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Does legalizing marijuana help Black communities?

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ARLINGTON, Wash. (AP) – When Washington state opened among the nation’s first legal marijuana stores in 2014, Sam Ward Jr. he was under electronic house arrest in Spokane, where he faced federal drug charges. He would soon be sent to prison to serve the lion’s share of his four-year sentence.

Ten years later, Ward, who’s black, recently posed on a blue and gold throne used for photos at his recent cannabis store, Cloud 9 Cannabis. He welcomed customers coming in for the early 4/20 deal. He also thought of being one in every of the primary beneficiaries of a Washington program to make the mostly white industry more accessible to those harmed by the war on drugs.

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“It’s great to know that I’m the general manager of the store and the employees, the people, rely on me,” Ward said. “Just being a part of something makes you feel good.”

Operations manager Willie Morrow stockes shelves at Cloud 9 Cannabis as the shop prepares to open, Thursday, Feb. 1, 2024, in Arlington, Wash. (AP Photo/Lindsey Wasson)

The essential argument for legalizing adult use of cannabis was to stem the harm attributable to disproportionate enforcement of drug laws, which has thrown hundreds of thousands of black, Latino, and other minority Americans into prison and perpetuated cycles of violence and poverty. Studies have shown that minorities were more more likely to be incarcerated than whites, despite similar rates of cannabis use.

However, efforts to help those most affected take part in and make the most of the legal marijuana industry have been stalled.

Since 2012, when voters in Washington and Colorado approved the primary ballot measures legalizing recreational marijuana, legal adult use has spread to 24 states and the District of Columbia. Almost all have “social equity” laws geared toward undoing the harm attributable to the drug war.

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These provisions include expungement of criminal records for certain marijuana convictions, granting cannabis business licenses and financial assistance to those convicted of cannabis crimes, and directing marijuana tax revenues to impacted communities.

“Social equity programs are an attempt to reverse the harm done to Black and Brown communities that are over-policed ​​and disproportionately impacted,” said Kaliko Castille, former president of the Minority Cannabis Business Association.

States have alternative ways of defining who can apply for marijuana licenses on a social equity basis, and so they will not be necessarily based on race.

In Washington, an applicant must own greater than half of the business and meet other criteria, resembling having lived for at the very least five years between 1980 and 2010 in an area with high rates of poverty, unemployment or cannabis arrests; you will have been arrested for a cannabis offense; or whose household income is below average.

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Legal challenges to the permitting process in states like New York have slowed implementation.

With other cases resolved, New York — which regulators say issued 60% of all cannabis licenses to social equity applicants — faces one other lawsuit. Last month, the libertarian Pacific Legal Foundation alleged that it favored women- and minority-owned candidates along with those that could show the harm attributable to the drug war.

“These are the kinds of general racial and gender preferences that the Constitution prohibits,” said Pacific Legal attorney David Hoffa.

CEO and co-owner of Cloud 9 Cannabis Sam Ward Jr. she smiles as she poses for a photograph during a photograph session on a throne for clients, Saturday, April 13, 2024, in Arlington, Wash. (AP Photo/Lindsey Wasson)

In other countries, deep-pocketed corporations operating in multiple states have obtained equity licenses, which can defeat the intent of the regulations. This 12 months, Arizona lawmakers expressed concern that predatory corporations were pressuring licensees to relinquish control.

Difficulty finding locations because of local prohibitions on cannabis businesses or obtaining bank loans because of ongoing federal prohibition also prevents applicants from opening stores. In some cases, the very aspects that qualified them for licenses – living in poor neighborhoods, criminal records and lack of assets – made it difficult to secure the cash needed to open cannabis businesses.

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The framers of Washington’s pioneering law were busy stopping the U.S. Department of Justice from shutting down the market. They required background checks to maintain criminals away.

“In many early states, social equity was simply not an issue,” said Jana Hrdinova, administrative director of the Center for Law Enforcement and Drug Policy at Ohio State University’s Moritz College of Law.

Many states which have legalized recently – including Arizona, Connecticut, Ohio, Maryland and Missouri – have had social equity initiatives from the start.

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Washington launched its program in 2020. However, it was only in the previous couple of months that it issued its first social equity retail licenses. Only two have been opened, including Ward’s.

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Washington Liquor and Cannabis board member Ollie Garrett called progress up to now disappointing, but said officials are working with applicants and calling on some cities to waive zoning bans so social cannabis businesses can open.

The state, which collects about half a billion dollars a 12 months from marijuana taxes, is making $8 million in grants available to social equity licensees to help cover expenses resembling security systems and renovations, in addition to business coaching.

It also directs $250 million to communities harmed by the drug war – including housing assistance, small business loans, job training and violence prevention programs.

Ward’s turnaround is one officials hope to repeat.

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He testified that he began dealing marijuana as an adolescent. In 2006, a customer pulled a gun on him and Ward was shot within the hand.

Marijuana plants seen in a secured grow facility in Washington County, New York, May 12, 2023. (AP Photo/Hans Pennink, File)

He claims to be a single father of seven children and continued to deal drugs to support them until he was charged in 2014 – together with 30 others – in an oxycodone distribution conspiracy. He served almost three years in prison.

Ward, now 39, spent that point taking classes, exercising and training other inmates. After his release, he began a private training business, got a job at a restaurant and joined the semi-professional Spokane Wolfpack football team.

There he met Dennis Turner, a black entrepreneur who briefly owned the team. Turner worked as a restaurant manager on cruise ships, on the post office and as a corrections officer before investing his savings – $6,000 – into growing a friend’s medical marijuana. They used the proceeds to open a medical dispensary in Cheney, a small college town southwest of Spokane, that eventually became an adult-use marijuana retailer.

In Washington’s social equity program, Turner saw a possibility to make Ward a business executive. The two joined Rashel Palmer, whose husband co-owns the soccer team, in launching Cloud 9 for about $400,000. They selected Arlington, Washington – 515 kilometers away – because they are saying it’s a fast-growing city with limited competition in cannabis.

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Ward “saw me as a guy he admired, who was in good business, self-made and out of the trenches, and he just wanted to beat my brains out,” Turner said.

Turner is working to open cannabis stores in New Mexico and Ohio as a part of social equity programs in those states. He hopes to sell them in the future for tens of hundreds of thousands of dollars. In the meantime, he plans to make use of his business to support local charities resembling the Boys and Girls Club of Arlington and the Carl Maxey Center, which give services to Spokane’s black community.

Another recent social equity licensee is David Penn Jr., 47, who helped persuade Pasco in South Central Washington to rescind its ban. Penn, who’s black, was arrested as an adolescent on crack charges. In 2011, he was kicked out of his apartment after stealing marijuana.

A friend who owns two other cannabis stores is financing the Penna store. Its location – a grimy constructing next to a gas station – still needs work. State subsidies will help, but they may not be enough.

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“It’s like giving you a carriage, but you need horses to move it,” Penn said.


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This article was originally published on : thegrio.com

Business and Finance

Amazon among companies fighting for the purchase of Tiktok as Saturday’s term Byedane for sale near

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Amazon, an organization founded by the billionaire Jeff Bezos, offers the purchase of a Tiktok, a preferred social application in the face of the ban on the United States, if it will not be sold by a Chinese home company, Bytedance, According to NBCNews. President Trump transferred the date of Saturday on April 5 to sell or face a ban in the United States.

Due to the nature of the offer at the last minute, he will not be considered a serious pretender to purchase the application, he should agree on sale, but is added to what is taken into account a big list of flights. The talks are conducted by the White House; Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of Trade Howard Lutnick received a suggestion from Amazon via a letter, as reported by New York Times.

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It was expected that President Trump would consider various offers to purchase Tiktok on Wednesday and put vice chairman Vance and national security advisor, Michael Waltz, responsible for establishing the best solution to act on the future of the social application.

Tiktok, one of the hottest applications for social media and influential users, has been the subject of debate for years and becomes a political point of conversation on either side of the nave. Former President Joe Biden signed an act in 2024, requiring the sale of non-Chinese buyer or a ban on a ban in the United States. After President Trump took office in January 2025, he signed the executive order on the first day, extending the date of Byedance for sale by April 5, 2025. At that point, several entities and companies offered the purchase of an organization to make sure its survival of users in the United States.

Since the full list of potential suitors was stored in the package, plainly no contract is inevitable and, in line with NBC News, President Trump signaled that it’s able to extend the deadline if the goal agreement can’t be concluded. In an interview at the starting of this 12 months, Vice President Vance signaled that they might give you the option to catch up with to the contract on time, but it surely is feasible that it will not be finalized on time.

“Usually, some of those contracts that are much smaller and cover much less capital, take months. We try to close it at the beginning of April. I think that the outlines of this thing will be very clear. The question is whether we can do the whole article,” said Vance.

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President Trump seems optimistic that the contract has concluded.

“We have many potential buyers. Tiktok has great interest. The decision will be my decision. Tiktok is very interesting and many people want to buy it.”

Only time will tell about the fate of Tiktok in America.

How to prepare for a TIKTOK ban, in how to save content

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This article was originally published on : thegrio.com
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Billionaires lose $ 208 billion in wealth in connection with the Trump tariff program

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Billionaires Lose $208B In Wealth Following Trump’s Tariff Announcement


The combined wealth of 500 richest people in the world fell by $ 208 billion after the announcement by President Donald Trump with wide tariffs focused on dozens of nations.

Mark Zuckerberg and Jeff Bezos amongst As reported, the highest American billionaires reached the most difficult on April 3, and their fortune dropped by a median of three.3%. The decrease means the fourth largest one-day decline in the 13-year history of the Bloomberg billionaire indicator-the most vital from the top of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Zuckerberg accepted the biggest hit, losing $ 17.9 billion – or about 9% of its net value – a 9% decrease in meta. Bezos was not far behind, dropping $ 15.9 billion, because Amazon shares fell by 9%, which suggests their most rapid decline since April 2022.

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Elon Musk, who saw his net value by $ 110 billion this 12 months, lost one other $ 11 billion on April 4, when Tesla’s shares were still falling, powered by poor supply numbers and growing controversies regarding his role, leading the performance of Trump’s government (Doge).

The markets were sent In disarray after Trump announced wide global tariffs, increasing the fears of a possible trade war and an upcoming recession. S&P 500 dropped by 4.84%to shut to five 396.52, pushing him back on the correction territory and marking its worst one-day decrease from June 2020. The industrial average Dow Jones dropped 1 679.39 points, i.e. 3.98%to finish at 40 545.93-get his most violent decline.

Meanwhile, the composite with the NASDAQ composite dropped by 5.97% to 16,550.61, affected by its largest one -day loss since March 2020. Sales were widespread, and over 400 S&P 500 corporations ended the day red.

Some achieved profit, including the richest man of Mexico, Carlos Slim, who was one in every of the few billionaires outside the US to avoid rainfall from tariffs. His fortune increased by about 4% to $ 85.5 billion after Mexico was omitted from the list of mutual tariff goals in the White House. The Middle East was the only region in which individuals in the Bloomberg wealth index managed to publish net profits on a given day.

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The latest content: Alleged Trump tariffs, a master class in stupidity and misleading politics

(Tagstotransate) Donald Trump

This article was originally published on : www.blackenterprise.com
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The culture of technological startups is not as innovative as the founders may think

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Eric Yuan was not satisfied with Cisco Systems, despite the incontrovertible fact that he made a salary in six numbers, working as a vp of engineering at the Cisco Webex video conference software.

“I didn’t even want to go to the office to work,” said Yuan CNBC Make It in 2019.

Yuan was dissatisfied with culture in Cisco, where latest ideas were often closed and the change was slow. When he suggested to construct a brand new, friendly mobile video platform from scratch, the idea was rejected by Cisco leadership. Frustrated with resistance to innovation, Yuan left the company in 2011 and founded a zoom, whose value increased astronomically in pandemic years in air-con, since it became an application for distant work.

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One might think that the founders, who, like Yuan, expressed the misfortune with the culture of previous employers, founded latest firms with very different values. However, we found that on average, whether or not they want or founders will probably recreate the culture of their previous employer of their latest undertaking.

The founders come from the place

Yuan’s story comprises an concept that many individuals have a couple of heavy technological giant in comparison with an agile startup. However, our studies have shown that this distinction is not so clear.

Over 50 percent of the founders of American technological startups have previous experience in other firms, often in giants such as Google or Meta. The work of the work of these huge organizations is not all the time really easy to walk when entrepreneurs arrange their very own firms.

IN Our researchWe identified 30 different cultural elements of firms. These include the culture of balance between skilled and personal life, teamwork, authority, innovation and culture -oriented culture in comparison with the customer -oriented culture.

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Previous studies have shown that the founders of startups transfer knowledge and technology from old jobs. We found empirical evidence that additionally they transfer work culture.

Comparison of the organizational cultures of “parents”, “Spawnów” and “twins”

In our research, we identified the founders of the startups and used their LinkedIn profiles to seek out firms wherein they worked earlier. Our team used natural language processing, namely Modeling the topic of the task of the latentTo send a SMS to Glassdoor, a site that permits current and former employees anonymously browse firms. We used processed reviews to characterize the culture of “home” firms and startup firms or “spawn”. We also identified the match or “twin” for a welding organization, which had an analogous size, product and number of years of activity.

Then we compared the culture of every startup with the culture of its parent organization and the culture of the “twin” of every spawn to the culture of the same parent in a given 12 months. If the spawn was more just like his parent than the twin to the parent, it confirmed our hypothesis that the founders often transfer their previous work cultures to latest projects.

We found that there are three conditions that favor such transfer.

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First of all, the longer the founders were in the organization, the more likely it is that they’ll take their culture to a brand new startup, because they got acquainted with this culture.

The second condition is the compatibility of culture, i.e. the degree to which culture consists of elements which might be consistent of their meanings, and due to this fact have internal compatibility.

For example, in our data there is a platform for location services in the cloud, which has high compliance in its culture. The company has three highly essential cultural elements: it is adaptive, customer -oriented and demanding. These elements consistently indicate the culture of customer response. Our data also includes an e-commerce clothing platform with two cultural elements-growth and balance between skilled and personal life-who are poorly even of their meanings, reducing the compliance of its culture.

We have found that the more conditionally the matching culture of the parent organization – and due to this fact it is easier to know and learn it – the more likely it is that the founders will transfer their elements to latest firms.

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Thirdly, the more odd the organization is – the more it stands out from others in its field – the more likely it is that its culture shall be moved to the startup.

In an unusual culture, it is easy to discover cultural elements and remember and switch on them after finding a startup. Because unusual culture attracts a stronger border that distinguishes the organization from others, employees grow to be more aware that the organization has chosen them and that they decided to work in it. This creates cognitive attachment in employees towards the organization, and likewise increases how well its culture learn.

In our study, the cultural unusuality of each startup was measured by calculating cultural distances between all organizations inside the same product category for a given 12 months.

Founders often describe their culture as a characteristic or one of a form. However, we found that this is not necessarily the case. The founders are likely to repeat the culture of their previous employers because they’re used to this manner of working.

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False perception?

Many students tell me that they attract more creative and innovative work environments – something that they often associate with startups, not traditional, recognized firms.

But our research suggests that this perception may not be completely accurate.

Job seekers searching for unique or pondering cultures may be surprised when it was found that startup environments resemble the environments of larger technology firms more often than expected.

And for the founders-especially those that left the previous roles because of frustrating cultures in the workplace-it will be awakening to understand how easy it is unintentional to revive the environments themselves that they may avoid.

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This article was originally published on : theconversation.com
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