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In 1921, Sadie Alexander became the first African-American to earn a PhD in economics. A few years later, she went to law school and became a celebrated civil rights attorney. But she never abandoned her focus on economic issues. In speech after speech, she argued that full employment — when everyone who wants a job can get one — was absolutely necessary to achieve racial equality. Today on The Indicator, episode 1 in our multi-part series about overlooked economists from the past.
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Paris Olympics organizers want breakdancing to be part of the 2024 Olympics. The sport was part of the Youth Olympic Games in Buenos Aires last fall, when Russian b-boy Bumblebee (left) defeated Japan’s b-boy Shigekix in the gold-medal battle.
Eitan Abramovich /AFP/Getty Images
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Eitan Abramovich /AFP/Getty Images
The world’s best breakdancers could compete for Olympic gold medals at the 2024 Summer Games in Paris, if the event’s organizers succeed in getting the hip-hop dance style recognized as an Olympic sport.
As Paris organizers proposed adding breakdancing to the roster, the International Olympic Committee said the idea fits with its goal of making the Olympics “gender-balanced, more youth-focused and more urban.”
Breakdancing was part of the Youth Olympic Games in Buenos Aires 2018, with participants competing as b-girls, b-boys and on mixed teams. At the Olympics, the discipline would be known simply as “breaking.”
In Buenos Aires, the b-girls competition was won by Ram (Japan’s Ramu Kawai), and the b-boy’s medal was won by Bumblebee (Russia’s Sergei Chernyshev).
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“The Paris organizing committee also wants to include climbing, surfing and skateboarding, which are already on the roster for the 2020 Tokyo Games,” Jake Cigainero reports for NPR’s Newsdesk. “Karate will also make its Olympic debut in Tokyo, but Paris snubbed the sport for its lineup.”
In breaking battle competitions, judges vote to decide the winner of multiple rounds of dancing, in which two dancers take turns on the floor — with rivals often doing their best not to look impressed with their opponent.
Discussing “le breakdance” at a news conference on Thursday, Paris organizers said that it speaks to young people worldwide and that it has more than 1 million practitioners in France — second only to the U.S.
Praising the dancers’ acrobatic ability and innovation and the dramatic suspense of battles, organizers said it would offer a completely new type of competition at the Olympics.
If breaking does become an Olympic sport, the dance style that has its roots in New York City’s streets will achieve a status that ballroom dancing aficionados have been pursuing for years. That effort has been led by the World DanceSport Federation — which now finds itself celebrating the inclusion of a different discipline.
“It is an incredible honor and privilege that, for the first time, a dance discipline is being considered for inclusion in the Olympic Games,” said WDSF President Shawn Tay, adding that breaking would be “an outstanding success” in Paris.
The Paris committee’s decision to back the four new arrivals means that baseball and softball will be left out of the Paris Olympics, after a brief return for the Tokyo Games. Squash is also shut out; so are chess and snooker, which were seen as facing long odds to become Olympic sports in 2024.
While a gritty sport that started in the U.S. has a shot at being in the Olympics, a gritty and acrobatic French sport — parkour — was left out of the Paris proposals. As NPR’s Laurel Wamsley has reported, the International Gymnastics Federation has increasingly sought to bring parkour under its purview and reportedly lobbied to make it part of the 2024 Games.
Paris organizers predict the new sports will boost the Olympics’ appeal to a younger generation that might not be transfixed by more traditional sports. While they sketched out how the competitions would be held in 2024, final details about the proposed sports aren’t likely to emerge until after the Tokyo Summer Olympics in 2020.
The International Olympic Committee will review the Paris group’s proposals, with an initial decision possible in March, when the Olympic Program Commission is slated to make its recommendation to the IOC Executive Board. Final approval could come in June, when the IOC will meet in Lausanne, Switzerland.
Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders entered the 2020 presidential race this week as Democratic candidates engaged in their first big policy fight — centered around health care.
STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
The entry of Bernie Sanders into the presidential race highlights a Democratic policy debate – one that Sanders himself framed four years ago. NPR’s Danielle Kurtzleben reports.
DANIELLE KURTZLEBEN, BYLINE: Democratic primary voters are hearing echoes from 2015.
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BERNIE SANDERS: In my view, we must move forward toward a “Medicare-for-all,” single-payer program.
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KURTZLEBEN: Not just because Bernie Sanders is back, but because one of his signature policies never left. Since he first ran for president, “Medicare-for-all” has become a mainstream Democratic proposal. Now presidential candidates are trying to figure out how to position themselves around it. New Jersey Senator Cory Booker has stressed that he thinks private insurers should still have a role.
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CORY BOOKER: Even countries that have vast access to publicly offered health care still have private health care.
KURTZLEBEN: Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar says “Medicare-for-all” is a possibility in the long term. But for now, she wants to let people buy into Medicaid.
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AMY KLOBUCHAR: So what we need is to expand coverage so that people can have a choice for a public option. And that’s a start, all right?
KURTZLEBEN: Ohio Senator Sherrod Brown, who’s still debating a run, also wants a sort of public option but only for people above age 50.
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SHERROD BROWN: I think “Medicare-for-all” will take a while, and it’s difficult.
KURTZLEBEN: Long story short, in a huge Democratic presidential field, health care is the first issue where candidates are really differentiating themselves. But they also face a problem. Getting into the details can turn voters off.
LARRY LEVITT: Health reform is always more popular as a bumper sticker than as a piece of legislation.
KURTZLEBEN: Larry Levitt is senior vice president for health reform at the Kaiser Family Foundation. This bumper sticker idea applies to any big health care overhaul, he says, whether it’s Obamacare or repealing Obamacare or, now, “Medicare-for-all.”
LEVITT: There’s a huge political benefit for candidates to be in favor of the idea of “Medicare-for-all” in a primary. But the more the details get filled in, the less popular that idea will be.
KURTZLEBEN: For example, polling shows that nearly 7 in 10 Americans like “Medicare-for-all” if they hear it will eliminate premiums and out-of-pocket costs. But that support drops to around 4 in 10 if people hear it will mean higher taxes. Both of those things could be true of a hypothetical “Medicare-for-all” system. But trying to sell the good with the bad on the campaign trail, especially this early, is tough, which is why staying broad might be a smart move, says Nadeam Elshami, former chief of staff to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
NADEAM ELSHAMI: It’s OK for a candidate to say, look, this is generally what I believe in; but I’m willing to hear first, and then get into specifics later after I have a deeper discussion of this issue.
KURTZLEBEN: But even this early, President Trump has used the debate over “Medicare-for-all” to paint Democrats as extreme. Republican strategist Michael Steel advised Jeb Bush’s presidential campaign.
MICHAEL STEEL: It’s a surprising development that 10 years after the passage of the Affordable Care Act and after a massive political backlash against it and a huge effort to defend it, Democrats are immediately swerving so hard to an even greater government role for health care.
KURTZLEBEN: For now, the debate is around health care. But a similar sort of calculation will likely underpin many more Democratic policy debates ahead of 2020, weighing sweeping, progressive ideas that the president could try to label as socialist against incremental policies that might not excite liberal voters. And deciding which choice is most likely to get a Democrat into office. Danielle Kurtzleben, NPR News, Washington.
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