| Just as Americans are getting restless at home, U.S. states are lifting some lockdown restrictions. A few are going further and faster than others, far ahead of what medical experts say is advisable. But "reopening" won't mean the same thing for everyone, though for many it will mean enduring a second-wave of infections and deaths. For "nonessential" retail and service workers being called back to jobs in Georgia, Florida and elsewhere, reopening forces a choice of whether to risk their health while earning a paycheck. For essential workers on the front lines, reopening coincides with the end of hazard pay, though the hazard remains. For many white-collar workers, reopening could mean very little. Tech giants like Google and Facebook are telling their U.S. employees to prepare to work remotely for the rest of 2020. Some are seizing the chance to get away from Silicon Valley's sky-high rents. —Philip Gray Did you see this? Almost 3 million Americans sought unemployment benefits last week, bringing the total to 36.5 million applications since mid-March, when cities and states began to shut down. Goldman Sachs now predicts the U.S. will hit 25% unemployment. Sweden's laissez-faire approach to the novel coronavirus appears to trade "more disease for less economic damage," reports Bloomberg Businessweek. When people are forced to isolate at home, domestic violence becomes an even more pernicious threat. South Korea's success with tracing contacts of Covid-infected people has run into a problem: When there's an outbreak at a gay nightclub, Koreans are wary of coming forward to admit they were there. The Bank of Japan now has its first female executive director. Some Canadians, meanwhile, are fuming that their prime minister passed over a female contender for Bank of Canada governor. We love charts Majority-black counties in America have three times as many Covid-19 deaths per capita as the U.S. average.  A prize fight that's headed to court Is it safe for mixed martial arts fighters to get back in the ring and grapple? No. But Ultimate Fighting Championship is pretty much the only game in town, and its parent company says it's time to fight. Health risks are part of the deal when one goes into that profession, but Bloomberg Businessweek reports that a half-dozen former UFC fighters are fed up with the low pay. They're trying to bring a class action alleging that UFC's parent uses its monopoly power to underpay performers. | 
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