A Message from the Comptroller   Budget season is in full swing and I just returned from Albany where I testified about the state of the City’s finances, the significant challenges we currently face, and the urgent need for greater investment in New York City through State funding. As you’ve likely heard, the City faces a multi-billion-dollar budget gap in the next two years. It’s not all doom and gloom, however; revenue is high and revised tax receipts are up this year. Still, New York remains a city of contradictions. The stock market is at an all-time high — the Dow above 50,000 for the first time ever — yet nearly 90,000 New Yorkers slept in our shelters last night. New York City is home to more billionaires than any other city in the world. And yet nearly one in four New Yorkers live in poverty. That’s 2 million people, including 420,000 children. And this month’s New York by the Numbers, our monthly economic snapshot, reflects that disconnect. While New York City’s office market has continued its steady and robust rebound in early 2026, job growth remains stagnant, with weekly jobless claims creeping upward in January and persistent hiring challenges for recent graduates which could further hamper future job growth. Rents continue to soar, which means shelter costs and the City’s contribution to rent subsidy programs are also rising. At the same time, New York City remains a preeminent destination with tourism numbers coming in stronger than last January and higher consumer confidence than the rest of the country. These contradictions are also evident in the City’s budget. With a fiscal gap not seen since the Great Recession, all options are on the table and a stronger partnership with Albany will be essential — after all, New York City sends far more money to the state than we receive in return; by one recent estimate, more than $20 billion. If we act now with clarity, urgency, and a real partnership with Albany, we can create a more resilient fiscal foundation, steel ourselves for the uncertainty ahead, and be a city and state that leaves no one behind. As always, we will continue to track these trends closely and share clear, data-driven insights to help New Yorkers understand what’s happening in our economy, and what it means for the City’s future. Sincerely, New York City Comptroller Mark D. Levine

Office of the New York City Comptroller Office of New York City Comptroller Mark D. Levine 1 Centre Street New York, NY 10007 United States

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Reported by Dr. Jeannie Yi

So deeply in love, holding them like a precious treasure, kissing them.

Reverend Paul Sladkus All Faiths and Spiritual  is Special Advisor to Jeff Ye, Founder of the The Jeff Collection

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https://shorturl.at/ZYsi5

At the Davos forum in recent years, the focus on climate change and stopping biodiversity loss has taken a back seat to issues like cryptocurrency, artificial intelligence and geopolitics. Fabrice Coffrini/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

Dire warnings at Davos, pushed to the periphery

	By David Gelles

All week at the World Economic Forum’s annual gathering in Davos, Switzerland, talk about climate change and renewable power has been relegated to the sidelines.

That changed on Wednesday, when President Trump used his speech at this gathering of the world’s top business leaders and policymakers to attack clean energy.

“There are windmills all over Europe,” he said. “There are windmills all over the place and they are losers.”

That was just one snippet from a speech in which Trump assailed the “green new scam,” promoted fossil fuels and made inaccurate statements about China’s use of coal.

Trump’s assault on renewable energy struck a discordant note at an event that was once a center for the corporate climate movement. But since Trump’s re-election Davos has strained to retain an idealistic, optimistic spirit.

For years, Davos was where chief executives and heads of state came to make high-minded pledges about how they would use their power to transform the world for the better and reduce dangerous planet-warming emissions.

Recently, however, the focus on climate change and stopping biodiversity loss has taken a back seat to issues like cryptocurrency, artificial intelligence and geopolitics. Instead, talk about sustainability efforts and climate action is now largely relegated to the scientists and activists.

Jennifer Morris, chief executive of The Nature Conservancy, told me that the dialogue in Davos had some glaring blind spots. “We’re not talking enough about oceans here,” she said, citing one example.

“Water is not woke,” she added.

Corporations are suddenly silent

The explanation for Davos’s pivot is simple. Climate change is no longer center stage in Davos because, in large measure, corporations have gone quiet on the issue.

“The Davos programming is a reflection of what chief executives want to talk about, ultimately,” said Sebastian Buckup, who runs the World Economic Forum’s center for nature and climate.

And what C.E.O.s want to talk about has changed.

Six years ago, Larry Fink, the chief executive of BlackRock, the world’s largest asset manager, used his time in Davos to rally Wall Street to combat climate change, promising to “transform finance.”

In an article I published last week, I explained how Fink sparked a movement that came to encompass most of the major banks, asset managers and asset owners in the world, which pledged to used their trillions of dollars to try and blunt global warming.

But in the face of pushback from Republicans, the fallout from the war in Ukraine and the return of President Trump to the White House, Wall Street has largely abandoned its climate pledges. Many of the alliances designed to make finance more sustainable have fallen apart. Investors have withdrawn tens of billions of dollars each quarter from E.S.G. funds.

Even though Fink is now co-chair of the World Economic Forum and took a strong hand in shaping this year’s program, which features hundreds of panels and speakers scattered across giant convention halls and small meeting rooms, discussion of climate change was largely missing from the most prominent programs — with the exception of Trump’s remarks.

Warnings from scientists

On the rare occasions when there was frank talk about the dangers posed by our rapidly warming world, the warnings were more stark than ever.

Johan Rockström, director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, delivered a presentation on Tuesday in which he showed dozens of ways in which the planet’s natural systems are under severe strain.

“The human pressure on the planet has now reached a crisis point,” he said. “The era where we can continue with economic growth without putting the stability of planet at risk has come to an end.”

Rockström added that “these pressures on the planet are now at risk of causing irreversible, potentially catastrophic tipping points.”

On Wednesday, I moderated a panel about why it was in companies’ own interest to protect nature.

“If you don’t have good land and good soil, you can’t have sustainable supply chains,” Kirsten Schuijt, director general of WWF International told me.

Schuijt said that more corporations were working to address these threats, but not fast enough. “It’s moving way too slow, because we’re losing biodiversity in basically every place we care about,” she said.

Then on Thursday, I hosted a discussion about how much economic activity was tied to the oceans, which are warming rapidly regardless of whether you think talking about it is “woke.”

For much of the conversation, the speakers put forward a rosy vision of continued economic growth that somehow didn’t pollute the planet. Then, during a remarkably candid moment, an executive acknowledged a notion that until recently had been gospel at Davos.

“The biggest adversary to nature might be humans,” said Boudewijn Siemons, chief executive of the Port of Rotterdam, the largest harbor in Europe. “The problem is us.”

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Where Do I Sign? From Tragedy to Resilient Triumph is a moving, motivational memoir by David A. Dodd—A global leader in economic resilience, dynamic speaker, and survivor of extraordinary adversity. Through deeply personal storytelling, David reveals how a life shaped by trauma and setbacks became one defined by purpose, innovation, and unshakable resilience.

After a near-fatal auto crash left him with life-threatening injuries and a long road to recovery, he had every reason to give up. Instead, he leaned into five core principles that had guided him from childhood, resulting in personal resilience, faith, and a commitment to service. Along the way, he founded the International Sustainable Resilience Center and helped reshape how communities worldwide recover from disaster and build lasting strength.

This book is a compelling blend of life story and practical principles that will inspire readers from every walk of life. Whether you’re seeking encouragement during hard times or a framework for long-term growth, Where Do I Sign? offers hope, clarity, and an empowering message: you are stronger than you think.

Sign your name to your future. Conquer tragedy with resilience.

Here are the five principles of personal resilience.
1. Learn something, something that interests you
2. In learning about that something, find your passion
3. Pursue that passion, continue to learn about it and experience it
4. Develop a strategy, with specific actions to realize results from that passion
5. Measure your progress and celebrate success, focusing on the future not the past

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Go to https://www.hkdbf-ny.org/About

#HKDBF #FlushingQueens

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The post We, The World Remembers Dr. Jane Goodall – Messenger of Peace, Champion of People, Animals and the Planet – Longtime Friend, Supporter of We, The World and Launch Partner of 11 Days of Global Unity – Extended Interview – #Urgency4Action appeared first on Good News!.

We are proud to announce a groundbreaking partnership between the World Talent Economy Forum Institute and 400 leading human resource corporations in Japan — a bold step forward in research and innovation collaboration.

Cutting-edge research

Talent mobility programs

Innovation-driven education

Sustainable development goals (SDGs)

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Under the High Patronage of
Mr Emmanuel MACRON
President of the French Republic

Paris, May 30, 2025 – Responding to the call of the Israeli, Palestinian, and global populations for lasting peace in the Middle East, the Paris Peace Forum is hosting a civil society mobilization event for the two-state solution, peace, and regional security in Paris on June 13, 2025. Entitled “Paris Call for the Two-State Solution, Peace and Regional Security,” the event will be held at the Economic, Social and Environmental Council (CESE) under the high patronage of Mr. Emmanuel Macron, President of the French Republic. This key meeting will take place a few days ahead of the High-Level International Conference on the Peaceful Resolution of the Palestinian Question and the Implementation of the Two-State Solution, which will be held from June 17 to 20, 2025, at the United Nations in New York.

This event will bring together several hundred civil society actors committed to the implementation of the two-state solution and a shared future based on mutual recognition, peace, and security for all. At a time when the region is plagued by extreme violence, terrorism, hatred, and injustice, and when the two-state solution faces existential threats, participants—mostly Israelis and Palestinians, but also from the Middle East, Europe, and the United States—will highlight the need for decisive action. They will stress the urgency of an immediate and permanent ceasefire, the release of all hostages, and the unconditional delivery of humanitarian aid commensurate with the needs of the people of Gaza.

On June 13 in Paris, these organizations and civil society figures will put their expertise and experience at the service of concrete solutions for the implementation of the two-state solution and the establishment of a viable Palestinian state, offering security guarantees for all, and for advancing regional integration. In addition to contributing to the work of the eight thematic working groups of the High-Level International Conference on June 17-20, the civil society actors gathered in large numbers on this occasion will launch a call to action to the international community reflecting their commitment to peace and security for all.

This Paris Call will reinforce the action of France and the European Union, which are committed to peace in the Middle East, which cannot be achieved without the implementation of the two-state solution. The conference organized by the Paris Peace Forum aims to support this objective by providing a platform for the concrete expression of civil societies committed to the two-state solution, regional peace, and security.

For media enquiries, please contact media@parispeaceforum.org. For all other enquiries (e.g., if you are a civil society actor), please contact contact@parispeaceforum.org. 

About the Paris Peace Forum: The Forum is a platform to originate, shape & share multi-actor responses towards global peace & sustainable prosperity. By convening key decision-makers and fostering collaboration between governments, international organizations, businesses, and civil society, we ensure that diplomacy is not just discussed but reinvented to meet the demands of a changing world. For more information, visit parispeaceforum.org. 

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Protesters in New York City in September joined thousands of others around the world in urging governments to act on climate change. Credit: Eduardo Munoz/Reuters

The past year has given many of us reason to pause. We are losing in a race to prevent planetary tipping points — the climate is changing faster than expected, and humanity has already breached six of the nine sustainable planetary boundaries (for biodiversity loss; climate, freshwater and land-system change; biogeochemical flows; and novel entities)¹. Summer Antarctic sea ice shrank to its lowest recorded extent in 2023 (see go.nature.com/4f86req), a year that is on track to be the warmest on record (see go.nature.com/4f9ykdj).

People around the world recognize that life is not getting any better. As wars rage, runaway inequality and political polarization are eroding societies’ sense of cohesion. Eight individuals owned more than the poorest 50% of the world’s population, according to an Oxfam report in 2017². Levels of anxiety, depression and burnout are rocketing. Full-time employees are unable to pay rent and must turn to extra part-time work to make ends meet, while employers cut staff and increase workloads.

Crises are now normal in this global economic system that depletes natural and social capital, energy and time in the name of economic growth at all costs.

But, looking to 2024, I’m hopeful that the world can turn in a better direction. For example, a meeting I attended in May on sustainable prosperity particularly buoyed my spirits — and, in my view, signalled a tipping point in thinking and governance. The Beyond Growth conference at the European Parliament attracted more than 2,500 participants in person, as well as 2,000 online. It was sponsored by the European Commission and the Club of Rome (a non-profit organization fostering research and action around pressing global issues).

In a stirring opening address, Ursula von der Leyen, president of the European Commission, said that governments must stop misusing growth of gross domestic product (GDP) as their goal and instead move swiftly and urgently to sustainable well-being within planetary boundaries. She got a standing ovation. Agata Meysner, the young leader of Generation Climate Europe, a coalition of climate and environmental networks across the bloc, concluded the event with a call to join the “movement of movements” to create a new economy based on sustainable prosperity, justice and sufficiency. Everyone rose to their feet.

And an increasing number of organizations and movements dedicated to overcoming our addiction to GDP growth are working together to do just that, including through networks such the Wellbeing Economy Alliance (which also supported the conference). The pursuit of GDP growth at all costs is an outdated paradigm that claims that all people want is more income and consumption with no limits. It assumes that the market economy can grow forever, that massive inequality is justified to provide incentives to promote growth, and that efforts to address climate and other environmental and social problems must not interfere with growth. It supposes that growth is the solution to all ills. It isn’t.

As the European conference emphasized, GDP was never designed to measure societal well-being — only market production and consumption. GDP says nothing about the distribution of income, unpaid work or damages to natural or social capital. The misuse of GDP as a policy goal is driving societies towards an unsustainable future that benefits an increasingly small proportion of the population while impoverishing the vast majority².

Researchers must help to provide alternatives. Here’s how.

Design better measures of societal well-being

Hundreds of indicators of societal well-being are already in use, including by the United Nations, the World Bank, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), non-governmental organizations, countries and academics. Examples include the Genuine Progress Indicator; the OECD Better Life Index; and annual surveys of life satisfaction³. To become a societal goal used by all, and to displace GDP, the world must settle on a new indicator. Broad consensus is needed on what should be included.

For example, it is not just income that matters, but also the ways in which it is distributed. The costs of environmental and social degradation must be included, as should contributors to well-being that are unconnected to income — such as our relationships and communities, good governance, the ability to participate in decision-making and ecosystem services provided by the natural environment. Several research initiatives are beginning to address these issues (including one I am involved with, called MERGE, which is funded by the European Union).

Model the complex dynamics of the economic system

Interactions between social, economic and natural elements of societal well-being must be better modelled and future projections developed to assess their sustainability. National examples include the EUROGREEN model, which has been applied to France, and the LowGrow model of the Canadian ecological economy.

The Earth4All model of the Club of Rome takes a global perspective. It explores two scenarios towards 2050. The first — known as business as usual, or too little too late — looks at what will happen if the world continues current trends of increasing inequality, climate disruption and decreasing well-being, even as GDP continues to rise. By contrast, the second scenario, called giant leap, shows how investing in five areas — renewable energy, regenerative food, reducing inequality, eliminating poverty and enabling empowerment — could ensure sustainable, prosperous and equitable well-being for humans and the rest of nature.

For example, rather than rewarding the fossil-fuel sector with enormous subsidies to maintain economic growth at the expense of climate and social disruption, new policies would focus on moving away from fossil fuels. At the same time, policies to achieve the other four turnaround areas would be implemented to enable sustainable well-being, regardless of the effects on GDP.

Develop policies to support sustainable well-being

The EU and the Wellbeing Economy Governments (WEGo) group that includes Scotland, New Zealand, Wales, Finland, Canada and Iceland have begun to implement measures of sustainable well-being and policies to achieve them. Researchers need to analyse these plans and offer lessons to help other nations adopt them. What are these policies? There are many versions, but an open letter I signed in May — together with more than 400 leading economists, scientists, policymakers and activists — provides starting points in four areas. These are biocapacity (protecting the planet), fairness (a more equal society), well-being for all (basic services and rights) and active democracy (see ‘Beyond growth policies’ and go.nature.com/47z3v6s).

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