Sublime
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The frantic push to commodify exceptional young people. Alissa Bennett
New York Times • Opinion | The Rising Tide of Global Sadness
Baumol’s cost disease to include any sector of the economy where demand is inelastic (goods and services that most consider “essential), and supply/productivity is naturally and/or artificially restricted. With this expanded definition, four sectors of the economy stand out as afflicted by cost disease: healthcare, higher education, housing, and ch
... See moreJ.K. Lund • The Curse of Material Progress
Washington is a large assisted living community full of rich people who believe the world can’t get along without them and will never have to.
Poverty is the constant fear that it will get even worse. A third of Americans live without much economic security, working as bus drivers, farmers, teachers, cashiers, cooks, nurses, security guards, social workers. Many are not officially counted among the “poor,” but what then is the term for trying to raise two kids on $50,000 a year in Miami o
... See moreMatthew Desmond • Poverty, by America
Porter spoke of how companies over the last generation had pursued a vision of globalization in which they owed nothing to any community. This was simply because those taught by professors like him at places like Harvard Business School, groomed by consulting and Wall Street and other training grounds, tended to be agnostic about place. You analyze
... See moreAnand Giridharadas • Winners Take All: The Elite Charade of Changing the World
Have you ever wondered why so many developing economies—the successful ones, I mean—rise to prosperity through exports and tradable goods? There are a few reasons for this, but one is that the external world market provides a real measure of value. If you are exporting successfully, it’s not based on privilege, connections, corruption, or fakery. S
... See moreTyler Cowen • The Great Stagnation: How America Ate All The Low-Hanging Fruit of Modern History, Got Sick, and Will (Eventually) Feel Better: A Penguin eSpecial from Dutton
The only thing worth believing in is measurement.