“What if paying workers more, training them better and offering better opportunities for advancement can actually make a company more profitable, rather than less?” That’s a question everyone from academics to employees would like to see answered. And over the past year, Walmart has turned itself into America’s largest petri-dish. From the NYT Upshot: How Did Walmart Get Cleaner Stores and Higher Sales? It Paid Its People More.

+ “Americans leave 658 million vacation days on the table each year.” From Slate: Vacations are good for us and good for our employers. So why don’t we take them?

+ Vox: Why we need to plan for a future without jobs. (That escalated quickly.)