With everything from housing and groceries to gasoline and home and car insurance becoming increasingly expensive, both red and blue states are trying to find ways to address Americans’ hardships. State officials and policy think tanks are offering income and property tax rebates, raising wages and enacting structural reform, with varying success.

California
The biggest problem in the Golden State is housing affordability, and Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) has told lawmakers they “should pass a law to stop institutional investors from buying homes in bulk,” said The Associated Press. But according to detractors, in an effort to “accomplish every objective and accommodate every interest all at once, California set up its housing agenda to fail,” said The Atlantic.

Florida
Efforts from lawmakers to “drive down insurance and utility rates failed,” and they have not “agreed on a way to lower property taxes,” said the Miami Herald. These property tax cuts nonetheless remain a top issue for Floridians, with a potential $18 billion in cuts on the line. 

Georgia
The Peach State has passed one-time income and property tax rebates. Georgia lawmakers followed that by introducing “four more affordability measures, this time aimed at insurance costs,” said The Augusta Chronicle. Another proposed state bill would “restore regular cost-of-living adjustments for Georgia state retirees,” said WALB-TV Georgia.

Illinois
Legislators are “pushing for ‘real structural reform’ surrounding affordability,” said Illinois House Speaker Emanuel “Chris” Welch (D) to The State Journal-Register, following a report that grocery costs in Illinois rose by $1,781 last year. Child care costs have been especially vexing for Americans, and one notable proposition would “create back-to-school sales tax holiday periods,” said WIFR-TV Rockford.

New York
New York — and New York City, in particular — is known for having one of the country’s highest costs of living, and legislators have worked on raising wages to battle this. At the beginning of 2026, New York raised its state minimum wage to “$17 downstate and $16 upstate,” said Fox 5 New York. And starting in 2027, the minimum wage will “adjust annually based on the Consumer Price Index.” 

As prediction markets like Kalshi and Polymarket vie for dominance in the growing field of online betting, Utah has emerged as a thorny challenge to their spread. With its long history of Mormon conservatism, this traditionally red state is now bucking a MAGA-led movement to facilitate e-gambling’s growth.

‘Onslaught’ of state challenges
The proliferation of online prediction marketplaces with “no state oversight” operating “even in states that ban gambling” has raised “bipartisan alarms, especially related to sports gambling,” said Stateline. The Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), led by Trump administration appointee Mike Selig, filed an amicus brief claiming his group has total authority to regulate prediction markets against the “onslaught” of state challenges. 

Prediction market operators argue that their platforms for making proposition bets on “specific in-game events rather than final outcomes” place their work in the realm of “federally regulated derivatives rather than gambling products,” said Financial Feeds. In February, Kalshi fired a “preemptive strike” by suing Utah’s Republican Gov. Spencer Cox, claiming in the lawsuit that it feared the state would “imminently bring an enforcement action” barring the company from “offering event contracts for trading on its federally regulated exchange,” said Fox13. Despite Utah’s ban on gambling, Kalshi, in its suit, said its prob-bet contracts are “lawful under federal law.”

‘Destroying’ lives
Cox’s conflict with prediction markets comes amid a larger debate among regulators and lawmakers about whether those markets “constitute finance or gambling,” said The Associated Press. Utah has “already made up its mind.” For more than a century, it has featured “no casinos, no lotteries and no racetracks that allow bets,” a prohibition “rooted in the conservative ideals of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.” With Utah poised to enact legislation “intended to undercut prediction markets,” this conservative state “not known for picking fights” is on the “frontlines of a cultural, political and economic battle.”

The prediction markets Selig is “defending are gambling, pure and simple,” said Cox in a video rebuttal to the CFTC. They are “destroying the lives of families and countless Americans” and have “no place in Utah.”

Two lava flows spew across the road linking the south and east of Réunion Island in the Indian Ocean. The Piton de la Fournaise (Peak of the Furnace) volcano, on the eastern side of the French overseas territory, has been erupting for a month.
Richard Bouhet / AFP / Getty

The chill of winter has passed. So while you wait for April showers to bring May flowers, immerse yourself in a bunch of new music from your favorite artists.

José González, ‘Against the Dying of the Light’
González is known for blending a rich cultural background, and now the Swedish singer born to Argentinian parents is dropping his fifth studio album. The album’s self-titled lead single, out now, is a “reflective meditation on the humanity of 2025, embracing who we are and what has shaped us while turning our focus toward the challenges that lie ahead,” said KCRW. (March 27)

Raye, ‘This Music May Contain Hope’
The British singer-songwriter has released several EPs but has only released one full studio album — until now. The new album covers “four different ‘seasons’ that span the complexities of human emotion,” said Melodic magazine. And for fans of album art, these ‘seasons’ are also “featured on each side of the vinyl release.” The album’s lead single, “Where Is My Husband!,” is out now. (March 27)

Thundercat, ‘Distracted’
Thundercat’s solo albums are typically a blend of funk, R&B and psychedelic, and his fifth LP continues this approach. The album includes collaborations with artists like A$AP Rocky and Tame Impala, as well as a “previously unreleased collaboration with the late Mac Miller,” said Consequence. The LP’s lead single, “I Did This to Myself,” is out now. (April 3)