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COVID-19 stimulus bill by the numbers

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By Nicole Caldwell and Lauren Liebhaber for Stacker

As the Congress and Senate reach an agreement on a $2 trillion stimulus bill amidst the worldwide coronavirus pandemic, Stacker looked at news and government reports to provide a by-the-numbers breakdown of how those funds will be allocated. Click through for an explanation of notable inclusions in the historic relief package and updates as they come in.

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How Big Hair Defined the Decade You Went to High School

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By Nicole Caldwell for Stacker

Adolescence represents one of the most significant periods of self-identity. Famed developmental psychologist and psychoanalyst Erik Erikson said the teenage years are specifically punctuated by that quest, which he described featuring “identity vs. role confusion.” No longer children but not quite adults, adolescents work through their personal goals, belief systems, and values while battling against their lack of autonomy. Without the ability to express themselves with careers, acquisitions, or other outlets, a vast majority of teenagers use exaggerated outward appearances that often subscribe to a particular stereotype to fit into a specific role.

High school students over the last century have divided themselves by visibly striking groups: the hippies, jocks, preppies, punks, emo kids, hipsters, and so forth. From fashion and musical tastes to hairstyles, teenagers wear their identities quite literally on their sleeves and heads. These trends reflect the cultural backdrops from which they grew: pixie cuts and fedoras during the Roaring Twenties; long hair and Afros during the ‘60s, and the big-hair trends of the ‘80s all typify the world in which these people lived; whether constrained and conservative (the ‘50s) or wild and subversive (the ‘70s).

In this way, it’s possible to chart American history by fashion trends and hairdos. Never ones to disappoint, the folks at The Pudding seized on this concept to use AI deep learning classification to analyze a dataset of more than 30,000 high school yearbook photos spanning 1930 to 2013 in a study called The Big Data of Big Hair, published in 2019. The study identified the median hair density for high school students in every year; median hair density is a measure of how far out a hairstyle extends from the bearer’s head. Here, Stacker has included the densities for the beginning, middle, and end of each decade in the study, separated into hairstyles associated with boys and those associated with girls.

The data is decidedly Anglocentric, which is representative of census data which shows the U.S. white population comprised more than 80% of the total population until 2000. As demographics in the U.S. have changed in the last few decades, we have seen more representative, mainstream hairstyles (and associated products) change, as well. It may take longer for schools to catch up to these changes: A New Jersey wrestler in 2019 was forced to cut his dreadlocks before a match; while hairstyles like braid extensions have been called out for violating dress codes.

Keep reading to see how big (and cropped) hairstyles accentuated the times from which they grew.

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Black Artists Music Wouldn't be the Same Without

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By Nicole Caldwell for Stacker

There is no American music that doesn’t have Black roots. From country-western, which draws upon banjo music from Africa, to rock ‘n’ roll, begun by a Black woman playing electric guitar in 1938, American music can’t be separated out from its rich history of diversity and experimentation.

Every artist transforms his or her medium simply by working in it, and it so follows that every musician changes the art form slightly just by creating and performing songs. But throughout American history, there are examples of artists who have been so transformative as to change musical genres themselves. Other times, artists unwittingly create new genres—whether Fela Kuti with Afrobeat, Frankie Knuckles with house music, or Fats Domino with ska.

To take a closer look at how Black musicians shaped American music, Stacker pored through historical documents, recordings, Billboard charts, and studied similarities in various musical acts over time to determine 41 artists music wouldn’t be the same without. Paring the list down to just 41 was a challenge (the gallery could easily include hundreds)—so there are certainly icons missing, including powerhouses like Lightnin’ Hopkins, Wilson Pickett, Mary Wells, Roberta Flack, Tina Turner, and Gloria Gaynor—each of whom has made significant contributions to music in his or her own right. To help narrow the field, we focused on artists whom scholars can definitively conclude altered the musical landscape in some dramatic fashion. Artists highlighted in this gallery changed the course of music by doing something entirely new with it rather than simply building upon the legends who came before.

Beyond their musicianship, many of the Black artists throughout history also stand as shining examples of bravery and leadership in the face of adversity. From Marian Anderson, who inspired Eleanor Roosevelt to drop out of the Daughters of the American Revolution when the group wouldn’t allow Anderson to sing in front of an integrated audience (Anderson ended up singing in front of 75,000 people at the Lincoln Memorial and was the first Black person to perform with the Metropolitan Opera in New York), to Ray Charles, who refused to perform for an all-white audience in Georgia, there is example after example of musical icons who shone a light that encouraged others to forge ahead and make incremental changes that helped form a more perfect union.

Keep reading to learn about 41 Black artists music wouldn’t be the same without—and be sure to check out our curated Spotify playlist of essential listening from each.

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Luxurious Spas Just for Your Dog

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By Nicole Caldwell for Stacker

Americans are obsessed with dogs. We are more likely than any other people on Earth to have dogs as pets and are lavish participants in a $70 billion pet products industry.

Of the estimated 63.4 million people with dogs in the U.S., the average owner spends a modest $73 a year on groomers and grooming supplies, according to the American Pet Products Association’s 2019–2020 National Pet Owners Survey. The same survey found that $6.31 billion was spent in 2019 alone on services such as grooming, boarding, training, pet sitting, pet exercise, and pet walking. Average spending on dogs is highest among millennials, who drop about $1,285 a year on their fur babies, according to a 2018 study by TD Ameritrade. And in fact, for people younger than 30, lower income levels don’t correlate with a decreased likelihood of purchasing premium dog food.

Of course, averages are just that. To find out what next-level pet care looks like, you have to take a look at the upper echelon. There, you’ll find spikes in high-end dog-care services, from holistic care and dog yoga to $1,800 pet cemetery plots. But excess is perhaps most obvious in how we pamper our pets with spas, toys, and specialty grooming services. While most of us think of groomers as providing basic shampoos, trims, brushing, and nail-clipping, dog spas today offer everything from massages and dye jobs to custom fur styles and blueberry facials.

Stacker checked out some of the most luxurious dog spas in the U.S., of which there are many more than we ever expected. The spas aren’t restricted to coastal city centers, either; they can be found in virtually every state and are as diverse as their clientele.

Read on to discover which spa will pick your dog up in a Bentley and where you can splurge on a “Don Draper” tie for your best friend.

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25 American Folk Heroes and the Stories Behind Them

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By Nicole Caldwell for Stacker

Folk tales serve as a cultural binder of sorts, bringing people together with a fomented sense of shared identity. They’re also used as explainers, similarly to how mythology worked for ancient Greeks. American folk heroes are richly textured and many-layered: Contemporary characters like Paul Bunyan explained the creation of America’s rivers and lakes and served as inspiration for workers exposed to grueling conditions while carving a way West and extracting resources for trade or infrastructure. Other tales, like those of Sacagawea and Pocahontas, served as scapegoats for a version of American history that sidesteps the Native American genocide enacted by early colonists, Western explorers, and even the U.S. government.

For enslaved African Americans, folklore provided subjugated people with heroic tales of bravery, defiance, and escape from Br’er Rabbit to Stack-O-Lee. Native Americans had hundreds of stories rooted in folklore from the Sleeping Ute Mountain to Kokopelli. Many folk heroes such as Hugh Glass and Annie Oakley are based on actual people, while others are pure fiction such as the Maid of the Mist and Bud Billiken. These tall tales come in the form of nursery rhymes, children’s tales, mascots, and cautionary myths and speak to us of strength, perseverance, and the celebrated intrepidness of rugged American individualism.

As is the case with any hero, much of American folklore features flawed characters. Some would certainly be villains today, whether Billy the Kid for his unchecked aggression against officers of the law or Hannah Duston for her violent slaughter of Native Americans.

Stacker scoured American history and mythology from books, news accounts, history lessons, and journal articles to curate a diverse gallery of 25 American folk heroes and the stories behind them. Some are well-known characters like Johnny Appleseed and Molly Pitcher, and others are much more obscure.

See how many you already know, and read on to learn about all the rest.

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Which State is This Jeopardy! Clue About?

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By Nicole Caldwell for Stacker

There are few game shows as revered as “Jeopardy!”—helmed by one of America's most-adored television personalities, Alex Trebek. Trebek took on hosting responsibilities forthe popular game show since 1984, two decades after the show's premiere. "Jeopardy!" is taped 46 days out of every year, with Trebek changing suits five times each of those days to account for each episode being filmed. To date, he has hosted more than 7,000 shows. His dedication to the game show (unless there's a Lakers game on TV, he says he dutifully watches the show every night) has paid off: “Jeopardy!” is the proud bearer of more Emmy Awards than any other game show and more than 9 million viewers who tune in each week to play along.

“Jeopardy!” withstood two cancellations before Trebek came on board, and the game show has become synonymous with his name—making his disclosure in 2019 of having stage 4 pancreatic cancer all the more difficult for his faithful fans. 

To celebrate all things “Jeopardy!” and Trebek, Stacker turned to the fan-created “Jeopardy!” Archive and found three clues for each of the 50 states from the questions curated there. The states are in no particular order, making readers' tasks a true challenge: to guess which state each set of three clues—covering geography, history, pop culture, and everything in between—corresponds with. Think you have what it takes? Click through to put your state knowledge to the test and see if you have the mettle to be a “Jeopardy!” champion—even if you can't beat Ken Jennings' 74-game winning streak.

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The Fiddle-Leaf Fig: A Headstrong Houseplant

The Fiddle-Leaf Fig: A Headstrong Houseplant

The fiddle-leaf fig is the outlaw of the houseplant world: tough to tame, hard to understand, difficult to love. Yet, we try to keep it and love it.

The fiddle-leaf fig’s columnar, complicated physique makes it among the most photogenic of trees; its likeness is printed, etched, and painted onto countless pieces of décor and works of art. Fiddle-leaf figs have been central to thousands of interior designs in the past decade; the focus of dozens of websites, giveaways, chat rooms, and weekly newsletters; and the muse for a seemingly endless stream of Pinterest galleries. Even The New York Times called the fiddle-leaf fig the new “it” plant. And no matter what houseplant trend comes up, nothing has budged this tree from its pedestal.

States With the Most UFO Sightings

States With the Most UFO Sightings

In the Bible's Book of Ezekiel, a mysterious ship appears from the sky in Chaldea, modern-day Kuwait. The next wave of mysterious apparitions showed up in fourth-century China when a “moon boat” was documented floating over the country once every 12 years. More strange sightings were noted around Rome in 218 B.C., Germany in 1561, Hull, England, in 1801, and multiple times during World War II when allied pilots used the term “foo fighters” to describe the odd circles of light pilots noticed flanking their planes during combat.

The term “UFO,” short for “unidentified flying object,” was coined in 1953 by the United States Air Force as a bucket term for such reports as the foo fighters in WWII. Stateside sightings were hardly restricted to military flyover zones, however. Here, the first recorded UFO sighting is from 1639 when John Winthrop wrote in his diary about a large, strange light in the sky that shot back and forth long before the time of satellites or planes. By the time he and the other men on his boat got their wits about them, their boat was a mile from where it had been when they first spotted the light.

The first documented image of a UFO was captured in 1870 on the summit of Mount Washington in New Hampshire. More sightings were reported at Mount Rainier in Washington in 1947, and of course several in Roswell, N.M. Since then, countless numbers of unusual shapes in the sky—and their supposed inhabitants—have been exhaustively reported without sufficient explanations beyond the possible existence of extraterrestrial life.

A surge in eyewitness accounts begot even more sightings, and ways to guard against invasions and abductions—more than 40,000 Americans bought into alien protection insurance, which offers customers monetary relief should a loved one get carted away by little green men. As recently as last year, Texas reported a wave of UFO sightings even as overall sightings have declined. In spite of hundreds of thousands of sightings, reports, and claimed abductions (researchers of one Roper Poll in 1991 estimate 4 million Americans think they've been abducted by aliens) worldwide, the official position of the government thus far has been that such alien activity stems from hoaxes or simple cases of mistaking other objects like weather balloons for alien life. Of course, UFOs are simply that: unidentified objects, which are not necessarily the same things as evidence of extraterrestrial life.

Since its founding in 1974, the National UFO Reporting Center (NUFORC) has documented around 90,000 UFO sightings, with almost 95% of those sightings supposedly easily explained away as military tests, weather balloons, or other terrestrial activity. Still, in December of 2017, the New York Times brought to light the Pentagon program Advanced Aviation Threat Identification Program (AATIP), a $22 million investigation funded and carried out by the U.S. government into UFO reports from 2007 to 2012. This investigation came decades after more well-known programs such as the 1952 Project Blue Book, which inspired the 2019 History Channel series by the same name.

Using data from NUFORC's 24/7 hotline, which has been around since 1974, Stacker compiled a ranking of the states with the most reported UFO sightings. The website details not only the total number of sightings in each state, but also the odds of spotting a UFO for a resident in each. Of note is that almost three-quarters of all UFO sighting reports in the United States occur between 4 p.m. and midnight, and tend to peak between 9 and 10 p.m. Food for thought next time you're out scoping for alien life.

Ecofriendly Swaps for Household Items

Ecofriendly Swaps for Household Items

Let’s say you’re a “Level Two” eco-warrior. Maybe you’ve been composting for a while, eat a plant-based diet, and have a bicycle basket loaded with mesh produce bags and cloth shopping totes for items not already grown in your garden. What, then, to do with the waste that still piles up around your home?

Even the most eco-conscious among us make daily decisions about a seemingly perpetual stream of trash that feels unavoidable and impossible to dispose of properly. For folks who have already taken steps to live green, here’s the next phase of self-examination: We’re talking clothing, toothbrushes, shampoo bottles, and cotton swabs, just to name a few. As your tin foil tube grows leaner and your plastic toothbrush frays, consider this guide for low-waste replacements.

Discover the Healing Power of Labyrinths

Discover the Healing Power of Labyrinths

Some people clear their heads by running. Others practice yoga, hike to a mountaintop, or walk in silence. A labyrinth is another form of moving meditation, spiraling its participants toward its center and back out again. The non-branching path, while meandering, is singular. Where a maze confounds, a labyrinth clarifies.

Best Countries for Children

By Nicole Caldwell for Stacker

Children around the world live vastly different lives, from places where child labor is legal and common (Bangladesh, Ethiopia, and Myanmar), to countries where education is compulsory and lengthy (Norway, the United Kingdom, and South Korea). Some nations, such as Italy, even require children to attend preschool. On other fronts, marriage and motherhood among teenage girls are still widespread (even in developed countries), and both are often viewed by international organizations and human rights groups as inhibitors to economic and social growth.

To find out which countries in the world are best for children, Stacker looked to a 2018 report from international NGO Save the Children, a group working to promote the welfare and rights of young people everywhere. Save the Children’s report is the result of data the group compiled on the livelihoods of children worldwide from 2012 to 2017. Save the Children created an index score on a scale from 1 to 1,000 that reflects the average level of performance across a set of indicators related to child health, education, labor, marriage, childbirth, and violence. Countries with higher scores are better at protecting and providing for children. Data points specifically look at under-5 mortality rates (deaths per 1,000 live births); percent of primary and secondary school age children not in school; percent of girls aged 15 to 19 currently married or in union; and births per 1,000 girls aged 15-19.

Findings reveal that Niger comes in last internationally for children, with an index score of just 388; while the United States ranks at a middling #36 with a score of 945 in between Russia and Belarus. Singapore and Slovenia are tied for first place with an index score of 987.

Stacker broke this listing out into the top-50 countries for children internationally and included the percent of a country’s population that is 0 to 14 years old for reference, provided by the CIA World Factbook.  

Read on to discover the 50 best countries in the world for children.

We Are 'All in the Same Boat'

We Are 'All in the Same Boat'

Eco-friendly initiatives, from zero-waste living to reducing meat consumption, are no longer concepts relegated to cities, progressive coastal communities, or the tired trope of yesterday’s “hippie.” With growing scientific evidence of the roles we all play in polluting our waterways, affecting climate change, and harming fragile eco systems all over the world, choosing to “live green” and tread more lightly aren’t fringe ideas at all—nor are they new in the north country.

Eco-Friendly Replacements for 50 Plastic Items in Your Life

By Nicole Caldwell for Stacker

About 300 million tons of plastic are produced from oil each year. Almost half of that is used for single-use packaging, such as plastic wrap on food, containers for personal care items, bottles for cleaning products, and other everyday purchases—including the plastic bags we carry them home in. Worse, only about 9% of all the plastic ever created has been recycled. And things are getting worse, not better: Almost half of all the plastic ever made has been created since 2000, the production of plastic is way up, and recycling alone can't stop the flow of plastic pollution into the world's oceans.

As more statistics come out about the volume of plastic ocean pollution (18 billion pounds annually from coastal regions alone) and the effect that is having on marine life (267 species worldwide have already been adversely affected), people have begun eschewing plastic products for zero-waste, eco-friendly options. Most global consumers are willing to pay more for sustainable products, which has inspired thousands of companies to seek alternatives to plastic items from zero-waste personal care products and kitchen items to office equipment and ethically sourced, sustainable clothing.

Stacker has pored over the research and scoured product reviews and company backgrounds to compile this gallery of 50 easy, eco-friendly replacements for common plastic items in your life. Prices have been provided, and represent the cost for long-term use, except in the case of items that run out, like toothpaste. Those numbers should be compared to an individual's or family's spending on similar, single-use products over time for items such as sandwich bags or disposable razors. Wherever possible, products listed in this gallery represent less expensive options over time to their plastic, disposable counterparts.

In the interest of being most serviceable, Stacker has left two of the most ubiquitous, eco-friendly items—stainless steel drink canteens and reusable shopping bags—off the list in order to make room for items that may be less well-known. Wherever possible, products referenced come in zero-waste, plastic-free packaging, as well.

Continue reading to discover 50 easy alternatives to everyday, plastic items.

Architecture Firm Creates 4-Story-Tall Whale From Ocean Plastic

Architecture Firm Creates 4-Story-Tall Whale From Ocean Plastic

The Contemporary Art and Architecture Triennial has returned with a splash to the northwest Belgium city of Bruges, featuring poignant works of art and architecture exploring this year’s “Liquid City” theme.

Peppered among the city’s famous canals, medieval buildings and beloved cobblestone streets rises a trail of installations by artists and architects from around the world that will be on display through Sept. 16. At one poignant spot—where the canal dips underground and disappears—rises a particularly noteworthy installation: a breaching, four-story tall whale called “Skyscraper,” made entirely of plastic plucked from the ocean.

How to Build a Capsule Wardrobe, According to the Woman Who Invented It

How to Build a Capsule Wardrobe, According to the Woman Who Invented It

Fast fashion is costing us dearly.

Worldwide, fashion is a $2.5 trillion industry that is one of the biggest consumers of water. People go through 80 billion pieces of clothing every year, and the average American produces 82 pounds of textile waste annually. Far from previous generations, when clothes were made to last, mended, and invested in, our cheap clothes today are seen as disposable. So we dump them, en masse, into landfills every single day.