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Derek Thompson Profile picture
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30 Sep, 4 tweets, 1 min read
There is a fandom faction within both parties that says a lot about their forking paths

Republicans idolize conspiratorial, institution-smashing outsiders, while many Democrats make bobbleheads from bureaucratic heroes, or within-the-system saviors

theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…
My point isn't that these distinct tastes for political heroes are equivalent, or equally rational.

But there is a difference here that clearly exists, which says something important, I think, about education polarization, trust in institutions, and baseline paranoia re: elites.
I don't think everything is downstream of education polarization, but the GOP Outsider Savior vs. Democratic Insider Hero dynamic definitely is.

If, at a gut level, you just trust advanced-degree leaders of traditional institutions, you're gonna fish in that pond for heroes.
I want to emphasize this point. The Democratic Party is a riotous, chaotic coalition right now, and any "The Democratic Party is [x]" statement is probably wrong.

I am talking about "a narrow influential wing" that is forever shopping for a new hero

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More from @DKThomp

Derek Thompson Profile picture
22 Sep
What's the best argument you've read against the Biden vaccine quasi-mandate?

I'm strongly supportive of the vaccine (obv), lightly supportive of the WH's employer mandate/testing policy, and have now read several unpersuasive-to-me cases against the policy.
States have for decades required immunizations for public education (etc), but suddenly it's The Beginning of Tyranny for the state to make our employment by big firms contingent on vaccination?

That's not v persuasive to me.

"Vaccine mandates will trigger a damaging backlash" is possible, but we don't know for sure. It's a guess.

But we have polling data that clearly identifies a group ppl who say they will get vaccinated if it's required.

Read 6 tweets
Derek Thompson Profile picture
21 Sep
I wrote about a huge new study on remote work—60,000 employees at Microsoft—and what it tells us about the future of knowledge work, productivity, and a trillion-dollar question: What are offices good for, exactly?

theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…
The study—from Berkeley and Microsoft—found that in the pandemic employees talked less to ppl outside their formal teams, while ties within teams ("clustering coefficient") deepened.

nature.com/articles/s4156…

The silos got deeper; the walls got higher.
Cross-group communication at Microsoft seems to have plunged. But it's harder to say that overall productivity at Microsoft has puked.

In its latest earnings report, net income increased by 47%. Since March 2020, the firm has added almost $1 trillion in market cap.
Read 8 tweets
Derek Thompson Profile picture
14 Sep
Social media is attention alcohol.

It has some beneficial qualities, but it's not naturally wholesome. Many ppl use it often and love it and are basically okay. But a lot of people abuse it and develop unhealthy compulsions with it. Also, it's functionally a depressant.
I want to defend "attention alcohol" against most other food/drink metaphors.

Twitter really isn't just Doritos, something tasty with no nutritional value.

Instagram isn't just heroine, a short-term rush of good feels that's destroying your body.
Social media is wine, or whiskey, or beer.

I love Twitter like I love wine or whiskey. These things makes my life better and more interesting. But knowing what alcohol *is* makes me aware of the way my drinking habits fits within a broader knowledge of addiction.
Read 5 tweets
Derek Thompson Profile picture
13 Sep
I wrote about why Americans die so much, from everything—and why that's a policy choice.

theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…

An amazing new study shows the U.S. is doing much worse than other developed countries at performing the most basic function of civilization: keeping people alive.
In the last 30 years, two important things have happened with US lifespans.

1. US longevity fell way behind much of Europe

2. This happened even though the Black-white mortality gap shrunk by half, thanks to strong improvements in Black mortality in high-poverty areas.
1. In the last 30 years, Black infant mortality in the U.S. has improved by a lot

2. But the slope of the red line is still steep, which means Black infants in high-poverty areas have much worse outcomes

3. In Europe, no slope = very little effect of poverty on infant death
Read 8 tweets
Derek Thompson Profile picture
13 Sep
Democrats claiming that it's "hysteria" to worry about sharply rising homicide rates across the country because of a long-term decline in burglaries seems like a moral and political dead end to me.

nbcnews.com/politics/polit…
Liberals claim they dislike the Pinker approach to progress—"if things seem bad now, look at the long-term trend"—but a lot of them revert to a bad caricature of Pinkerism on crime.

"Homicides are spiking"
"No, look at this basket of crime variables over a 40 yr period!"
Here is a move that is totally available to us:

The 1990s were really violent. Then most crime measures declined for 20 years. In 2020, homicides spiked in some places but not others. We should care about that, and want to know more it, so we can stop it.
Read 4 tweets
Derek Thompson Profile picture
11 Sep
Quick thought on the remote work study, which got some ppl riled up.

The 20th century office is a bundle of REAL WORK—desk work, meeting spaces—and SORTA WORK—lunch, chats, serendipitous convos.

The biggest advantage of offices isn't REAL WORK. It's the SORTA WORK stuff.
What I think we only barely understand—because it's really really hard to study—is how much does in-person "Sorta Work" matter for creativity and productivity? Is idle chatter a critical carrier wave for psychological safety? Or is easily replaceable by Slack, Twitter, etc?
My bet for now is that

1. The Harvard Business Review Mafia has almost certainly overplayed the benefits of serendipity

2. The pro-WFH group probably underrates how psychologically discombobulating it can be for extroverts to interface w/ peers via only screens for too long
Read 4 tweets

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