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Today’s Big Story

Consumer Prices Are Rising

Businesses are in ‘survival mode’ and the ‘corporate pricing dam is cracking’

Just over six months into President Donald Trump’s campaign to rebalance global trade, some American small businesses are already on the brink. Other large corporations are raising prices, or signaling that increases are coming, to absorb some of the costs of the White House’s new tariff regime.

Axios says the “corporate pricing dam is cracking,” and that “Americans are already under strain from rapidly rising prices during the Biden administration.” Another bout of hot inflation—especially at a time when the labor market is slowing down—will hurt.

Trump’s announcement of steep tariffs in April on “Liberation Day” triggered widespread worries of higher prices. But the process has taken time. There were delays and back-and-forth between the White House and other countries over rates. CNBC reports that a widely followed measure of inflation accelerated slightly less than expected in July on an annual basis. Tariffs did appear to show up in several categories, but other areas that normally would be hit by import duties showed little reaction.

Economists point out that many companies, fearful that high prices could spook their customers, held the line in the meantime. They stockpiled goods before the new tariffs kicked in. But stockpiled goods will eventually run dry, just as companies will find their bottom lines crunched by diminishing profits, those economists warn. “Once everybody runs out of stockpiled inventory, everybody will be losing money,” Laura Veldkamp, a professor of economics and finance at Columbia Business School, tells ABC News. “They'‘ll raise prices and it will be passed onto the consumer. It's just a matter of when.”

Now, reality is beginning to bite. Home Depot has hinted at “modest price movement in some categories”. Procter & Gamble’s products (from toothpaste, to laundry detergent) will start costing more next month. And Sony announced Wednesday it will raise PlayStation 5 console prices in the U.S. by $50, citing ongoing economic challenges and the financial strain caused by recent U.S. tariffs on electronics imported from China. “Similar to many global businesses, we continue to navigate a challenging economic environment,” Isabelle Tomatis, vice president of global marketing at Sony Interactive Entertainment, told Fortune. “As a result, we’ve made the difficult decision to increase the recommended retail price.”

Texas State House Passes New Election Map

The Trump-endorsed move is part of an extraordinary nationwide redistricting fight

The Texas state House on Wednesday passed a new election map that President Trump has embraced to boost his party’s chances of holding its U.S. House majority in the midterms—clearing the way for final approval of the contentious plan in coming days. The 88-52 party-line vote in the Republican-controlled chamber cleared the way for the state Senate to take up the map within days and send it to Republican Governor Greg Abbott for final approval.

Texas Republicans were able to proceed after dozens of Democratic lawmakers on Monday ended a two-week walkout from the statehouse in Austin that had deprived the House of the quorum needed to hold a vote. The plan to flip five Democratic-held U.S. House seats to GOP control in Texas has set off an extraordinary nationwide fight over redistricting—pitting red states against blue states as they jockey for power in 2026. California Democrats have lined up their own redistricting effort, which former president Barrack Obama has endorsed as a “responsible approach.”

But in Texas, in an effort to ensure Democrats would not attempt to halt the vote again, State House Speaker Dustin Burrows ordered the chamber doors to be locked on Monday. He also said Democrats would be “released into the custody” of a designated police officer to ensure they returned to the statehouse on Wednesday for the redistricting vote. One of the lawmakers, Nicole Collier, decided to sleep in the chamber rather than be escorted by an officer. Her protest spread among Democrats, with others joining her and ripping up their police escort agreements.

Are American Millennials Okay?

Because, apparently, we’re dying at an alarming rate

Well, this is sobering news for all my fellow Millennials … we could be in trouble. First, some facts: About 3 million Americans die every year. Compared with other rich countries, we die at an alarmingly higher rate: One-quarter of those deaths wouldn’t have occurred if America were only as deadly as its peers. Zoom in, and things get even more concerning: Among Americans younger than 65, almost half of deaths wouldn’t have happen if we had a death rate that matched our peers. Among those aged 25 to 44, a group science calls “early adults,” it’s 62%—nearly two out of three deaths at those early ages.

A group of mortality experts spoke with Slate about an analysis they did of death rates in 22 countries from 1980 through 2023 (the last year with reliable data). “When we set out to do this research, we expected to find a story about the pandemic,” they said. “America’s pandemic experience was much worse than that of our peers, with three U.S. deaths for every two in peer countries.” But the researchers found that while COVID temporarily worsened America’s standing—due to higher infection rates, lower vaccine adoption and greater impact on the nonelderly—the long-term trend predates the pandemic and continues to worsen. In 2023 alone, there were about 700,000 “missing Americans”—those who died but would be alive if they had lived somewhere else.

The causes are complex and interwoven. Theories range from deindustrialization’s economic fallout and a frayed social safety net to systemic health care shortcomings, high rates of chronic disease, gun violence, and car-related fatalities. All of these factors have been present and growing for years. COVID certainly exposed and intensified these weaknesses but did not create them.

Cambridge Dictionary’s Latest Additions Drop

It’s official: ‘Delulu’ and ‘tradwife’ are officially in the books

What the skibidi is happening to the English language? TikTok trends are officially taking over and suddenly everyone sounds so … chronically online. As of this month, it’s been confirmed that the home of the English language, the Cambridge Dictionary, is becoming even more plugged into internet culture.

But the lexicon is no longer just for social media. In the most recent addition of 6,000 words to the dictionary, a few were Gen Z speak. “It’s not every day you get to see words like ‘delulu’ make their way into the Cambridge Dictionary,” Colin McIntosh, the dictionary’s lexical program manager, told CNN. “We only add words where we think they’ll have staying power. Internet culture is changing the English language, and the effect is fascinating to observe and capture in the Dictionary.” So, essentially, delulu is still the solulu.

Elsewhere, McIntosh revealed that “delulu” wasn’t the only word added. Other words included were “tradwife,” “broligarchy” and ironically, the word used to troll people because it has no meaning, from the Youtube series ”Skibidi Toilet”. According to the dictionary, “skibidi,” a slang term that can mean “cool” or “bad,” or sometimes nothing at all, was coined by the creator of the viral YouTube series Skibidi Toilet and is especially popular among Gen Alpha—another newly added term—or those born between 2010 and 2024.

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