In the last six years, housing prices in São Paulo have increased by 208 percent, and the cost of rent has increased 97.5 percent in the metro area. According to the website Numbeo, which compiles user-generated data, a 970-square-foot apartment here costs the equivalent of 16 years of an average family’s total income. By comparison, this cost-to-income ratio is eight in New York, 6.9 in Berlin and only three in Chicago. Someone making the minimum wage in Brazil ($325 a month) can afford to rent only a three-room shack in the crime-ridden Favela Paraisópolis ($280), leaving him practically nothing left over to live on.

Forty-five years after astronauts landed on the moon, scientists say they have finally discovered its true shape: slightly flattened, with a bulge on one side.