In December 2025, the University of Utah became the first major college athletic program to take private equity investment, spinning off its commercial operations into a for-profit company. Half a billion dollars and a public university now answering to Wall Street. In this episode of our series The Private Equity Playbook, host Manpreet Kaur Kalra is joined by collaborator Anna Canning to trace how college athletics went from extracurricular programs serving educational missions to financialized assets in a private equity portfolio.

This is a story about what happens when the logic of investor returns takes the wheel at a public university, and ultimately, who gets left behind. Spoiler: it's not the programs already generating millions. It's women's sports and all those other sports that may no longer make financial sense to a firm looking to make quick returns on their investment.

For decades, the NCAA built a billion-dollar industry on the backs of athletes classified as "amateurs," barring them from receiving fair compensation while coaches pocketed millions and broadcast deals soared. That system only cracked when courts forced it to. NCAA v. Alston. The House v. NCAA settlement. We trace how a wave of legal pressure cracked open the system and how private equity arrived right on cue to profit from the chaos.

In this episode, we explore:

• How Name, Image, Likeness (NIL) rights, and a slew of legal cases set the stage for private equity to swoop in and why this deal is unlikely to remain unique.
• How the University of Utah's deal is structured – what moved to the new for-profit entity, what stayed with the athletic department, and why the "we retain control" narrative deserves scrutiny.
• Who is behind Otro Capital and what their investment thesis tells us about what comes next for college sports.
• Why women's sports, Title IX protections, and non-revenue generating athletic programs are at particular risk when investor returns become the driving metric for decisions.
• The ongoing legal fight over athlete employee status.

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Starbucks built its brand on the idea of the “third place.” But over the past decade, the company has quietly unraveled the very conditions that made that promise possible.

In this episode of Art of Citizenry Podcast, Manpreet Kaur Kalra speaks with Megan Erickson, a Philadelphia-based barista and member of Starbucks Workers United, about the growing labor movement inside Starbucks. Together, they examine the widening gap between the company’s “third place” narrative and the working conditions faced by baristas across the United States.

From unpredictable scheduling and low wages to stalled union contract negotiations and ongoing allegations of union busting, this conversation examines how Starbucks became one of the most prolific labor law violators in modern U.S. history and how organizing by Starbucks Workers United has helped reignite the labor movement across the United States.

This podcast episode breaks down what union organizing looks like in practice, what “good faith bargaining” requires under U.S. labor law, and why thousands of Starbucks workers have gone on strike demanding fair pay, reliable hours, and workplace protections.

In this episode, we explore:

• Starbucks union movement: the rapid rise of Starbucks Workers United and coordinated organizing across hundreds of U.S. stores
• Labor law violations and union busting: over 1,100 unfair labor practice charges filed with the NLRB, including allegations of retaliation, store closures, and bad-faith tactics
• Contract negotiations and corporate leadership: how union bargaining shifted following the arrival of CEO Brian Niccol
• Working conditions at Starbucks: low wages, unpredictable scheduling, chronic understaffing, and barriers to accessing benefits
• Good faith bargaining under U.S. labor law: what the National Labor Relations Act requires and how delays, cancellations, and surface bargaining undermine negotiations
• Solidarity and community care in labor organizing: how striking workers built mutual aid networks, including a community-run strike kitchen, demonstrating how worker solidarity extends beyond the picket line

“When the systems in place fail to care for the people who make them run, solidarity gives us the power to build our own systems of care.” – Megan Erickson

How to take action:

• Delete the Starbucks app
• Find your local union store at sbworkersunited.org/map
• Sign the pledge at nocontractnocoffee.org
• Follow and support Starbucks Workers United at sbworkersunited.org

📌Support the Podcast: Art of Citizenry is proudly independent. Support us as we critically explore, challenge, and unravel mainstream narratives by empowering listeners with accessible, nuanced perspectives.

• Contribute via Paypal: https://visit.artofcitizenry.com/paypal
• Substack: https://artofcitizenry.substack.com

Follow the show on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/artofcitizenry

Follow Manpreet on Instagram: https://instagram.com/manpreetkalra

Explore Past Episodes of the Art of Citizenry Podcast with Manpreet Kalra: https://www.artofcitizenry.com/podcast

For more, you can find the full show notes of every episode at https://www.artofcitizenry.com/episodes

Artificial intelligence (AI) is often framed as a technological breakthrough. But behind the headlines is a deeper question: who owns the infrastructure shaping how we communicate, create, and understand truth?

In this episode of Art of Citizenry Podcast, we slow down the AI conversation to ask harder questions – not just about what these systems can do, but who built them, who profits from them, and what we give up by using them. Manpreet Kalra is joined by Vauhini Vara, author of Searches: Selfhood in the Digital Age and longtime journalist covering Big Tech, to unpack the structural forces at play behind the AI boom.

Together, we explore how AI is less a neutral technology than a mirror of the economic and ideological forces that built it. A social system shaped by corporate incentives, embedded bias, and the quiet erosion of our ability to define truth for ourselves and what it means for all of us when the infrastructure shaping that truth is privately owned, profit-driven, and constantly learning from us.

This isn't a conversation with easy answers. It's about sitting with complexity, and the uncomfortable reality that opting out is rarely simple.

In this episode, we explore:

• Why AI bias is more than a technical glitch and how it reflects deeper social and economic power structures.
• The legal battles over AI training data, including The New York Times v. OpenAI and Bartz v. Anthropic
• How AI systems can reinforce confirmation bias and shape our perception of truth
• Why Big Tech’s incentives matter when the infrastructure of communication and tools shaping public knowledge are privately owned
• The relationship between users and tech companies; and why exploitation and convenience can coexist
• Alternative models for technology governance, from public infrastructure to nonprofit platforms

AI isn’t just a technical system. It’s a social and economic one. The outputs we see reflect the data they’re trained on, the incentives of the companies building them, and the broader political economy of the internet. If we want different outcomes from AI, the conversation must expand beyond engineering fixes to include questions of ownership, accountability, and power.

Vauhini Vara is the author of Searches: Selfhood in the Digital Age, named a best book of the year by Esquire, Slate, and Publisher’s Weekly and a winner of the Porchlight Business Book Award. Her previous books are This is Salvaged, which was longlisted for the Story Prize and won the High Plains Book Award, and The Immortal King Rao, a Pulitzer Prize finalist and winner of the Colorado Book Award. She is also a journalist, currently working as a contributing writer for Businessweek.

📌Support the Podcast: Art of Citizenry is proudly independent. Support us as we critically explore, challenge, and unravel mainstream narratives by empowering listeners with accessible, nuanced perspectives.

• Contribute via Paypal: https://visit.artofcitizenry.com/paypal
• Substack: https://artofcitizenry.substack.com

Follow the show on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/artofcitizenry

Follow Manpreet on Instagram: https://instagram.com/manpreetkalra

Explore Past Episodes of the Art of Citizenry Podcast with Manpreet Kalra: https://www.artofcitizenry.com/podcast

For more, you can find the full show notes of every episode at https://www.artofcitizenry.com/episodes