Two-bedroom setups went for around $1,910 in the nation's 100 largest real-estate markets, only a few dollars lower than last month and 2.6% higher than in October 2023.
Zumper
Apartment supply has reached unprecedented heights thanks to a surge in new rental units, Zumper found. Although that's kept rent from getting even more expensive, it hasn't brought prices in tenants' direction, as a recent report from Rentometer about third-quarter rent attests.
The explanation for this dynamic is straight out of ECON 101: prices have barely budged because demand has risen alongside supply.
"Sustained high demand can be linked to several economic factors, including low unemployment, easing inflation, and continued wage growth," said Anthemos Georgiades, the CEO of Zumper, in a statement for the report.
16 cities where rent is reasonable
Even though rent is stubbornly high on the national level, there are several cities among the 100 biggest rental markets where apartments are increasingly affordable.
Below are the 16 markets where rent was at least $200 cheaper than the national median price of $1,534 in October and no less than 3% cheaper than it was a year ago. Along with each city are its year-over-year and month-over-month rent changes and its median rent, the savings compared to the national median, and its rank among the 100 top US real-estate markets.
1. Minneapolis, Minnesota
Minnesota received a top-five ranking for work environment.
Mint Images - David Arky/Getty, masterzphotois/Getty, Tyler Le/BI
Misuse of perks has pervaded Big Tech, as Meta's recent 'Grubgate' episode highlighted.
Big Tech's lavish perks culture led to entitlement and rule-bending among some employees.
In a new era of efficiency and layoffs, companies are clamping down.
For more than a decade, Big Tech companies doled out lavish perks to hire and retain a limited supply of technical talent — and some workers pushed the limits of these benefits.
"Grubgate," where Meta fired staff for misusing meal vouchers, shows how engrained perks-grifting became in Silicon Valley, but also how the era of pampered tech employees may be ending.
Cost-cutting, huge layoffs, and the use of AI have put tech employers in a more powerful position. Hiring has also slowed, with tech job postings about 30% below pre-pandemic levels, according to job site Indeed. That, in turn, means fewer perks.
"In the 2010 to 2021 days, it was very much like employees were in charge," said a former Instagram staffer. "Then suddenly the tables turned."
Business Insider interviewed tech workers and industry experts about Grubgate and the evolving relationship between Big Tech companies and staff. Most people asked not to be identified so they could speak frankly about some of the more egregious perks-grifting that's gone on in Silicon Valley. They also described how layoffs, efficiency drives, and tougher policy enforcement have shifted the culture at once easygoing tech companies.
It started with the entrées
For years, luscious Silicon Valley "campus" spaces offered workers fancy food, exercise classes, laundry, and even massages, all on the company dime.
Google kicked things off with high-quality free food in the early 2000s. It now has dozens of cafes at the Googleplex in Mountain View and in offices around the world offering an array of free meals cooked by chefs with fine-dining experience.
Things gathered pace from there as Facebook and other emerging tech giants began competing hard for talent.
Perks became so expected that such benefits stopped being highlighted in job postings across the sector, according to Allison Shrivastava, associate economist at Indeed's Hiring Lab.
Hacking the perk system
In a culture of moving fast and breaking things, it was perhaps inevitable some staffers hacked the system.
In 2022, Meta banned employees from bringing in Tupperware because too many had been stocking up on free food and taking it home with them. Even then, employees invented workarounds.
"They got clued up on people taking food home, so people would start bringing their family in," for meals on campus, said a former Google employee, who worked at the company for five years. (Google's policy also states that employees can't take food from its cafeteria home.)
In the Grubgate episode from earlier in October, Meta fired several employees after they misused Grubhub vouchers to order nonfood items like laundry detergent, acne pads, and wine glasses.
Food isn't the only in-house luxury where employees tested the boundaries.
"I used the laundry expense — yes, do my own clothing, but also my spouse's clothing. It's one big laundry hamper at the end of the day. Am I supposed to use it for my spouse's laundry? I don't know, but that kind of thing seems very minor," said a former US Meta employee who was offered a clothes-washing credit because they worked at an office with no on-site laundry.
Meta briefly nixed its in-house laundry service in 2023 before reinstating it — though it's now no longer free.
The use of voucher-based perks was long established at tech companies with offices that couldn't cater for food and other services. These sorts of benefits ballooned during the COVID-induced work-from-home era as employers looked to maintain employee morale.
Over at Snap, the company used to offer employees Snapchat-yellow-branded cash cards loaded with an allowance for a daily meal. "It could be used anywhere — so yes, people used to save it up during the week and blow it on a big shop," said a former Snap UK employee.
A $2,600 travel pass ruse
A senior Meta employee who left last year recalls former colleagues claiming a $2,600 annual travel pass to get the receipt to expense, only to then instantly refund their tickets.
A $3,000 a year "wellness stipend" — meant to cover costs for employees' physical and mental health and care for their families — was exchanged for Nintendo Switch consoles by other staffers, he said.
A $25-a-month advertising credit given to employees to test and improve their skills on Facebook Ad Manager was instead sold for $20 cash, he added.
"It was just kind of normal. Oh, you're getting an Uber Eats, you throw stuff in. It wasn't like you felt you were cheating," said the former Instagram employee. "You feel like that's your money."
A growing sense of entitlement
Some say that all this pampering of tech employees led to a growing sense of entitlement, which allowed some to think they could push the limits of what was acceptable when it came to perks.
"Google would give out Christmas presents, the latest phone or something, and I would see people complain about it," the former Googler said.
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg famously bristled during an all-hands meeting about coming layoffs in 2022 when an employee asked whether the company would continue its COVID-era bonus holidays.
"People would get angry about the littlest of things in the live comments when Zuck did the company all-hands — the kinds of comments that would get you fired in any other job," said a former Meta employee who left last year. "'How can you cut the laundry benefit?' 'The food is crap now!' etc."
Where to draw the line?
None of the tech workers Business Insider spoke to endorsed expense fraud. Indeed, there are tax consequences for companies and individuals if tax-exempted benefits or vouchers or a specific purpose are used for something else.
Many tech workers told BI that companies never really made it clear what was acceptable. Is it ok if your partner stops by late to see you in the office and grabs a French fry from a plate of food that your employer paid for? What about 10 fries, or a whole plate?
Patrick Mork, who led marketing for Google Play before leaving in 2013, thinks tech companies have moved too far away from their initial worker-friendly cultures as their focus has turned toward Wall Street's profit expectations. That shift has eroded leadership skills, meaning some employees aren't clear on their company's values and rules, he added.
"Employers don't focus on anything that's not being measured — and what's not being measured is culture, leadership, and values," Mork said.
Dilip Rao, CEO of Sharebite, a startup that lets client companies give workers credit cards for meals that only work at approved restaurants, criticized companies for offering easily abusable perks to workers then penalizing them for it. "Why even put somebody in that position?" he said.
Grubgate is "a perfect example of a recurring issue," he added. "Obviously it's gained visibility because it happened at Meta. But I got to tell you, this same exact problem happens all the time."
He said he's seen other examples of tech employees using company meal vouchers to buy firewood and pet food.
Layoffs led to more perks-grifting
Layoffs across the industry have left some employees cynical about the companies they work at, and worried about job security. When you might be let go by a company, you might max out on perks.
According to job marketplace Trueup, at least 650,000 tech workers have been cut since the start of 2023.
"Once the layoffs started, people were focused on spending whatever perks they had as quickly as possible," said the former Meta employee who left last year.
Soon there may be fewer perks-grifting opportunities. Alongside industrywide layoffs that began in 2022, many tech companies also trimmed back the benefits on offer.
The Big Tech pampering era could soon be over, according to Bruce Daisley, a former vice president at Twitter and YouTube who now coaches leadership teams at large companies on workplace culture.
"There's a feeling that it became a monster that needed to be killed," Daisley said.
"From early in the morning, until late at night, people are calling me, people are WhatsApping me, people are asking how to get their ballots," she told Business Insider during a phone call. "It's non-stop."
Working with the Republican Overseas in Israel group, she is emerging as a key organizer to mobilize the GOP vote in what looks like a very close race.
Expats' votes are counted in the last state they lived in. As a former Michigander, Segaloff's vote is powerful.
She has been reaching out to other US voters living in Israel, originally from battleground states, in the hope of helping to secure a win for former President Donald Trump.
"I think that we could influence the swing states and move them a little bit," she said.
, Israel has the US's fourth-largest expat community.
AHMAD GHARABLI/AFP via Getty Images
According to the Federal Voting Assistance Program, Israel has the US's fourth-largest expat community and about 147,000 eligible voters. iVote Israel, a voting resource for Americans in Israel, estimates the number at around 200,000.
The pool of voters isn't huge, but in such a close election, it could prove significant.
Matanya Harow, iVote Israel's national director, said most voters contacting them are from New York, New Jersey, and California, but a significant number come from battleground states, mainly Pennsylvania and Michigan.
"I believe that they can have quite a sizable impact," he said.
With days to go, absentee ballot registration deadlines for many states have already passed, so iVote Israel is primarily helping voters return their existing ballots — a process that varies by state.
Historically, the challenging task has stunted turnout in Israel. According to the FVAP, only about 5% of American voters in Israel cast their ballot in 2020.
Nonetheless, both parties are trying.
According to CBS News, the Democratic National Committee allocated $300,000 for Democrats Abroad to reach overseas voters—a first in a presidential election cycle.
Although the official Democrats Abroad in Israel group disbanded over a disagreement shortly after last year's October 7, 2023, terrorist attacks, a new organization formed — American Democrats in Israel.
Heather Stone, the group's executive vice chair, said they've received "thousands" of calls from swing-state voters living in Israel. "It's down to the wire," she said.
She said those voters see Vice President Kamala Harris as supportive of Israel and its ability to defend itself. They are, she said, also motivated by other issues like abortion, healthcare, the economy, and the climate crisis.
"We don't check our values just because we moved across the ocean," Stone said.
The GOP pitch — protecting Israel's security
The Republican camp appears to be zeroing in on Israel's defense and security.
Sen. JD Vance, Trump's running mate, said in a video earlier this month to American voters in Israel that if Harris becomes president, "it's going to lead to broader regional war or maybe even worse."
"We're fighting for our survival right now, our sons and daughters — of Americans — are being killed in Gaza and Lebanon," Raphael Gantshar, a New Yorker who moved to Israel 17 years ago, told BI.
He said American voters in Israel will be asking, '"Which presidency is the one that will save the lives of my children?"
Gantshar believes Trump is the answer and will vote for him for a second time. He said he feels the former president understands better than Harris how to stabilize the region, which he believes aligns with the best interests of the US.
Then-President Donald Trump watches as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks after the signing of the Abraham Accords in September, 2020.
SAUL LOEB/AFP via Getty Images
For Tzvi Silver, who moved from New Jersey 13 years ago, Israel's security is a concern, but he doesn't necessarily buy the apocalyptic warnings.
"I don't think that Vice President Kamala Harris being elected will necessarily be good for Israel," he said.
"I'm also not concerned that I'll wake up on the day after the election, November 6, and all of a sudden the Jewish state will, God forbid, be gone or something like that."
Silver said that he had been convinced to vote for Trump based on his track record, highlighting the Abraham Accords — agreements from Trump's presidency that promoted Arab-Israeli normalization — and the state of the US economy.
Although Silver is firm in his decision, that is not the case for everyone around him. He said his in-laws plan to vote for Harris, while his wife may vote for Trump for the first time.
In Trump-friendly Israel, American expats are divided
While no specific polls exist for US voters in Israel, Uriel Abulof, an associate professor at Tel Aviv University's School of Political Science, believes opinions are divided, primarily along religious lines.
He said that among American voters in Israel, Orthodox Jews are more likely to support Trump, while secular Jews tend to favor Harris.
For those in the middle, their choice is likely to hinge on who they believe will best protect Israel, Abulof said.
He said, "In this age where everything is so personalized, if Bibi says, and effectively he does, that Trump is better for Israel, then they would vote for Trump."
For the Republicans Overseas in Israel, they're banking on a sizable number of those people being from swing states.
Or, as Segaloff wrote in a WhatsApp message, "Here's hoping."
The presidential election has the potential to reshape the investment landscape.
Detailed below is what Wall Street is saying about investing implications across multiple asset classes.
This is the first in a five-part series about the impact both Trump and Harris presidencies could have on US consumers.
With the presidential election just over a week away, and the candidates in a dead heat in the polls, Americans are in suspense about how their lives will change under a new leader.
Business Insider has prepared a five-part refresher for the final stretch that will unpack the potential impact that both Donald Trump and Kamala Harris presidencies will have on US consumers. Today's first installment is focused on the investment landscape.
To date, Trump and Harris have outlined specific policy proposals that will impact different parts of the stock market. Their varying platforms will also be crucial in determining the future path of interest rates, which will shape the bond market.
But they're not expected to have diametrically opposed impacts on everything, with both candidates seen as positive forces for crypto.
Detailed below is the latest research and commentary from top Wall Street strategists, outlining how the market and investing landscape will shift under potential Trump or Harris administrations.
The guide covers four specific asset classes, and is divided between the Trump and Harris impact on each.
Stocks
From the perspective of equities, it's helpful to look at the potential impact on both the micro (specific sectors set to be impacted) and the macro (how the broader market will respond).
Trump
Sectors
Much of the industry guidance for the stock market under Trump boils down to his proposed tax policies. Bank of America says his plan to cut the corporate tax rate to 15% from 21% will boost corporate earnings by 4%. How much it impacts each sector ultimately depends on sensitivity to changes in the tax rate.
To that end, BofA says the consumer discretionary and communication services sectors — the areas most beholden to tax-rate changes — will benefit the most. On the flip side, less exposed areas like utilities, real estate, and energy will get the smallest boost.
For energy specifically, Trump's pro-drilling stance — while supportive of industry activity — will likely lead to oversupply and lower oil prices, says BNY Wealth. That, in turn, will hurt corporate profitability in the sector and drag on stock prices.
It's also worth noting that energy was the worst-performing sector during Trump's previous presidential tenure.
Financials is another area of the stock market seen benefiting from a Trump win. Allies of the former president have said he aims to unburden banks from many of the regulations that were imposed following the 2008 financial crisis, something that his first administration tried to do with limited success.
Those looser regulations could could also ignite a fresh wave of mergers and acquisitions, which would increase advisory revenue for big banks and help drive up profits from dealmaking.
Broader market
Zooming out and assessing the full equity-market landscape, views are divided, particularly along partisan lines. Trump's proposed tax and regulatory policies are seen by his supporters as pro-business, which would be good news for corporate profit growth and deal activity.
But Trump critics argue that his proposal for universal tariffs and steeper levies on Chinese imports — as well as a crackdown on immigration — will be inflationary, which could hold back stock prices. The nonpartisan Tax Foundation says the tariff plan in particular could hurt profit margins and put pressure on consumer spending.
Bank of America estimates that 60% tariffs on China and 10% on other countries would lower S&P 500 earnings per share by 3.1%. That would be a problem since earnings growth has long been the stock market's primary driver of gains.
"The conventional wisdom is wrong: Trump is not going to substantially cut taxes once in office; he is going to raise taxes by jacking up tariffs. To the extent that this dampens economic activity, it is bad news for stocks," BCA Research chief strategist Peter Berezin said.
Harris
Sectors
Just like with Trump, much of the guidance around the stock market under Harris involves her tax plan. Her proposal to hike the corporate tax rate to 28% from 21% would have an inverse effect on sectors.
That means consumer discretionary and communication services — the top beneficiaries under Trump — would be hit the hardest under a Harris regime, BofA says.
"Consumer discretionary stocks have underperformed the S&P 500 modestly since Harris' presidential candidacy was announced, perhaps reflecting concerns that a Democratic President could result in higher corporate taxes and employee wages," BNY Wealth said.
Financial firms will also feel a negative impact of both higher taxes and Harris' proposed regulatory tightening.
But there are bright spots too. A Harris victory would likely benefit homebuilder stocks because of her proposal to build 3 million houses. Renewable-energy stocks should also see gains due to the favorable view of wind and solar energy by Democrats.
Both sectors have outperformed in recent months during periods when Harris saw positive momentum in election polls.
Broader market
The stock market has soared to records during Joe Biden's presidency, up more than 50% since he was inaugurated, and a Kamala Harris win would likely be a continuation of many of the same policies that have been supportive of the market.
Those include infrastructure investments and tax incentives to bring manufacturing jobs back to the country, like in the semiconductor industry via the CHIPS and Science Act.
But BofA says Harris' proposed tax hike would also put downward pressure on corporate profits, which estimates a 5% earnings hit. Beyond that, a quadrupling of the stock buyback tax to 4% would also take 1% off S&P 500 profits, the firm said.
With all of these cross-currents swirling, a neutral market outcome must also be assessed.
A potentially muted impact
Capital Economics believes neither a Trump nor Harris win will mean all that much for stock prices because bigger trends — specifically AI — will shape the market's direction.
"Our upbeat projections for the stock market in 2024 and 2025 are predicated on a view that hype over AI will continue to fuel a stock market bubble," the research firm said. Capital Economics has a 2025 year-end price target of 7,000 for the S&P 500, regardless of which candidate wins the election.
Meanwhile, Bank of America said that as long as corporate profits continue to grow, the stock market will rise regardless of who wins the White House.
Bonds
The performance of the US bond market largely hinges on the direction of interest rates.
As interest rates rise, bond prices generally fall, and vice versa. And since presidential actions usually impact rates, the bond market will be shaped by what either Trump or Harris end up doing.
Trump
A Trump win would is seen ushering in higher interest rates, which would push bond prices lower. It ultimately boils down to inflation.
Economists see Trump's double-whammy proposals of mass deportation and universal tariffs as inflationary. And since the Federal Reserve's primary tool for fighting inflation is raising interest rates, bond prices would suffer as yields rise.
"Our assessment is that a Trump win would lead to higher US yields," Capital Economics said.
Estimates from the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget — a non-profit think tank — say a wider deficit and an increasing pile of debt under a Trump presidency, compared to a Harris presidency, would also put upward pressure on interest rates. That would also hurt the performance of bonds.
Harris
Capital Economics said it expects interest rates to fall under a Harris win, which would be good news for bonds, as she wouldn't pursue certain inflationary policies like tariffs or immigration deportations, which could fuel wage inflation.
Harris' policies, considered to be less inflationary than Trump's, would also allow the Federal Reserve to continue on their path of cutting interest rates, which would boost bond prices.
A Bloomberg survey of institutional investors last month found that 30% of investors would add to their bond exposure if Harris wins, while just 17% said they would buy more bonds if Trump wins.
Additionally, 46% of respondents said they would reduce their bond exposure if Trump wins, compared to just 23% under a Harris win.
Crypto
Trump
A Trump win is seen as bullish for bitcoin and the broader cryptocurrency industry, as former President Donald Trump has firmly embraced digital assets in recent years.
According to Bernstein analyst Gautam Chhugani, bitcoin could hit $90,000 by December if Trump wins the election, representing potential upside of about 37% from current levels.
"Elections remain hard to call, but if you are long crypto here, you are likely taking a Trump trade," Chhugani said.
Yet, Wall Street seems to think that a big case for bitcoin will remain intact no matter who wins. The US government debt pile is expected grow regardless of who controls the White House. That scenario is among bitcoin's biggest bull theses.
"I'm not sure if either President or other candidate would make a difference. I do believe the utilization of digital assets is going to become more and more of a reality worldwide," BlackRock CEO Larry Fink said during the company's third-quarter earnings call.
US dollar
Trump
Trump's tax plan and protectionist trade policies are expected to strengthen the dollar. It's the opposite of what the presidential hopeful has said he wants, since a weaker currency makes a nation's exports more competitive in global trade.
These policies are expected to be inflationary, which would push interest rates higher and possibly prompt the Fed to tighten. Those climbing rates would then underpin dollar gains.
"Should he re-take the White House ... the dollar would probably rally sharply, at least in the near term, on expectations of higher US tariffs and interest rates," Capital Economics said in recent research.
Harris
A Harris presidency would continue the trends of a weaker dollar due to "policy continuity" of the Biden administration, Capital Economics said.
Since Harris' overall platform is less expansionary, it's expected to drive less inflationary pressure, and therefore keep the coast clear for the Fed to cut rates and stimulate the economy as currently planned.
That likelihood of lower interest would, in turn, push the dollar lower.
Donald Trump has pledged to lead a mass deportation campaign once elected.
That would create a major labor crunch for homebuilders, driving wages and costs higher.
Here's how Trump's plans could hit the workforce and homes costlier for buyers.
Donald Trump's vow to crack down on immigration doesn't bode well for priced-out homebuyers.
The Republican presidential candidate has promised to lead the largest deportation campaign in US history if reelected. By one estimate, that could involve deporting up to 1.2 million people, though as many 11 million undocumented residents live in the country.
While there's room to debate the plan's feasibility, what's certain is that a sudden drain of the immigrant workforce could significantly hinder construction in the US, igniting deeper unaffordability for home market buyers.
A critical homebuilder workforce
"If we did see mass deportations, I do think it would have a chilling effect on the labor market," Jim Tobin, CEO of the National Association of Home Builders, told Business Insider.
He said immigrants are a critical component of the industry, as they help relieve a serious shortage of skilled labor. Foreign-born construction workers, who make up as much as a third of the sector's labor force, are often concentrated in specific trades required to build a home, such as plasterers and drywall installers, the Home Builders Institute reported.
"We consistently see government data showing that we are anywhere between 200,000 to 400,000 workers short in our industry and that lack of skilled labor slows down the pace of construction, drives up labor costs, and ultimately leads to higher home prices, and a slower pace of home building," Tobin said.
A 2022 George W. Bush Institute study found that US metros with the highest immigrant population growth scored the lowest construction costs.
Without the supply of these workers, history suggests housing costs are likely to rise.
According to a research paper released earlier this year, home prices were found to rise in counties impacted by an immigration crackdown that spanned from late 2008 to 2014. The US "Secure Communities" program led to the deportation of over 300,000 undocumented immigrants in that time period, it cited.
Given the pace of homebuilding, price effects were muted for two years after enforcement began, the study said. However, three years later, the average new construction property became 17% more expensive among tracked counties compared to the baseline.
That translates to a $57,300 jump compared to the average property price before the program's implementation.
"Three years after SC rollout, the average county has foregone the equivalent of an entire year's worth of additional residential construction: 2,423 fewer buildings are permitted, and 1,997 fewer newly constructed homes enter the market," the authors wrote.
Considering how wide-sweeping the Trump campaign's deportation effort could be, experts told BI that homebuilders would likely resort to wage hikes to attract domestic workers. These could be significant, given that the construction industry would be competing against other immigrant-dependent sectors.
According to Tobin, mass deportation would also require the industry to redouble its efforts in attracting new domestic interest in the trades.
"Whether that's kids coming out of out of high school, or adults that are looking for a new career, transitioning military that are coming out of the service. We would have to look at previously incarcerated."
What about demand?
Trump's campaign has implied that cracking down on immigration will help ease housing unaffordability by effectively removing one source of demand. It's a talking point recently made by Vice President candidate JD Vance, who blamed "millions of undocumented immigrants" for adding pressure on a supply-constrained housing market.
While research has suggested immigrant demand plays a role in influencing prices, economists generally doubt that this is a major driver.
Rents and home prices started surging in 2020 and 2021, at a time when net immigration inflows were close to the two-decade average, as tracked by the Congressional Budget Office.
Meanwhile, Trump's platform is also pushing another policy initiative that's unlikely to help housing costs: tariffs.
The candidate has pledged to raise duties on virtually all imports to the US, raising them as much as 60% on Chinese imports.
"If you're going to add tariffs onto building materials, that cost is just going to be passed along to the homeowner or the renter," Tobin said, citing that there's a lack of evidence that tariffs will meaningfully increase production in the US. He pointed to a 15% tariff on Canadian softwood lumber that has failed to do this.
John Hussman warns of poor S&P 500 returns over the next 12 years.
High valuations suggest potential underperformance against Treasurys.
Hussman's past predictions include accurate forecasts of the 2000 and 2008 crashes.
Before investing in the stock market, John Hussman urges investors to keep in mind that return outcomes ultimately have different probabilities based on when you buy in.
"This is like stepping into a house with two rooms, one with the temperature at 0 degrees and one at 140 degrees, and expecting a temperature of 70 either way," said Hussman, the president of the Hussman Investment Trust who called the 2000 and 2008 crashes, in an October 17 note.
Case in point, if you bought in on February 14, 2020, you'd be up 71%. But if you bought in just over a month later, at the bottom of the pandemic-driven crash on March 20, you'd be up 152% right now. They're both great outcomes, no doubt. But they're very different. And in business cycles where monetary and fiscal stimulus aren't as robust, the market can take a much longer time to recover.
Right now, a few different variables show that investors should expect poor outcomes over the next 12 years if they were to invest in the S&P 500 today, Hussman said.
First, there are valuation levels. Hussman's go-to measure is the market cap of non-financial stocks divided by those stocks' total gross value added. The metric is at all-time highs, surpassing the largest bubble peaks in history.
Hussman Funds
Hussman likes it so much because it's been a fairly good predictor of 12-year market returns relative to 10-year Treasury returns. Here's the relationship between expectations and actual market returns. Current expectations have the S&P 500 underperforming Treasurys by 9.9% annually over the next 12 years.
Hussman Funds
Then there's investor sentiment, which Hussman measures through the uniformity of movement in thousands of securities. In the chart below, when the measure goes flat like in 2000 and 2008, it's historically been bad for stocks.
Hussman Funds
Finally, there's the accumulation of warning signs of market over-extension that rivals prior major downturn periods. The individual warning signs that Hussman monitors are various technical indicators, like the S&P 500 being within 2% of its 5-year high while less than 72% of stocks are below their 200-day moving averages and 2.5% of stocks hit new both 52-week highs and lows at the same time, among other conflicting signals.
Hussman Funds
Hussman's track record — and his views in context
Hussman's outlook is often seen as extreme, and perhaps fairly so. But valuations are causing skepticism about future market returns among others on Wall Street, even if not to the same degree.
It's also worth remembering that Hussman's outlook is only for a 12-year period if you were to buy in now — not if you plan to hold for multiple decades.
For the uninitiated, Hussman has repeatedly made headlines by predicting a stock-market decline exceeding 60% and forecasting a full decade of negative equity returns. And as the stock market ground mostly higher, he persisted with his doomsday calls.
But before you dismiss Hussman as a wonky perma-bear, consider again his track record. Here are the arguments he's laid out:
He predicted in March 2000 that tech stocks would plunge 83%, and then the tech-heavy Nasdaq 100 index lost an "improbably precise" 83% during a period from 2000 to 2002.
He predicted in 2000 that the S&P 500 would probably see negative total returns over the following decade, which it did.
He predicted in April 2007 that the S&P 500 could lose 40%, then it lost 55% in the subsequent collapse from 2007 to 2009.
Hussman's recent returns, however, have been less than stellar. His Strategic Growth Fund is down about 55% since December 2010 and has fallen 16% in the past 12 months. The S&P 500, by comparison, is up about 39% over the past year.
The amount of bearish evidence being unearthed by Hussman continues to mount, and his calls over the past couple of years for a substantial sell-off began to prove accurate in 2022. Yes, there may still be returns to be realized in this new bull market, but at what point does the mounting risk of a larger crash become too unbearable?
That's a question investors will have to answer themselves — and one that Hussman will keep exploring in the interim.
A display window at a Versace clothing store on Fifth Avenue in New York City.
Robert Alexander/Getty Images
A judge has granted a preliminary injunction to halt the merger between Tapestry and Capri Holdings.
The two companies planned to have multiple luxury brands — including Versace — operating under one umbrella.
Following the ruling, on Thursday, Capri's stock plunged 45% in after-hours trading.
Versace's parent company, Capri Holdings, suffered a steep loss in after-hours trading on Thursday after a federal judge blocked its proposed merger with Tapestry, the parent of fashion brands Kate Spade and Coach.
Jennifer Rochon, a judge in the Southern District of New York, granted the Federal Trade Commission's request for a preliminary injunction to halt the merger of the two companies while the commission investigates the deal.
Rochon wrote that the FTC argued in its case that the merger would "substantially lessen competition in the market for accessible-luxury handbags."
Rochon ruled in favor of the FTC's stance, writing in her ruling that the "merging parties are close competitors, such that the merger would result in the loss of head-to-head competition."
"The Court thus finds that there is persuasive additional evidence of unilateral effects of the merger causing anticompetitive harm," Rochon wrote.
Following the court order, Capri's stock was down 45% in after-hours trading on Thursday. The company's stock is down 18% year-to-date.
Tapestry's stock, however, surged about 12% in after-hours trading.
In response to the judge's ruling, Capri released a statement saying that it — along with Tapestry — intends to file a notice of appeal to the US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit.
Tapestry announced in August 2023 that it would buy Capri for $8.5 billion. Under the proposed merger, six high-end fashion brands would operate under one umbrella: Capri's Versace, Jimmy Choo, and Michael Kors, along with Tapestry's Coach, Stuart Weitzman, and Kate Spade.
However, in April, the FTC announced a lawsuit to block the merger. The FTC wrote in an April 22 press release that it believed this business move would give Tapestry "a dominant share of the 'accessible luxury' handbag market" and "eliminate fierce competition between the two companies."
"The proposed merger threatens to deprive millions of American consumers of the benefits of Tapestry and Capri's head-to-head competition, which includes competition on price, discounts and promotions, innovation, design, marketing, and advertising," read the FTC's April 22 statement.
The FTC added that the deal would impact the companies' incentives "to compete for employees and could negatively affect employees' wages and workplace benefits."
Tapestry and Capri said in an April 22 statement responding to the FTC lawsuit that their companies "face competitive pressures from both lower- and higher-priced products."
"In bringing this case, the FTC has chosen to ignore the reality of today's dynamic and expanding $200 billion global luxury industry," Tapestry said in its statement.
The trade commission celebrated the Thursday ruling.
"Today's decision is a victory not only for the FTC, but also for consumers across the country seeking access to quality handbags at affordable prices," Henry Liu, director of the agency's Bureau of Competition, said in a statement to The New York Times.
Representatives of the FTC, Capri Holdings, and Tapestry didn't respond to a request for comment from Business Insider sent outside business hours.
Hanna is a former Google AI ethicist who worked alongside Timnit Gebru, who was fired from the tech giant after voicing concerns about its natural language processing tools. Hanna now oversees research at Gebru's Distributed AI Research Institute. Her work centers on communities most affected by AI. "A near-term AI dystopia is one in which there's not a masterful AI that takes over the world — that's bullshit — it's a world in which there are AI tools which are promised to do XYZ and that many employers have effectively bought into only to lay off full-time workers and hire them back at a calcualized rate," Hanna told Business Insider. "So it increases that gigification and casualization of work." She's writing a book, "The AI Con," with the University of Washington linguistics professor Emily Bender examining what they see as the harms posed by AI and the myths around what it can and cannot do.
In practice, though, many Bhutanese workers have little time left for the pursuit of happiness. The tiny country tops the ranking for the average number of hours worked in a week.
According to the International Labour Organization, Bhutanese employees work an average of 54.4 hours a week, far exceeding the 38-hour average in the US.
Bhutan also has the world's largest share of employed people working more than 48 hours a week, the data said — the level the World Bank considers overwork.
That covers 61% of Bhutan's workforce, the ILO said, compared to 13% in the US.
Long hours, little rest
It might come as a surprise — the small Buddhist kingdom is often viewed as a tranquil paradise of mountains and temples.
Bhutanese workers challenged that impression, telling Business Insider that they feel compelled to spend most of their waking hours on the job.
According to the World Bank's report on Bhutan's labor market, published earlier this year, overwork is particularly prevalent in the country's private sector, especially in family businesses, construction, transportation, and hospitality.
Bhutan has the world's longest working weeks according to the International Labour Organization.
Eric Lafforgue/Art in All of Us/Corbis via Getty Images
A couple of hours into working overtime, 22-year-old Ten Choezim joined a video call from the kitchen of the hotel where she works in Thimphu, the capital.
Choezim and other workers in this article gave their real names but asked that their workplaces not be identified for fear of retaliation.
She told Business Insider that working beyond her contracted 12-hour shift is normal for her. She often hits 16-hour days and regularly clocks in a 112-hour week, she said.
Once, she said, she worked a 16-hour shift pattern for three weeks without a day off.
"I had aches, back pain, my legs were sore," she said. "Mentally, I couldn't speak well."
Though she often feels exhausted by her work, Choezim saw few alternatives.
"After some time, I got used to it," she said, noting that she wouldn't be able to afford to live there if she worked any less or left her job.
Many Bhutanese are leaving the country
Although Choezim said she enjoys living in Bhutan, her intense workload has made her consider leaving for better pay and working conditions.
"Our country is peaceful and all, but when it comes to work, it is heavy," she said.
Her sisters have already joined the exodus of young Bhutanese, moving to Australia. She said she feels obliged to remain to care for their parents.
In his State of the Nation address in July, Bhutan's Prime Minister Tshering Tobgay said that about 64,000 people — around 9% of the country's population — have migrated, mainly to Australia.
He described it as an "unprecedented existential crisis" that could hinder the country's development.
Overwork is widespread in Bhutan.
Sergi Reboredo/VW Pics/Universal Images Group via Getty Images
Kalyani Honrao, an Asia analyst for the Economist Intelligence Unit, told Business Insider that Bhutan is caught in a vicious cycle.
She said the mass departure of skilled workers created to a "brain drain," leaving employers unable to fill skilled vacancies.
As a result, she said, the burden on those who remain increases, leading to them doing the "heavy lifting."
Meanwhile, according to Honrao, there is a huge supply of unskilled and semi-skilled jobs, which makes workers easily replaceable. "People try to do their best to stay employed and accept overwork as normal," she said.
'It's just enough to sustain me and my family'
According to the World Bank, the main reason given for overwork in Bhutan is that the job requires it. The second biggest reason is that workers need more money.
For Namgyal Dorji Wangchuk, 43, both apply.
He told BI he works up to 90 hours a week, including unpaid overtime, as a sales and marketing professional at a hotel.
To supplement his income, he occasionally takes extra hours as a freelance consultant.
His hotel job requires him to work six days a week, often with late-night shifts. It brings in about $361 a month.
Bhutan also has the world's largest share of employed people working 49 or more hours a week.
Anupam Nath/AP Photo
"It is just enough to sustain me and my family," he said. It covers rent, bills, and some costs associated with raising two teen daughters. He said he has little, if anything, left to save.
Most days, he's home too late to see his children before they fall asleep. "So, just once a week I get a good time with my family," he said. "Otherwise, mostly, I am mostly working."
Bhutan's innovative Gross National Happiness index, introduced in the 1970s and enshrined as a national goal in the constitution, aims to take a holistic view of development.
It values the population's well-being and happiness alongside, or even above, traditional economic indicators.
In an interview with the Spanish newspaper El País this month, Prime Minister Tobgay said the framework takes into account measures like how the population uses their time, which he said is crucial to "find out whether it's balanced, if you're sleeping enough, how you manage work-life balance, etc."
Gross National Happiness is a development indicator in Bhutan's constitution.
Peerapon Boonyakiat/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images
Meanwhile, Bhutanese employment laws aim to codify these occupational standards by establishing an eight-hour workday, mandating rest breaks, and entitling workers to overtime pay at a rate equal to or higher than their regular wages.
But Honrao of the Economist Intelligence Unit said these labor laws are rarely enforced, and semi-skilled and unskilled workers tend to put up with violations for fear of losing their jobs.
Bhutan's Department of Labour did not respond to repeated requests for comment from Business Insider.
'A job is a job'
Bikash Sharma, 46, is a supervisor at a company that exports construction materials near the Bhutan-India border.
He told BI he usually works 12-hour days, six days a week, but is only paid for an eight-hour day.
"It's not fair enough, but what to do?" he said. "A job is a job, and you can't just get another job very easily."
He added: "It's very difficult, but we have to feed ourselves and our family."
Sharma said that sometimes he is so exhausted from work that he just wants to "run away somewhere and hide."
However, despite these fantasies of escaping, he has no intention of leaving Bhutan.
He said the kingdom's low crime rates, absence of war, tranquility, and the comfort of being with his family surpass other considerations.
Bhutan is a picturesque country, but many citizens leave for other countries, primarily Australia.
Eric Lafforgue/Art in All of Us/Corbis via Getty Images
Instead, Sharma is trying to embrace Bhutan's guiding philosophy — finding greater value in sources of joy other than the size of his bank balance.
"We are not very rich, " he said, but "we are happy."
He added, "I do wish my standard of living were just a little bit better."
Jonah Weinbaum joined a hacker house to work on a neurotech project in summer 2023.
The hacker house, Myelin, aimed to develop a wetware computer with $8,000 in funding.
Living in the hacker house shifted Weinbaum's career focus from academia to entrepreneurship.
This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation withJonah Weinbaum,a 19-year-old who moved into a hacker house during the summer of 2023. The following has been edited for length and clarity.
After finishing my freshman year at the University of Michigan, I planned to spend the summer on campus working on an independent computer science research project.
A few days before the summer semester started, I was talking to a friend on campus when a random student sat down to join our chat. We talked about nonlinear dynamics and exchanged phone numbers.
He recruited me to live in a hacker house and work on a neurotech project
Later that day, he sent me a message explaining that he was starting a hacker house called Myelin and asked if I wanted to live there and work on a neurotech project for three months. I had heard of hacker houses before but didn't know of any around campus.
The guy I met and three other students wanted to build a wetware computer. They pitched the idea to different VCs and other organizations and received around $8,000 in funding through Emergent Ventures and the 1517 Fund.
Once they had the funds, they rented a house in Ann Arbor for three months. They aimed to recruit a handful of people to work on the project, hoping it would become a startup.
He recruited me because he thought I was good at physics. The project's novelty seemed exciting, and I needed a break from just doing coursework.
I was majoring in math, physics, and cognitive science. I wanted to do something interesting now instead of in seven years. After learning more about the opportunity, I said yes. I moved in in May 2023, when I was 18.
I got free rent in exchange for helping the team work on a project
Myelin house.
Courtesy of Jonah Weinbaum
When I looked for summer housing, it seemed like I'd have to spend around $1,500 for three months. It was a big draw that living in the hacker house came with free rent for the summer.
The house also supplied some meals and covered the utilities. All I had to pay for was the extra food I wanted, but I ate very inexpensively, so my bills were around $30 a week.
At any given time, 7-14 people from places like Michigan, Washington, Canada, Russia, and California lived there. Some people had internships in the latter half of the summer and left the house early.
Not everyone was a student; some were later in their careers, but most of us were college-aged. They came because they wanted to work on and talk about neurotech, and such places aren't easy to find.
A handful of us moved in on the same day, picked our rooms (I got lucky and had my own room), cleaned the house, and had our first meeting about the project and how we would operate.
Every hacker house operates differently
There were three teams, each with three or four people. The teams started with somebody presenting an idea for a team, and people joined if they liked it. The house was full of neurotech equipment and people working on projects ranging from personalized medicine to EEG-based object control and biological neuron computers.
Whenever we woke up, at around 9 a.m., we started working on the project and worked on it all day until we went to bed at random late hours. We didn't do anything else. I was the only person enrolled in a summer class and completed my work during lunch or dinner breaks. I didn't travel or see friends outside this.
Despite the high-tech focus, life in the house was simple. We had a piano that was played at regular intervals, food in the fridge, and beds. Some house members slept less than others, so there was almost always some conversation in the living room.
I spent my time doing research and sharing it with the other members of the house
Our goal was to design a low-cost wetware computer that one could use for edge computer applications (robotics, drones, etc.).
I worked with two other house members to develop a new paradigm for wetware computing. We eventually found a set of plausible methodologies for the project and wrote a white paper on how we could see them coming together. Being near the University of Michigan campus gave us constant opportunities to speak with researchers.
We'd spend our days talking to researchers, reading papers online, and synthesizing everything. At the end of every week, we'd present our progress to the rest of the house.
When your time at a hacker house ends, the community doesn't
By the start of the school year, we viewed our operations through a business lens and realized the potential for a business from a device we had been building: a microelectrode array.
When school started in August 2023, we all moved out of the hacker house. I found other off-campus housing and returned to being a full-time college student.
Since then, I've had the opportunity to stay at two other San Francisco hacker houses while capital-raising for the wetware computing startup I worked on at Myelin. I'm still in touch with everyone I met at the Myelin house. The community has been very valuable.
Living in the hacker house changed the career path I was on
Before this experience, I was confused about what path to take. I thought maybe I'd pursue a Ph.D. Living in the hacker house changed my mind completely. I'm now 100% on the entrepreneurship path.
I used to follow the flow and did things because that's what I saw others do. I was always aware of the fundamental disconnect in my perception of the future but wasn't sure how to mend it.
My time in the hacker house taught me how to take a problem and investigate it intensely for a short period. I'll be able to speak about my neurotech research for decades.
My focus has now shifted. Instead of continuing school at the University of Michigan, I'm off to live in a pro-town, a town built for deep-tech entrepreneurs, in Texas.
Goldman Sachs forecasts muted S&P 500 gains, with a 3% annual return over 10 years.
Mega-cap tech stocks and AI enthusiasm have led to high index concentration.
Diversification and equal-weighted S&P 500 exposure may offer better long-term returns.
The S&P 500's bullish run over the past year, with an over 38% return, may come at the expense of its future performance, according to Goldman Sachs.
An October 18 note, led by David Kostin, forecasts muted gains for the foreseeable future. The index could post an annual return of only 3% over the next 10 years; it's well below the average consensus estimate of 6% based on 21 asset managers tracked by the investment bank. Still, all outlooks look grim: in comparison, the index posted a 13% average annualized return over the past decade. The bank's most bearish scenario would see the S&P 500 decline by an annual 1%, while its more positive calls for a gain of 7%.
You can thank the dominance of a small group of mega-cap tech stocks. Investor enthusiasm for the prospects of AI has cornered them into a handful of names, bringing the index's concentration to its highest in over 100 years, the note reads. That can make things a bit shaky at the top, especially since the attractiveness of AI darlings like Nvidia rides on hypergrowth and wide profit margins. The catch-22 of this type of setup is that such extreme growth comes in bouts followed by periods of normalization.
Even if the AI darlings remain on the top for the next decade, they may not be able to sustain the same growth margins, which is the reason investors are willing to pay a premium for them.
The forward-looking outlook of 3% is so muted that even lower-risk bonds, like the 10-year Treasury, are expected to outperform with a 4% yield. Goldman pegs the likelihood that bonds will beat the index over the next 10 years at a whopping 72% probability.
There's also a 33% chance the index won't outpace a 2.2% inflation rate. While it's a much lower probability, it's still at more than double the historical average of 13%. Even if it outperforms inflation, the base case would only provide real returns of 1%.
The chart below shows the distribution of returns on the index since 1930, demonstrating the rarity of such muted expectations.
Goldman Sachs
Indeed, it's a rare outlook considering that since 1930, equities underperformed the 10-year Treasury in only 13% of the time on a rolling 10-year basis, according to the note. The chart below shows the range of outcomes for the index's performance relative to bonds and inflation.
Goldman Sachs
So what should investors do?
The key word moving forward will be diversification.
The timing could be ripe for a rotation to broader market exposure. Simply put, history shows that the equal-weighted S&P 500, which spreads the contribution of each stock to the basket's overall performance equally, outperforms the aggregate index over the long term. This outperformance is even sharper in the periods that follow peak stock-market concentration. This was the case during the 10 years following the bear market of 1973 and the dot-com bubble of 2000, according to the note.
The chart below demonstrates the annualized 10-year returns of the equal-weighted S&P 500 relative to the aggregate one, with returns fairing better in the former on a long-term outlook and in sharper bouts following peaks of elevated concentration.
Goldman Sachs
Adding an exchange-traded fund that tracks the equal-weighted S&P 500 could be one way to go about it. This also means investors will increase their exposure to small-cap stocks, another perk in a reversion-to-the-mean type scenario, where this sector has room to catch up.
Furthermore, investors should consider a more mixed asset portfolio of stocks and bonds without tilting toward one more than the other. This would create better risk-adjusted returns. Factoring in the types of yields across bonds is another option. Consider the 10-year US Treasury at a yield of 4%, investment-grade bonds at 4.8%, and high-yield bonds at a 7% yield.
Finally, be open to readjusting the allocation tilt based on macroeconomic shifts. This flexibility is referred to as a "strategic tilt," according to a May 28 note led by the head of asset allocation research, Christian Mueller-Glissmann. For example, in an environment where economic growth is strong but there's a risk of inflation, leaning more into equities, especially stocks with strong cash flows, may be the right direction. Meanwhile, if growth is slowed and inflation is muted, consider further allocation to bonds.
