--- title: Five Best: Working in America is Hard description: Working in America is hard, batteries are about to change the car business and more. canonical: https://time.com/4904522/working-in-america-is-hard/ author: TIME article:opinion: true article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2017-08-17T16:00:43.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-05-11T04:58:34.420Z article:section: Ideas og:title: Working in America is Hard og:description: And four more of today's best ideas og:url: https://time.com/4904522/working-in-america-is-hard/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Working in America is Hard twitter:description: And four more of today's best ideas twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # Working in America is Hard by [The Aspen Institute](https://time.com/author/the-aspen-institute/) ## The Aspen Institute Aug 17, 2017 4:00 PM UTC by [The Aspen Institute](https://time.com/author/the-aspen-institute/) ## The Aspen Institute Aug 17, 2017 4:00 PM UTC **1\.** [**With erratic hours and difficult conditions, working in America is hard.**](https://www.rand.org/news/press/2017/08/14.html) By the _Rand Corporation_ **2\.** [**Batteries are about to change the car business. What’s next?**](https://www.economist.com/news/briefing/21726069-no-need-subsidies-higher-volumes-and-better-chemistry-are-causing-costs-plummet-after) By _the Economist_ **3\.** [**Energy drinks might be linked to substance abuse later.**](https://umdrightnow.umd.edu/news/umd-researchers-discover-link-between-regular-energy-drink-use-and-later-drug-use-among-young) By the _University of Maryland_ **4\.** [**This smart underwear can prevent back pain.**](https://news.vanderbilt.edu/2017/08/01/smart-underwear-prevents-back-fatigue-with-just-a-double-tap/) By Heidi Hall at _Vanderbilt University_ **5\.** [**Here’s how NASA’s next rover mission could get Martian rocks back to Earth.**](https://www.space.com/37815-nasa-mars-sample-return-plans.html) By Leonard David at _Space.com_  [_The Aspen Institute_](http://www.aspeninstitute.org/) _is an educational and policy studies organization based in Washington, D.C._ ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"OpinionNewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4904522/working-in-america-is-hard/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4904522/working-in-america-is-hard/"},"headline":"Working in America is Hard","datePublished":"2017-08-17T16:00:43.000Z","dateModified":"2026-05-11T04:58:34.420Z","description":"These are today's best ideas","url":"https://time.com/4904522/working-in-america-is-hard/","keywords":["Five Best Ideas","Innovation","NASA","cars","Pain","productivity"],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"The Aspen Institute","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/the-aspen-institute/"}],"articleSection":"Ideas","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/ideas/","name":"Ideas"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/five-best-ideas/","name":"Five Best Ideas"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4904522/working-in-america-is-hard/","name":"Working in America is Hard"}}]}] ```