The Washington Post - USA (2020-11-13)

A18 EZ RE THE WASHINGTON POST.FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 13 , 2020

Economy & Business

HOUSING

Single-family home

prices rise 12% in U.S.

Prices for single-family homes
across the United States
increased 12 percent in the third
quarter, the biggest annual jump
in seven years, according to the
National Association of Realtors.
The cost of housing is rising
everywhere, adding to
affordability concerns as millions
of Americans lose income during
the coronavirus pandemic. Prices
rose from a year earlier in all 181
metropolitan areas measured by
the group, and 117 regions had
double-digit gains, compared
with only 15 in the second
quarter, according to a report
Thursday.
Mortgage rates near record
lows have fueled a surge in
demand, pushing buyers to
compete for a scarce supply of
listings. Many are rushing to the
suburbs, looking for extra space
to quarantine in comfort —
searches that are likely to
intensify now as coronavirus
infections soar to the highest
levels in months. Unless

borrowing costs fall much

further, first-time buyers will

increasingly get priced out of

homeownership.

The nationwide median price

of a single-family home in the

quarter was $313,500, according

to the Realtors group.

The 12 percent year-over-year

increase was the largest since the

third quarter of 2013, when

prices jumped 12.4 percent.

Fairfield County, Conn. —

home of tony enclaves such as

Greenwich, as well as

Bridgeport, one of the state’s

poorest cities — had the biggest

increase in prices, with

27.3 percent. Following were

Crestview, Fla.; Pittsfield, Mass.;

Kingston, N.Y.; Atlantic City; and

Boise, Idaho.

— Bloomberg News

RETAIL

Amazon to increase

garage deliveries

Amazon is about to see

whether shoppers wary of

contact with package delivery

drivers would rather let them

into the garage instead.

The world’s largest online

retailer said in a statement

Thursday that it is expanding an

in-garage delivery program for

Prime subscribers to some 4,

U.S. cities, up from 50 previously.

(Amazon chief executive Jeff

Bezos owns The Washington

Post.)

Amazon launched Amazon

Key in late 2017, offering to

deliver packages inside the

homes of shoppers with smart

front-door locks by equipping

delivery drivers with a one-time

code to place packages just

inside. The company touted the

service as a convenient way to

limit theft and launched a

companion indoor camera.

But the offer drew mixed

reviews, and Amazon has since

shifted the focus to garages, as

well as car trunks, a service that

was paused during the covid-

pandemic.

Shoppers need to have the

myQ garage-door-opener control

app. Amazon said Thursday it

would also start delivering

groceries from Whole Foods

Market or Amazon Fresh inside

customers’ garages. That service

will go live first in selected areas

of Chicago, Dallas, Los Angeles,

San Francisco and Seattle.

— Bloomberg News

ALSO IN BUSINESS

Delta Air Lines and Southwest

Airlines on Thursday cautioned

that the recent surge in

coronavirus cases may have a

negative impact on travel during

the winter holidays, a period the

sector had hoped would see

improved bookings. “With the

U.S. hitting a grim milestone of

10 million positive cases and

outbreaks in Europe and other

parts of the world, all signs point

to a challenging winter ahead,”

Delta chief executive Ed Bastian

said in a memo to employees on

Thursday. Earlier, low-cost

carrier Southwest said an

improvement in revenue in the

past few months was losing

steam in recent weeks.

Revlon said Thursday that

enough bondholders had taken

part in its debt restructuring

program for the cosmetics maker

to stave off bankruptcy. The

company had warned this month

that it may be forced to file for

Chapter 11 bankruptcy

protection if a certain amount of

its bonds worth $342.8 million

were still outstanding by mid-

November, as it would trigger

the accelerated repayment of

other debts. Holders of about

$236 million, or 68.8 percent, of

the company’s outstanding

bonds that mature in February

had been tendered into an

exchange offer by the end of

Tuesday, Revlon said.

— From news services

DIGEST

BING GUAN/REUTERS

An October night view of the Glacial Lakes Energy manufacturing

plant in Mina, S.D. The facility, which is on a 287-acre site, produces

more than 100 million g allons of ethanol a year.

○

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NASDAQ 11,709.

DOWN 76.84, 0.7% ○

S&P 500 3,537.

DOWN 35.65, 1.0% ○

GOLD $1,873.

UP $11.70, 0.6% ○

CRUDE OIL $41.

DOWN $0.33, 0.8% ○

10-YEAR TREASURY YIELD 0.88%

DOWN 9.62%

CURRENCIES

$1=105.12 Y EN, 0.85 EUROS

BY RACHEL SIEGEL

The Senate is expected to con-
firm President Trump’s contro-
versial Federal Reserve nominee
Judy Shelton to a seat on the
central bank’s board of gover-
nors, giving the president an-
other chance to shape the long-
term direction of one of the
government’s most powerful en-
tities.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch
McConnell (R-Ky.) took pro-
cedural steps Thursday to set up
a vote on Shelton’s long-pending
nomination for as early as next
week. Also on Thursday, Sen. Lisa
Murkowski (R-Alaska) — a key
moderate whose support had not
been assured — said she would
back Shelton’s nomination.

Just a f ew months ago, it was

unclear whether Shelton had

enough support among GOP sen-

ators to be confirmed.

Shelton’s confirmation could

mark Trump’s final imprint on

the Fed board before the Biden

administration is inaugurated in

January. Trump’s previous picks

to fill the Fed’s two current vacan-

cies have faced criticism from

Democrats and Republicans

alike, and getting his final nomi-

nees confirmed would be a victo-

ry before his administration

leaves office. Some of Shelton’s

critics had previously wondered

whether Trump, if reelected,

woul d try to elevate Shelton to

Fed chair. Yet those prospects

have all but evaporated with an

incoming Biden administration.

“Judy Shelton, President

Trump’s exceptionally qualified

nominee to the Federal Reserve,

has the full backing of the White

House and we expect she will be

confirmed,” deputy White House

press secretary Judd Deere said

in a statement Thursday.

In September, Sen. John

Thune (R-S.D.) suggested that

Shelton did not have the votes to

be confirmed. At the time, Thune

said conversations about Shel-

ton’s nomination “kind of got

eclipsed by the coronavirus dis-

cussion” and related stimulus

negotiations.

“We’re still working it,” Thune

said at the time. “She’s a p riority

for the White House. It’s the

Federal Reserve. It’s important,

so obviously we want to get it

done. But we’re not going to bring

it up until we have the votes to

confirm her.”

Shelton’s confirmation also ap-

peared in jeopardy earlier in the

summer when Sens. Susan Col-

lins (R-Maine) and Sen. Mitt

Romney (R-Utah) said they

would vote against her nomina-

tion. In July, Shelton’s nomina-

tion narrowly made it through

the Senate Banking Committee,

which voted 13 to 12 along party

lines to send the nomination to

the floor of the Senate. Some on

the panel had previously ex-

pressed concerns that Shelton

was too much of an outlier in her

views on the Fed’s independence

and monetary policy.

Shelton advised Trump’s 2016

presidential bid and has been

criticized for her views on the

long-abandoned gold standard.

Shelton also had called for closer

ties between the White House

and the Fed despite a long-stand-

ing tradition of central bank in-

dependence.

Shelton was nominated along-

side Christopher J. Waller, a St.

Louis Fed economist. Waller’s

confirmation has been far less

controversial. If both Shelton

and Waller are confirmed, the

board’s current vacancies will be

filled.

“It means Republicans are tak-

ing it very seriously and Trump

wants to get it done,” said Ste-

phen Moore, an outside eco-

nomic adviser to the White

House who abandoned his own

bid to fill one of the Fed’s vacan-

cies amid scrutiny of his past

remarks. “People said, ‘Well, she’s

not in the mainstream with all

the other Fed economists.’ Well,

that’s what we like about her....

There’s this sense that everyone

has to drink the same Kool-Aid at

the Fed.”

Still, the makeup of the Fed

board of governors could change

further once the Biden adminis-

tration is in office. Lael Brainard,

the board’s lone Democrat, is also

a top contender for Biden’s t reas-

ury secretary or, some suggest, a

successor to Fed Chair Jerome H.

Powell if he is not reappointed

when his term ends in 2022.

[email protected]

Erica Werner contributed to this

report.

Senate readies confirmation vote to end limbo of Fed nominee Judy Shelton

BY ELIZABETH DWOSKIN

Technology companies are
bracing for a prolonged period of
uncertainty as long as President
Trump and his allies dispute the
outcome of the election, testing
whether the firms can sustain the
pace of enforcement they put in
place during the past week.
Social media firms insist the
dramatic changes to their policies
and practices instated ahead of
the election are not permanent,
but they have amended them in
the past week. Facebook said
Wednesday it is extending its ban
on political and social ads — ini-
tially forecast to last one week —
for another month, an acknowl-
edgment that ad campaigns dis-
puting election results present
significant risk for disinforma-
tion. Experts say the companies
will have a hard time retracting
the changes in this hyper-charged
political environment.
“There has never been a plan to
make these temporary measures
permanent, and they will be
rolled back just as they were
rolled out — with careful execu-
tion,” Facebook spokesman Andy
Stone said.
Twitter has softened the ag-
gressive approach it took in the
days after the election, when the
company covered up 456 total
tweets, the company said in a blog
post Thursday, including many by
Trump, his campaign, and allies
including his son Eric Trump and
White House press secretary Kay-
leigh McEnany. It labeled
300,000 tweets overall.
Spokesman Nick Pacilio said
the platform will continue to re-
strict the proliferation of tweets
that get labels and disable the
retweet button indefinitely in an
effort to slow the flow of poten-
tially harmful content until the
election results are settled.
About 30 percent fewer people
shared tweets that received a
prompt warning people before
sharing, Twitter said. And 74 per-

cent of people who saw the tweets

saw it with the label — the others

saw the tweets before they were

labeled.

A Google spokeswoman, Char-

lotte Smith, declined to share in-

formation about the company’s

timeline for lifting its political ad

ban, which applies to all Google

properties, including Google-

owned YouTube.

Technology companies face a

Catch-22, experts say. In exten-

sively preparing to ward off elec-

tion turmoil, they raised the bar

on their willingness to alter their

services to fight misinformation.

Now the public expects them to

maintain that high bar, even if it is

almost impossible.

The companies are being

pushed to the brink of their ca-

pacity, researchers and insiders

say. Employees from senior exec-

utives to mid-level engineers have

been working round-the-clock

since before the election to field

and spot problems, say people

who work at the companies, an

exhaustive effort even for people

known to work long hours.

In another sign of strained re-

sources, Facebook redirected its

content moderation teams last

week to focus on “high-severity

content,” with election-related

content taking top priority, ac-

cording to a Nov. 4 memo ob-

tained by The Washington Post.

The memo noted lower-severity

takedown appeals and other tasks

would be immediately closed out

because of a lack of bandwidth

and the need to reduce a signifi-

cant “backlog” resulting from a

“spike” in the amount of content

awaiting review.

“This is an unsustainable pace”

for the social media companies

“to have so many resources aimed

at one event,” said Alex Stamos,

Facebook’s former chief security

officer and the director of the

Stanford Internet Observatory, in

a Zoom call last week with the

Election Integrity Partnership, a

coalition of disinformation re-

searchers.

Stamos said in an interview

Wednesday that Facebook is

charged with protecting the in-

tegrity of democratic debate in 80

to 100 elections around the world

each year, including a national

election in Myanmar last week-

end and a coming municipal elec-

tion in Brazil. He questioned

whether some of the new policies

employed by social media compa-

nies — reducing the spread of

tweets, pausing group recom-

me ndations and ads — will be

applied globally and whether cer-

tain countries will be moved to

lower-priority status as a result of

the resource crunch.

“The big platforms are running

very large teams dedicated to

election disinformation to get the

level of responsiveness we’ve

seen. It’s still very labor-inten-

sive,” he added.

Executives say a protracted pe-

riod in which Trump or others

may contest the results was al-

ways part of their scenario-plan-

ning, and they acknowledged

there are trade-offs during un-

precedented times, according to

two people familiar with the

thinking at Facebook and Twitter.

The trade-off is particularly ev-

ident in Georgia, where Demo-

crats are pressuring Facebook to

allow political ads during the Sen-

ate runoffs there. But the compa-

ny has no technical ability to turn

on political ads for a specific state

or advertiser, Rob Leathern, a

Facebook ads executive, tweeted

Wednesday. Executives are aware

that turning on political ads is

likely to unintentionally allow the

proliferation of even more false

claims about the vote, according

to a person familiar with the

company’s thinking who spoke on

the condition of anonymity to

discuss sensitive matters.

Facebook also said Wednesday

it would continue to label prob-

lematic content with a notice

showing Joe Biden as the project-

ed winner and that it has no

immediate plans to restore its

groups-recommendation feature,

in which software algorithms rec-

ommend online groups for users

to join. The feature was paused in

the week before the election as a

preemptive measure to slow the

growth of problematic groups,

though such groups proliferated

anyway.

Twitter has stopped covering

up claims disputing the election

results, as well as misleading sto-

ries about voter fraud. Since then,

Trump has tweeted false claims

numerous times, and Twitter has

responded by placing a smaller

label beneath those tweets noting

that the content is disputed and

linking to authoritative informa-

tion. Twitter also permanently

banned Trump’s former chief

strategist, Stephen K. Bannon, for

violating its policies prohibiting

incitement to violence.

“With the election now called

by multiple sources, we will no

longer apply warnings on tweets

commenting on the election out-

come. However, we will continue

to apply labels to provide addi-

tional context on tweets regard-

ing the integrity of the process

and next steps where necessary,”

Twitter ’s Pacilio said.

Experts said the changes com-

panies have made are a tacit ad-

mission that their products cause

harm, which raises the question

of why they should not be made

permanent.

“The fact that these companies

had to label so much content

since the election shows how in-

tractable the problem is,” said

Joan Donovan, director of the

Technology and Social Change

Research Project at the Shoren-

stein Center on Media, Politics

and Public Policy at Harvard’s

Kennedy School. “Social media

companies now see how their

inaction has harmed many and

that, while they may try to return

to the features they have limited

in this election period, I hope they

see how these interventions are

necessary if they truly care about

the health of our democracy.”

Facebook, Twitter and YouTube

have said that in less charged

times, the features and products

that have been suspended pro-

vide more good than harm. In

Facebook’s case, chief executive

Mark Zuckerberg has empha-

size d — in a recent call with

investors and in a companywide

meeting — that his personal com-

mitment to giving wide latitude

to freedom of speech had not

changed.

[email protected]

 M ore at washingtonpost.com/

technology

Disputes over election outcome weighing on tech giants

WINNI WINTERMEYER FOR THE WASHINGTON POST

Inside Twitter’s offices in San Francisco. The company has softened the aggressive approach it took in

the days after the election but will continue to restrict the proliferation of tweets th at get labels.

Facebook and Twitter

prolong moves to counter

spread of misinformation