Hopes up high, heads down low

It's crazy out there, but the work continues.

Apr 17, 2025

Nokia Bell Labs in Murray Hill, New Jersey

Apologies, as it’s been a minute. I’ve been trying to slow down and get a feel for just what the hell is going on out there. And I’ve failed. Things are moving fast—too fast—and I think it’s futile to try and keep up. I do think that’s at least partially by design.

I’m sure many of you can relate. Despite my attempts to take a measured mental approach to our current circumstances, I think it may be more beneficial to get swept up by the current of events and do my best to swim against the current—that is to say, nothing makes sense, it’s not going to make sense, and standing by trying to make sense of it all isn’t going to help. So, it’s probably best that I, you, we, and everyone, continue the work. In whatever form that is.

I was recently able to get a first-hand look at some of the work that is continuing to take place. It’s important work, too, and it’s happening as some of the people doing the work likely fear for their funding, their jobs, and in some cases, the possibility of being kidnapped and shipped off to some gulag in Central America.

Irregardless, as they say.

Last week, I was invited to visit Nokia Bell Labs in Murray Hill, New Jersey. The place is absolutely gargantuan—it’s more like a college campus than a corporate office complex.It was all a part of Bell Labs’ 100th anniversary, taking place this year.
For a bit of background: Bell Labs was founded in 1925, and is a massive complex housing a number of different research laboratories. It’s seriously massive. We—my fellow reporters and journalists on the media tour, roughly a dozen people or so—were led down hallways that stretched for a quarter of a mile—and oddly enough, I’d reckon that 90% of the place is empty. It used to house thousands of workers, but that was a different time.

Bell Labs is famous for developing and inventing all sorts of technologies: transistors, radio astronomy, Unix operating systems, several programming languages, solar panels, and more. The people working there have won several Nobel Prizes. In fact, some of the guys who’ve invented things we use every day are still walking around the place. It was originally owned and operated by AT&T, but over the past few decades, it has changed hands through a series of mergers and acquisitions. Most recently, it was acquired by Nokia in 2016. The labs themselves are also slated to be relocated to a newer building in New Brunswick, not far from Murray Hill, within a couple of years.
I’m not sure what will happen to the current campus, but hopefully, it’s put to good use. There’s a lot of history that deserves to be preserved.

However, as noted, the work at Bell Labs continues. I was a part of a media group that was able to tour several of the individual laboratories within—they’re all spread around the campus, and at some points, it took a solid ten or 15 minutes to walk between them through a series of labyrinthian hallways and buildings. I thought I was going to get lost and die in there—it seriously reminded me of the catacombs beneath Paris or something.

The labs we saw were not open to the public, so it was a cool chance to see some behind-the-scenes stuff. And those labs? They looked exactly how you might expect a scientific lab to look—wires, computer parts, binders, coffee mugs with quirky phrases left haphazardly on cluttered desks (“Yes, let me drop my problems and work on your problems” was one that I particularly liked), and in some areas, there were even autonomous robots zipping around.

The researchers and scientists themselves were also reminiscent of the cast of “The Big Bang Theory.” It was clear that they weren’t used to having people invade their space, and explain what they were doing to dumb-dumbs like me. But they were all kind and welcoming. It was a great experience.

As for what I saw? One lab was working on undersea cable technology, which is especially important right now, as those cables have become targets for bad actors. We saw a live feed of the data and information moving through one of those cables in real-time—we weren’t allowed to know where the cable was, and they wouldn’t get more detailed other than telling us which continents the cable connected—and how technology is improving the cables.

We saw how Nokia was working on mining technology in Brazil. They had incorporated AI into a mining operation that provided real-time feedback and data from trucks and tractors all across the mine, and in one case, we saw how one truck was experiencing more stress on its chassis than usual. What was interesting about that was that the additional stress caused the truck to shimmy a bit, losing some ore out of the back on every trip, and over the course of a year, potentially losing the operation millions of dollars. Just because of a little shimmy—and there’s no way anyone would’ve really noticed that shimmy. But the AI did, and flagged it, helping keep the mine operating at a higher efficiency, and getting the truck into the garage to fix the chassis.

I was then taken to a robotics lab, where I saw how robots are being used to manage warehouse inventories through voice commands. Essentially, a researcher could verbally tell a robot to go find a specific box on a shelf with numerous boxes, and it could. If the box was missing, it could go track it down, or find a replacement. It was pretty rudimentary, but interesting, and the tech is already being used in warehouses around the country, with flying drones, in many cases.

Another lab was working on improving telecommunications arrays and technology. I’ll admit, most of it went over my head, but the team there had found some relatively simple ways to improve our telecom and cellular systems, which allow more data to flow freely, and increase internet speeds, among other things.

One researcher said something that stuck with me: “If the pandemic had happened a decade earlier, the whole country would’ve been crippled.” That’s to say that we simply wouldn’t have had the technological backbone and infrastructure to support millions of people working and going to school remotely. It all would’ve crashed.

But perhaps the most interesting part of the tour, and frankly, the one that convinced me to make the drive out there through Jersey traffic, was the quantum computing lab. I’ve written about this topic before, and how it’s blowing my mind. Well, they’re working on quantum computers at Bell Labs, and I had the chance to talk to some of the researchers working on it. I listened to a short lecture from the head of the lab while sitting within spitting distance of the computer’s refrigerator, which keeps the machinery cool—and it was colder than outer space, or approximately -450℉.

I got to sit down with a physicist, too, who helped me understand it all a bit better. I’m not confident that I could explain it to you all. Still, the physicist was confident that this technology would become more commercially viable within the next decade, and that could blow the lid off of things. If you thought AI was changing everything, quantum computing is going to be a whole other reality.

I did get to ask some of the people working in the various labs about their thoughts relating to what was going on outside of the campus’ walls. The place is largely dark and quiet, and it felt very insulated from the outside world—insulated enough to do important work without distraction. But given the tumult we’re all experiencing, and the possibility of some of the research needing to cease due to tariffs, losses of government grants, deportations, and more, I was curious if it was affecting the researchers.

After all, these people are doing important things—it’s the stuff we don’t think about, but allows us all to keep doing our own things without disruption on a daily basis. And if they can’t keep working, we’ll all suffer for it.

Surprisingly, they were all pretty upbeat. For now. They’re still getting after it. They’re still heads-down. They’re still optimistic about the technologies they’re working on, and how they could be used to improve our lives and solve problems.

I found it…inspiring? I’ve definitely had trouble focusing. I’m concerned about the future. And all of those big-picture worries have made it difficult to sit down and, you know, write about stock movements, or whatever is in front of me on any given day.

But these people, who are actually working on important things, are still at it. They’re not letting it get to them. They’re disconnected—physically, in many respects, and mentally. They’re heads down. They know the stakes are high, and they’re getting it done, so far as I was able to tell. I can appreciate that. It’s a type of toughness and resiliency that I’ve been missing recently, and need to work on redeveloping and applying.

This is all to say that, yes, things are crazy. But the work continues.

Who bears the brunt of the Department of Education’s closure?

TLDR: Small towns and rural communities.

Mar 25, 2025

Last week, the president signed an executive order to close the Department of Education.

I’m sure we all have our opinions on this, and lots of questions. First and foremost, I think it’s important to keep in mind that the DOE’s closure was initiated by executive order. Those can be reversed, and I assume this will be if and when a new leader enters the White House who doesn’t share the same aims as the current leader. Second, it’s important to note that this isn’t something that the president can unilaterally do—though, he’ll certainly try, and he’ll certainly act like it. Congress would need to take action to shutter the DOE, or other agencies fully. This Congress might do it, too. We’ll see.

The thing is, there are problems with the Department of Education. There are problems with all agencies, businesses, and organizations. So, if you wanted a reason to close the DOE down, you could find some. Trump’s executive order highlights the fact that we spend hundreds of billions of dollars each year, and get lackluster results from our public schools as a primary motivation for shutting it down:

Unfortunately, the experiment of controlling American education through Federal programs and dollars — and the unaccountable bureaucracy those programs and dollars support — has plainly failed our children, our teachers, and our families…
…Closing the Department of Education would provide children and their families the opportunity to escape a system that is failing them. Today, American reading and math scores are near historical lows. This year’s National Assessment of Educational Progress showed that 70 percent of 8th graders were below proficient in reading, and 72 percent were below proficient in math. The Federal education bureaucracy is not working.

The order ends by saying that DOE’s “main functions can, and should, be returned to the States.” So, there’s your stated reasoning for closing the DOE. Your logic. Your chum in the water.

The Secretary of Education, former wrestling promoter Linda McMahon, had this to say about the president’s decision to close her agency:

“With today’s action, we take a significant step forward to give parents and states control over their children’s education. Teachers will be unshackled from burdensome regulations and paperwork, empowering them to get back to teaching basic subjects. Taxpayers will no longer be burdened with tens of billions of dollars of waste on progressive social experiments and obsolete programs. K-12 and college students will be relieved of the drudgery caused by administrative burdens—and positioned to achieve success in a future career they love.”

Now, let’s assume that the administration is ultimately successful in dismantling it. What then? As the executive order states, each individual state would need to take a bigger, and perhaps the only role in governing education. I think this gives us a good chance to educate ourselves as to whether that would work, and answer an important question: Who bears the brunt of a decision like this?

I’m not arguing for or against keeping the DOE. I’m not informed enough to make an argument. But I do think it’s worth taking a look at the potential effects of its closure.

What the DOE does

The DOE’s main function is to distribute money to public schools around the country, usually through grants and loans. It also distributes federal student loans, and enforces equal access laws as they relate to education. During 2024, it spent $150 billion in grants, mostly for programs that helped schools with “disadvantaged” students, special education programs, and funding after-school programs.

It’s not a terribly large agency, and as of last year, had around 4,200 employees. That’s roughly a single Army brigade. In all, it has spent between between $100 and $200 billion per year running its programs and operations, though that ballooned during the pandemic, and last year, was around $267 billion, and less than half of that during 2023.

And when it comes to funding public schools, the federal government plays a surprisingly small role. A little less than 14% of public school funding is provided by the feds, according to 2022 data.

Why close the Department of Education?

While I did note some of the logic behind the closure earlier, it’s also important to know that closing the DOE has been on many a wishlist for a long time. Famously, Rick Perry, the former governor of Texas and Secretary of Energy, said that the DOE was one of the three agencies he would close if he were elected president in 2016—the other two were the Departments of Commerce and Energy, which he would go on to run during the first Trump administration.

It’s probably safe to say that Trump issued his executive order to close it not because he has an ideological bent against it one way or the other, but simply because he’s the head of the Republican Party. And they wanted him to.

As for why the Republicans, by and large, may support such a move? In broad strokes, you can argue that the government is involving itself in a market (education) that may be better served by private interests—which may include for-profit companies. The logic here is that for-profit companies would be more focused on getting better results, lest they go out of business. In theory, they’d also be incentivized to reduce waste and corruption to achieve those results, as the goal would be to maximize profits.

That makes sense, sure. We have many for-profit education companies and schools operating around the country, too. You likely know someone who went to a private school, or perhaps you did.

Further, the idea of getting the federal government out of the education space also, theoretically, reduces the overall government’s size, and its fiscal needs. It saves the taxpayers money, in other words.

In exchange, we are hypothetically allowing private interests to dominate the education space. Again, this may or may not be a bad thing. However, education is a weird “market,” in the same way that healthcare or childcare is. If you ask me, both healthcare and childcare are classic market failures—the market does not provide adequate solutions to meet demand. I think that’s likely what we’re looking at with education.

That said, with the DOE gone, the burden of educating public school students would be shifted to the states. So, taxpayers may not actually save any money, and there’s really no way of knowing whether the quality of public schools would increase or decrease. It, again, would depend entirely on the state, and how voters in those states value education. This is already in play since public schools get most of their funding from local and state taxes. This is also why we have such a disparity in school quality from place to place, too.

It’s complicated.

Who bears the brunt?

The important question: If the DOE were to disappear overnight, who would get hurt? It’s likely to be students, parents, and economies in small towns and rural areas. While the DOE closing wouldn’t completely gut public schools, it would levy a considerable hit on many or most of them, remove funding for certain programs, and lead to widespread layoffs where many communities can ill-afford them.

Again, those who bear the brunt are likely to be people living in rural areas and small towns. If you’ve ever driven through rural areas, and particularly, small towns, schools are often their focal point. They employ a good number of people in the area. The students congregate there, they play sports and join clubs. It’s a place for the community to come together. They’re also strapped for cash, in many cases, and if they lose funding, need to start stripping down programs. That could include sports, after-school programs (impacting childcare arrangements), and more. That could also remove jobs for coaches, aids, and childcare workers, killing jobs.

The employment factor is perhaps bigger than most of us realize. Data from North Carolina shows that public schools are the biggest employers in more than half of the state’s 100 counties, and are among the top three biggest employers in 91 counties. North Carolina is not an exception, either, as many states are much, much more rural and sparsely populated.

If DOE funding is taken away from those schools and communities—even if it’s certain grants and funding for specific programs or projects—there will be a downstream effect on the local economy.

The states that receive the most federal aid for their school systems are also among those that tend to support the president and his policies, too: Mississippi, South Dakota, Montana, Alaska, Arkansas, etc. So, in some of these states, it’s likely that taxes may need to increase to keep up with the current level of education. But again, it all depends on myriad factors.

There are other things to think about, too.

There are programs that fall under the DOE currently that would need to be continued, or that need to continue in accordance with federal law (like the existence of the CFPB, which I wrote about a few weeks ago). Those wouldn’t go away, and would still need to be funded. Ultimately, they’d all likely move under different agencies, like the Department of Health and Human Services, or something similar. The costs would simply shift, not disappear.

In all, it’s unclear that disbanding the DOE would actually alleviate the burden on taxpayers. It might, in some places. But in others? They may end up with worse educators and at higher prices. We simply don’t know.

But if there is one thing we can say with any degree of certainty, it’s that there are disadvantaged (in any number of ways) kids and teachers out there, working with few resources and limited support, who would feel the impact of the DOE’s closure more than others.

While it may be easy or cathartic to look at some of the states that would bear the brunt of this and laugh—”har har, guess what you got what you voted for!”—an empathetic approach is probably more productive. These people were sold an idea that they’d get a better outcome for a better price, and while theoretically possible, it’s unlikely to come to fruition. As for whether the DOE ultimately survives and is still around in four or six years? It’s anyone’s guess.

As always, I’m open to your thoughts: sammbecker@gmail.com

Why we may not be able to depend on economic data going forward.

Mar 18, 2025

Data: it’s supposed to be objective. Black and white. The truth, unblemished by opinion, politicization, or emotion. But some changes at the top are making the data we gather suspect, untrustworthy, or at least, a tad suspicious.

This happened during the pandemic. Remember “if we stop testing, right now, we’d have very few cases, if any?” The whole idea around that was to artificially deflate the number of positive COVID cases. If you don’t test, there are no postive cases, right? Genius.

Now, the same sort of politicization is occuring to our economic data. And, as much as it pains me to say it, that data may be suspect going forward.

The crux of the issue is the administration’s firing of two expert panels and committees that work with the federal government to verify the quality of economic data, such as GDP and inflation numbers. Specifically, the Trump administration terminated the the Federal Economic Statistics Advisory Committee (FESAC) and the Bureau of Economic Analysis Advisory Committee.

Why?

According to a message sent by Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick to those on the committee, the reasoning was that “the Secretary of Commerce has determined that the purposes for which FESAC was established has been fulfilled and the committee has been terminated, effective February 28 2025."

Lutnick, it’s important to note, has recently said that he wants to change how some of the data, such as GDP, is calculated. Specifically, he wants to exclude government spending when measuring the growth or contraction of the economy. That’s also an idea that’s been pushed by Elon Musk, who, you know, is…hanging around.

There may be arguments for or against excluding government data. But it’s important to know that government spending is included in the GDP calculation because there are numerous governmental changes that can shape the economy, such as taxation, spending, regulations, and more — all of it can shape the economy’s trajectory.

Accordingly, that adds a dimension to the calculation that makes the data a bit more transparent and easier to sift through. So, why change it? Well, a simple answer could be that there have been some big changes at the federal level over the past couple of months, with widespread layoffs and mothballed or gutted federal agencies or programs. That, in turn, is likely to effect the wider economy, and result in some fairly ugly numbers when they’re ultimately calculated. The tens of thousands of laid off workers, for example, could increase the unemployment rate, put more strain on safety net programs, and have downstream effects—federal spending does trickle down to the private sector (somebody has to build tanks!), and that could have an exponential effect on employment. We’re not sure how it could all shake out yet.
But changing the way it’s calculated could obscure the damage to a degree.
At least, that’s where my cynical brain veers.

Now, it’s important to note that the the groups disbanded by the administration, like the FESAC, do not provide or produce the actual statistics. The FESAC is merely an advisory comittee. But the question is this: Why disband these committees if their absence will inevitably result in lesser quality data, or even bad data?

The cynic (again, me) might suspect some good, old fashioned corruption. And frankly, it’s difficult to come to any other conclusion at this point. They—the administration and DOGE, mostly—know they’re causing some real damage to the economy, and want to mess with the numbers to make it appear that the damage is not nearly as bad as it may seem. I don’t know if that’s true. Nobody does. However, if you were to manipulate the GDP data, it may help make charts like the one below look a little better.

But more broadly, messing with the economic data models absolutely invites conspiratorial thinking. You’re seeing some of it blossom, as you read this, in my mind. I do need to wonder whether I’m being unfair. Unfortunately, given the people and personalities that are floating the changes, I don’t think I am. I’m not giving them the benefit of the doubt.

Again, we saw this during the pandemic. We also saw them float conspiracies about how the government was changing data or definitions during the previous administration — you might remember when the Biden administration “changed” the definition of a recession? What happened was that there were two straight quarters of negative GDP growth, which is, in layman’s terms, the definition of a recession. But it’s not the ACTUAL definition, and while Biden’s people tried to dance around it, they didn’t change anything. And, in subsequent months, the GDP numbers were revised (as they always are), so there was only one quarter of economic contraction during Biden’s tenure.

Again, though, you can see where this type of thinking leads. You start messing with numbers and definitions and calculations, and it makes us all a bit less trusting. You also can’t really make an apples-to-apples comparison after changes are made, making it all the more difficult to gauge change, negative or positive, over time periods.

Accordingly, there doesn’t seem to be a valid reason for making the proposed calculation changes. Or for disbanding the committees. Those would be, or are, mistakes—in my opinion.

But It’s the kneecapping of public trust, though, that’s the largest casualty. Perhaps it’s even the point? Trump’s people do like to muddy the waters, making it seem that everyone is corrupt and untrustworthy, so their own corruption and dishonor isn’t so bad. I do believe that’s a primary tenent of their strategy, insomuch as there is one.
You do need to wonder, too, if the administration would be disbanding these committees and floating changes to the numbers if the numbers were, well, looking a bit better? You may remember that during Trump’s first go-around that, as if magic, jobs reports were no longer “fake” or exagerrated, as they were under Obama.

Here’s the actual exchange between a reporter and then-Press Secretary Sean Spicer, when asked about that, per a 2017 report from Politico:

“In the past, the president has referred to particular job reports as phony or totally fiction,” a reporter asked. “Does the president believe that this jobs report was accurate and a fair way to measure the economy?”
“I talked to the president prior to this, and he said to quote him very clearly,” Spicer said. “They may have been phony in the past, but it’s very real now.”

How long before that same line is trotted out to defend the manipulation of CPI or GDP data? Or should I just take my tin foil hat off and have a Diet Coke?

As always, I’m open to your thoughts: sammbecker@gmail.com

Stay vigilant!

A primer on quantum computing, because you’re about to hear a lot about it.

Mar 14, 2025

Superposition in action

It’s not fun to feel like the dumbest person in the room, but sometimes, it pays off. That’s because you’re likely learning something new, and hanging out with people that are operating on another level than you are, at least in some ways.

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That was my experience this past week, as I was working on a story about quantum computing. I’ve written and read a bit about quantum computing before, and frankly, it’s above my head. Way above. I don’t understand it.

But if I were to lay my chips on the roulette table, I’d say it’s the next big thing. The new, new thing. It could change everything — even more so than artificial intelligence throwing the world into a tailspin.

Given how important I think the topic is, and will be in the coming years, I wanted to put together a sort of primer, which can hopefully help establish at least a baseline understanding of what quantum computing is, how it works, and why it’s important.

To set the stage, most of what I know about the topic derives from conversations I’ve had with the team at a company called D-Wave. Their team has been extremely helpful in dumbing things down for me, and as a result, I was able to cover the news that the company has effectively “achieved quantum supremacy.” That means that it used a quantum computer to do something that would otherwise be impossible to do with normal, or “classical” computers. Their team was able to simulate the properties of a hypothetical magnetic material without actually creating the material. That would’ve taken a million years to do with a normal computer.

Imagine what else we could do with that technology!

What is quantum computing?

I’ll start with the most basic question: What is quantum computing? If you Google that question, the answer you’ll get will describe computing performed using the principles of quantum mechanics, or something along those lines. It’s confusing, abstract, and difficult to conceptualize.

In effect, quantum computers use wild concepts like “superposition” and “entanglement” to work things out. You may know that a classical computer, at its core, uses binary language, 0 and 1, to compute. Quantum computers use “quantum bits,” also called “Qubits,” which are actually 0s and 1s at the SAME TIME. That’s what “superposition” refers to: Being in two places, or two things, simultaneously.

Have a headache yet? Me too.

But you can think of it this way: If these computers can simultaneously look at or analyze the same thing in two different ways simultaneously, it can reduce the time and energy required to work out computations. That’s how it ultimately made the most sense to me.

On top of that, classical computers compute in a linear fashion. So, they read computer code and follow the instructions accordingly. Quantum computers, on the other hand, don’t need to work in a specific order, or operate one step at a time. They can do it all, all at once. It’s like that movie, Everything, Everywhere, All At Once, which itself is a reference to the quantum realm.

So, if you want to boil it down? Quantum computers can, basically, do a bunch of things all at once, which means that they can do a lot more, a lot faster, and with fewer resources.

Is this stuff even real?

If you start reading about quantum computing, you’ll learn that a lot of this stuff is hypothetical. Theoretical. It’s pie-in-the-sky.

Notably, the CEO of Nvidia, Jensen Huang (an Oregon State grad! Who knew?), recently ruffled feathers when he said that quantum computers were decades away. That, evidently, is not true. D-Wave has quantum computers, and has clients that are already using them. Other quantum computing companies likely do, too — a list that includes Rigetti Computing, IonQ, and others. Big companies are also in the mix, like IBM, Google, and Microsoft.

In fact, Microsoft recently made a quantum announcement of its own. The company unveiled a new quantum computing chip in February, and that was a couple of months after Google announced one of its own. Not to be outdone, Amazon also announced a quantum chip a couple of weeks ago.

So, yeah, there’s momentum in the quantum space. There’s money flowing to it, and people are working hard to make this all a reality. Or, more of a reality.

What’s next?

The big question for quantum computing, really the only question of any substance, is this: What does this all mean and how will it materialize in everyday life? Well, as noted, quantum computers are already in use. They’re being used in laboratories, and I was even told that some telecom companies are using them in various ways to help improve their networks.

But it’s the potential here that is particularly striking. Since quantum computers can do so many things, all at once, cutting down calculation time, there is immense potential. For instance, they could be used to try and find new drugs or cures for diseases — instead of having scientists and researchers physically create new drugs in a lab and test them out, it may be possible to use quantum computing to simulate their creation and then virtually test their effects. That could shave years off of development times.

They could be used to create unbreakable codes, helping the cybersecurity field. They could, as D-Wave demonstrated, help materials researchers develop new materials that power new and improved technology. And then think about how it may help with modeling in fields like finance or even meteorology.

Quantum computers could change everything. I’m still trying to wrap my head around it. It’s not often that I learn something completely new that really blows my mind, but this is a topic that did.

Even if it did put me on my heels and take me out of my comfort zone, that’s what it’s all about, right? Imagine trying to teach your great-grandparents about ChatGPT? Or showing a medieval peasant an iPhone? In some ways, that’s how I feel—out of my depth.

But it’s cool, and probably best that we start learning about these technologies now, before they’re implemented into everything and anything around us, like AI.

Questions? Thoughts? Tell me: sammbecker@gmail.com

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Not Pretty, Not Rich

A farewell to NPNR

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