A man tries to wash his hands with water from an automatic faucet in a public restroom. No water. At the next sink, his friend has no trouble getting water to flow. When he tries his neighbor’s faucet, it works fine. What’s going on here? The first man is Black and the second is White. […]

Some of the U.S.’s wealthiest individuals reportedly pay just a tiny fraction of the billions of dollars added annually to their fortunes in federal income tax – sometimes they pay nothing at all. Investigative journalism outlet ProPublica says it has obtained a “vast cache” of information from the Internal Revenue Service that purports to show […]

Alcohol is still the most commonly used drug among high school students. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, every year approximately 3,500 people under 21 die because of alcohol use. I have studied the relationship between alcohol marketing and youth drinking behavior for the past 20 years. In 2011, my colleagues and […]

Let’s start with a pop quiz. Who said “I’m very pro-choice in every respect” to Tim Russert on Meet the Press in 1999? Hint: His name rhymes with Hump. That’s right Donald Trump. Ever the opportunist, Trump claimed to be pro-choice before he found Jesus and decided that a politician must be rabidly anti-abortion to […]

Texting is replacing talking as the preferred form of communication? According to a recent survey by OpenMarket, 75% of millennials chose texting over talking when given the choice between being able only to text versus call on their mobile phone. To be sure, the powerful digital devices almost everyone is carrying around these days have […]

Now is not the time to put an additional financial burden on Maine residents, Maine retailers, Maine small business owners. Our state legislature is continuing to examine the benefits of doubling the tax rate on all tobacco products in this year’s legislative session. Instead of a $2 per pack tax on a pack of cigarettes, […]