Why Are Young People Pretending to Love Work? - <AUTHOR> https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/26/business/against-hustle-culture-rise-and-grind-tgim.html <comment><USER3> I have recently been applying for a new software engineering job. Any job that has included in the listing for job responsibilities: "A passion for what you do", I have not applied to.

The amount of jobs I have skipped due to this "job responsibility" is ridiculous. I am good at what I do. I will come to work, work a full day maybe even longer, then go home and unwind or do something non software related. I am not trying to burn out. Why is it not enough to just be good at your job and work an honest day every day? Why do I have to love every moment of it as well? I am not going to fake it because that lead to burnout at my last job. Who has a passion for writing crummy software for someone else anyways?

By skipping those jobs, I think I have found the right one where I am surrounded by down to earth like minded people who are still good at what they do. I start in a couple weeks and I am actually looking forward to working now.

<comment><USER4> I like being around people who have a passion for software development. That does not mean that they are working themselves to death but the curiosity will end up making them better developers.

As a .NET developer you usually get a MSDN licence from your company and that will give you a generous amount of "free money" on Azure. My passionate colleagues have read up on what you can do and tried some cool things while most of my other colleagues have never even logged in to it.

My passionate colleagues might read an article from Hackernews about web architecture at lunch because they think it is interesting while my less passionate colleagues browse Facebook.

<comment><USER5> I think "passion" is too strong (probably a result of word inflation, like "awesome" and such), but yeah, having someone to work with who actually gives a shit about what they're doing is much nicer. It's not even about the company, just the process itself.

<comment><USER6> David Mitchell agrees with you: [https://youtu.be/Bz2-49q6DOI](https://youtu.be/Bz2-49q6DOI)

<comment><USER7> Off topic but thanks for that. :) I didn't know David Mitchell made youtube content. He's one of my favourite british TV personas! Love him on Would I Lie To You.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I'm 25 and while I enjoy software engineering I would much rather just spend time with my wife and child. I work only for the well-being of my family. My first priorities are God and family, and it is here that I know my purpose in life.

<comment><USER9> I'm going to say this in the politest way I know how to - because I'm not trolling you, I sincerely care about the sanity of my fellow human beings.

When you make God a priority, it is most likely that you're prioritizing a fictional lense on your worldview.

Thats fine if it's a choice, but it's cruel to train that kind of thinking into children before they've had a chance to experience the world in it's raw form, and have learned how to discern fact from fiction.

<comment><USER10> As a parent I have a strong desire to raise my children with the same values that I have. For people who practice organized religion, you can't really have the "values" part without the religion part. It all fits together into a cohesive whole. Young children also have a strong desire to mimic their parents, while at the same time wanting to know "why?". How does one explain to kids why you're celebrating a religious holiday or headed off to church/synagogue/etc... without teaching them about God? Most organized religions also have imperatives for passing on the knowledge to children. It's totally incompatible with a person's own belief system to not raise their children in their faith.

Many people for thousands of years have devoted their lives to the search for Truth. It is a journey that takes a lifetime. I don't believe there is some moment in time where one is able to discern fact from fiction when it comes to the big questions of the meaning of life.

<comment><USER11> >As a parent I have a strong desire to raise my children with the same values that I have. For people who practice organized religion, you can't really have the "values" part without the religion part. It all fits together into a cohesive whole.

Then you should probably examine whether your values can stand up without the false axiom you're using to shore them up. I'm not saying they can't! But you need to check. And if they do, so much the better: you can pass on good values and avoid teaching your children nonsense.

<comment><USER12> You should look up the definition of axiom, and possibly look up the concept of phenomenology.

<comment><USER11> I'm quite aware of the definitions of both. What did you mean to say?

<comment><USER12> Firstly, your expectation that an axiom be true belies your misunderstanding of what an axiom is. Secondly, your expectation that something at all be true independently of personal experience shows your lack of acquaintance with phenomenology, or at least a refusal to understand it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I actually do really like work (wouldn't say 'love'), am 23 and have a consulting side-hustle which pays somewhere like 220% more per hour than my salaries job.

I'm not doing this consulting work because I love software so much my day job isn't giving me enough satisfaction, I'm doing it to earn well-needed money.

I got into heroin addiction a couple of years ago and built up a decent debt (in total probably about 50% of my annual income). Put simply, I need somewhere to live and something to eat. I've interviewed at other companies which offer me about 40% more than where I'm working now, but my company has stuck by me so I'm going to stick by them.

Basically, I wonder how many people are working like this due to circumstances beyond their control.

Workers fought for centuries to get the 40-hour work week, something seems wrong when we're stating to go the other way.

(I have been clean of heroin and all drugs except nicotine, alcohol and cannabis since around mid-August, I don't keep track of the date anymore because last time I got clean I got completely fixated on it)

<comment><USER14> I commend your loyalty (and the grit and determination required to pull back from addiction), but I have to agree that such loyalty will not benefit you long term. Stay loyal to your boss and to those who helped you through tough times - but don't mix that up with a loyalty to the company as a whole.

<comment><USER15> Agreed. I worked with an incredible boss and company, probably the best period of my life.

But later, the boss took a step back, hired someone for the CEO spot. The company aggressively hired people and attracted a lot of really bad types with their hiring policy. Whole thing started to go downhill rapidly within two years. Same company, entirely different culture.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> My very first job was in finance on Wall St at a bulge bracket investment bank (read: big name fancy boohah bank).

I did it not because I like finance and I thought working 100 hours a week on excel was fun, I did because I had no idea what I wanted in life and a job the most prestigious / best paying job at the time available to a graduating student was in finance.

Most the people I started with (trading), didn't last more than 2 years. I burned out and quit the day I got my bonus after 1 year. But you see a pattern in all the people who stay. They don't love the work, they love the money and the prestige of the work. After a while, it becomes your identity and even though most bankers hate their jobs, they pretend to like it because there is nothing they can do elsewhere that offers them the same perks.

I worked with a guy who complained to me every single night when we worked together almost 10 years ago. He said he was going to quit once he reached XYZ arbitrary milestone and go work at an NGO. Last time I checked, he is still there. Now he has a wife, kids, and a lifestyle that requires a lot of money so he can't leave. He also says now that he "loves" his job, but like in the article, he is fooling himself. It comes out after a few drams of scotch.

<comment><USER17> >But you see a pattern in all the people who stay. They don't love the work, they love the money and the prestige of the work. After a while, it becomes your identity...

Sounds like what I saw in the medical field.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> > Why Are Young People Pretending to Love Work?

But I do love my work. I'm not pretending. I do look forward to sitting down to work on Monday morning. It's creative, fun, fulfilling, and satisfying.

I just feel sorry for the author that they're so relentlessly incredulous that anyone could find joy in doing something.

<comment><USER19> But would you turn up to your work on Monday morning if it didn't pay you a salary?

Even people that "love" work usually know that it isn't the thing they would most want to spend their time doing if they had the choice.

<comment><USER20> This is the real test. If money was taken care of, I'd probably be doing something else with my time. In my case, I've found the most fulfillment volunteering in very remote areas. My job is good, but I'm under no illusion that I love it or that it loves me.

<comment><USER21> If money was already taken care of, I would absolutely be building software (and playing music). I just wouldn't be doing it at my current job (the software part...my music would be frowned upon at work).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> While I enjoy my work, you've got to have breaks even from things you love. It seems doubtful that even if someone is in love with something, they try to spend all day, every day thinking about it or doing it. Heck, I love my SO and my dogs but I need breaks from them as well lol.

Some people love work, some people don't. That being said, the excessive propaganda that work, work, work doesn't typically benefit the person working as much as those they report to, like the article points out. That seems to be the main issue rather than an entrepreneur trying to materialize their dream.

<comment><USER23> But listen - someone has to babysit the datacenter, just like taking out the trash, or fixing people's plumbing.

When even low level _retail_ job listings demand _A Burning Passion!!!!!11oneoneeleven_ for the terrible job?

They're trying to find the people who would do this work anyway, without getting paid for it. Why?

So they can pay us all less. When we work partially for the privilege of what we do, money matters less... and we can get away with expecting less.

Anyone else? Is too busy fitting this mold to even be able to ask for a raise.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> There are multiple things happening here. I don't think a majority or even a double-digit percentage of young people have what this author is calling "hustler" mentality, but we'll ignore that, and focus on the people who do have it. Thoughts on "hustle" culture in no particular order...

\- Some people are legitimately trying to build a business and be first to market. There are arguments for and against burning the midnight oil, but it could be a rational thing to do.

\- Some people are filling a void in their lives left by the evaporation of community, family, and church. The "hustler" types typically live away from their family, don't have kids, and certainly are not going to church. Immersing yourself in a lifestyle with other people struggling, in the same way, is a decent way of feeling like you're a part of something.

\- This is probably just a thing in places like NYC and SF where you're surrounded by hyper-successful people at all times. That's why they call it a rat race.

FWIW, I've never been able to work anything like a 12-14 hour day unless it was something I truly wanted to do. There was no pretending.

<comment><USER25> You raise an interesting point about filling a void.

I have talked to more than a few hustlers who had fairly deep rooted issues around failure and rejection and not amounting to enough.

This is present in all populations, but I personally have noticed that it's strikingly common among people trying to create startups compared to other groups of people I talk to.

<comment><USER26> The same is true for many great athletes, they are "running from something". It makes a lot of sense that at the very top of any human activity only those that have had the talent, a bit of luck and _very importantly_ sacrificed everything else over it will make it. And that's much more "easier" to do when there's something in their lives driving them strongly towards that goal.

I wouldn't even say that's a bad thing. The achievements of those people push humanity forward and even if you focus on the person, if they wouldn't have done that what makes you think they would have otherwise been happy and productive members of society?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> As uninteresting as most modern day employment work is, what bothers me most is the lack of concern for the meaning of one's work.

I'm all in favor of people "hustling" and working hard if it's for something that benefits humanity and/or something they genuinely want to work on. But most people aren't taking us to the moon or curing cancer, they're selling crap people don't need. The dystopian motivational quotes in the article are like the business version of "keeping up with the Joneses"

Not that there's anything wrong with selling shakeweights. But I wish that instead of this #hustle culture, our culture was more geared towards making the world a better place. Of course for this to ever take place, at a minimum we'd probably need to end the precariousness of our economic system and free people from the servitude of boring 9-5 jobs (eg. UBI).

But until workers see through the billionaire employer-brewn Kool-Aid and stop giving in to this propaganda, the young will continue to get exploited and waste their lives pursuing crap that will make a few rich, but ultimately doesn't add any value to society. But the fact that this article was even written by such a prominent publication gives me hope that the mainstream is beginning to see through the facade, or at least finally stop perpetuating the gospel they've been forced to preach.

<comment><USER28> The notion of meaning in work was covered originally by Marx drawing on ideas from Hegel. Even Marx's fiercest detractors found his theory of alienation brilliant, along with the theory of commodity fetishism. It's a shame to me that many people end up rediscovering these ideas independently rather than seeing just how deep the insight of past thinkers has been and applicable to the modern day too.

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> I question the author's conclusion of a truly subjective experience. It feels like fancy gatekeeping. The cross-references to social life are in interesting way to tease out meaning, but ultimately the dude is calling people "posers" with a richer vocabulary.

I'm 53 and I still don't know if I have really "liked" my work/career in tech that started in the late 80's. I got off on my 80-hour weeks when I was in my 20's, but there was a direct result from my efforts (first silicon!). It's always been a challenge, and at some points broke me down (e.g., awful task, asshat manager), but I've always thought: "Welp, I gotta do something, might as well be something that pays well." I suspect the rest has been after-the- fact self-conditioning. But I'm almost done, and I look forward to retiring and doing more tech projects I never finished, so I guess I really did enjoy the career?

</comment><comment><USER30> I think some people are confusing the point. It's not about whether or not you enjoy your work. It's about the glamorization of working more than others.

I think a critical mass of people have bought into the belief that overwork is equivalent with success. That dedication to work is heroic. So there's signalling going on, a desire to cultivate the image of being a winner (in this narrow sense). There's also naivety... people who buy into this and aren't just signalling but truly think working in this way is somehow reflective of the superiority they desire to possess. So there's a cyclical effect, one group feeding back into the other.

<comment><USER31> > I think a critical mass of people have bought into the belief that overwork > is equivalent with success.

Basically it's another one of those misunderstanding implication fallacies.

They are saying:

hard work <=>success (equivalence)

When really:

success => hard work (hard work is necessary for success)[1] hard work =/> success (hard work is not sufficient for success)

[1] Mostly.

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> "Welcome to hustle culture. It is obsessed with striving, relentlessly positive, devoid of humor..."

I remember a time when humor helped build trust and friendship at work.

I remember laughing at work...

<comment><USER33> This is one of the things which really rubs me the wrong way. I've rejected a couple of offers over the years simply because the interviewers came off as weird robots with poles up their asses (that unfortunately includes Google, where the people I met couldn't take a joke but had no problem laughing about others). You CAN crack a joke without being unprofessional, especially if it's about the profession. I don't understand why people choose not to do that. Humor is one hell of a stress coping mechanism and inside jokes are a side effect of having a cohesive team.

</comment></comment><comment><USER34> I dunno. I absolutely love what I do. 95% of my days don't feel like work. I work from home so I see my kids a ton more than I used to. I go to the park with my oldest after lunch. I have flexible hours. I do interesting stuff that challenges me. And I get a ton of freedom to design and implement solutions that I think are best (and learn from my mistakes). Finally, I've never once been pressured to work more than ~40 hours a week.

My one issue is that I can't picture any other job ever being this compatible with how I want to live my life. I worry it'll never be this good elsewhere. Happiness handcuffs, if you will.

<comment><USER35> Oof! This is where I am with teaching post-secondary at a non-research institution in California. 6 weeks of Winter and 6 weeks of summer off, with added pay to teach those intercessions? Scheduling classes so I get every Friday off? Yes please!

I still dream of getting into more technical work where I get to solve interesting problems, but figuring out how to best teach a class and reduce equity gaps is a meaningful, interesting problem. If I ever find a different line of work I at a tech company, I worry about having the freedom and flexibility in my current job to raise my family in the same way.

</comment></comment><comment> crack-the-code Here are some of my reasons why I love working (and working hard):

1\. I actually enjoy programming and working with others.

2\. Sense of purpose. Working with others towards a common goal.

3\. Reward. The harder I work, the more I increase my chances of greater financial output.

4\. Recognition. When my boss or peers acknowledge my accomplishments, it makes me feel proud.

5\. Growth. A lot of my personal development has come from wisdom gained through work.

</comment><comment><USER36> If you're lucky, and many tech workers are, at the beginning of your career work can be insanely fun because, unlike school, you're finally spending most of your time doing the one thing you're good at it, you're gaining skills rapidly, and you're getting paid to do it. The thrill wears off after a few years.

<comment><USER24> Eh, I'm like...7 years in or so. It's still pretty fun. It feels good to develop expertise and to have valuable insights that people are interested in. If I were still doing the same job as when I started, I think I'd be very bored.

</comment></comment><comment><USER37> Work is not some uniquely arduous activity. I blog for fun, as a writer I'm sure she would find that to be "work". Even playing video games could be work nowadays. Sex and going to restaurants could also be work to some people. If the "work" is cool and rewarding it could be good. The writer probably grew up in an era where work is divorced from achievement and the results are all sucked up by some far away corporation. Then it sucks, but the problem with that is not work, but that somebody is stealing the credit for your work.

</comment><comment><USER38> I'm happiest when I'm working hard on meaningful problems that I care about.

I also understand that everyone doesn't feel that way. I think that's okay too. I don't understand why this needs to turn into a debate or perpetual flame war.

</comment><comment><USER39> Being an outsider, the thing that stand out most about North American culture is that it is extremely self-promotional. Granted, self-pormotion exists more or less is all cultures. But what makes it different here is self promotion is actively encouraged as a virtue. I think 'I love my work', along with many other behaviors, can be attribute to this self-promotional culture.

</comment><comment><USER40> I wrote about this previously, but here it goes again:

I think the 7 day "work" week is the most life-relaxing way to work.

I try to work 7 days a week. Some days I work 3 hours, some rare days I work 36 hours.

When I'm not working, I'm enjoying that time and not stressing out regarding income taking time off, because I know I have given it my 100% and not held anything back.

It is satisfying. I feel relaxed at work. I feel well rested.

I think the 5 day work week is soul-crushing: there's just enough time off from work that you dread coming back, and there's enough time at work that you feel overworked.

40 hours over 7 days is a little over 5 hours per day, and sprinkling in a couple 12 hour days spreads the remaining work to 5 three-hour days.

<comment><USER41> You're going to grind yourself to death.

The huge advantage of the 7th day is that you _know_ you cannot work, nobody else is working, that it's pointless and you can relax. It's 'the time for not working'.

When you work 'every day' \- the nagging of 'maybe I can do something' always exists.

If you put in your time on the 5 days, then you can have this 'I know I gave it 100%' feeling.

Also, knowing that you can 'finish stuff on the weekend' I find makes one even a little bit more likely to procrastinate!

I've lived extensively in both worlds (i.e. 5, 6 , 7 days) and I think 7 will catch up to you. It caught up to me.

<comment><USER42> Given your experience, what are your thoughts on five 6-hr days vs four 7.5hr days (but these 7.5 hours must be fully productive otherwise I cannot bill them).

<comment><USER41> I would say it's likely a personal issue, you may want to try to see what works for you.

I think the most important thing is that there are 'hard lines' i.e. you have time which you know to be 'yours'. The bleeding of personal time into professional time takes its toll.

Also, not relevant to your case, is the 'every day' nature of 7 day a week work - I believe this to be grinding as well, and it extracts a hidden cost on your health.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER43> Society has systematically devalued things like family, marriage and community.

It's like a variant of Orwell's vision. The proles are probably the happiest ones.

</comment><comment><USER15> There's a book, Flow. It was written in 1990, meaning that the research doesn't even involve millennials, but rather the Boomers. It's not even research for productivity; the goal was to find _when_ we are happiest.

In it, it describes that most workers actually enjoy work. About 47% for blue collar up to 64% for white collar. Whereas during their leisure times, it's 20% for blue collar, down to 15% for white collar.

However, the catch is that when at work, they describe that they would rather be doing something. There's a paradox that motivation is lowest when at work, even though they feel happy, strong, creative, satisfied. And that they look forward to periods like watching TV where they feel more weak, dull, and dissatisfied.

The book doesn't have a solid theory as to why this is so. Maybe we have a cultural stereotype that we're supposed to hate work. Maybe we feel forced to do it against our will.

Modern society seems to actually restrict flow. We're constantly interrupted by social media and messaging. We have open offices where everyone can interrupt one another. There's less situations where we can just sit down and lose ourselves in work. A blue collar worker can tune the world out while they cut grass and assemble cars, while the engineer has to deal with a barrage of emails and stand up meetings.

So, it's quite possible that work now is less enjoyable than 30 years ago.

<comment><USER12> I decided to leave my last job with a month's notice due to a few reasons, one of which was constant noise and interruption. I was in the process of finishing a project with no further input needed, and I wanted to leave behind something I was proud of.

Given that I had no reputation to protect there, without asking anyone, I moved into a disused room, no windows, completely isolated from the rest of the office and spent my whole days cracking out code alone. I was never happier, and I've never got so much work done in an office in my life.

</comment></comment><comment><USER44> Some people are just conscientious, they love work and feel they have to be engaged in some work - whether it be meaningful work or pointless drudgery - for their life to be worthwhile. My mom is like that. I think the article is overly focused on these sorts of people. There are tons of people out there who are more relaxed and want to take it easy - in fact I would say that's the majority.

Sure some companies and employers are highly conscientious and they seek out conscientious employees. It's sad because conscientious people are more readily taken advantage of by employers. But at the end of the day it's just a personality and I don't know how well we can apply the label to all millennials. My experience has been that early boomers are the most conscientious people, probably more so than any generation that came after them.

I would argue that with millenials some of that hustle culture we're seeing is not necessarily a work nature, but more desperation. Here we have a generation coming of age into hard economic times. Many have high hopes but believe that their lives will be worse financially than that of their parents. It's natural that some of them would adopt a hustle mentality as a way to struggle against that.

</comment><comment><USER45> Because the idea of your job and your life being separate is ridiculous, an artifact of a first-generation middle-class that burgeoned in the second half of the 20th century and was largely just happy to have money and security.

We - the young people now - want a lot more, and to some extent we're willing to close the gap between what-we-want-to-do and what-we-do-for-work from both sides so we're not living in a perpetual disharmony like our sad parents did.

</comment><comment><USER46> I can't believe no one has said it, but I have a theory that says working hard and making yourself inaccessibly busy is a new status symbol.

In a world where it's difficult to buy even the most modest of homes and unreasonable to buy a sports car if you have no home in which to put it, making yourself seem like you can't possibly get away from your desk because too many people need you is the nouveau status symbol.

</comment><comment><USER47> Isn't the answer obvious?: Work has become much more precarious again and looking like you aren't into it is a competitive disadvantage that few can risk.

<comment><USER48> Or maybe some people actually do love the work they do... Are people really this disenfranchised that they can't possibly imagine that some people really are doing work they enjoy? I love my career and the work I do is fulfilling and gives me a sense of accomplishment

<comment><USER47> Do you think most people love their work the way you do?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER49> I think a part of the problem is caused by ubiquitious caffeine consumption.

On caffeine, I'm driven, and want to code more, and start new projects, and meet people, and never stop thinking, and hustle towards the future. I also never stop to question whether my goals are worthwhile, or at least good for me. I just "love the chase" on caffeine.

Off caffeine, I'm considerate, more withdrawn, and enjoy life as it is, being in the moment. Life is more "real". I take breaks, talk to family on the phone, cook myself a meal, smell the flowers.

Our generation runs on coffee. 64% of people over 18 in the US drink at least a cup every day [1], with rising tendency. "Programmers are machines which turn coffee into code", and other similar memes aplenty. I believe that a side effect of taking in caffeine is to be driven and motivated during the day, and of weak willpower at night, leading to excessive social media usage. It makes the hustle itself a means to an end.

1: [https://www.reuters.com/article/us-coffee-conference- survey/...](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-coffee-conference- survey/americans-are-drinking-a-daily-cup-of-coffee-at-the-highest-level-in- six-years-survey-idUSKCN1GT0KU)

<comment><USER50> Biggest mystery haven't been solved yet: why coffee makers are still complicated?

<comment><USER51> Well you can have instant coffee, or an air-press, or ... addicts get a bigger hit when they establish a religious experience through ritualising their consumption. One of the difficult things about giving up cigarettes is giving up the paraphernalia, the sense of occasion, the ritualised actions that start the happy hormones as Pavlov's bell initiates salivation. Your hands themselves are almost separately addicted to the actions, unwrapping a packet, sliding out a cigarette, tamping the tobacco, wheeling the flint on the lighter; each action a stepping up of the anticipation of drug-satiation.

Now, with coffee one can do the same: the steam and coffee-incense rise like the smoke from a thurible; beans clink, machines whirr, chrome shines in the bright halogen light of the kitchen. All subtle sensory inputs hailing the ever-closer hit of caffeine.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER52> lol yesterday I saw an ad from JP Morgan on Twitter..."why young people don't just want a paycheck".

The ad led you to page that talked about how a charity in Seattle got basically 2 weeks of free work from an entry level dev at a JP Morgan event...and now the dev works at the bank.

The subtext of all this of course, wink wink, was how to pay your employees less by giving them something, anything, other than the one thing they actually need, money.

</comment><comment><USER53> I cringe at the interview question of "why do you want to work here?" and the dance you play in saying anything and everything accept for "the paycheck."

<comment><USER54> It shows if the candidate has seriously considered what the company does, how it operates, and what would mean for them to join the company.

It also helps the interviewer take stock of what the candidate is looking for. If the candidate does well they can circle back to those interests and sell the candidate on the company a bit.

<comment><USER55> It also shows the company and person asking this are completely out of touch with reality, basically arrogant idiots who think their candidate has time to research and make up a lie to answer their questions just like he has time to do the same for the other five hundred or a thousand job postings he replied to. It shows arrogance and way too much self-importance, both huge red flags for any employer. But at least they can target the best liars in their applicant pool.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER56> The title is a little misleading. It leads us to believe that young people pretend to love work regardless of working conditions

> I saw the greatest minds of my generation log 18-hour days — and then boast > about #hustle on Instagram.

This summarizes the idea better. It is unnatural to love an activity that simply drains you of all your time and energy. I "work" all the time. I'm always doing some course, doing actual work, learning, practicing different skills, but mostly I do it in my free time.

The author questions then the surprising nature of the relationship young people have with extremely time consuming jobs, and I believe that is a valid criticism. We need to protect the youth from believing it is OK to reduce the daily routine to sleep and work. Health, mental and social problems all rise from such situations and cost a lot of money from society, from having to waste time and money on therapy specifically to counter those issues that rose from work abuse, to ultimately crippling depression and suicide

</comment><comment><USER57> In my experience, the ones who shout the loudest about passion and motivational quotes have the least knowledge to get the work done. Sure they put in long hours, only to have their spaghetti code fail at the first attempt of running it.

Sick and tired of it frankly, so I prefer to avoid those boys.

</comment><comment><USER58> I used to be the young people who love the work and made the work dominate my work life balance. My reason was quite simple: I felt this is the first time I have my ability validated, furthermore I was constantly surpassing my own expectations, I don't want it to stop. So in other words I don't belong to the group that are pretending to love work.

For a long time I automatically think others must felt the same way. On the other hand I think it's not efficient nor effective to pretend that you love your work: you are evaluated based on your performance/competence anyway, although in work environment we like to call it your "enthusiasm", the pretending only works in certain working environment with a certain culture, theoretically.

</comment><comment><USER59> I've been wondering the exact same thing. Especially in regards to working hours and what not. Seriously, when did work go from '9-5' (or something similar) to 'let's do as much overtime as possible'?

Too many young people seem to be treating work like a community/social club thing rather than a work for hire one, and forgetting that work is really a means to make money rather than the entire meaning of their existence.

Maybe this also explains why hobbies seem to be on the way out in general. To a world where your passion 'has' to be your main job, the idea of doing anything for fun must be a dying trend.

<comment><USER18> > Maybe this also explains why hobbies seem to be on the way out in general.

I don't understand where you're seeing this - I think people are becoming _much more_ serious about hobbies these days.

People don't just go jogging - they do ultramarathons. They don't just enjoy baking, they set up baking tutorial YouTube videos. They don't just watch movies, they write their own fan fiction and get it published. They don't just play with toys, they build Arduino robots.

This is the age of the amateur professional in hobby areas.

</comment></comment><comment><USER60> > _Perhaps we've all gotten a little hungry for meaning. Participation in > organized religion is falling, especially among American millennials. In San > Francisco, where I live, I've noticed that the concept of productivity has > taken on an almost spiritual dimension. Techies here have internalized the > idea — rooted in the Protestant work ethic — that work is not something you > do to get what you want; the work itself is all._

This feels true...

</comment><comment><USER61> Haha, I agree. I always had arguments with my dad where he'd say you have to have a passion, etc. and I'd be like "Dude, I don't care about that extra stuff. I just want money"

Of course now I'll play along since pretending to be passionate about office politics or JavaScript is part of making money.

I work a lot more than the minimum but the part outside my work week is all very long term fundamental stuff I hope will help my career over the decades

</comment><comment><USER62> Is it just me or is this article exceptionally "New York City?"

The work culture here in SF, in my experience anyway, is not at all like the article describes.

<comment><USER63> I agree, but despite never being a New Yorker and still reading NYTimes every day I always forget that it is a _New York City_ paper first. And because of it, I really shouldn't be surprised that part of their outlook is going to be focused on the elite circles available in NYC.

</comment></comment><comment><USER64> > When did performative workaholism become a lifestyle?

During the Protestant Reformation? Another sign of young peoples' rightward drift: [https://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/generation-...](https://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/generation- zs-rightward-drift).

<comment><USER65> compare to the data:

[http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2019/01/17/generation-z- looks...](http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2019/01/17/generation-z-looks-a-lot- like-millennials-on-key-social-and-political-issues/)

<comment><USER64> That survey looks at current views, not views across generations at the same age. Older people are more conservative on average, but there is evidence that millennials and Gen Z are more conservative than their parents and grandparents were at the same age: [https://capitalresearch.org/article/the- conservative-millenn...](https://capitalresearch.org/article/the-conservative- millennial-no-longer-a-myth/)

<comment><USER66> You have a good point, but that article is not convincing. Most of the claims don't consider other generations at the same age either. The statistic about abortion comes from a push poll conducted by an anti-abortion organization. The claim about Obamacare is cherry-picked from an Atlantic article about how cherry-picking polling results can make young people look very conservative or very liberal!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Honestly, at this point, I'm expecting that anyone participating in "hustle culture" is either self-consciously referencing _Sorry to Bother You_ or just letting me know they are, in the immortal words of Douglas Adams, a bunch of mindless jerks who will be first against the wall when the revolution comes.

</comment><comment><USER67> This is mainly a US cultural phenomenon through the Protestant Work Ethic. Europe had more Catholicism but the immigrants to America were puritans. Anyhow the idea is that by working hard you are good.

It's not something new it's in the very fabric of American society and culture. Work is good, lots of work is better.

</comment><comment><USER68> This is so perfect. Those poor kids got duped into thinking that somehow grinding their young life away will eventually get you somewhere. Hardly anyone gets into the NBA, or gets to be top drug dealer, or has their startup get bought for millions.

But, well, someone needs to be the hopeful drones I guess.

</comment><comment><USER69> what the hell are people doing working 130 hours? I kind of get it if your work involves sitting in an office thinking of how to unify gravity and quantum physics, but if a tech worker takes so much time to work he either doesn't know how to use the tools or is not good at it.

> Participation in organized religion is falling, especially among American > millennials. In San Francisco, where I live, I've noticed that the concept > of productivity has taken on an almost spiritual dimension.

This is probably closer to the truth. How many people make friends outside of work anymore? Esp. when people live in a big multicultural city with everyone moving every few years, work is the one place that actually feels like home.

</comment><comment><USER70> stagnant wages + media glorification of big tech = millennials fighting for studio apartments

</comment><comment><USER71> Funny while they work themselves to death I'm just sitting here barely working by putting a little forethought, planning, and efficiency in the mix. Seems like the amount I work drops by 25% and my pay goes up by 25% a year.

</comment><comment><USER72> All of the measures in this article to increase morale about work aren't exploitative unless they're being used to exploit workers. I don't think the author made a really good case for this; instead they argued on the snuck premise that employers naturally want to squeeze their slaves dry and used that to conclude these measures are evil attempts to propagate "burnout culture" (look! A shiny new Term for us to use).

In reality, this is easily explained as an attempt to merely increase positive feelings about work. I like the work I do, but a negative working environment is infectious and is usually a big productivity sapper for me. The tech industry has plenty of managers attempting to juice their slaves for as many hours at the keyboard as they can get, but I think carved cucumbers encouraging people in their work is mutually exclusive to that issue.

</comment><comment><USER73> Because they don't have families, social ties with friends have been loosening for decades, and there really isn't anything else to live for.

I can count many colleagues from the past few years for whom work is their main social group.

</comment><comment><USER74> Is it coincidental that two of the defining features of the Victorian era -- overwork and prudery -- are making a return at the same time? It's a strangely conservative turn for young urban people to take.

<comment><USER75> _citation needed_

</comment></comment><comment><USER76> Because, unless you are in some market niche, surviving got really complicated.

> It is obsessed with striving, relentlessly positive, devoid of humor, and — > once you notice it — impossible to escape.

That's the world we build for ourselves. Let me quote a passage from Max Weber, in his book "The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism":

"The Puritan wanted to work in a calling; we are forced to do so. For when asceticism was carried out of monastic cells into everyday life, and began to dominate worldly morality, it did its part in building the tremendous cosmos of the modern economic order. This order is now bound to the technical and economic conditions of machine production which to-day determine the lives of all the individuals who are born into this mechanism, not only those directly concerned with economic acquisition, with irresistible force."

If others are stepping the game up, we have to step the game up too if we want to survive.

Is this good or right?

<comment><USER77> They call it the Puritan work ethic, but I'm pretty sure the Puritans had kids. It's more like the "Japanese population collapse work ethic."

</comment></comment><comment><USER78> Relevant John Lennon lyric[0]: " _A working-class hero is something to be..._ "

[0] - [https://youtu.be/D77dbv-xNfE](https://youtu.be/D77dbv-xNfE)

<comment><USER79> Check out lyrics of this[0] glam rock song from 1986. Reflects this whole thread over and above.

[0] [https://youtu.be/nM_yNG2htsg?t=61](https://youtu.be/nM_yNG2htsg?t=61)

</comment></comment><comment><USER80> It's a big cycle.

WW2 vets were the hard workers of the 50s, followed by the Flower-Power hippies of the 60s, followed by the Yuppies of the 80s, followed by the Slackers of the 90s.....

</comment><comment><USER81> Not a new problem:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stakhanovite_movement](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stakhanovite_movement)

</comment><comment><USER82> > Today's messages glorify personal profit, even if bosses and investors — not > workers — are the ones capturing most of the gains. Wage growth has been > essentially stagnant for years.

Everyone loves quoting this statistic out of context. Median wages have been stagnant but compensation for the top 10% (and the top 1% especially) have increased substantially. All those poor exploited FAANG engineers fall at least into the top 10% by income (120k/year), and very large fraction of them into the top 1% too (~300k/year). It's amusing how techies love to complain about being victims of capitalist oppression when in reality they are, by a very, very large margin, massive beneficiaries of rising inequality, not its victims.

<comment><USER63> I agree. IMO, we're seeing a pretty intense class stratification to go along with it, even between FAANG's.

</comment></comment><comment><USER83> "Because in the end, you won't remember the time you spent working in the office or mowing your lawn. Climb that goddamn mountain." — Jack Kerouac

</comment><comment><USER84> Why is the NYT shaming people for loving their work?

</comment><comment><USER85> My company has some pretty good benefits. It's full of great people. I spend lots of time there. It's mostly enjoyable.

</comment><comment><USER86> Maybe I missed it, but where is the evidence that a majority of young people are pretending (or even claiming) to love work?

<comment><USER87> The editor who wrote the headline seems to have confused a corporate branding strategy with what the actual workers are saying. Seems kind of hard to reconcile the high support for socialism among American youth with the idea that they're hustle cultists.

</comment></comment><comment><USER88> I think I'm getting tired of people villainizing a love for your work & industry.

Within reason of course - but I think we're seeing a knee-jerk reaction to the hustle philosophy that has historically permeated the industry. Moderation never sits in the corner of the right or the left - you can still enjoy your field without working until 10pm every night.

"It has exported its brand of performative workaholism to 27 countries..."

Why polarise the issue even further with journalism that is so bias. And perhaps dig up some "pre-success DHH mantras" before extolling his anti-hustle rhetoric.

</comment><comment><USER89> I doubt they are the "greatest minds of his generation" that probably goes to someone like Terry Tao

</comment><comment><USER90> God damn, do I hate cynicism.

The entire tone of this article, written by someone whose beat is literally "Startups and venture capital for the New York Times" according to their Twitter bio, is so absolutely beyond patronizing and Knows-Better-Than-You that they can't possibly fathom the idea of people both enjoying work, and having a purpose that is a long way off.

So you're working for someone else's startup right now. They're getting rich off your work. Is the idea that you might be working to prepare yourself for a next job, a startup of your own, somewhere where you have a larger piece of the pie, completely unreasonable? Not all of us came from families that can afford to put us up for the time it takes to get the funds to start. Others of us already have families and want something better.

Furthermore, yes, this generation really does seem to give a fuck about making the world a better place. It often materializes in ways that personally enrich ourselves, but such is capitalism: There's literally no way to be widely effective at helping people that doesn't also enrich yourself along the way. Hence why all the largest charities have significant government sponsorship alongside, and Religion is more commonly seen today as the ignorant hideaway for homophobia, sexism, and the status quo. But many of us also think that we have an idea, that might just work, that is hard to execute on. So why not work toward it?

I'll never fault someone for hating their job. My first gig was being the locker room towel boy for a bunch of fat, sweaty rich people in the densest population of poverty in America at the time(Fresno, CA). The job I got before I became a professional coder was delivering car parts in Claremore, OK, for a guy who store rumor said did some stuff to kids. At that job, I worked 80-90 hour weeks and only billed 50 because I both didn't know what I was doing, and was afraid of being yelled at by my boss.

But for those of us who have something better than that, who enjoy bettering themselves at their craft, while making stabs and tries at something better- why be a cynic about our day job is still a job? Yeah, it's the rat race. But I'm not doing it for a big house, or a car, or fame or fortune. I'm doing it because I hope I can say I left this place better than I found it.

</comment><comment><USER91> I enjoy software engineering for about 8 hours a day

</comment><comment><USER92> This writer sounds like a slacker.

</comment><comment><USER93> Because they've internalized - quite unconsciously, it would seem - <USER2> dominating ideology of their time:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neoliberalism](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neoliberalism)

</comment><comment><USER94> Fear.

</comment><comment><USER41> They're not faking it, they believe they have impact and are finally able to have the identity and distinction of 'real responsibility'.

They are 'grown ups now' able to live their lives and do real things.

That said - this for those in decent jobs and most of the generation actually doesn't believe that 'hard work' is a defining quality. I looked up the reference but sadly could not find it but from 'greatest generation' to 'baby boomers' to 'gen X' \- they all put 'hard work' as a top 5 characteristic of their gen. Gen Y/Z are the first to not include this. It may be a matter of semantics or wording, or even their perception of _others_ in their generation as opposed to an objective reality.

</comment><comment><USER95> leading the witness.

Some are some are not.

clickbait nyt

</comment><comment><USER96> Signaling.

<comment><USER96> Why is this downvoted?

<comment><USER97> Reasons.</comment></comment></comment>


The development industry is broken - <AUTHOR> http://x-team.com/2014/08/the-development-industry-is-broken-and-were-here-to-fix-it/

<comment><USER2> Great points in the article. I agree 100%. I have long thought we were treading water.

I agree with making progress, but there is just so much NIH syndrome out there when it comes to new languages, development practices, you name it. I honestly miss the older days when I was doing simpler Perl stuff. The expectation was for me to solve a discreet problem, not enable a group of people to ramp up to a billion dollar company in less than a year.

Startups that focus on the money always do worse than those who focus on delivering good software, services, whatever. Solve a problem and the money will come naturally. There is really nothing new under the sun, just different ways to do things. Lately, I just want to solve problems, not come up with "new" things.</comment>


Public key authenticated encryption and why you want it (Part I) - <AUTHOR> https://neilmadden.blog/2018/11/14/public-key-authenticated-encryption-and-why-you-want-it-part-i/ <comment><AUTHOR> Part II: [https://neilmadden.blog/2018/11/26/public-key- authenticated-...](https://neilmadden.blog/2018/11/26/public-key- authenticated-encryption-and-why-you-want-it-part-ii/)

Part III: [https://neilmadden.blog/2018/12/14/public-key- authenticated-...](https://neilmadden.blog/2018/12/14/public-key- authenticated-encryption-and-why-you-want-it-part-iii/)</comment>


Globalization's Backlash Is Here, at Just the Wrong Time - <AUTHOR> https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/23/upshot/globalization-pain-and-promise-for-rich-nations.html <comment><AUTHOR> TLDR version: (1) Initially, globalization causes the rich world to compete with labor elsewhere. Later, it permits the rich world to sell to a new middle class in the rest of the world. (2) While there's no regaining the manufacturing jobs that left the US, we could do something (the TPP would have) to secure intellectual property rights, data and privacy.</comment>


Elizabeth Warren Came Up with a Plan to Break Up Big Tech - <AUTHOR> https://www.newyorker.com/business/currency/how-elizabeth-warren-came-up-with-a-plan-to-break-up-big-tech <comment><USER2> > The plan she released consists of several parts. Companies with revenue of > twenty-five billion dollars or more that provide an online marketplace would > be designated as "platform utilities" and would not be allowed to both own > the marketplace and participate on it. Right from the start, Warren says, > Amazon would have to separate its "Basics" business, which sells products > under a house brand, from the rest of Amazon, and Google's advertising > business and its search business would have to be split apart. Secondly, she > pledged to "empower" federal regulators to undo many of the tech-industry > mergers that have already happened, such as Amazon's acquisition of Whole > Foods and Zappos; Facebook's takeover of Whatsapp and Instagram; and > Google's purchase of Waze, Nest, and DoubleClick.

This would really change the landscape if implemented. On thing that it would do is force the companies to innovate themselves, knowing that they can't just acquire every innovative company that challenges their dominance.

<comment><USER3> So it's okay for supermarkets and brick/mortar retailers to offer house brands but not online retailers. Pretty arbitrary line.

And this would equally apply to Apple and Google who have a number of apps on their app stores. This would then lead to even more bundled apps on the phone e.g. Garageband which would decrease competition.

Most of these policies are really not well thought out.

<comment><USER4> The line is not 'you are not allowed to ever do this' but 'this particular instance is hurting competition'.

If the vast majority of people shopped at one supermarket, and that supermarket's most popular products were largely it's own brand products, and most industries that competed with such products had largely shrunk to providing specialty alternatives or cheap knockoffs because it was so hard to compete, then there might be a case for breaking that supermarket up.

<comment><USER5> So not really a leading question, just curious... why shouldn't I be OK with buying the cheap mega-supermarket brand product? As the consumer, I just want a cheap price - I personally don't really care where the money is going. If small companies can't produce a less expensive alternative, then won't breaking up the larger company just increase costs to the consumer? Thanks for your thoughts.

<comment><USER6> Ultimately if all those other brands go out of business, the _cheaper_ option may no longer be that cheap.

<comment><USER7> This comes up with predatory pricing antitrust claims, which are complex in themselves, but you shouldn't punish someone or an organization for behavior that they only have the potential to do, but have not done.

<comment><USER6> I think it's destined to happen when there is less competition. I don't think of it as punishment, but as prevention. Even if we assume a company was altruistic and kept prices artificially low, the lack of competition would at least prevent a product from getting cheaper faster due to less players innovating... and we wouldn't even be able to measure what we're missing out on.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> > The companies make money by monitoring their customers' online activity and > selling the data, largely to advertisers.

Not true. They make money by monitoring their customers' online activity and using the data to target ads, which they sell to advertisers.

I can't take anyone's reporting or opinion on FB and Google seriously if they don't understand this extremely important distinction.

<comment><USER9> While this distinction is accurate, I'm not sure it's useful?

If you can target with enough granularity, which is fairly typical of these modern ad networks like Facebook/Google, then you have the data about those users who click through by the fact that they saw that targeting. It may not be perfect data, but it's close enough to be incredibly valuable to companies.

I can't buy an email list from Facebook with salaries attached, but I can target those who have a salary in the range I'm interested in and see who I get through.

You're right that this is a distinction, but I think it has very similar outcomes.

<comment><USER7> It's an important distinction because without it, it implies some human being is reviewing information linked to your name somewhere, when in reality the information is being anonymously evaluated by algorithms to target ads.

<comment><USER10> Disagree. The important point isn't whether or not an actual human is "spying" on my activity, it's that the platforms providing the targeted ads are not behaving responsibly with regards to the content being shown.

I don't care about being shown ads for products I might buy. I care about targeted disinformation being fed to "persuadables" in order to affect massive political upheaval (current political breakdown in the United States, Brexit in the UK, other instances all across the globe in smaller nations.)

The only important thing here is that e.g. Facebook has the data and sells access to nefarious actors. Selling the data "directly" or not isn't the point.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> I actually think this would just make things worse.

If you were strip Google to just search and Facebook to just Facebook then they would have to more aggressively go after advertising dollars to ensure they are growing revenue. And since they would've already been broken up they would surely do this by invading privacy even more.

Surely the smarter move is to focus on heavily regulating their ability to track users. And make approaches like Apple did with WebKit mandatory.

<comment><USER11> They would still have business relationships with the other entities they were split from; they'd just be _only_ business relationships, done in public and appearing on the balance sheets, and able to be regulated "between."

An example of the type of business relationship Warren probably wants to encourage: the way Google pays Mozilla to keep Google Search as Firefox's default search provider.

So, if Google were split up into Google-the-search-engine and Google-the-ad- agency, Google Search's main source of revenue would still be from ads—but it'd be via the separate company of Google Ads, paying Google Search for ad placement.

<comment><USER12> > Google Search's main source of revenue would still be from ads—but it'd be > via the separate company of Google Ads, paying Google Search for ad > placement.

This would almost certainly lead to less privacy. Google Search, instead of just sourcing ads from Google Ads would have to open bidding to a wide variety of ad networks.

That means your personal search history wouldn't just be accessed by Google, it would be publicly available to any upstart ad network that wanted to bid for Search ad placement.

<comment><USER11> Yes, by default. But opening that interface exposes that previously company- internal leak of information to the government-as-regulator to step in and clamp down on. If they say both that Google must not run its own ads but must rely on a third-party for ad placement, _and_ that Google isn't allowed to show its search data to third-parties, then that has a meaningful impact on how Google operates as a business.

<comment><USER13> I don't have as much faith in the system as you. And I wouldn't want to wait a decade for it to be fixed.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Only online marketplace? Why not physical too?

Walmart?

Then why not telecom? By the same logic shouldn't Comcast no longer be allowed to own NBCUniversal?

Or for media - would Disney not be allowed to launch their new video platform thing? Does Newscorp also have to be broken up? Certainly they have platforms for distributing media, but also a staggeringly large amount of content being generated.

<comment><USER15> Walmart doesn't have a physical marketplace. A marketplace implies multiple sellers, and Walmart is the only seller at their B&M locations.

<comment><USER14> Ah sorry for walmart I meant their online marketplace. I guess my first reply was sort of incoherent, I was thinking along three separate lines:

1\. why only online, and not also physical? (Are there just not large enough physical marketplaces?)

2\. What about walmart (in the context of online) - would they need to divest their online marketplace too?

3\. What about telecom/media industries? Would they need to be broken up as well?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> > _The companies make money by monitoring their customers' online activity and > selling the data, largely to advertisers._

I can't buy reams of data from Google. There are data brokers out there, but big adtech companies won't sell me the source of their ad success. Most of the data market is composed of smaller companies which don't run ad networks and wouldn't even come close to the eye of an antitrust program.

<comment><USER17> It's also not like physical stores don't do it either. They all have membership cards that track your purchases and visit data.

<comment><USER7> Reciprocity with credit cards is a thing too. It's how Amazon was able to re- target me with a product carousel for something I impulse bought at a Macy's.

I'm not really complaining but even tech savvy people can underestimate just how much of their information is out there.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> As an engineer with a math degree, this all seems like unnecessary complexity, imposed by a pro-complexity politician in the interest of preventing feigned- natural-selection of markets from evolving a proper fit solution.

What am i missing?

<comment><USER19> The part where 20 years of natural selection by markets has resulted in a few ginormous companies owning the Net?

<comment><USER20> Yahoo "owned" the net not that long ago, now they're completely irrelevant. Microsoft "owned" the browser market with Internet Explorer not that long ago, now people cringe when they have to use IE. MySpace was at one time the most visited social media site in the world, now it's merely a quirky bit of internet history.

Google, Facebook, Amazon, etc. do not "own" anything. They are businesses that exist in a fiercely competitive environment in which consumers have zero loyalty and will gladly switch to the next hot thing at the drop of a hat. These businesses are successful because they continually innovate and deliver products that people want. There's no guarantee that any of these companies will still be around in a decade, much less "own" the market they operate in.

<comment><USER21> > Microsoft "owned" the browser market with Internet Explorer not that long > ago

And monopoly regulation put an end to that and allowed Netscape to come in and make it a competition.

<comment><USER22> Where is Netscape now?

<comment><USER18> Mozilla is its offspring, isn't it?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Most people here will seize on Better Markets' phrasing rather than addressing the merits of this part of what Warren proposes: (1) "Right from the start . . . Amazon would have to separate its 'Basics' business, which sells products under a house brand, from the rest of Amazon," (2) Google's advertising business and its search business would have to be split apart. (3) regulators can "undo many of the tech-industry mergers that have already happened, such as Amazon's acquisition of Whole Foods and Zappos; Facebook's takeover of Whatsapp and Instagram; and Google's purchase of Waze, Nest, and DoubleClick."

Friendly reminder that (1) through (3) are the actual stakes of the policy, not what Vaheesan says to the reporter about forcing companies to "behave in more socially responsible ways." That editorializing will never, ever become law, and it is entirely secondary to the actual debate here.

</comment><comment><USER24> How about splitting the cable companies between content production and connectivity?

<comment><USER22> Or how about even the portions of the companies working on infrastructure and the portion that interface/provide service to customers? Why can't we have Comcast Infrastructure build out using those billions of tax payer dollars donated to them and then have an array of smaller players providing competitive service leasing out that infrastructure?

<comment><USER25> This is basically how Texas sells electricity.[1] I'm not an expert on it but it makes a ton of sense.

Of course, it may be easier to do this for electricity, where the fundamental technology doesn't change quickly anymore (as far as I know), than for internet connectivity, where we are still undergoing fairly rapid technological change, relatively speaking.

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deregulation_of_the_Texas_elec...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deregulation_of_the_Texas_electricity_market)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> How exactly is Big Tech depressing wages? Apple, Facebook, Amazon, Google, Microsoft all pay more than almost any other companies, regardless of role. Amazon pays all its employees at least $15 and offers far better benefits than any other large employer to those lowest on the totem pole. Compare Amazon to Walmart and then tell me who the bad guy is. Google and others have raised the median wages for tech workers through the roof, to the point that a career that barely existed 20 years ago is now one of the best-paying jobs you can get. Tech employs millions of people making six figure starting salaries, many of them self-taught or with very affordable educations. Tech has created the largest crop of millionaires in generations.

I'm not saying there aren't problems with large companies, tech or otherwise, but how exactly are they depressing wages? Who's getting screwed?

<comment><USER27> you are. you should actually be getting paid much more. Just because you are getting paid more than everyone else doesn't mean that you still aren't getting underpaid.

That is the scarcity mindset. Instead, engineers should be getting million+ salaries instead of the measly 150k+.

<comment><USER26> Well, none of this applies to me personally, since I'm not working at all, and would never work for one of the big tech companies. Most people I see making six figures aren't actually all that productive. I don't believe in the 10X engineer, but I may believe in the -10X engineer.

<comment><USER28> > I don't believe in the 10X engineer, but I may believe in the -10X engineer.

I think you mean a X/10 Engineer. A -10X engineer would have to work backwards.

<comment><USER26> That is what I meant. I've worked with a lot of expensive engineers who created net negative value, drained the resources of everyone around them, and would have created a more productive team simply by departing and being replaced with no one.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> Warren and Sanders have made it clear that they dont understand economics or the constitution. They have just resorted to making promises and elaborate plans to capture media attention, and gain voters.

<comment><USER30> What part of this is unconstitutional? Progressives breaking up big companies has a long and (mostly) celebrated history in the US.

<comment><USER29> Sorry, I was referring to Warren's planned wealth tax, which is unconstitutional under the 16th Amendment. I support antitrust laws, and they have done a lot of good for America.

[https://taxfoundation.org/warren-wealth-tax- constitutionalit...](https://taxfoundation.org/warren-wealth-tax- constitutionality/)

<comment><USER31> The 16th Amendment doesn't prohibit anything; it only allows things.

You could argue that the preceding parts of the constitution prohibit a wealth tax, though, and that the 16th doesn't carve out space for one.

<comment><USER29> Yes, and if something is not allowed in the constitution, then the federal government does not have the power to do it. The states could do it, but I find the likelihood of all 50 states adopting a wealth tax to be extremely unlikely.

[https://constitutioncenter.org/interactive- constitution/amen...](https://constitutioncenter.org/interactive- constitution/amendments/amendment-x)

<comment><USER31> If it's popular enough to get through the House and Senate, it would have to be drawing widespread public support across the political spectrum.

At that point, there would be a lot of pressure on state legislatures to ratify an amendment. Anyone who voted against it would be putting a target on their back in the next election.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> The anti tech sentiment amongst candidates like warren and sanders is a bit annoying. if you rank order the problems we need to solve as a nation this issue wouldnt even make it in the top 10. its getting more attention than it should. i think a part of the reason is just this deep seated feeling within people that if some group of people became really really successful (and especially really really fast) there must be something unfair or fishy about it. that they don't really deserve it or somehow cheated. atleast this is the feeling i get when i hear warren or sanders.

<comment><USER33> I think that's the psychology of it: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-KSryJXDpZo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-KSryJXDpZo)

(video of monkey getting a grape and the other monkey getting a cucumber)

</comment></comment><comment><USER34> So Costco doesn't have to spin off the Kirkland brand even though they operate an online marketplace (Costco.com), but Amazon does with AmazonBasics? So many things wrong with that.

<comment><USER35> Does costco have a web platform for selling goods? Does it exceed the revenue limit? Does it sell own brand goods through its web platform?

Yes to all three, so it would be caught by this law as it is stated here.

<comment><USER24> I think Costco might actually not have a web platform as described, if there are no third-party merchants there. Presumably all the products on their site go through them, just like the products in their physical stores.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> I'm just here waiting for a plan to break up Big Government.

<comment><USER37> On that note, one of Elizabeth Warren's primary focuses seems to be the concept of who the government works for. To that end, the boogieman of "big government" can either be positioned as something that fights for its citizens or fights for special interests and corporations.

I think the idea of "Big Government" is amorphous, in that is calls into question the purpose of a governing body.

Who, or what, should be the governments number one priority? It seems universal that keeping its citizens safe (military, police) and supplying fundamental services (roads, fire departments) are accepted by all but the most jetpacky libertarians. Do we believe that we have the capacity to extend other foundations of wellbeing to be rights as well? This is the crossroads we're at with healthcare, protecting the environment (by investing in clean technologies and slowing down the harm we're inflicting through other practices), and living wages?

That's what I see as the crux of this conversation. Who does the government work for? And who SHOULD it be working for?

<comment><USER38> > And who SHOULD it be working for?

The people that employ them: taxpayers.

<comment><USER37> I completely agree with you.

<comment><USER38> Honestly, I look at what we can measure and monitor at big tech companies today and there's nothing I want more than metrics driven legislation.

There is no reason that we should be passing any legislation today without attached measurable criteria for success and criteria of measurable side effects that might be impacted. If the legislation does actually measurably improve something or causes unwanted side effects, it should be removed automatically. In 2019, we absolutely have the technology to run the government the exact same way as tech companies.

So many of the services the government provides could easily be metered and we charge citizens directly based on what they individually consume instead of indiscriminately taxing people to pay for those services.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> The prospect of Warren alone could crash the market as we draw closer to 2020. The first leg will be health care then the rest. I am actually not against her ideas but deeply concerned about implementation.

<comment><USER40> Just like the market crashed in 2012 with the re-election of President Obama and the market crashed in 2016 with the election of President Trump?

</comment></comment><comment><USER41> Amazon, Google, etc. are global companies. Every other country wishes that those companies were theirs. They're major drivers of prosperity in the US - armies of well-paid engineers and lower prices for consumers. Planning to wreck them seems terribly shortsighted.

</comment><comment><USER42> Something interesting is when Warren came to Silicon Valley (well technically the East Bay), people cheered when she talked about breaking up big tech. I can't imagine what would have happened if a candidate went to West Virginia and talked about regulating coal, went to Iowa and talked about removig corn subsidies or went to Detroit and talked about phasing out ICE vehicles. I think a lot of people here see the problems that the FAANGs are creating and want to fix it.

</comment><comment><USER43> The road to hell is paved with good intentions.

<comment><USER44> And the road to mediocrity is paved with thought-terminating clichés.

</comment></comment><comment><USER45> > Bork's consumer-based theory had many flaws. One of the most obvious was > that it did not anticipate the rise of online companies such as Facebook and > Google, which offer their products to consumers for free.

Not entirely true [1]. For one thing there were close and similar models at that time. For example yellow pages were given out for free and advertising was sold. Second there were (and still are) many local newspapers that make money solely off of advertising. And along those lines I would argue that even paid newspapers are close. Why? They give a great deal of value for the small amount that is paid in exchange for viewing advertising. Ditto for tv broadcasts the content is free (as long as you have a tv set) and they make money off advertising.

[1] And I wouldn't call something that in no way could have anticipated the future in the way it rolled out 'a flaw' anyway.

<comment><USER25> Not only is this not "entirely" true--it's not at all true. The author is disguising a (hotly contested) opinion/minority position as a well-accepted fact.

The mainstream position in the antitrust world, even among liberals (at least until recently), is that Bork's theory is generally right. (For example, Barack Obama's antitrust appointees would generally have agreed with it.)

What Bork did was bring economic models (i.e. math) to bear in antitrust analysis. Before Bork, antitrust law was basically run on judges' intuition about whether business practices were good or bad. After Bork, there is more structure to the analysis--if we are trying to figure out whether things are good or bad for consumer prices, there's an economic framework we can use so that we're not just making random guesses.

You can quibble with the math, but it seems crazy to go back to a world where we just say "big mergers are bad." _Some_ mergers are bad, sure. But some are not. For example, I have yet to hear anyone explain why Amazon's purchase of Whole Foods is bad for anyone other than other grocery stores (who have to try to compete as Amazon figures out grocery delivery).

</comment></comment><comment><USER46> No one who works in tech should be supporting these kind of initiatives or the people that come up with them. Yet looking around, it seems many people in tech don't really understand what's at stake.

<comment><USER47> Or they understand exactly what's at stake, and that's why they support plans like these.

<comment><USER46> If they just want to watch the world burn and slow our tech progress for decades, sure.

<comment><USER48> I guess for you the end justifies the means?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER49> My main problem with the idea of breaking up big tech, is that foreign companies are just going to pick up the pieces. China for instance will use the weakness to use their mega partially-state owned companies to crush everyone. I just don't see how that's a positive. We live in a global economy now, we have to think of the consequences of our corporate laws globally as well.

</comment><comment><USER50> I'm typically a smaller government type of person, but I'm actually ok with the specifics of her plan. One power that I think should never be stripped from the government is the ability to regulate parts where the free market becomes dysfunctional. I think her plan encourages competition and makes the markets healthier, so thumbs up from me.

</comment><comment><USER51> I've been thinking that a natural way to split up many large corporations that are anti-consumer would be to require:

1\. Hardware manufacturers be separated from software manufactures

2\. All hardware sold must have available appropriate documentation to write software for it.

3\. Hardware and software be purchasable piecemeal, even when also available as a pre-configured bundle.

For example, for Google to sell a Google Home device they would:

1\. Have to have a company, Google Home:Hardware, that produces the physical device and it's documentation

2\. Have a company, Google Home:Software, that implements the software for that device, and perhaps bundles it.

3\. These companies can collaborate, e.g., through support contracts, but any documentation made available to Google Home:Software must also be made available to purchasers of the physical device, separate from Google Home:Software.

 _Advantages of this approach:_

1\. This supports the "Right To Repair" movement.

2\. Production of hardware has a very high cost-of-entry relative to software, making it prohibitively expensive for new entrants to compete. This allows smaller entrepreneurs to build software on existing hardware designs, bringing new features to consumers.

3\. New competition will help to naturally break the anti-consumer monopolies and oligopolies currently existing, because they will have to compete with features that they currently refuse to implement, fix issues they currently refuse to acknowledge.

4\. As a re-iteration of 3, would provide more consumer choice. Where as right now an individual may like the hardware features of one television set, they may dislike the software features if it (privacy invasion and phoning home?). Consumers could mix and match.

Although I've focused on tech with Google, this is applicable to many industries: smart phones, TVs, smart home devices, farming equipment, vehicles, robotic vacuums...

<comment><USER33> That's sort of how it works in the automotive industry: one company makes the parts, one company assembles the car, one company sells the car and anyone can provide service.

The only downside is that there's a lot of overhead (imagine if a software project you worked on needed this amount of formality every time you talked to a UI designer or database engineer).

</comment></comment><comment><USER52> There are dozens of politician plans and manifestos to reorganize 'big tech'. Interesting that the New Yorker chose to feature the Warren team plan so prominently. A more rounded comparison of plans would be useful at this point in the candidate beauty contest.

</comment><comment><USER41> Breaking apart large US tech companies will open the door for foreign large companies to fill that niche. This doesn't sound like a smart move for the US government.

</comment><comment><USER53> Could one get around this by owning large percentages of multiple companies & just directing that they work together & buy services from each other?

In essence something companies already do since they're split up into separate sections/departments/groups.

Maybe they even split services such as HR into a consulting services organization that they all rely on.

<comment><USER54> That actually is why anti-monopoly laws are called "anti-trust". "Trust" in this case was an entity that controlled a number of companies.

</comment></comment><comment><USER55> If this means that google would have to stop operating the play store and Apple would have to stop operating the App store, it would simply fragment the marketplace, and consumer risk and make it even more expensive to be an independent developer or producer.

This is not the way to foster innovation. It's a way to produce a bunch of meaningless middlemen.

</comment><comment><USER56> Interesting the article mentions Robert Bork.

Bork was the first Supreme Court nominee to earn his own eponymous verb. Bork was put through a ringer similar to the one Judge Kavanaugh went through recently.

Per Google, the verb 'bork' means "obstruct (someone, especially a candidate for public office) through systematic defamation or vilification."

</comment><comment><USER57> The USA has such a terrible track record when it comes to breaking up companies. Not what companies but break up but how to do it. Look at AT&T. The solution for one national monopoly? Why a collection of regional monopolies of course! I mean that's what the RBOCs (Regional Bell Operating Companies) were.

So whenever I hear about some kneejerk proposal to break up tech I expect to hear someone propose that Facebook should be broken up into two companies: one for surnames A-M and another for N-Z.

I think the only tech company where you could make any case for being anticompetitive right now is Amazon. Fedex and UPS exist largely at the whim of Amazon. Any online retailer is now at a severe disadvantage to Amazon itself as well as Amazon marketplace sellers.

Second place are the two app stores.

We're living in an era where China's tech giants are tools of statecraft and not subject to the same level of scrutiny as US companies. The Chinese market is artificially restricted from competition. By any measure of government intervention China cheats here. It doesn't really seem like the right time for the US to kill the golden geese.

<comment><USER38> > The solution for one national monopoly? Why a collection of regional > monopolies of course!

Regional monopolies are far less of a threat to politicians operating at the national scale. So much of what we are observing comes down to people and institutions vying for power and trying to neuter those people and institutions in competition for that power.

This is Silicon Valley (big tech) versus Washington D.C. (big government) versus NYC (big finance).

</comment></comment><comment><USER58> We need to stop how big companies are growing. It's not sustainable. If we don't implement new strategies we are going to live in a well known distopic future. You all have seen the results of a company that dominates an specific market without limits.

<comment><USER59> Yeah, its so terrible being able to search the whole Internet for free, carry a computer in your pocket, and order anything delivered to your door.

</comment></comment><comment><USER60> Really curious what happens to the stock price of these companies if a progressive dem like Warren or Sanders wins. I mean, on election day will the price of these stocks drop double digits? Doesn't seem like these risks have been priced in at all.

<comment><USER61> usually original investors get stock in the split-up companies correct? In the long run the aggregate value of the split up / smaller basket of independent companies could be larger than the original quasi monopoly.

</comment></comment><comment><USER62> MS is not included? How about breaking up many other monopolies as well?

</comment><comment><USER59> Elizabeth Warren is an idiot, and her ignorance is destructive and a threat to a productive and free society. Arbitrarily destroying businesses doesn't make anyone richer.

</comment><comment><USER63> It reminds me of the late 1980s-early 1990s era calls to split Microsoft off into separate companies: OS and Office. A credulous judge was quoted saying "Microsoft can just take other people's products and incorporate them into Windows!"

Today, the notion of Microsoft as a threat to the world seems quaint and laughable, though at the time it was deadly serious business.

In my opinion, the FAANG monopolies will pass, just as the MS-IBM hegemony passed. Something new will emerge - a 5G-based tech, maybe, or a Chinese AI or quantum machine - that will render the current tech giants irrelevant. Warren's plan is pointless and probably would be counter-productive.

<comment><USER64> > Today, the notion of Microsoft as a threat to the world seems quaint and > laughable,

Interesting considering they are the most valuable company in the world by market cap.

Addendum: Currently, MSFT's market cap is higher than Facebook, Google, Apple, and AMZN.

<comment><USER63> It fluctuates; recently, Apple was the highest, then Amazon.

The point is that few are talking about Microsoft as a monopolistic threat anymore; alternative technologies (Linux, MacOS, iOS, Android) have come along and knocked them off their once-dominant position.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER65> Welcome to Costco, I love you! [1]

[1] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z8zNsUTWsOc](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z8zNsUTWsOc)

</comment><comment><USER27> will this hurt or help her chances at winning the California democratic primaries? if the tech industry does not want her then what are the other options out there?

</comment><comment><USER66> There seems to be a blame everything on tech thing recently in the news (what is "tech" for even?)

Why not break up other industries, like some of the giant food and household companies and the shit they're practically poisoning us with. It feels like pandering to go after "big tech" constantly.

These industries are just hard to break into. Who is going to compete with Google at search at this point? We watched Microsoft throw money at and fail miserably. Social media comes and goes, Facebook the website is dieing, Facebook the company is will be around by running other social media, opinions of Facebook specifically aside why is that a bad thing?

We need politicians that are younger and in touch with the world. But still, anything but Trump at this point unfortunately.

<comment><USER67> > Why not break up other industries

Are you actually asking this question, or is it like when Trump says that he won't pass gun restrictions because the real problem is mental health, but also won't raise the budget for mental health?

I think it's easier to make the (internet) tech case because they tend towards pure rent-seeking models rather than production or innovation. Warren isn't proposing breaking up hardware companies, car companies, or companies that make consumer appliances; "tech" is a shorthand for internet rent-seekers.

<comment><USER38> > they tend towards pure rent-seeking models rather than production or > innovation.

I don't know how anyone can make the case that there isn't innovation and production isn't the end all be all of a functioning market. You can't buy goods and services that you aren't aware of and even if you are aware of them, you need a way to buy them.

25 years ago I couldn't type something into a box, discover a product that satisfies a need/want related to that query, buy it and have it delivered to my home in 24-48 hours all from the comfort of my home while I sit in my underwear.

Once upon a time you had to pick up a big yellow book, hunt around by category, find some businesses that may or not be related to what you're looking for if you find any business at all, make some phone calls, eventually get in your car, drive there, taking out cash from the bank along the way. The alternative was catalog companies if you knew that a company existed and had a copy of their catalog (or you had to wait for a catalog to be delivered).

And even long before that the only option was to go down to the local market and buy whatever was produced locally. If it wasn't produced locally, then you had to produce it yourself or you were SOL.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER68> My problem with Warren is she thinks that a plan or law can solve everything. If there were only a law that said, 'It's illegal to be evil,' then there wouldn't be any evil left in the world.

</comment><comment><USER69> I am horrified by an idea that eventually, I will have to vote for Donald Trump.

</comment><comment><USER70> Does she have a plan to win the Senate?

</comment><comment><USER71> by the time she would be elected some of the big tech will have bigger problems.

</comment><comment><USER72> Warren's blog uses the Microsoft antitrust case as a precedent:

> In the 1990s, Microsoft — the tech giant of its time — was trying to parlay > its dominance in computer operating systems into dominance in the new area > of web browsing. The federal government sued Microsoft for violating anti- > monopoly laws and eventually reached a settlement. The government's > antitrust case against Microsoft helped clear a path for Internet companies > like Google and Facebook to emerge.

[https://medium.com/@teamwarren/heres-how-we-can-break-up- big...](https://medium.com/@teamwarren/heres-how-we-can-break-up-big- tech-9ad9e0da324c)

And then goes on to confuse the Web browser with search:

> .. Aren't we all glad that now we have the option of using Google instead of > being stuck with Bing?

There are three reasons I'd avoid this comparison as a selling point:

1\. Little of substance came from the Microsoft case:

> On November 2, 2001, the DOJ reached an agreement with Microsoft to settle > the case. The proposed settlement required Microsoft to share its > application programming interfaces with third-party companies and appoint a > panel of three people who would have full access to Microsoft's systems, > records, and source code for five years in order to ensure compliance.[30] > However, the DOJ did not require Microsoft to change any of its code nor > prevent Microsoft from tying other software with Windows in the future.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Microsoft_Cor...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Microsoft_Corp).

2\. The market handed Microsoft its richly-deserved smack upside the head with the introduction of the iPhone in 2007. There's no reason to believe that Google, Amazon, or Facebook will be immune to this process of marketplace disruption.

3\. The AT&T Anititrust case seems more applicable in that it deals with a network. After the successful breakup, long distance rate fell.

> The breakup led to a surge of competition in the long distance > telecommunications market by companies such as Sprint and MCI.[5] ...

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breakup_of_the_Bell_System](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breakup_of_the_Bell_System)

From Warren's blog again:

> First, by passing legislation that requires large tech platforms to be > designated as "Platform Utilities" and broken apart from any participant on > that platform.

This raises the question: what's actually new here? What about the named companies is so different from previous monopolies that new laws are required?

The discussion in the New Yorker doesn't seem to address this issue. There are antitrust laws on the books. They have been used in the past. What specifically prevents them from being applied today, other than political will?

</comment><comment><USER73> Warren is a really frustrating candidate. She's the kind of candidate I want to like. At least by the way she brands herself as a thinking person--a serious wonk. A nerd. All in ways that are good to me. She wants to say, "Look, I'm doing the hard work of figuring out good solutions to all these complex and difficult problems so that you don't have to. You can trust me and read all about it here."

But when you do read her policies, you can see she hasn't thought about these problems at all. She's basically just doing what the loudest, most ignorant complainers and pundits are saying to do.

She doesn't seem to understand that Google, Apple, Facebook, and Amazon present incredibly _different_ problems. Beating them all up with the same stick is pointless and won't fix any of the problems.

The fact that they are big isn't really the worst of the problems they cause. In incredibly simplistic terms, Facebook is bad because of what they do with _your_ data. Google is bad because of what it does with all the rest of the data on the _internet_. Apple is bad because of what they _won 't_ let people do. And Amazon is bad because of what they will let _anyone_ do.

Chopping them up into smaller entities won't solve any of those problems. None of it addresses any of the problems at all. But in a time where doing anything is far more important to people than doing something useful, it gets traction. She also clearly does not understand section 230 of the CDA, and would like to get rid of that, which will do nothing but ensure that _only_ the big companies--even broken up--will ever be able to compete.

The same kind of thing applies to the wealth tax idea. It's just a base appeal to class animosity. There's no nuance, and even if it did happen, it wouldn't make that much difference in our overall tax revenues. Certainly not enough to fund the kinds of programs she wants to fund. If you want to fix taxes, you have to shut down loopholes for wealthy people _and_ corporations. The latter will make much more of an impact than the former.

I'm certainly on board with higher taxes to a certain extent. But this is just pandering to angry people who don't think the world is fair, and that's not healthy for society.

All of this really makes me question her bona fides on topics I really don't know anything about. Is it more of the same shallow pandering? I haven't really heard any _good policy_ ideas from her so far, and as much as I want to like her as my kind of candidate, I just don't have any reason to believe she'll do anything worthwhile if she does get elected aside from not being Trump. Which is valuable to me, I admit. But . . . is a huge swath of awful social, tax, economic, and tech policy actually better than having to deal with the buffoonery we have right now? I hope we don't have to find out. I suspect that many people will not like that choice and keep things as they are.

</comment><comment><USER74> Shouldn't this be senators job, not really the presidents?

Also, it's policy proposals like these that are going to push Trump to win in 2020. All the Democrats are suggesting more and more socialist policies, while popular with their base.. is pretty detached from the middle and right side ideologically. People want cheaper products, more money and stability. Focus on that.

<comment><USER67> You overestimate the public's opinion of large tech companies, and forget that Trump ran to the left of the rest of the Republican primary candidates, not to the right of them.

The only voters that are going to move from voting Democrat to voting Trump over the breakup of big tech are people who work in big tech.

</comment></comment><comment><USER75> What about breaking free from "Native American Heritage" ?

</comment><comment><USER76> Ok... but what about big _____ (anything else)?

<comment><USER23> There's no way you're paying attn to the news and believe she doesn't have plans specific to other industries.

<comment><USER77> Yes, but it seems intellectually dishonest to go after big tech (where, often, the "product" is free) yet avoid going after -- say -- big telco or big cable or big pharma -- where you come out of a retail store feeling disgusting because you got ripped off so badly.

By ripped off, I dont mean, I over-spent, but rather I was forced into buying something due to having only a single choice, while not even knowing the ultimate price I will pay.

Where I live in the US -- there is ONE and only ONE broadband provider. If you ask for the price, they give you the three month promotion price. If you press them really hard, you get the ultimate non-promotional price. Then you get the bill and there is a "wire fee", "regulatory recovery fee", "line charge" and all manner of all surprise charges that you didn't agree to except in some blank-check-fine-print fashion.

Say what you might about privacy etc, but my immediate, acute pains are with real monopolies like my broadband provider -- _not with which free photo sharing app I need to use_

<comment><USER23> She put out her broadband plan last week. The lack of competition in your area of the U.S. must have prevented you from loading this webpage: [https://www.wired.com/story/elizabeth-warren-unveils-plan- ex...](https://www.wired.com/story/elizabeth-warren-unveils-plan-expand- broadband-access/)

<comment><USER77> I read the entire wired article, the article is about _expanding_ broadband access to areas which dont have broadband. A worthy exercise...but that is different from:

1\. Applying her [awesome] CFPB approach to telco where you cant just spring mystery charges post-hoc and hang customers on a contract they didn't agree to.

2\. Allowing _multiple_ broadband providers to compete

<comment><USER23> She also proposes to strike down state laws that prohibit municipal broadband options, and I'm shocked at this point that you're standing by your original comment that she's only regulating Big Tech. [https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/mbmjja/elizabeth- warren-p...](https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/mbmjja/elizabeth-warren- promises-to-kill-state-laws-that-ban-locally-owned-isps)</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


High on business: Marijuanettes rapidly gaining popularity in the US - <AUTHOR> http://www.shoestring.com.au/2013/08/high-on-business-marijuanettes-rapidly-gaining-popularity-in-the-us/

<comment><USER2> Talks about misconceptions, insinuates smoking weed wont lead to lung cancer. Claims video seen by 8500 people means it went 'viral'.

Was this ad paid for?

Edit dont get me wrong there is a list a mile long why pot should be outright legalised this article just didnt cover any of them.</comment>