CSBS News

FBI data shows that in 2018, approximately 300,000 Utahns applied for a new gun background check. By 2020, it was more than 1.2 million. "Already in 2021, we are looking at about 422,000, and the year isn't even half over yet," said Sonia Solari, a professor at the University of Utah who's been researching the number of Utahns applying for gun background checks.

Experts discussed the pandemic, how it changed our economic systems and how the policy response will shape our recovery. The panelists included Juliette Tennert, chief economist for the Kem C. Gardner Policy Institute; Rodi von Arnim, associate professor of economics at the University of Utah; and Phillip Singer, assistant professor of political science at the University of Utah

In order to head off more Prop 22s, there’s been talk recently from companies, researchers, and some within the labor movement of a sort of grand bargain with Lyft and Uber, whereby drivers would accept that third-category worker status and, in return, be granted what’s known as “sectoral bargaining.” Workers would be granted the right to organize and bargain with the companies — something that, legally, independent contractors cannot do.

“What Tribal members have said all along is that you don’t just preserve the archaeological site,” said Lisbeth Louderback, curator of archaeology and director of the archaeobotany lab at the Natural History Museum of Utah and anthropologist at the University of Utah.

Compared to a regular election, the RCV results were surprising, says Baodong Liu, professor of political science at the University of Utah who authored the report, “Ranked-Choice Voting Delivers Representation and Consensus in Presidential Primaries.”