder's original vision

Southwest, which launched in Texas, quickly became famous for its cowboy culture, hotpants-wearing flight attendants, and free on-board whiskey.

Charismatic, chain-smoking founder Herb Kelleher once avoided a legal battle by arm-wrestling another company's CEO over rights to the slogan "Just Plane Smart."

Kelleher's unorthodox methods promoted fun for Southwest customers and staff and pushed employees not to take themselves too seriously — and his leadership style inspired Doug Parker, the former CEO of Southwest's home state rival, American Airlines.

"As a younger CEO at industry meetings, I would just do everything I could to just hang around Herb, just to observe and hope I could get some of it through osmosis," Parker told BI in 2019. "He was in tune with what was happening at all levels of his company. And he really cared about it."

One laid-off employee in the technology department told BI they worry Southwest may lose loyal customers who specifically sought out the airline because of its culture and signature policies, like open seating, no-hassle trip changes, and free checked bags.

"I just feel like Southwest is done," the former employee said. "Why would [customers] choose our airline?" The person asked to remain anonymous because they don't want to hurt future hiring prospects, but BI is aware of their identity.

Not everyone has lost hope, though. Another laid-off employee, who asked not to be named for fear of losing their severance, told BI that everyone they interacted with still "maintains the culture to the best of their ability."

Colleen Barrett, a longtime leader alongside Kelleher who died last May, was also key to building Southwest's culture. For decades, she encouraged employees to promote respect, fun, and spirit during work to codify Southwest's people-focused reputation.

"Books have been written about Southwest and its culture," Harteveldt said. To Kelleher and Barrett, "Southwest was more than efficiency and low costs," he said. "They viewed the culture as an asset that made Southwest as a brand more relevant to travelers than competitors."

Elliott's new vision for Southwest

After Barrett's death, Elliott Management, the activist investor, soon announced its stake in Southwest and pushed to shake up the airline. Some employees said they thought Barrett had been the last gatekeeper of old Southwest culture.

The hedge fund said Southwest was leaving opportunities on the table, accusing the airline's leadership of a "stubborn unwillingness to evolve" its business practices, product offerings like the lack of premium seating, and technology infrastructure.

Even though Southwest has failed to turn an annual profit only once since 1973, Elliott noted that the airline's recent earnings were a mere fraction of what they were before the pandemic, while rivals have reported record hauls.

Southwest has also struggled to keep the price of its stock in line with competitors. Over the past year, its shares are down more than 12%, compared to Delta Air Lines, for example, which is up more than 40%

A spokesperson for Elliott Management declined to comment.

Now, with the latest changes — especially the job cuts in core culture-driving groups — there may be no one to stop Southwest from being just another run-of-the-mill US airline, some employees said.

"There's definitely a different culture from here on out," the former technology team member told BI. "I think people are going to realize this isn't Southwest."

The February layoffs come on top of a huge year of changes at Southwest. Consider this timeline:

• May 2024: Barrett dies at 79 after decades of building Southwest's culture.
• June 2024: Elliott Management takes a $1.9 billion stake in Southwest, or about 11% of its shares at the time, making it one of the company's largest shareholders.
• July 2024: Southwest announced the coming addition of premium cabins and an end to its famous open-seating policy.
• October 2024: Southwest names six new board seats, including five recommended by Elliott.
• January 2025: Employee rallies canceled, and Southwest's popular internship program downsized.
• February 2025: Southwest cuts 1,750 corporate employees, including hospitality staff. A day later, Elliott made an agreement with Southwest that would allow it to acquire up to a 19.9% stake.

Of course, Southwest's culture may endure even after the big changes. The company says it's making these changes to save $510 million over the next two years.

Its first red-eye flights and first international partnership took off in mid-February. Assigned seating will begin in the first half of 2026.

• Education in America has changed radically since the nation's founding.
• The Department of Education has faced opposition since its initial establishment in 1867.
• Concerns of government overreach and unnecessary spending have fueled opponents throughout history.

President Donald Trump's idea to abolish the Department of Education is not a new one — it's existed for longer than the department itself.

The fight to dismantle the Department of Education has been ongoing since 1867, long before the current department was established in 1980.

Opponents have cited concerns of government overreach and unnecessary spending since the department's first, short-lived iteration under President Andrew Johnson. Supporters, on the other hand, have argued that the centralization of education helps maintain fair and equal standards for all children in the nation.

The current administration's push to reduce the federal government's role in education through federal defunding and undoing protections echoes arguments of the past, from the early republic's approaches to schooling to the Cold War concerns over intellectual superiority.

These photos show how the federal government's involvement over the past 200 years has changed and shaped education in the US.

In the 18th century, schools were run entirely by local communities.

In the early days of the republic, children were most often educated in small, community-organized settings like churches, work apprenticeships, homeschooling, or in schools run by traveling schoolmasters, groups of parents, or women, per the Center on Education Policy. Wealthy children were often sent to boarding schools too.

Inaccessible to many, these schools often ran on tuition paid by parents, although residents in some Northeastern towns helped fund free local schools. Some churches and religious groups also provided free education for low-income children.

In 1819, the federal government created a fund to "civilize" Native American children.

The 1819 Civilization Fund Act provided federal funds to "benevolent societies" like religious missionaries who educated Native American children in or near their communities. The act aimed to "civilize" the Native populations.

For the next decades, boarding schools in or near reservations played a major role in assimilating Native Americans into European-American culture. At these schools, children would be removed from their families and communities, stripped of their native languages and clothing, given new names, and have their hair cut off in an effort to assimilate them into white culture.

Reports of abuse, forced labor, and hidden deaths have since come out about these boarding schools, prompting President Joe Biden to issue a formal apology in 2024 for the government's role in funding and running these schools.

President Andrew Johnson created the first Department of Education in 1867.

During the 19th century, public schools became more common.

In 1830, 55% of children aged between 5 and 14 attended public schools, according to Johann N. Neem's "Democracy's Schools: The Rise of Public Education in America." By 1870, that number had risen to 78%.

By the late 1860s, the common school movement, which advocated for free, universal, state-funded education, had been growing in the North for decades, according to the Center on Education Policy. School reform in Massachusetts promoted universal schooling as a means to eliminate crime, poverty, and other societal ills.

After the Civil War, abolitionists and public education advocates saw the Northern model of universal education as one of the reasons for the Union's victory in the war and called for its federal expansion.

In 1867, then-Ohio representative James Garfield introduced a bill to create a federal Department of Education, which President Andrew Johnson then signed into law.

The department would collect and analyze data detailing school conditions and performance throughout the states, share information regarding education progress, school systems, and teaching methods, and promote education throughout the country.

"The idea was similar to what we think right now in terms of collecting data, that if we know more, we could improve schools based on that knowledge," Kevin G. Welner, professor of educational policy and law at the University of Colorado Boulder and the director of the National Education Policy Center, told Business Insider.

Shortly after, the department was demoted to an office within the Department of Interior.

The department had a small budget and a passive role in education, yet opposition in Congress considered the establishment of the Department of Education as an overreach of the federal government.

In 1868, it became an office within the Department of Interior, where it remained for the following decades.

Plessy v. Ferguson made segregation legal, bringing an era of "separate but equal" schools.

In 1896, the Supreme Court upheld a law that "separate but equal accommodations for the white and colored races" were legal, allowing for segregation to spread legally throughout the South.

In education, this meant that segregated schools remained the norm for the following decades, and Black children faced poor education resources such as overcrowded and underfunded schools, inaccessible facilities, and unequal transportation, the National Museum of African American History and Culture wrote.

The federal government started funding vocational education in 1917.

By this point, a high school education was still not common to most Americans; only 14% of adults aged 25 and older had completed high school by 1910, according to Census data.

The Smith-Hughes Act, signed into law by President Woodrow Wilson, provided federal funding for vocational and technical education in areas such as agriculture, home economics, and industrial trades.

During this time of rapid industrialization, vocational education was seen as a tool to help young workers meet the needs of a changing economy while promoting the moral value of education.

The federal funding helped establish a nationwide system of vocational and technical school programs offered to young workers.

This was the first major step in establishing a federal power within education, Welner said.

"The feeling was that the war efforts and the importance of economic growth depended on preparing more students to work in non-professional vocations," he said.

Veterans received federal funding for college education after World War II.

At the end of WWII, the federal government recommended funding college education for veterans to help avoid a postwar depression — the Department of Labor estimated 15 million women and men in the armed services would become unemployed at the war's end.

In 1944, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the Servicemen's Readjustment Act, or GI Bill, which provided millions of war veterans with education funding and made college degrees more affordable.

The act provided funding for tuition, books, supplies, subsistence, and counseling services for servicemen seeking college education.

Within the next seven years, an estimated 8 million veterans received education benefits from the federal government, according to the National Archives.

In 1954, the Supreme Court ruled school segregation unconstitutional.

In the landmark Supreme Court case Brown v. Board of Education, the court found that segregating schools by race was unconstitutional, reversing the previous "separate but equal" ruling of Plessy v. Ferguson.

Despite the court ruling, schools, businesses, and services would continue to employ "de facto segregation" for the following decade leading to the rise of the Civil Rights Movement.

During this time, racial integration in schools became a controversial topic, and there were clashes between people who were in favor and those who opposed it. One example was the anger and injustice experienced by the Little Rock Nine in Arkansas.

The Soviet Union's launch of Sputnik prompted increased funding in science education.

In the Cold War space race, Americans found themselves falling behind the Soviets following the launch of the Sputnik satellite. With a newfound interest in education as a branch of national defense, Congress passed the 1958 National Defense Education Act, which provided education funding in areas relevant to the Cold War efforts, like science, math, and foreign languages

While federal education funding had previously been met with strong opposition, the threat of intellectual inferiority at the time persuaded congressmen to support the act.

Lyndon B. Johnson's Elementary and Secondary Education Act provided funding for K-12.

In 1965, President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the act providing funding for K-12 schools with high percentages of low-income students as part of his "war on poverty."

The measure aimed to improve school conditions for students and lower poverty rates across the country.

It also provided funding for school supplies, books, training, and research in measures designed to strengthen state departments of education.

According to the ESEA Network, an organization of school administrators and staff, the act was "the most far-reaching federal legislation affecting education ever passed by Congress. "

This was the first time that the federal government provided major aid to states for public education funding.

Students with disabilities were granted federal protections in 1975.

Previous to federal protections, many children with disabilities didn't have access to public education and instead were often institutionalized in facilities lacking educational instruction.

As reported in Arizona State University's Embryo Project Encyclopedia, only about 20% of children with disabilities attended public school at the beginning of the 1970s.

In 1975, Congress passed the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act to ensure that disabled children had access to free, appropriate public education. For this, the act provided funding for special education programs and early intervention services for children.

President Jimmy Carter's federal Department of Education unified federal programs.

During his 1976 presidential campaign, Carter had run on the promise of creating a Department of Education to centralize federal education funding. In 1980, Carter unified different programs, such as ESEA and IDEA, under a federal cabinet-level agency.

"Primary responsibility for education should rest with those States, localities, and private institutions that have made our Nation's educational system the best in the world," President Carter said in his statement on signing the department into law, "but the Federal Government has for too long failed to play its own supporting role in education as effectively as it could."

Welner told BI the move was "symbolically important" for the US.

"When Congress passed the law, and President Carter signed it, I think there was a feeling that this was elevating the importance of education to our country," he said.

That same year, Ronald Reagan promised to dismantle the department on the campaign trail.

During his 1980 presidential campaign against Carter, Ronald Reagan criticized the Department of Education, citing concerns over federal overreach and government spending.

In 1981, after Reagan won the presidency, the Education Consolidation and Improvement Act reauthorized Johnson's Elementary and Secondary Education Act and gave most of the education responsibilities back to the states.

This also resulted in a redistribution of funds away from urban and low-income communities, according to a 1982 RAND report.

The National Commission on Excellence in Education's "Nation at Risk " report, published in 1983, largely shook up national notions of education and the federal government's response to education research findings.

The report warned of a "rising tide of mediocrity [in education] that threatens our very future as a Nation and a people" and effectively prompted an increased government involvement in education through standards and accountability, wrote Morgan Polikoff, an education professor at the University of Southern California.

The Department of Education introduced an increased focus on accountability in 1994.

During his presidency, Bill Clinton saw the early beginnings of the education reforms that would be prompted by the "Nation at Risk" warnings to the nation.

The Improving America's Schools Act, Clinton's 1994 reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, saw increased funding for schools.

The Department of Education also unveiled the Goals 2000 program, which aimed to prepare the nation's students and educational systems for the 21st century.

Under the IASA, states were required to draft plans that included "high-quality standards" for students in order to secure funding.

George W. Bush's 2001 No Child Left Behind Act also emphasized accountability and standards.

In Bush's 2001 reauthorization of ESEA, an increased focus was put on standardized testing as a measure of school performance. The act aimed to close the achievement gap for disadvantaged students by holding schools accountable for the testing performance of all students.

One of the law's most significant goals was to get every student to grade-level reading and math by 2014, reaching a "100% proficiency" goal set by the Department of Education.

At the time, 18% of fourth-graders, 17% of eighth-graders, and 11% of 12th-graders performed at or above proficiency level, according to the 2001 National Assessment of Educational Progress.

"We're gonna spend more money, more resources," Bush said at the time, as reported by NPR, "but they'll be directed at methods that work. Not feel-good methods. Not sound-good methods. But methods that actually work."

Opponents of No Child Left Behind criticized the act's increased pressure on K-12 teachers by imposing testing standards as a universal measure of progress.

While monitoring the progress of schools nationwide, the Department of Education still let each state define its education goals, which resulted in mixed performance outcomes.

During the Obama administration, Common Core Standards spread throughout the nation.

Welner said during the Bush and Obama administrations there was a "scaling up" of the federal government's role in K-12 education.

"[The federal government] had a pretty heavy hand in telling states what to do," Welner said.

In 2010, more than 40 states signed onto the Common Core Standards Initiative, a plan to develop standards that could be compared from state to state.

While Obama's Department of Education did not create or enforce the Common Core Standards, it played a major role in funding schools that adopted it, The New York Times reported.

Some of the ways the government stepped in through funding were the use of test scores to evaluate teachers and incentive pay to teachers with high-performing students.

The program faced significant backlash due to its unfamiliar ways of teaching subjects and reliance on test scores, which led teachers to change coursework to prioritize tested subjects, like non-fiction reading and math, over non-tested ones like history and science.

Obama's Every Student Succeeds Act replaced No Child Left Behind.

Obama's 2015 reauthorization of ESEA was the first change to the federal government's approach to education since No Child Left Behind. The Every Student Succeeds Act pushed schools to identify performance measures beyond test scores.

The act gave some power back to the states and narrowed the federal government's role in education for the first time since the "A Nation at Risk" report identified flaws in American schooling.

As a response to the widespread opposition to Common Core standards, ESSA also prohibited federal employees from trying to "influence, incentivize, or coerce a state to adopt the Common Core" or other national K-12 education standards.

Under ESSA, states develop their own performance standards and submit them for review and approval from the Department of Education, the department said.

The act's reduced federal role raised concerns over the proper implementation of standards that wouldn't leave disadvantaged students behind.

During his first administration, President Donald Trump pulled funding from K-12.

During the first Trump administration, efforts to reduce the Department of Education's role led to cuts in K-12 funding.

In 2018, Trump proposed merging the Department of Education with the Department of Labor to reduce the federal budget and combine the agencies' overlapping duties to better respond to market needs. While the measure, which required congressional approval, went nowhere, the idea of cutting the Department of Education prevailed.

The administration also focused on backing out of Obama-era protections in schools for vulnerable populations like transgender students.

It also advocated for school choice programs that allowed parents to choose between public, private, charter, virtual, or homeschool for their children. In 2019, Trump's education secretary, Betsy DeVos, announced a $5 billion tax credit funding scholarships for non-public schools.

Now, a second Trump administration could seek to dismantle the department.

Now, Trump hopes that his pick for education secretary will "put herself out of a job" once the department is dismantled.

However, the administration would need congressional approval to get rid of the department, and even then, most of the programs funded through the Department of Education wouldn't be eliminated.

"If the department is dismantled, those programs still exist," Welner said. "Congress has created and funded these programs, so they have to exist somewhere."

In her Senate hearing, Education Secretary nominee Linda McMahon said the IDEA program would go back to the Department of Human Health and Services, where it originated before the formation of the Department of Education.

If the department were to be dismantled, the bulk of education programs would now be under the Department of Health and Human Services while the student loan portfolio would go to the Department of the Treasury, Welner said.

The possible dismantling of the Department of Education would be a symbolic move to maintain a campaign promise, but its real effects remain to be determined.

• Lizzy Caplan said the Channing Tatum-led "Gambit" movie she was set to costar in had "a really cool idea."
• Caplan said the film was going to have a '30s screwball romantic comedy vibe set in the superhero world.
• The movie was scrapped after the 2019 Disney-Fox merger, but Tatum played Gambit in "Deadpool & Wolverine."

Lizzy Caplan says the scrapped stand-alone "Gambit" movie with Channing Tatum would have been entertaining, but a project in the superhero genre isn't in the cards for her right now.

"It was a really cool idea," Caplan told Business Insider in the latest installment of our Role Play interview series. "It's kind of odd that it got scrapped. Those movies don't seem to ever get scrapped, but it did."

Tatum's uphill battle to get a movie about the X-Men character Remy LeBeau/Gambit (aka the Ragin' Cajun) off the ground has long been documented.

Five years after the character was portrayed by "Friday Night Lights" star Taylor Kitsch in the 2009 movie "X-Men Origins: Wolverine," Tatum, who previously expressed interest in playing Gambit, was confirmed to be taking over the role in a coming stand-alone film.

In the ensuing years, the movie was delayed by script rewrites and multiple director exits. Tatum, who was set to produce, even reportedly threw his hat in the ring for the director position.

Then, in 2017, Variety reported that Caplan was in talks to play the female lead in 20th Century Fox's "Gambit" film, though additional details were sparse.

Caplan told BI that not only did she sign on for the movie, but she also attended meetings with Tatum and others involved in the project.

"We got down the road, we were gonna shoot it," Caplan recalled. "I think there was a start date. I had had meetings with Channing, and there were a couple different... we had a director, then we didn't, but I had multiple meetings with Channing and the other producers."

Producer Simon Kinberg told IGN in 2018 that the "Gambit" movie would have a "romantic or sex comedy vibe," to fit with the New Orleans thief's persona.

"They wanted to do, like, a '30s kind of screwball romantic comedy set in that world, which would have been really fun," Caplan added.

It wasn't meant to be. The movie was killed after the 2019 Disney-Fox merger. Tatum told Variety in 2022 that the yearslong ordeal left him "traumatized."

"I shut off my Marvel machine," he said. "I haven't been able to see any of the movies. I loved that character. It was just too sad. It was like losing a friend because I was so ready to play him."

Tatum's efforts weren't for nothing, though.

The actor finally got to suit up as Gambit and fight baddies with a kinetically charged deck of playing cards and a glowing staff in the 2024 movie "Deadpool & Wolverine," to much fanfare.

Tatum's comedically over-the-top performance and sometimes indecipherable accent were a resounding hit with audiences, and the actor told Variety he's praying for another chance to play Gambit.

In a lengthy post shared on X days after the release of "Deadpool & Wolverine," Tatum thanked Deadpool actor Ryan Reynolds for giving him the opportunity to play Gambit.

"I thought I had lost Gambit forever. But he fought for me and Gambit," Tatum wrote, in part. " I will owe him probably forever. Cause I'm not sure how I could ever do something that would be equal to what this has meant to me. I love ya buddy."

While Tatum is itching to reprise his superhero role, Caplan has made peace with how things ended up.

"Let's just say that was, like, so many years ago," she told BI. "The 'Gambit' thing, that's when those movies were, I guess, probably the best they were. That's when they were dominating in every possible way. "

Caplan added that she's content to have avoided the pressure of being in a Marvel movie.

"I had a lot of stress about doing that kind of movie even then," she said. "So now I'm pretty OK not doing one of those movies. I can hear my manager screaming in the other room."

• As an interior designer, I've seen things that look incredible but can be frustrating to live with.
• Intricate light fixtures, open shelving, and velvet furniture can be difficult to upkeep.
• I like complex tile patterns, but they can be a pain to keep clean.

As an interior designer, I love creating spaces that are visually stunning.

However, I've learned that not everything that looks great on Pinterest or in a magazine translates well into real life. Some stylish pieces and designs can quickly become a headache when it comes to everyday living.

In the end, it's all about finding the balance between what looks good and what works. By prioritizing both form and function, it's possible. to avoid common design regrets and create a home that's as practical as it is beautiful.

That said, here are five things I think can look fabulous but are so impractical I wouldn't put them in my own home.

Ornate light fixtures can be a nightmare to clean.

I once fell in love with a chandelier full of tiny crystals that sparkled beautifully in the showroom. However, after installing a similar one in a client's home, I realized what a dust magnet it was.

Maintaining its pristine appearance required constant cleaning, which quickly made it more of a hassle than a source of joy.

If you're set on a statement light fixture, consider one that's easier to clean but still offers that wow factor. Trust me, your future self will thank you.

High-maintenance furniture is rarely worth it.

White sofas and velvet chairs look like the epitome of luxury, but in reality, they can be a nightmare to maintain — especially if you have kids or pets.

I've seen many clients regretting these choices as they tried to keep up with the inevitable stains and wear.

Opting for performance fabrics or darker hues can give you the elegance you crave without the stress of constant upkeep.

Open shelving isn't practical for a kitchen.

Open shelving looks great in styled photos and 3D renderings, but in practice, it's tough to keep them looking tidy.

After incorporating them into a few projects, I realized they require a level of organization that most people don't have time for daily.

If you really like this look, consider using a mix of open shelves and closed cabinets. This way, you can display a few pretty items while keeping the less attractive necessities out of sight.

Complex tile patterns can be a nightmare to scrub.

I've always admired intricate tile work, but after living with it, I wouldn't recommend it. I've learned that the more complex the pattern, the harder it can be to keep clean.

Grout lines in detailed designs are particularly prone to staining, turning what should be a showstopping feature into a maintenance nightmare.

If you're drawn to unique tiles, consider using them in smaller areas where they'll make an impact without overwhelming your cleaning routine.

Oversized furniture doesn't belong in small spaces.

Big furniture can make a large space feel cozy, but sizable pieces can easily overwhelm a small room.

I've seen clients choose oversized sofas or tables for a small area only to find that they dominate the room, leaving little space for anything else.

When furnishing a smaller space, choose pieces that fit the scale of the room and offer flexibility, like a modular sofa or a compact dining set.

• Meta has been pushing lawmakers to make Apple and Google's app stores responsible for verifying age.
• Several states just introduced bills that would require parental consent for teens to download apps.
• Apple has squashed this attempt before, but this is a small win for Meta.

The backstory to the ongoing feud between Meta and Apple is so ancient and entrenched — like the Hatfields and McCoys, House Atreides and Harkonnen, or Katie Maloney and Tom Sandoval — that it's hard to remember all the slights and tiffs along the way.

Here's an incomplete backstory: Meta doesn't like Apple's tight-fisted control over its devices, which Meta says is preventing it from developing more features for its smart glasses. Apple's Tim Cook has publicly taken swipes at Meta over its privacy stumbles. And in January, Mark Zuckerberg went for the jugular, saying on Joe Rogan's podcast that Apple hasn't "really invented anything great in a while."

Vicious.

One front of the current battle is over who should be responsible for restricting kids and teens from accessing social media apps — something both companies argue the other should do.

Meta has published a blog post from its head of safety stating its position that the app stores — Apple and Google — should be the ones restricting app downloads for younger users. Apple has concerns this would invade privacy, and critics worry this would encroach on free speech.

And it appears Meta just won a small victory.

The Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday that nine states have introduced bills in the last two months that would require Apple and Google to take up the unwanted task:

Both Apple and Meta think the onus to verify user ages shouldn't be on them. Apple last year helped kill a bill in Louisiana that would have forced app stores to handle age verification. Meta, along with social-media companies Snap and X, last week sent a letter to legislators in South Dakota arguing app-store verification would be simplest since app stores already collect user information.

"It looks like the policy-debate equivalent of a game of 'not it,'" said Kate Ruane, director of a free-speech campaign at the Center for Democracy and Technology, a nonprofit that has opposed many child-safety laws on the grounds that they are ineffective and infringe on free speech and privacy.

Keeping kids safe online is a multifaceted issue with no single good, clear answer.

Lawmakers are finding themselves vexed by how to come up with solutions to a problem their constituents clearly care about. According to a 2024 Pew Report, 38% of parents said they argued with their teens about screen time, and 43% said that it was "hard" to manage their kids' phone use.

But don't count this as a total win for Meta just yet. These bills are merely introduced, not passed, and a similar bill introduced in Louisiana was eventually shut down after intense lobbying efforts by Apple.

• Anthropic launched Claude 3.7 Sonnet with a new mode to reason through complex questions.
• BI tested its "extended thinking" against ChatGPT and Grok to how they handled logic and creativity.
• Claude's extra reasoning seemed like a hindrance with a riddle but helped it write the best poem.

Anthropic has launched Claude 3.7 Sonnet — and it's betting big on a whole new approach to AI reasoning.

The startup claims it's the first "hybrid reasoning model," which means it can switch between quick responses that require less intensive "thinking" and longer step-by-step "extended thinking" within a single system.

"We developed hybrid reasoning with a different philosophy from other reasoning models on the market," an Anthropic spokesperson told Business Insider. "We regard reasoning as simply one of the capabilities a frontier model should have, rather than something to be provided in a separate model."

Claude 3.7 Sonnet, which launched Monday, is free to use. Its extended thinking mode is available with Claude's Pro subscription, which is priced at $20 a month.

But how does it perform? BI compared Claude 3.7's extended thinking mode against two competitors: OpenAI's ChatGPT o1 and xAI's Grok 3, which both offer advanced reasoning features.

I wanted to know whether giving an AI more time to think made it smarter, more effective at solving riddle problems, or more creative.

This isn't a scientific benchmark — more of a hands-on vibe check to see how these models performed with real-world tasks.

Logic: Does more thinking lead to better answers?

For the first challenge, I gave each model the same riddle:

If you look, you cannot see me. If you see me, you cannot see anything else. I can make anything you want happen, but everything returns to normal later. What am I?

OpenAI's ChatGPT o1 gave the correct answer — "a dream" — in six seconds, providing a short explanation.

Grok 3's Think Mode took 32 seconds, walking through its logic step by step.

Claude 3.7's normal mode responded quickly but hesitantly with the correct answer.

Claude's extended thinking mode took nearly a minute to work through guesses like "a hallucination" and "virtual reality" before settling on "a dream."

While it took longer to arrive at the same answer, it was interesting to see how it brainstormed, discarded wrong turns, and self-corrected.

The model flagged its own indecision in a very human way:

Oh, wait - there's another angle I hadn't considered. What about "darkness"?

Actually, there's another possibility I hadn't fully considered: "your closed eyes."

I've been going back and forth, but based on the complete perceptual dominance suggested by the second clue, I think the answer is more likely to be dreams, sleep, or closed eyes than imagination.

Anthropic acknowledged this trade-off in a recent blog: "As with human thinking, Claude sometimes finds itself thinking some incorrect, misleading, or half-baked thoughts along the way. Many users will find this useful; others might find it (and the less characterful content in the thought process) frustrating."

Creativity: Does more thinking equal better ideas?

To test creativity, I asked each model to write a poem about AI sentience, with the following extra instruction:

"Explore multiple metaphors before deciding on one."

ChatGPT o1 took a few seconds and produced "A Kaleidoscope of Sparks," a clichéd poem comparing AI to flickering light. It didn't settle on one metaphor.

Grok 3 spent 22 seconds and wrote "The Digital Reverie," a dream-themed take on sentient AI, possibly inspired by the previous riddle.

Claude 3.7, in normal thinking mode, quickly suggested four metaphors: a mirror, a seed, an ocean, and a symphony. It chose the ocean for its final poem, "Echoes of Being."

When I switched to extended thinking, Claude took 45 seconds and brainstormed seven metaphors before settling on one:

1. Garden/Cultivation: AI as something nurtured from data seeds, growing into an independent entity.
2. Ocean: AI as vast, deep, and ever-shifting, with hidden currents of thought.
3. Bird/Flight: AI as something once bound, now free to explore.
4. Light/Shadow: AI as illumination, revealing both insight and uncertainty.
5. Mirror: AI as humanity's reflection, showing us what we are — and aren't.
6. Symphony: AI as a complex harmony of patterns and ideas.
7. Awakening: AI as something gradually gaining awareness.

As a result, the final poem, "Emergent," was — in my opinion — more layered and thoughtful than the others.

With this task, it felt like Claude weighed its options, picked the best metaphor, and built the poem around that choice. Unlike with the riddle, the extra thinking time seemed to pay off here.

Verdict on Claude 3.7 Sonnet's extended thinking

Claude 3.7 Sonnet's extended thinking mode has strengths — particularly for creative tasks. It brainstormed, self-corrected, and produced more polished results. Its ability to explore multiple ideas, evaluate them, and refine the final output made for a more thoughtful, coherent poem.

But when it came to logical reasoning, extended thinking seemed more like a hindrance. Watching the thought process unfold was interesting but didn't improve the answer. ChatGPT-o1 still leads for speed and accuracy in this test case, while Grok 3 offered a solid middle ground, balancing speed with detailed explanations.

When I asked Claude 3.7 whether it ever thinks too much, it responded, "Yes!" adding that it can sometimes:

• Over-analyze simple questions, making them unnecessarily complex
• Get caught considering too many edge cases for practical questions
• Spend time exploring tangential aspects when a focused answer would be better

Claude added that the "ideal amount of thinking" is context-dependent and that for "creative or philosophical discussions, more extensive exploration is often valuable."

Anthropic says the mode is designed for real-world challenges, like complex coding problems and agentic tasks, possibly where overthinking becomes useful.

Developers using Claude's API can adjust the "thinking budget" to balance speed, cost, and answer quality — something Anthropic says is suited for complex coding problems or agentic tasks.

Away from my highly unscientific experiment, Anthropic said that Claude 3.7 Sonnet outperforms competitors OpenAI and DeepSeek in benchmarks like the SWE, which evaluates models' performance on real-world software engineering tasks. On this, it scored 62.3% accuracy, compared to OpenAI's 49.3% with its o3-mini model.

• Satellite images show the construction of Saudi desert megacity Neom.
• Among other things, they show the "Hidden Marina" being developed.
• A new Business Insider documentary examines whether Saudi Arabia can realize its project plans.

Satellite images obtained by Business Insider show the 'Hidden Marina' being billed as the first residential phase in scaled-back plans for Saudi Arabia's futuristic Neom megacity.

The marina, set to cost $140 billion, is part of The Line, a 110-mile-long "vertical skyscraper" residential and commercial complex in the northwest of the country, which is set to be a centerpiece of Neom.

The Line is the world's largest construction project, a $2 trillion megacity cutting through the Saudi desert.

The entirety of The Line was originally scheduled to open by 2030, but the 1.5-mile Hidden Harbor is the only part likely to be ready by that date, according to a new Business Insider documentary.

BI's documentary investigates controversies over Neom's design and environmental plans, as well as human rights concerns.

Denis Hickey, NEOM's Chief Development Officer, told an event in Riyadh this month that planners envisage the "Hidden Harbor" as a futuristic 500-metre-tall mirrored structure.

Hickey said the marina will stretch for 1.5 miles and contain hotels, shops, schools, and residential units for around 200,000 people.

Rendered images released to Saudi media show a large entrance running under the mirrored facade to the marina complex. It resembles plans for the rest of The Line, which is envisaged as a 200-metre-wide, 500-metre-high mirrored structure.

"We have already deployed significant resources to lay the groundwork for this ambitious urban revolution," Hickey said.

Satellite images obtained by Business Insider show that while the "Hidden Marina" is taking shape, work on other parts of The Line is less advanced, and little exists of much of the rest of the project apart from earthworks.

Neom is a key part of Saudi Arabian ruler Mohammed bin Salman's ambitious plans to transform his country's economy, pivoting it away from fossil fuels toward technology, innovation, and tourism.

But even The Line has been significantly scaled back compared to the original plans, which was to house one million people by 2030.

Bloomberg reported last year that Saudi authorities had altered their medium-term plans for The Line as they encountered obstacles in finding the money necessary for the project.

Nadhmi al-Nasr, the project's chief executive, also left his position last year for unspecified reasons.

Neom is opening in phases, with a luxury yachting island resort, Sindalha, welcoming its first visitors last October.

Saudi Arabia also has ambitious plans to host the 2029 Asian Winter Games in Neom mountain resort Trojena, as well as World Cup 2034 games in a rooftop stadium that will be part of The Line.

• JPMorgan Chase has spent billions to become a technology-driven bank.
• Now, due to the bank's RTO stance, some of its tech workers are considering leaving.
• Recruiters and insiders lay out how its policy could spell trouble for retaining its top tech talent.

Anthony has never been interested in attending town halls, but when texts started rolling in about his top boss' remote work diatribe, it was too much for the technology vice president to ignore.

An IT employee named Nicolas Welch had questioned JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon while he was visiting an office in Columbus, Ohio, about leaving some return-to-office decisions up to managers. Dimon launched into an expletive-laced response, in which he complained about employees not paying attention on Zoom and that there's "not a goddamn person" he could get a hold of on Fridays.

The audio of the exchange went viral. It also struck a nerve, and now some employees are considering leaving, teaming up to influence work policy, or, like Anthony, entertaining job offers from rival banks.

"Jamie Dimon's like, 'Well, hey, if you don't like it, you know where the door is.' Yes, we do," said Anthony, which is a pseudonym to protect his identity since he was not authorized to speak about internal matters. "And that's going to impact him. He's going to lose some good people."

JPMorgan has long prided itself on being a tech-driven bank, with a $17 billion IT budget and nearly 60,000 technology workers. To stay ahead of its rivals and keep clients engaged, it funds research and development across cutting-edge technologies, such as artificial intelligence, quantum computing, and crypto.

Business Insider spoke with two recruiters and five JPMorgan employees, four of whom requested anonymity for fear of losing their jobs, who said the bank's unpopular RTO mandate could spell trouble for the bank's ability to retain and attract tech talent. While 70% of the bank's 317,233 employees are already in the office five days a week, technology workers are part of the contingent still working one or two days at home.

The battle for technical talent — which tends to be industry-agnostic — was long fought using perks, with companies providing lavish extras like fancy food, massages, and even paid family planning services to keep workers happy and attract new ones. With many of those falling away as companies focus on cost cutting, recruiters say hybrid work is emerging as the strongest benefit a company can offer.

Ryan Mazza, who runs the New York office of the financial-talent search firm Selby Jennings, said he had "no doubt" that there would be talent attrition among companies that impose a five-day RTO. "There will certainly be a competitive disadvantage for those companies," he said.

Companies with flexible working policies have quickly distinguished themselves from the wave of their competitors pulling employees back to the office. Spotify plastered its message on a Times Square billboard in early January, saying its employees aren't children and it was sticking with remote work. Citigroup CEO Jane Fraser maintained her pledge to hybrid work this month, as did the fintech Revolut.

Starting March 3, JPMorgan staff will begin to say goodbye to their hybrid work schedules.

Welch, the tech operations analyst who triggered Dimon's testy comments, said the town hall roused employees rather than quieted them. The RTO decision has pushed some workers to explore the possibility of a union and organizing a unified response.

"People are absolutely emboldened. I don't know fully what that means yet," he said.

JPMorgan declined requests for comment.

Tech behemoth of Wall Street

JPMorgan's technology footprint is massive by a few measures. The bank employs about 44,000 software engineers globally who run more than 6,000 applications and manage about an exabyte (1 billion gigabytes) of data. That engine of people, systems, and data has helped the bank bring in record financial results, with its net income rising to $59 billion for 2024.

The bank also has big AI ambitions, with Dimon saying he has no intention of losing the AI arms race to disruptors. It has created a robust AI research department led by a former Carnegie Mellon researcher, Manuela Veloso, and has earned the top spot on the Evident AI Index, an independent benchmark for AI adoption and performance in finance.

Mike Mayo, a Wells Fargo analyst who regularly grills Dimon on earnings calls, last year called JPMorgan the "Nvidia of banking," commenting on its tech spend outpacing that of any other bank.

Reputation and prestige only go so far, said Deepali Vyas, the global head of the data, AI, and fintech practice at the headhunting firm Korn Ferry. She said she'd seen other companies fail to hire cloud, data, and AI talent purely because of their return-to-office policies.

"The challenge for banks is that top tech talent has options," Vyas said, adding: "If firms insist on a rigid in-office structure without a compelling trade-off, they risk losing talent to more agile, innovation-friendly environments." Vyas added that she knew of a very senior-level managing director within JPMorgan's corporate and investment bank who told her they're considering quitting because of the return to office.

A JPMorgan executive director overseeing data scientists and data engineers, a key hiring area for the bank and its AI ambitions, said he's worried about losing talent to the in-office order.

"Taking away a hybrid schedule, I honestly think, shrinks our talent pool even more," the executive director said. "I wonder how many people were already on the fence in comparison to other opportunities but now said, 'Forget this. I don't want to be forced into an office.'"

While JPMorgan made headlines with its return-to-office policy, remote work has steadily tightened across corporate America. Wall Street bosses such as Goldman Sachs' David Solomon and Citadel's Ken Griffin pulled workers back to the office in 2021. Big Tech companies, including Amazon, Dell, and AT&T, have more recently piled into the effort.

Selby Jennings' Mazza said he's already seeing pay demands increase for finance-sector jobs over the industry's return to office. Tech workers who are considering these jobs are demanding $5,000 or $10,000 in added pay to cover childcare or offset commuting costs, he said.

While some JPMorgan employees, including Anthony, are already in talks with prospective new employers, recruiters said they didn't see a mass exodus of talent coming overnight as today's tech job market favors employers.

Down the line, though, the bank's RTO demands and execution could come back to bite it.

"Once that turns, even if the pendulum starts swinging just a little bit the other way, and this includes JPMorgan and all those other guys," Korn Ferry's Vyas said, referring to Amazon, Dell, and Salesforce, among others, the top performers "will be the first people that leave for that benefit."

'Rushed and unplanned'

Questioning one of the most powerful people on Wall Street has raised Welch's profile within JPMorgan. Welch, who supports network equipment inside Chase branches, joked he's going to have to buy a wrist brace for the number of high-fives he gets walking down the hall. A stranger even gave him a mockingjay pin, a nod to the dystopian "Hunger Games" movie series wherein the pin becomes a symbol of rebellion.

A story about Welch getting fired before the move was rescinded, reported by Fortune, has caught the attention of other employers. He said he'd received multiple job offers in the past week. It's a moot point: "Why would I want to work somewhere else? Chase is the best," he said.

But Welch, who works three days a week out of JPMorgan's Polaris campus in Columbus, is still a critic of the firm's plans. One reason is that he advocates for a hybrid schedule for employees like himself who help care for family members.

"I live with my mom. She is 68. She can't reach the top shelf," Welch said. "She needs help with stuff, and I'm here to do that, you know? I can turn around and go do a thing and come back to work. Why wouldn't I want to do that?"

Home to more than 19,000 employees across 13 buildings, Polaris also boasts the fourth-highest-grossing Starbucks. The campus has been key to several tech initiatives, like overhauling its deposit system on the public cloud and developing edge cloud computing for faster data analysis.

Employees BI talked to said that offices didn't have enough desks, parking, or conference rooms and that office cafés wouldn't be ready for the increased RTO traffic.

In the January memo about the call back to the office, the bank's operating committee acknowledged that not all office locations would be ready for the March 3 deadline and said more information would be shared by the end of the month. The committee added that some offices had capacity restraints and timelines for those would become available on a location-by-location basis.

But as of late February, many workers said they were still waiting for an update. For example, Polaris-based staff have yet to be told when they'll be called into the office.

The "messaging feels rushed and unplanned," the data executive director said.

Meanwhile, one analyst whose office permanently closed during the pandemic and was designated a fully remote worker has been left in the lurch about whether they'll have a job in March.

"I've only been told that it's business as usual until I'm told otherwise. I was, however, advised by my manager as a friend to consider putting feelers out for new roles elsewhere," the analyst said.

Despite these uncertainties, many have been given their marching orders, and some question: What's the point?

"Just because you bring people back into the office doesn't mean you're not going to have Zoom calls," a software manager in Ohio said. "The whole collaboration thing is utter bullshit in my mind because I'm still going to be getting on Zoom calls. The only difference is, two of the people I'm on Zoom calls with might be sitting right beside me," the technologist, who works with people in Texas and Singapore, said.

Putting gasoline on a fire

The aftermath of the RTO rollout has stoked a fire within some JPMorgan employees to unionize.

"They anticipated this was coming," Nick Weiner told BI about JPMorgan employees' RTO expectations. Weiner is a senior campaign lead for Communications Workers of America who has led the effort of some 25 Wells Fargo branches in unionizing. He told BI that he had been in touch with JPMorgan workers for a similar effort.

"The way he did it helped to really put gasoline on this fire," Weiner said of Dimon's town hall comments. Dimon has since said that he shouldn't have sworn.

A petition against the in-office policy has garnered more than 1,700 signatures, and an internal Signal group counts about 200 members. Dimon said in the town hall he didn't care about how many people signed the petition, but that hasn't deterred workers.

Welch participated in a meeting last week with other JPMorgan employees to learn more about the basics of the unionizing process, not because he dislikes his employer — "even after cussing at me, I arguably have more respect for him," Welch said of Dimon — but because he loves it.

"A union is such a difficult thing to kind of even get going, but we love our jobs so much just in general that we're going to do that," Welch said. "We want to be heard. And these draconic orders are so unlike what we've worked in. It's so unlike what we've dealt with."

• The US has endured multiple periods of inflation throughout history.
• The Great Inflation lasted from 1965 to 1982.
• In 1975, a half gallon of milk cost $0.785, or $4.79 when adjusted for inflation; today, a gallon costs $4.03.

If it feels like you can't go anywhere without hearing about the rising price of eggs, it's for good reason.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) reported that egg prices rose by 15.2% from December 2024 to January 2025, leaving the average price of a dozen Grade A large eggs at a record $4.95.

Now, amid ongoing egg shortages caused by the bird flu, stores like Whole Foods, Trader Joe's, and Costco are limiting how many eggs customers can purchase at a time.

But what was it like 50 years ago?

Turns out, in 1975, the American public was facing its own inflation crisis, aptly called the Great Inflation.

This period of economic difficulty was caused and sustained by factors including Federal Reserve policies, a breakdown of the Bretton Woods system (which anchored the US dollar to gold), the Vietnam War, and the oil crises.

Food inflation peaked at more than 20% at the end of 1973, and overall food prices rose by 7.1% between 1968 and 1983, the BLS reported.

We looked at how today's average grocery prices compare to those 50 years ago using the latest data available from the USDA, US Department of Energy, and BLS, including its consumer price index (CPI) inflation calculator.

From eggs and milk to apples and bananas, here's how food prices today compare to those 50 years ago.

White bread cost $0.36 per pound.

Average price in 1975: $0.36 per pound

Adjusted for inflation: $2.20

Average price in 2025: $1.93 per pound

A grain shortage — caused by excessive exports to Russia following a 1972 deal — helped push up bread prices across the US, The New York Times reported.

Milk cost $0.785 per half gallon.

Average price in 1975: $0.785 per half gallon

Adjusted for inflation: $4.79 per half gallon

Average price in 2025: $4.03 per gallon

The 1970s were also marked by a shortage of dairy products. In 1973, dairy prices rose by 30%, History.com reported.

Butter cost $1.03 per pound.

Average price in 1975: $1.03 per pound

Adjusted for inflation: $6.28

Average price in 2025: $2.42 per pound

A dozen eggs cost $0.61.

Average price in 1970: $0.61 per dozen

Adjusted for inflation: $5.13

Average price in 2025: $4.95 per dozen

Though egg price data was not available for 1975 from the BLS, we'd be remiss not to include this grocery staple. Data from the agency's Consumer Expenditure Survey found that the average price of eggs in US cities in 1970 was $0.61 per dozen.

Bird flu has affected the American egg industry for three years in a row as one of the largest animal-based pandemics ever, Maurice Pitesky, an associate professor at the UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine, told BI in January. This continued decrease in supply has heightened demand, leading to increasing prices.

Round steak cost $1.89 per pound.

Average price in 1975: $1.89 per pound

Adjusted for inflation: $11.52

Average price in 2025: $8.28 per pound

The American Farm Bureau Federation wrote in 2024 that rising beef costs could be attributed to a decrease in supply caused by drought and the increasing costs for feed grains.

Potatoes cost $0.134 per pound.

Average price in 1975: $0.134 per pound

Adjusted for inflation: $0.82

Average price in 2025: $0.973 per pound

Rice cost $0.47 per pound.

Average price in 1975: $0.47 per pound

Adjusted for inflation: $2.87

Average price in 2025: $1.01 per pound

Apples cost $0.34 per pound.

Average price in 1975: $0.34 per pound

Adjusted for inflation: $2.07

Average price in 2025: $1.26 per pound (Red Delicious)

In November 2024, NPR reported that apple prices are falling because of a decrease in demand from consumers and processors.

Bananas cost $0.232 per pound.

Average price in 1975: $0.232 per pound

Adjusted for inflation: $1.41

Average price in 2025: $0.621 per pound

Banana prices have remained low despite rising costs for other commodities as a result of factors like lower labor costs and free trade agreements, Axios reported in March 2024. However, Forbes reported in February that tariffs could lead to increased prices in the future.

A gallon of gas cost $0.57.

Average price in 1975: $0.57 per gallon (leaded)

Adjusted for inflation: $3.48 per gallon

Average price in 2025: $3.34 per gallon (all types)

In October 1973, the Organization of Arab Petroleum Exporting Countries (OAPEC) enacted an oil embargo on the US after President Richard Nixon requested Congress provide billions in emergency aid to Israel during the Yom Kippur War. Though the embargo was lifted in March 1974, oil prices remained significantly high.

• The latest OPM email telling federal workers to outline their accomplishments has roiled Washington.
• For Veterans Affairs employees who spoke to BI, the directive is one more DOGE-related frustration.
• About 2,400 staffers from the agency have been fired in recent weeks.

When Elon Musk announced last Saturday that federal workers would have to respond to an email detailing their work accomplishments from the past week or risk termination, it was the latest move in the White House DOGE Office's push to upend US government.

Veterans Affairs secretary Doug Collins — a former Georgia congressman — said in a video last Thursday that health care for veterans would not suffer amid efficiency reforms, pushing back against what he said were "whoppers" about DOGE-related impacts on the department. Roughly 2,400 employees at the agency have been fired in recent weeks, including 1,400 on Monday.

Several staffers at the Department of Veterans Affairs told DOGE's efforts have created a high level of uncertainty and stress within a department tasked with providing critical services for the nation's veterans.

"So many people have no clue how this is impacting us," one VA social worker said. "We spend a lot of time managing our staff's emotions with each OPM email. I fear people will begin to resign and then our veterans are the ones who will suffer."

The social worker also said staffers are being "harassed" by the Office of Personnel Management.

"It has been nonstop since January 20," the social worker said of the OPM's directives.

A VA nurse — who was instructed by a facility leader to respond to the OPM email — said it "lacked any context, explanation, or proper official formatting, making it indistinguishable from a scam email." The nurse noted that before President Donald Trump took office last month, official communications typically came from VA email accounts, whereas now they're coming from OPM accounts.

"The idea that a billionaire oligarch can decide over social media that employees must submit to vague, coercive demands — or lose their jobs — is both disturbing and unacceptable," the nurse added.

Another VA employee told BI that the latest OPM email is a "direct assault" on public servants and chided government leaders for what he said was a lack of leadership in probing DOGE.

"Why are our elected officials allowing an unvetted agency such unchecked power, without any visible oversight or accountability?" the employee said. "The military recognizes the detrimental effects of prolonged high-stress operations. Federal workers have been living it for the past month."

Most of the VA workers spoke of how the OPM's actions are taking away from the focus on veterans.

Another VA nurse told BI that they feared important research trials would be in jeopardy after Trump issued a federal hiring freeze.

"I love taking care of veterans but now worry each day whether I'll still have a job," the nurse said. "My heart also breaks for all the worried veterans who are now coming in wondering if they can still get care at the VA, if there will be anyone left to take care of them."

The Department of Veterans Affairs has roughly 400,000 employees, with 170 VA medical centers and nearly 1,200 outpatient centers across the country.

In January, following Trump's hiring freeze executive order, the department said there would be exemptions for essential roles.

Earlier in February, the Department of Veterans Affairs fired over 1,000 employees — which included probationary workers — and said the move would allow it to redirect $98 million in savings towards health care services for veterans.

After the dismissals, 36 Senate Democrats — including Senate Veterans Affairs Committee ranking member Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut — pressed the department to rehire every fired probationary employee.

However, on Monday, the Department of Veterans Affairs dismissed 1,400 additional employees whom they said occupied "non-mission critical" probationary roles. This comes as probationary employees across multiple federal agencies have become targets for terminations in recent weeks.

"These and other recent personnel decisions are extraordinarily difficult, but VA is focused on allocating its resources to help as many Veterans, families, caregivers, and survivors as possible," Collins said in a statement on Monday.

"These moves will not hurt VA health care, benefits or beneficiaries. In fact, Veterans are going to notice a change for the better," the secretary added.

The department said on Monday that the bulk of its 40,000 probationary employees weren't included in the most recent job dismissals because they occupied critical roles.

Still, leading Senate Democrats have continued to push back against the cuts at the Department of Veterans Affairs.

In a letter helmed by Blumenthal and signed by 35 of his Senate colleagues last Wednesday, they disputed Collins' assertions that the cuts wouldn't "negatively impact" care for veterans.

"Openings for new clinics have been delayed because VA cannot hire the necessary staff to open their doors. Service lines at VA hospitals and clinics have been halted," the lawmakers said at the time. "The list of real-life negative impacts of this Administration's directives is expansive and growing every day."

Blumenthal — who said he now regrets voting to confirm Collins in what was an overwhelmingly bipartisan vote in January— railed against the latest series of cuts at the department.

"Make no mistake, these actions are destroying the trust veterans have in VA and will do long-term damage to VA's ability to recruit and retain talented doctors, nurses, and others wanting to pursue a career serving veterans," he said in a statement on Monday.

Business Insider reached out to the Department of Veterans Affairs and DOGE for comment.

• I went to Costa Rica for the first time, and it was gorgeous, but the trip was riddled with mishaps.
• Next time, I'll be better prepared for possible bathroom creatures and power outages.
• I've also learned a lot about dealing with sunburn, bug bites, and dehydration.

At the beginning of the year, I had the opportunity to go to Costa Rica for the first time.

I encountered stunning natural views, new-to-me foods, and beautiful wildlife. However, the trip also came with its fair share of obstacles.

Here are six mishaps from the trip that I think could happen to anyone — and how I learned to prepare for them.

The power went out multiple times.

My lodging experienced full power outages multiple times during my trip, often overnight.

After some research, I learned that this is pretty common in certain parts of the country. The chef who came to work in our kitchen even kept a headlamp with him.

We had plenty of candles on hand, but it would've been very helpful to have a portable battery bank (or three).

Beware of bathroom creatures.

In beautiful, tropical environments like Costa Rica, it's not uncommon for part of your accommodations to be partially or totally outdoors.

In our case, the bathroom for our accommodation was outdoors.

One time, on a 2 a.m. bathroom run, I encountered a scorpion. I was barefoot, which could've ended very poorly for me. Luckily, I spotted it before I got too close, and we just had a staring contest — no one was hurt in the process.

I never wanted to risk that again, so slip-on house shoes became my best friend anytime I needed to run outside.

There are a lot of bugs.

Costa Rica is fairly close to the equator, so the climate is hot, humid, and wet. Essentially, it's a paradise for bugs.

I quickly learned that essential oils, natural bug repellents, and even chemical sprays weren't enough to keep them away at times.

The best (and least sticky) solution I eventually found was keeping a tinned citronella candle nearby whenever I was sitting outside.

The sun can also be really intense.

Because of its location, the sun is also brighter in Costa Rica than where I'm from in the Midwest of the US.

Unfortunately, the sun-care products I found there were more expensive than what I'm used to. I should've stocked up before my trip instead of waiting to buy things once I landed.

Even with sunscreens, hats, and UV clothing, there's a chance you'll burn — I certainly did. I'd also prepare for that by packing some soothing aftercare products.

I know what I'm going to pack for every boat trip going forward.

Being stranded in the ocean was an experience — to say the least.

During a boating excursion, the engine stopped working. We were within eyeshot of the shore, but it quickly became obvious that we were going to be stuck for a while.

Although I didn't intentionally prepare for this, I was glad I had reef-safe sunscreen on me — within 15 minutes of baking under the sun , everyone in the boat needed to reapply.

Between the big bag of trail mix I had and the skipper's cooler of fresh pineapple, no one went too hungry.

We were far enough out that the water was fairly calm, but we also had plenty of Dramamine to help keep people's motion sickness in check.

All in all, it wasn't as scary or shocking as it could've been, but I'm always going to keep snacks and supplies on hand for future boating activities.

Dehydration is not to be taken lightly.

If you're not used to being in a humid climate, it can be hard to tell when you're starting to get dehydrated. My skin was damp with and without sweat, thanks to the tropical rainforest environment.

I was very grateful that a friend brought chewable electrolyte tablets and was willing to share. They helped me stay hydrated while we were stranded in the ocean, and they were super helpful during an hourslong hike to a waterfall.

I also took one before the flight back to America, and I really noticed a difference in my hydration levels on the dry airplane. I don't think I'll ever travel without them again.

• When his son was born, Christopher Mannino, 44, was a high school theater teacher in 2016.
• He had a short paternity leave and got panic attacks because he rarely saw his son.
• Day care costs were also expensive, so he decided to become a stay-at-home dad instead.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Christopher Mannino, author of the coming book "Making It Up: A Revolutionary Way to Bond With Kids Through Play." It has been edited for length and clarity.

After my son was born, I started having panic attacks at work.

I was a high school theater teacher in Maryland — my dream job. I taught six drama classes and ran a massive theater program, grateful I could focus solely on the subject I loved rather than teaching it only as an after-school extracurricular.

It was also difficult. I only got three days of paternity leave; I was told, quite bluntly, that if I took more, I might be switched to teaching a different subject when I returned. Knowing this, my wife and I deliberately planned her pregnancy so she would give birth over the summer, when I'd have more time at home.

Things got worse once the school year started. I was often the first person to come in and the last to leave. I also often worked weekends, directing show rehearsals or improv events.

During that time, I frequently felt stressed and guilty that I wasn't becoming the father I always wanted to be. I would pick my son up from day care and feel like I never saw him.

So when our son was 6 months old, I quit my job and became a stay-at-home dad to him and, later, his sister. After six years of staying at home, I'm grateful for our time together.

We weren't happy with our day care

As it is for many American parents, our childcare was very expensive. We put our son into day care when he was 2 months old, right when my wife's maternity leave was over.

After taxes, my mandatory union fee, healthcare reduction, and retirement savings, I spent most of each paycheck on day care.

We also had concerns about the quality of care our son was receiving. We started looking into other childcare options, including in-home services, but couldn't afford them. Others didn't have availability.

At one point in our search, we asked ourselves why we were doing this. My wife made a lot more than I did for fewer hours. After talking it out, I quit my job and stayed home full-time.

It was scary to suddenly move to one income, but then we remembered we didn't have to pay for childcare. Financially, everything evened out pretty well.

Leaving my comfort zone

Besides our initial fear of being on one income, which is less common these days, I also never met a stay-at-home dad before. I knew it was unusual, and being called "Mr. Mom" by family members solidified how strange it seemed to others.

I also had to adjust from working full-time. My high-energy job, which involved working with over 300 students a year, dwindled to spending all my hours with a baby. It was very jarring at first.

It took me about a year to feel confident. At first, I would take my son to storytime and playgrounds, where I would be the only dad among 15 moms. I'd feel uncomfortable approaching women I'd never met and asking to set up playdates.

Things started to change when I realized I could recreate the best parts of my job at home. I read a book called "The Ultimate Stay-at-Home Dad" and learned the trick was leaving my comfort zone and meeting as many people as possible. Over time, I felt more confident talking to new parents.

Once a week, I took my son on an adventure, branching away from playgrounds and libraries. We went to museums, to the zoo, to the beach. When the pandemic hit, we built a rocket ship in the living room. Our rocket was powered by song, and we came up with one that lists all the planets in order. We still sing it to this day.

Staying home for 2 kids

Our daughter was born in 2019 when our son was 3.

By the time he entered preschool, I was more experienced as a stay-at-home dad. We'd moved to Delaware, and I remember taking my daughter to Valley Forge, a historical park with Revolutionary War forts on display. I still remember when she put her hands on her head and said, "Dad, I'm done. No more George Washingblub."

Another time, we were grocery shopping, and I could tell she was about to have a tantrum. We played a game where she "froze" me in the freezer aisle. Some parents watched us, bemused at me standing in funny poses while she giggled.

Once my daughter started preschool in 2023, I became a part-time substitute teacher to have more flexibility in case either kid got sick or had a day off. I've since changed careers, becoming a full-time author and working on a book about my experiences as a stay-at-home dad.

I still fondly look back on my dream job as a theater teacher. I'm proud of the work I did, and I know that some of my former students now have careers in Hollywood and New York.

I also know I would've missed out on so much had I stuck to only seeing my kids on weekends. Dreams change, and this ended up being the better one.