2:00PM Water Cooler 9/6/2024

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100 comments

1. hemeantwell September 6, 2024 at 2:20 pm

   Re strollers and subways, I can confirm for New York, and it’s standard practice in other cities.
   1. Jokerstein September 6, 2024 at 2:41 pm

      London, Lisbon, Berlin all yes.

      Paris? Probably not :-)
      1. Bugs September 6, 2024 at 5:18 pm

         I have often done just that maneuver in Paris. But I’m not a native Parisien lol.
   2. ACF September 6, 2024 at 2:46 pm

      Me too, during two pregnancies
   3. Tommy S September 6, 2024 at 3:09 pm

      Yep, seen it for 35 years in SF on muni buses, so I learned it too long ago. Also with older people and those wheeled shopping carts. Very normal. Though most of our buses have that cool lowering (without unfurling the handicap ramp) function now so they can go out the front door level with sidewalk. Also seen a driver almost every week, get up slap the seats back , for wheelchair positioning, or even get out the door to help extra slow person on.
   4. Jeff W September 6, 2024 at 3:26 pm

      As someone who grew up in New York (but didn’t observe that specifically), I can say it sounds exactly like what I would expect.

      Aside from exhibiting basic human decency, it conforms to one of the cardinal rules of New York City life: Don’t break “the flow.” New Yorkers move fast and don’t want anything that impedes their progress. Also, New Yorkers value succinctness in purely practical interactions and nothing says succinctness like nothing said.
      1. Jeff W September 6, 2024 at 9:32 pm

         I think the aspect that makes this particular way of assisting a more “New York City” type of interaction is this:

         no words are exchanged. eye contact is minimal.
   5. jsn September 6, 2024 at 3:49 pm

      Have seen it repeatedly and done it on several occasions myself.
   6. Omicron September 6, 2024 at 4:09 pm

      I can absolutely confirm that practice for New York, even though I haven’t lived there in nearly 40 years. Not for my native Boston, though. New Yorkers are the most decent people on the face of the earth.
   7. FreeMarketApologist September 6, 2024 at 4:12 pm

      Yes, I see this often (and do it).
   8. katenka September 6, 2024 at 4:24 pm

      Yes, we do this in Chicago.
   9. The Rev Kev September 6, 2024 at 6:54 pm

      Done it myself. A young mother trying to struggle with a stroller up a flight of stairs is no joke. That is one of the things about parenthood that I have never missed.
      1. MFB September 7, 2024 at 12:58 am

         Not an unfamiliar action at all. People are always better than the contemporary culture represents them as being, because people are not, for the most part, sociopaths — it’s just that our damaged culture promotes sociopaths and allows them to dictate popular culture.

         As for New York, Steven Jay Gould’s “Happy Thoughts on a Sunny Day in New York City”, is all about his being in New York during a solar eclipse and seeing New Yorkers dropping everything to gaze at the spectacle and helping each other to admire the sun through pinhole cameras, welding masks and whatever else came to hand — the message being that New Yorkers are not what really the kind of people that the elite tells us New Yorkers are like. Which is plausible — Oliver Sacks’ essay on hunting moss on Manhattan (and generously tolerating the inferior people who were hunting liverworts) is another similar essay with a similar message.
   10. Ellery O'Farrell September 7, 2024 at 9:58 am

       Yes for New York. I’ve been on both sides of this.

       It’s my thesis that New Yorkers of the ordinary, subway- and bus-riding variety are very helpful. Conversation is kept to a minimum: none at all for helping with strollers and shopping carts (although the latter often ask whether you’d like help). But if you’re standing in the subway, platform or car, gazing at the map for a little too long, at least one and often two or three people will ask you where you’re going and, when you answer, proceed to give detailed instructions, often repeated slowly and carefully if you still look bewildered. Then they dart off, perhaps with a token “Good luck,” perhaps not.

       If you drop a glove on the sidewalk in the winter, someone will call out to let you know. Often, if you don’t stop or turn around, that person will pick the glove up and run after you to return it.

       It’s a great city. As long as you don’t encounter the rich people of midtown.
2. griffen September 6, 2024 at 2:23 pm

   Payrolls Friday….jobs report headlines this morning are slightly more encouraging for that very initial Fed target rate easing. Will that be a 0.25% or a 0.50% move…last odds I saw from CNBC were favoring the former as the initial move. We’re gonna know soon enough.

   *still moderately a positive trend but the weaker numbers from the past 2 to 3 months is getting more notice
   1. Roger Blakely September 6, 2024 at 3:56 pm

      Last month when I commented that there was talk about a one-half percent rate cut at the Sept. 18 FOMC meeting, someone responded that such talk was on the alarmist side of things.

      Today the narrative on the business internets is that market sold off because today’s job Non-Farm Payrolls numbers were not bad enough to push the FOMC to give a one-half percent rate cut.
      1. Lou Anton September 6, 2024 at 7:35 pm

         Ha, that was me, Roger. And you’re right, the narrative shifted pretty darn quickly to a half-percent cut. Mea culpa! You were right.
3. CA September 6, 2024 at 2:25 pm

   https://olympics.com/en/paris-2024/paralympic-games/medals

   September 6, 2024

   Paralympics Medals, 2024

   ( Gold) ( Silver) ( Bronze) Total

   1 China ( 80) ( 62) ( 41) ( 183)
   2 Great Britain ( 42) ( 32) ( 24) ( 98)
   3 United States ( 31) ( 35) ( 18) ( 84)
   4 Netherlands ( 24) ( 14) ( 10) ( 48)
   5 Italy ( 20) ( 13) ( 29) ( 62)
   6 France ( 17) ( 24) ( 24) ( 65)
   1. flora September 6, 2024 at 2:29 pm

      They kept longtime sports powerhouse Russia out of the games. / ;)
      1. IMOR September 6, 2024 at 3:29 pm

         Well, unfortunately, Russua’s gonna have truckloads more potential medalists for 2028.
         1. Joker September 7, 2024 at 8:00 am

            Fortunately for medal aspiring EU countries, they will be able to import as much needed from the future rump Ukraine, in addition to prostitutes and children.
   2. CA September 6, 2024 at 4:38 pm

      The point of the Paralympics is to take pleasure in what a society can afford in the way of opportunity for all its people. China has grown wonderfully, but China is still far from the per capita levels of the UK or US or Netherlands… I find the performance of China’s athletes inspiring, and a reflection of Chinese values.
4. Otto Reply September 6, 2024 at 2:43 pm

   re: MF’s Plant. Dropped the image in https://identify.plantnet.org/ab and it came back with Setaria pumila (Poir.) Roem. & Schult. Commonly known as
   Yellow Foxtail. Pretty aggressive so we’re trying to keep it from taking over the fields with regular movings.
5. Hermine Shockey September 6, 2024 at 2:50 pm

   To the nakedcapitalism.com owner, Good to see your posts!
6. Screwball September 6, 2024 at 3:11 pm

   RE: Manufacturing: Short “industrial knowledge”

   I couldn’t agree more, although I don’t agree totally with the contents of the Tweet. The part I’m not sure about is the claim; there are enough young guys with the intelligence and work ethics to keep things running.

   I’m not so sure about that, but the loss of knowledge in the workplace is a problem, and it didn’t start yesterday.

   I am a retired engineer. I have been teaching a STEM class at a nearby college since then. I can tell you the workforce before I left was without a doubt going in the wrong direction when it came to skills. And like the Tweeter claimed, the older people keep retiring. OR – forced out before they were ready to go. I know, I was one of them.

   The new people have fewer people to look to as mentors, that is if the old people want to be. Some are so miserable, due to work conditions (long hours because deadlines and salary), they don’t give one good hooey anymore. So there are less experienced people to show the younger ones how things work, how to survive in that workspace, and how to do their job the best and most efficient way(so they don’t have to work 7 days a week).

   Furthermore, I noticed over the last 8-10 years or so, it became harder and harder to find qualified people. If you did, maybe they were good or maybe not. Different generations, different lifestyles, different ways of living. I think overall, they didn’t have as good of work ethics as people in the past, but that’s just me and my observation.

   And a final thought; we are also to the point, our HR departments have been taken over by bean counters and we don’t know HOW to hire good and qualified people. Our hiring practices became “check the box.” Good GPA, check. Went to a name school, check. Answered some easy questions, check. Did you give them a test? No. Did you ask them some tough questions that we have had to deal with to see how they would answer them? No. But your hired because we liked your GPA and you made the HR person giggle.

   We are screwed, and I wondered years ago how in the Sam hell we made anything anyway. When academics and bean counters take over the technical and manufacturing fields (maybe more – giggle) we are going to have trouble. I guarantee it.
   1. Laura in So Cal September 6, 2024 at 3:39 pm

      100% this. I work in an old fashioned manufacturing environment. Over the years the “lean” mentality kept the company from maintaining a training pipeline of new people because that costs money and you have to keep some slack in the system so those people can be trained. For years, the people here kept doing their jobs with very little “new blood” especially
      in machining and manufacturing engineering. We had a great retirement during 2020/2021. We now have many more quality problems and scrap and rework costs. They have been hiring new people who might try hard, but you can’t replace the hard won product and process specific knowledge in just a year or two.
      Basically, at this point, a whole bunch of problems are having to be solved ftom scratch.
      1. Screwball September 6, 2024 at 7:27 pm

         Thank you

         Let me say up front, after reading all the comments below – I couldn’t agree more and great stuff. Once again, thanks to NC for allowing this kind of discourse. The people here are great for allowing us to do so without all the downsides of other places (read rules and moderation).

         I laughed when you highlighted the “lean” thing. One of the corporate buzzwords over the years that was pounded into our heads, over, and over, and over. Lean, continuous improvement, excellence in manufacturing, and many more that I can’t remember. I called them corporate obedience training classes. One place I worked actually sent people to a class and when they graduated this week long torture show, they walked on hot coals in bare feet.

         Really? I don’t think so. I don’t love you that much.

         I could write a book about how silly all this stuff is, but I’m sure many already have, and I’m not good with the language anyway. I was cursed with being good with math, geometry, computers, and CAD. And I end up living in this world. It was miserable.

         Dating myself, in 1987 I went to work (best job in my life) for a fortune 500 (they might have been in the top 100 at the time) who supplied the auto industry. We were the largest OEM supplier in the world at the time and also the largest gear manufacturer. Dana Corp. I was in the transmission division. Trucks.

         When I started there, the old guys there were unreal. They immediately took me under their wings to teach me the ropes. Everyone was investing in each other to help the company who, IMO, back then, actually gave a shit about us. That is just one place, one example, but no matter, that’s long gone now.

         Corporate obedience training – need more – bottom line says so. TBH, many of those classes were great, and spelled out the things you can do, but nobody paid any attention to them. Incompetent corporate worms who become bosses trying to climb the ladder along with the bean counters driving the importance of the bottom line. Problem is, they don’t have a clue how the real world works.

         Your dishwasher was built by people who do something on the line every 13 seconds. They want them to do it in 10. Squeeze everything. There are teams who do nothing but try to cheapen and speed up the process, product, and life cycle expectancy.

         It’s all about the next quarter earnings report. Penny smart – dollar stupid.

         Funny, I watched the very same videos of Deming (industrialist – who was used as a training guru) about 25 years apart. It was about stats and assembly line efficiency. It was about the four quadrants of the process; good, some problems but OK, not good, and the state of chaos. This was hours worth of class (while people could schmooze too – giggle).

         OK, that all makes sense, but they moved on. I had to; wait, back up. I understand quite well about this state of chaos thing, and I understand we never want to get in there, but is there another slide that explains how we get out? Because that’s where we live.

         That didn’t go over so well.
         1. Betty September 6, 2024 at 10:38 pm

            Screwball, I was disturbed by your use of giggle with HR (at least twice). Do men giggle in your world? Is this a dog whistle? Are you blaming poor recruitment on women? Can’t you take your case to a higher level — like corporate legal and the officers (and those “shareholders) — who dictate policy and figure out how to enforce it?
            1. Screwball September 6, 2024 at 10:59 pm

               I apologize if it came off that way. No, not at all.

               Incompetence is everywhere, and anyone. And the fish stinks from the head down.
   2. CA September 6, 2024 at 3:39 pm

      “I am a retired engineer…”

      An important analysis, for which I am grateful.

      This is an unprecedented period for manufacturing. Manufacturing productivity has actually declined now over the last 12 and a half years. Generally manufacturing productivity increases at about 2% per year.

      https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=m2mB

      January 30, 2018

      Manufacturing Productivity, * 1988-2024

      * Output per hour of all persons

      (Indexed to 1988)
      1. Screwball September 6, 2024 at 8:42 pm

         After I retired my daughter bought me a tee-shirt that said; retired engineer – not my problem anymore. Loved it, and wore it with a smile. I couldn’t work in today’s environment. I wouldn’t last a month.

         There is an old saying that sums it up perfectly IMO. The only way this can get more *family blog* up, is if it got bigger.

         And, for the record; I love FRED. :-)
   3. IM Doc September 6, 2024 at 3:58 pm

      This is not just manufacturing.

      I can speak for medicine.

      I have decades of experience to know what physicians face every day and what they have to deal with.

      I can tell everyone to rest assured that the current generation of young doctors is woefully unprepared for what awaits them. It is a mentality problem on both the young ones part, but also on the faculty and how they have been trained.

      One after the other after the other, as they enter the work force, I see them just melt under the strain. I simply do not know what to do about it other than work harder to pick up the slack. There are only so many more years for the system where that will even be an option.
      1. Felix_47 September 7, 2024 at 4:06 am

         When I trained in IM the notion that one would falsify medical records or claim something in a record as having been examined when it was not examined would be unimaginable. Nowadays it is rare that I see an honest medical record. When the referring doctor says the reflexes were normal I assume and the patient’s correlate the referring doctor or nurse practitioner never checked them as well as a myriad of other findings. It is amazing what you can find with a detailed examination. The compensation rate is based on the volume of laser printer ink and paper produced and so we get what we pay for…..useless electrons and paper……The quality of results speak for themselves. US medical care has become, based on worldwide standards, mediocre at best. But as Joe Biden reassured us “if a medicare for all plan crosses my desk I will veto it.” Until doctors are put on salary and health care nationalized expect less and get less.
   4. rePiet September 6, 2024 at 4:51 pm

      I was born in the early 80’s and in my mid thirties decided to grow up and get an engineering degree from a major state school. I initially chose chemical. In my junior year, I attempted to fail a core chemical engineering course and failed to do so. Yes I have emotional problems. I can attest to the quality of engineers being graduated currently.
   5. TheMog September 6, 2024 at 5:42 pm

      It’s been happening in IT as well, just with slightly different wrinkles due to decades of wrapping new clothes around the old systems to make them look “modern”. It’s made worse by the average career lifespan of a software engineer – a lot of them fizzle out in the first decade – but mostly because of the assumption that The New Hotness is better than what came before and thus we don’t need to maintain the old cruft. So most of the people who maintained said old cruft (got) retired.

      If we look at the expense and effort necessary to bring back those experienced people to address the Y2k problem, that gives us a glimpse at the order of magnitude of effort necessary. The next problem of that sort will arrive in 2038, but the people they relied on in 1999 are unlikely to be around, and I’m not sure my generation of greybeards is going to be any cheaper to fix these “we told you so” problems. And they’re likely to be more issues simply because there are a lot more computers around.

      Part of the reason why it feels like IT systems are getting more fragile is because more layers have been piled upon old layers, and while it’s turtles all the way down, not many people speak the ancient dialects of turtle necessary to work in the lower stratae, and few newer software engineers are encouraged and renumerated to learn those dialects.
      1. The Rev Kev September 6, 2024 at 7:03 pm

         And then there is the dependency problem-

         https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/2347:_Dependency
         1. TheMog September 7, 2024 at 10:45 pm

            Agreed, and that’s also usually one of those greybeards that by now have been thinking hard about retiring for a while. Not to mention that maintaining a component like that is often a thankless task.

            The dependency issues are getting worse in the more modern systems and ecosystems, as a dependency you need/want might bring in a dozen dependencies of its own, which then bring in a dozen of their own etc. And five years from now, someone stops maintaining one of the dependency-of-a-dependency’s dependency, and the house of cards experiences a rapid unscheduled disassembly.

            For a glimpse of that, Google “leftpad”.
            1. The Rev Kev September 8, 2024 at 7:33 am

               @ TheMog

               I see what you mean and I remember that incident. So some corporation through greed tried to cheat that developer of his work – so the developer picked up his marbles and left which caused chaos throughout the internet.
      2. Screwball September 6, 2024 at 7:29 pm

         I spent some time in IT. I always thought of that as jumping on a speeding train. The technology just keeps changing and you have to keep up. I can’t anymore.

         Of course, I remember booting a computer with a floppy disk. :-)
         1. TheMog September 7, 2024 at 10:54 pm

            Heh, my first few computers only had Basic in ROM and used audio cassettes for not very reliable storage.

            I’ve been a professional software developer for more than three decades, and while I’ve mostly kept up with the development relevant to my specific (backend) fields, there are areas where the Way We Do Things seemingly changes every three months. And in some areas, this means you’re toast when you don’t have the latest hotness on your resume. That contributes to the relatively short careers of a lot of developers, at least in my opinion.

            One advantage of having worked through many hype cycles and having seen some stuff (usually the kind that flows downhill) is the ability to correlate the latest buzzword to something that was The new thing twenty years ago, hpjust in fresh packaging. That tends to help.
         2. jc near philly September 8, 2024 at 7:15 am

            I remember booting a PDP-8 by pushing down the little tabs on the front when the paper tape broke.
   6. nyleta September 6, 2024 at 5:43 pm

      Same here in Australia, it started around 2001 and has been downhill ever since. I was in chemical operations on the plants for the last 30 years of my working life. The depth of understanding is no longer here. I once did product development for an engineer with 6 degrees, those people are long gone.

      The bosses no longer want people who can think, they want people to follow procedures blindly so they can be replaced by people off the streets to keep others in line. People like me wrote those procedures before retiring but they were meant for people who can think on their feet.

      Going to wartime conditions wouldn’t do the trick because like you say there is no one who can do the job under any conditions at the moment. Only a real collapse and rebuild from the ground up with vocational training would do it, but that will take a generation and the powers that be don’t have the patience for it.
      1. Screwballd September 6, 2024 at 7:41 pm

         You make a great point. It’s all about process. They break down the process into little pieces and then figure out how to do it the cheapest and most reliable way possible. Don’t need qualified people – the process is simplified to do so. Put in this screw, replace a part. No need to understand how it works.

         I spent 4 hours one day with 20 fellow workers and three instructors playing the board game Mouse Trap. They call it “process mapping.” They don’t want workers. They cost too much money. Hence robots…
   7. John k September 7, 2024 at 1:50 am

      Imo many schools just push students up to the next grade, don’t require they learn the material. To the extent this is true we don’t have an educated workforce. Also, when I was in high school there were two tracks; college and shop. Shop has been gone a long time. Seems a lot of people are limited in what they are prepared to do, far more than, say, ww2.
      Russia collapsed in the 90’s, alcoholism was rampant, falling lifespans, massive theft of former state assets. Somehow, perhaps because the slide was only one decade, they were able to pull themselves up to where they are now. The neolib ‘this q profit is all that matters’ slide here has been going on for a generation, might be hard to reverse our empire’s slide any time soon. … past the point of no return.
   8. ashley September 7, 2024 at 8:46 am

      i disagree with your point about young people and work ethic. i was once a young person with work ethic (now 35 and cynical to a fault) only to graduate into the worst possible economy and had the great luck of being born visibly queer and with a vagina. believe it or not, sexism was still a thing when i was first coming into the workforce (and its still a thing, but not as bad as the late 2000s) and i was pushed to go to college to go into fields i wasnt interested in (and also werent hiring) because what i was interested in were jobs held traditionally by men that didnt require college (even back then i knew it was a scam)…

      eventually i made my way into construction, worked my ass off for multiple companies doing some absolutely insane dangerous work, got nowhere career wise. wanted proper training so bad, but nobody wants to train. i was a glorified construction cleaner instead of an apprentice carpenter despite having the intelligence, work ethic and desire to learn…. my male coworker, with baby mommy issues who couldnt build a wall straight made $5 an hour more than me despite having less experience, less education, worse work ethic, more excuses, etc, and yet he got more training and projects that didnt involve ‘sweep this’. i got photographed for marketing so the company could show how ‘diverse’ they are. and then i quit when they wouldnt match my pay to his. it wasnt just that company, it was numerous companies that i worked for that treated me like a diversity hire…

      so no, companies dont want to invest in their workers, and even if they make small investments, they choose shitty people not worth investing in. and being a woman, especially a visibly queer one entering middle age, makes it worse. now i work in a bs dead end job thats reliant on tips because i gave up on trying to pursue a career in a field that doesnt want me.
      1. Bsn September 7, 2024 at 2:50 pm

         As a follow up. I was a public school educator for over 30 years and supervised many student teachers in their early years, either still in college or recently graduated. The biggest problem these young “teachers to be” had was writing letters and emails home to parents. Creating documents such as permission slips, field trip itinerary etc. we so full of composition errors that the parents lost respect for the author. The lack of capitalization, poor sentence structure and other immediately recognizable “mistakes” diminished the respect that these future teachers could have garnered. Sad but true, even today.
7. ChrisFromGA September 6, 2024 at 3:29 pm

   Edifice Wrecks update!

   https://www.costar.com/article/1614212969/major-us-office-landlord-sees-its-survival-in-doubt-hires-restructuring-officer

   Hertz Properties Group, an arm of one of the largest owners of office properties in central business districts across the United States, said it has “significant doubts regarding the continued existence of the company.”

   The concerns are tied to ongoing deterioration in U.S. office leasing, high operating costs due to inflation and high interest rates, the company said in a regulatory filing. The disclosure comes as some office properties in major cities across the United States have been selling for far less than what the owners had paid years earlier as some companies hold off on taking more space and others allow remote work.

   Hertz Properties had financed 11 U.S. office properties with about $200 million in bonds issued on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange in Israel and bondholders are scheduled to meet over the next two weeks to discuss the redemption of the bonds, which are only partially repaid. The firm disclosed its “going concern” doubts in its half-year financial report filed this past weekend in Tel Aviv that also details financial reporting irregularities it discovered for the first time.
   1. Ranger Rick September 6, 2024 at 5:51 pm

      I wonder how much US commercial real estate debt is owned by foreign nationals? That’s one way to spell GFC 2.0.
8. Pelham September 6, 2024 at 3:41 pm

   Re Axios question on Harris: “Why should voters believe her new views are the ones she’d stick with inside the White House?”

   I think there’s a pretty good reason. If she wins, it will be her current “views” that got her there, and from all appearances she would be fine with that. I could be wrong, but I’m getting the impression that more than most pols, she’s comfortable only with what she believes will get her elected and truly has little or no other source of motivation or conviction on public policy.
   1. urdsama September 6, 2024 at 6:42 pm

      Didn’t see that behavior in CA…
      1. barefoot charley September 6, 2024 at 7:22 pm

         She was a lock-’em-up liberal like most successful pols even in the Bay Area. She thinks what’s thunk around her as she ascends. I have no doubt she’ll figurehead for whoever/whatever drives the empire into our next imbecilities. What else can she do with no ideas of her own?
   2. Tom Doak September 6, 2024 at 7:22 pm

      Like Biden stuck with his promises?
      1. Randall Flagg September 7, 2024 at 5:55 am

         Well, Biden did on one promise, there was that time he was caught on tape ( I think you all know the one so no link), say to a group of heavy hitter funders” Nothing will fundamentally change.” And of course it didn’t, except for the little people it got worse.
   3. tegnost September 6, 2024 at 7:47 pm

      I’m sure she has concrete private positions and meets with the billionaires regularly to ensure them she will perform as directed
   4. Lambert Strether Post authorSeptember 8, 2024 at 7:22 am

      > If she wins, it will be her current “views” that got her there,

      Why would you think this?
9. Roger Blakely September 6, 2024 at 4:04 pm

   RE: SARS-CoV-2 in wastewater in Los Angeles County

   http://publichealth.lacounty.gov/media/Coronavirus/data/index.htm
   It looks like SARS-CoV-2 in wastewater in Los Angeles County peaked on Aug. 10, 2024 at 86% of the winter high. Two weeks later (the latest number) the lab result is at 75% of the winter peak.

   However, I predict that two weeks from today we will see that the lab result for SARS-CoV-2 in wastewater in Los Angeles County will not continue falling. The arrival of a new variant from China and the social mixing from the Labor Day holiday will push the lab result for SARS-CoV-2 in wastewater higher.
10. mrsyk September 6, 2024 at 5:02 pm

    Gonna have to pry the “seasonal” paradigm form the cold dead hands of epidemologists… I just direct them to water cooler.
11. Ranger Rick September 6, 2024 at 5:24 pm

    That hypothetical in the “dying with the boomers” thread about some factory worker and his lubricant formulation is an eye roller. That’s not industrial know-how, that’s “how we’ve always done it” exemplified. Each succeeding generation runs into this during onboarding, and each one spends the next two decades of their careers waiting for that person to retire so they can try something else that may work better.

    I’ll just start extemporaneously predicting things that will disappear with the Boomers. Some of these are low-hanging fruit, others are deliberately provocative:
    – Restaurants (and ready-made food in general)
    – Movie theaters
    – Telephone polling
    – Home ownership
    – Personal vehicle loans
    – Entrepreneurship
    – Cruises
    – Unscheduled outdoor activities (camping, hiking, climbing, etc. will all require permits)
    – Botox and liposuction
    – The three-wheeled motorcycle
    – Harley Davidson
    – The shopping mall for real this time
    – English as the de facto official language
    – Christian official holidays
    – Shuffleboard
    – Golf
    – Tennis
    – Football (American)
    – Mayo being the national condiment
    – Newspapers and other forms of physical information of temporal relevance (potentially even notice boards, signs, and flyers)
    – Lawns
    – Retail investing, especially for college education and retirement
    – The concept of retirement in general
    – Voting participation, potentially precipitating Australian-style legal requirements to vote
    – Parades
    – Classic cars and other investment grade collectibles
    – Second/vacation homes
    – International travel
    – Most non-service commuting
    – Downtowns (and all other exclusively-offices business districts), as a civic institution, and a political force
    – Ham radio
    – Television (broadcast and cable) and other forms of non-interactive video presentation
    – General aviation
    – Personal watercraft
    – Any property that requires special natural disaster insurance coverage
    – Portraits
    – Burials and embalming
    – Pets
    – Having (or even planning) more than two children in a household
    – Middle names and other family-related naming schemes (hyphenation, maiden names)
    – Snow within the 50th parallels, possibly 55th by the end of the century
    – Family owned farms

    Feel free to add your own!
    1. Mike September 6, 2024 at 5:56 pm

       The only items on this list that my teen-aged son cares about are golf and football. We’ll see how long that lasts.
    2. Neutrino September 6, 2024 at 6:27 pm

       New development opportunities:

       Hovel futures, a way to combine housing and finance.
       Social credit score tiny home door locks.
       Smart tents.
       Road-kill takeout.
       Long pig recipe books.
    3. Wukchumni September 6, 2024 at 6:36 pm

       Only real high altitude ski resorts will make it, i’m talking about Breckenridge & Company in Colorado~

       There will be the odd bumper crop season here and there which will give lower altitude resorts hope, but they’ll be goners.
    4. Jeremy Grimm September 6, 2024 at 7:13 pm

       I am curious how you arrived at your predictions. I also wonder what boomers have to do with the items on your list. Are you onboard with the WEF’s prediction that you will own nothing and be happy, or maybe just own nothing?

       Your notion that the lubricant formulation is best characterized as “that’s ‘how we’ve always done it’ exemplified.” Are you suggesting the the boomer replacements are held back from just whipping up a lubricant to satisfy the requirements of the older lubricant formulation? I am not knowledgeable about tribology, but what little I know makes me wonder about your belief that those pesky boomers hanging on to their jobs until they can afford to retire are really holding back the evident brilliance of their replacements in designing a new lubricant from scratch.

       I also believe ham radio will make a comeback after the collapse. Ham radio may be one of and probably the only operating communications systems. And looking over your list a second time leaves me wondering what kind of world you believe the departure of boomers will bring about.
    5. Tom Doak September 6, 2024 at 7:21 pm

       Why entrepreneurship?

       Also, I think Botox has already been picked up by younger generations, unless it is proven to harm one’s health it will probably stick.
    6. kareninca September 6, 2024 at 10:59 pm

       In my observation the boomers were the last generation that considered “aging naturally.” They may not have ended up doing so as individuals, but it was at least thought of as an option. As the U.S. becomes more and more like Brazil, desperately poor people (and the struggling middle class, if it still exists) here too will feel the need to have the edge that physical attractiveness may give a person. That is what I see on reddit; younger people are getting cosmetic surgeries and procedures done decades earlier than used to be the norm. And men are getting them, too.
       1. The Rev Kev September 6, 2024 at 11:49 pm

          Like this karenica?

          https://www.bitchute.com/video/rhVblhdrLq9u/ (1:12 mins)
          1. kareninca September 7, 2024 at 3:11 am

             Yes, like that. A 24 year old having Botox injections for cosmetic purposes??????
             1. The Rev Kev September 7, 2024 at 3:50 am

                It seems to work much better for the older women that the younger ones. The younger ones end up looking like plastic dolls.
    7. ashley September 7, 2024 at 9:08 am

       – restaurants / ready made food will still exist because most people cant cook / dont know how to cook / too lazy to cook. especially in the cities.
       – personal vehicle loans will still exist for a while longer, because the US runs on cars and most people cant buy them outright in cash. even with dealer financing, theres still the entire used market to contend with. i see the ICE going before vehicle loans go… and with that, independent mechanics. soon working on your car will be a paywalled activity where you have to bring it to the dealership and get anally raped sans lube for the service. look at john deere tractors for an example of whats to come…
       – re outdoor activities, maybe in the major tourist attraction parks like the grand canyon or yellowstone (and honestly that makes sense with over tourism), but as a vermonter i can walk right out my door and go on an epic hike, rudimentary camping or a paddle without asking for permission and i dont see that changing any time soon. theres too much land and not enough people to enforce it on.
       – botox and lipo – i personally know of millennials getting botox for cosmetic reasons. hell, i qualified for botox in my 20s due to migraines… maybe lipo will go away now that theres ozempic and related weight loss drugs. but plastic surgery and cosmetic procedures arent going anywhere, people are just as vain now as they were ‘back then’. if not more so with social media!
       – english is an interesting one. i was back home in NY for the summer taking care of my mom, i moved away a decade ago. everything is bilingual spanish now. its a bit jarring of a change and a bit uncomfortable as an english only speaker (not for a lack of trying, but my injured brain just doesnt do foreign languages)
       – pets – maybe less people will have pets due to the cost of ‘ownership’, but the cat distribution system isnt going anywhere. and people need companionship, especially if having a family or even a partner is out of reach…
       – snow wont be as common, but it will still happen. the global climate is getting warmer, sure, but its also getting weirder. the jet stream is getting all wonky, i expect we will still have crazy unpredictable snowfalls in the northern US for the foreseeable future. but consistent snow on the ground from christmas to easter? that ship has mostly sailed. theres gonna be a lot of freeze/thaws and icy conditions in places (such as vermont where i am) where consistent snow was the norm. this past winter we had like 7 mud seasons, before it was even mud season.
12. lambert strether September 6, 2024 at 5:55 pm

    Forgot to say I added the last of the orts. Have a good weekend, everyone
13. Wukchumni September 6, 2024 at 6:23 pm

    Saw a measly couple of Trump/Vance signs headed north on Hwy 99 running through the very heart of the red bastion in Cali-the Godzone going from Bakersfield to Visalia, full of fervid evangs.

    Has the luster gone off the Donald?

    2016 & 2020 sported hundreds of Trump signs on the very same stretch of highway~

    Twice smitten-thrice shy?
    1. kareninca September 6, 2024 at 11:08 pm

       It may be that “regular” people have decided that it is not prudent to be public in their support of Trump. If you really believe that there will be internment camps for people who are political dissidents, or prison cells as for the Jan 6 people, you might want to be quiet about your views. Perhaps that could extend to not voting, but I’m not sure we’ve reached that stage yet.

       I find it interesting that here in Silicon Valley I have not seen a single Harris/Walz sign or bumper sticker. Not one. Political signs are never common here, but none is a surprise.
       1. Wukchumni September 7, 2024 at 12:07 am

          Au contraire…

          Generally the only part of the Central Valley that those in the Bay Area or Socal see, is on Hwy 5 & 99.

          The myriad of stupid signage I’ve been witness to over a couple decades on Hwy 99 that repeats itself over and over again seems designed to apply the Fox News method of beating local loyal lackeys over the head with the same message, while irritating intrastate left-handed drivers all the while.

          I suspect the lack of Trump signs here has more to do with the highfalurin tariffs on American Ag that China retaliated with when Trump hit the middle kingdom first.

          Cali Ag got hit hard on almonds and pistachios to the point of not making money, why would you want more of that?
          1. tegnost September 7, 2024 at 1:06 am

             https://www.forbes.com/sites/chloesorvino/2021/09/20/amid-drought-billionaires-control-a-critical-california-water-bank/

             Yep, just a bunch of small time knucklehead rednecks

             https://perfectunion.us/how-this-billionaire-couple-stole-californias-water-supply/

             Maybe they’re burners?
          2. kareninca September 7, 2024 at 3:17 am

             I don’t understand the point you are making in your first three paragraphs. I wrote that people may fear reprisals if they are open about being Trump voters. What would that have to do with other signage? No other American politician brings such a hazard on his supporters.

             I can see that there might also be some ag reason, as you say, but I don’t see that you disproved the reason I’m suggesting.
             1. Wukchumni September 7, 2024 at 8:18 am

                It’s a badge of courage for those in the red bastion to thrust their views at a largely left audience driving by, there is no price to pay ideologically, as those lefty drivers never typically go into Godzone, they’re just passing by.
                1. kareninca September 7, 2024 at 7:07 pm

                   But you are begging the question. I am saying that something has changed, and people who were not reluctant before may have become reluctant. The fact that the people in your region were not reluctant before, isn’t relevant; the question is whether they are reluctant now.
       2. ashley September 7, 2024 at 9:11 am

          in VT im seeing a lot more harris/walz signs than im seeing trump/vance signs. and i dont live in the ‘liberal/progressive’ areas of the state, i live in one of the most conservative areas.
    2. Lefty Godot September 8, 2024 at 8:50 pm

       Did they (evangelicals) feel safer going with Trump when he had Pence along for the ride giving him cover? Maybe any of the ones who were slightly dubious about Trump’s New York City style wheeler-dealerism were willing to give him the benefit of the doubt because of Pence, where they may be less inclined with J. D. Vance as the second-stringer.
14. steppenwolf fetchit September 6, 2024 at 6:26 pm

    Here’s a video of a seal behind glass in an aquarium looking at a big lizard someone has brought in for him?/her? to look at. Titled: ” This seal could have gone his whole life without knowing lizards exist.”
    https://www.reddit.com/r/youseeingthisshit/comments/1famljh/this_seal_could_have_gone_his_whole_life_not/
15. Michaelmas September 6, 2024 at 6:30 pm

    Well, well! Here’s who shares Kamala’s values and think she’d be a firm hand in the White House–

    Former vice-president Dick Cheney confirms he will vote for Kamala Harris
    Lifelong Republican makes announcement day after daughter Liz also endorses Democratic candidate

    https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/sep/06/dick-cheney-vote-kamala-harris

    Also THE HILL —

    https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/4866425-dick-cheney-vote-kamala-harris/
    1. Tom Doak September 6, 2024 at 7:25 pm

       Wow, Dick Cheney and Vladimir Putin on the same page!
       1. The Rev Kev September 6, 2024 at 7:32 pm

          Only difference is that the bird interviewing Putin had a hard time not laughing at Putin screwing around about Harris but White House spokesman John Kirby got bent all out of shape about it-

          ‘Speaking to reporters on Thursday, Kirby said: “Mr Putin ought to stop talking about our elections, period. He shouldn’t be favoring anybody one way or another.”

          He stated that the only people who would determine the outcome of the presidential election were the American people.

          “And we would greatly appreciate it if Mr Putin would, A, stop talking about our election and, B, stop interfering in it,” the White House representative reiterated.’

          https://www.rt.com/news/603617-white-house-responds-putin-backing-harris/
       2. griffen September 7, 2024 at 8:16 am

          The man’s visage and demeanor, let alone his manner of speaking from years back in the Bush 43 administration ( arguably a counterpoint, as to whom was in charge )…Cheney continues to give off that Darth Vader or Dark Lord of Mordor vibe.

          Others mileage may vary…as to these brand of Republicans supporting Harris over Trump they are just showing their reptilian nature as true Lizard People. Power corrupts and all.
    2. Randall Flagg September 6, 2024 at 8:03 pm

       Well, those warmongers, birds of a feather…
    3. Jason Boxman September 6, 2024 at 8:11 pm

       When you’e got the support of a War Criminal, what more do you need?
       1. hk September 7, 2024 at 3:33 am

          More war criminals?
          1. Cassandra September 7, 2024 at 4:28 am

             It’s war criminals all the way down…
    4. John k September 7, 2024 at 2:05 am

       Sounds like trump isn’t like Cheney but Kamala is. Warmongers know a warmonger when they see one. Birds of a feather…
       Dems have become the warmonger party, reps may be turning away (not counting Gaza).
16. The Rev Kev September 6, 2024 at 7:20 pm

    “In Australia, COVID-19 deaths may have stopped decreasing’

    I would suggest that the leveling in those charts is a result of the preceding spectacular levels of death. Those that were vulnerable died due to Covid after the country opened up and as you only die once, the levels would be lower in the following years. At this stage of the game, if a virus arose spread through aerosols that caused spontaneous combustion in people, I am convinced that political leaders, business leaders and especially the media would try to convince us that it was no biggie and catching fire is just a normal part of life, especially in children. People will just have to learn to live with catching fire-

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wyqTkak1-_c (2:19 mins)
17. MaryLand September 6, 2024 at 8:44 pm

    For what it’s worth, I happened to be driving some back roads and through small towns in rural Pennsylvania about 2 hours southeast of Pittsburgh today. There were tons of signs for Trump by driveways and lawns. I saw just two signs for Harris and that was in an area that was not as rural.
    1. MaryLand September 6, 2024 at 8:54 pm

       The area seemed pretty impoverished. Some would call it Pennsyltucky, but the voters there may cast a decisive vote with Pennsylvania possibly being the most important battleground state.
    2. Carolinian September 6, 2024 at 9:08 pm

       Only one Harris sign in my neighborhood and it’s the yard that has the “Dictatorship or Democracy” sign. Another yard not too far away that always–for years–had the Dem sign of the month stopped putting up any after the assassination attempt. It’s all fun and games until the shooting starts.

       So those OMG Project 2025 warnings are now sitting forlornly in the attic.

       Still this neighborhood is salted with college professors and teachers and so unlikely to favor Trump unless Kamala gets too annoying with her “I’m speaking here” trademark.
       1. MaryLand September 6, 2024 at 9:12 pm

          Interesting.
18. ChrisPacific September 6, 2024 at 9:19 pm

    That Benny Johnson tweet is very low quality. No link to the source, just an inline graph with no assumptions or model info shown. Not even a label on the X axis, FFS! Further down the thread somebody shows a similar graph (reportedly from the same source) showing the opposite. How would we know which one is right? Neither offers a source link, so it’s just dueling propaganda.
19. Wukchumni September 6, 2024 at 9:57 pm

    RIP Sergio

    Sergio Mendes & Brasil 66 — Greatest Hits

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MNZp200emfY
20. VTDigger September 6, 2024 at 10:41 pm

    Engineers don’t like to reveal their secrets, because then the company will defenestrate them at the earliest opportunity. Thus the keys are kept to the grave!
21. steppenwolf fetchit September 7, 2024 at 12:27 am

    Here’s a heartwarming photo titled . . . ” Company owner decided to stop paying his drivers so one of them parked their semi on the owners Ferrari and just left it ” Here is the link.
    https://www.reddit.com/r/interestingasfuck/comments/1fatxun/company_owner_decided_to_stop_paying_his_drivers/
    1. Yves Smith September 7, 2024 at 12:37 am

       Someone called the company. There are multiple witnesses to the fact that the driver was fired after the first day for unacceptable behavior and the owner offered to pay him for his time and costs.
22. The Rev Kev September 7, 2024 at 12:31 am

    “As strike looms, Boeing pushes 777 jets through chaotic production in Everett”

    From this article you can see that Boeing as absolutely lost control of their production line and should shut it down until they can reset it again. But then you read this-

    ‘Several employees said management is pushing to complete three almost-finished 777 freighters before the machinists go on strike, which could begin next week at midnight on Thursday.’

    Who here would feel safe flying on those three 777s?
23. skippy September 7, 2024 at 2:00 am

    Decades ago the old saw was never buy a car made on Monday or Friday in the states.

    To Kev above.

Comments are closed.