Universities are often discussed as places of learning, debate, and research. That framing understates their real role. In many towns and cities, a university functions less like a school and more like an anchor institution — one that quietly holds together jobs, spending, reputation, and long-term economic direction. When an anchor weakens or disappears, the damage rarely looks dramatic at first. It spreads slowly. In the UK for example, the recent decision to close the Sout

When offices emptied in 2020, the story sounded simple. Work moved home. Offices became redundant. Cities would hollow out. Productivity would collapse or soar, depending on who you asked. None of that fully happened. What actually broke wasn’t work. It was a set of assumptions that had quietly shaped business for decades. Before COVID, offices served multiple roles at once. They were places where work happened, but also where control was exercised, culture was signalled, car

In cities like Omaha, finding work has never been purely transactional. Jobs move through conversations. Through churches, colleges, old employers, family friends. Someone knows someone. Someone hears something before it’s public. Someone gives a quiet nudge. That system still exists. But it no longer lives only in people. It lives in platforms. The local job market never disappeared — it reorganised Omaha isn’t Silicon Valley. It’s not a place where people reinvent themselve