📖 What I’m Reading: Simon-Ehrlich Wager – Wikipedia Fun example of an academic putting money where his mouth is. Over the decades, life gets better in terms of resources. But it gets worse in terms of equality and ennui. You Can’t Put a Price on Mental Freedom – Nick Maggiulli Stock picking bad. Phone bad. WWEconomics: Kayfabe and the Trade War – Kyla Scanlon All the world’s a stage. “The show will continue because the incentives align: politicians get attention, corporations get deals, and...
about 2 months ago • 1 min read
📖 What I’m Reading: Mike White’s 15-Year Journey For “The White Lotus” – Trung Phan Mike White is Ed Schneebly from School of Rock. He wrote Season 1 of White Lotus in 14 days. And True Detective helped pave the way. The Grand Encyclopedia of Eponymous Laws – Roger’s Bacon “Gibson’s Law: For every PhD there is an equal and opposite PhD.” “Hanlon’s Razor: Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.” “The Lindy Effect: The future life expectancy of a...
3 months ago • 2 min read
📖 What I’m Reading: Outcome Orientation as a Cure for Information Overload – Common Cognition “At all times, whenever you are doing something or reading something, you should ask yourself the question: ‘What is the outcome I am trying to achieve here?’” The Abundance Agenda – Matt Bruenig Best review of the biggest book of 2025 so far. Jordan Rudess – Wikipedia I discovered Jordan Rudess via this video. I’ve never heard a keyboard sound like it does at 3:05. Virtuosic. Turns out his life is...
4 months ago • 2 min read
📖 What I’m Reading: We Live Like Royalty and Don’t Know It – The New Atlantis Tough one. I go back and forth. Yes, we benefit from many hidden systems that are indeed miraculous. Clean water, abundant food, etc. But there are still a lot of people struggling, and abundance, as we’re learning, causes its own problems. But I generally agree with this author’s outlook. We would do well to recognize this stuff more. This is the first in a series of essays on boring miracles. 50 Years of Travel...
5 months ago • 1 min read
📣 Update: This is now a monthly newsletter. 📖 What I’m Reading: Kim Jong-nam – Wikipedia “Kim Jong-nam was the eldest son of North Korean leader Kim Jong Il. From roughly 1994 to 2001, he was considered the heir apparent to his father. He was thought to have fallen out of favor after embarrassing the regime in 2001 with a failed attempt to visit Tokyo Disneyland with a false passport, although Kim himself said his loss of favor had been due to advocating reform.” Stop speedrunning to a...
6 months ago • 2 min read
📖 What I’m Reading: Health Care Administration Wastes Half a Trillion Dollars Every Year – Matt Bruenig The excess administrative cost of the current healthcare system vs. a single-payer system exceeds the budget of all public colleges and universities. Analysis: In Medical Billing, Fraudulent Charges Weirdly Pass As Legal – Elisabeth Rosenthal What Luigi was reading. Book finished: The Wisdom of Life by Arthur Schopenhauer – 4/5 Short collection of essays. Lots of cool ideas. Very readable....
7 months ago • 1 min read
📖 What I’m Reading: Manufacturing is a war now – Noah Smith Dire. Best Performing S&P Stocks Last 20 Years – Bespoke Surprised I’ve never heard of half of these. It’s Time to Rethink Inequality – Dror Poleg “We should encourage and celebrate success rather than vilify and suspect it. And we should also tax such success hard and put more money aside for investment in public goods. Meanwhile, we should embrace and scale up innovation in all the fields that affect everyone’s quality and cost of...
7 months ago • 1 min read
📖 What I’m Reading: You Only Have to Get Rich Once – Jack Raines Sell your principal. Time may be an illusion, new study finds – Joseph Shavit Every (observed) tick of a clock cleaves a new universe. More here. Farewell, for Now – John Rekenthaler A quaint article on retirement and the miracle of compounding. ☝️ Word of the Week: fastidious (adj) fa-STID-ee-uhs Hard to please, exacting; meticulous; excessively concerned about cleanliness, propriety, etc. From Latin fastidium (disgust). “A...
8 months ago • 1 min read
📖 What I’m Reading: Americans hate inflation more than they hate unemployment – Noah Smith We also hate inflation more than we care about social issues. For better or worse, “it’s the economy, stupid.” Read More Books – Packy McCormick Given the dopaminergic alternatives that are out there, reading is basically meditating. The Age of Abandonment – Freya India Turns out “we live in a society” is more of an injunction than a shower-thought. Book finished: Essays by Michel de Montaigne: 4/5...
8 months ago • 1 min read
