Sunday Reads...
- Greg McNeilly
- Apr 13
- 3 min read
An irregular round-up of interesting reads. Most of these made me go "hmmmmm," none of them imply concurrence:
Quote of the Day:
"I’ve got no advice on these up and down times of elation & depression you seem to have, but I can tell you that time is very dangerous without a rigid routine. If you do the same thing every day at the same time for the same length of time, you’ll save yourself from many a sink. Routine is a condition of survival." - Flannery O'Connor
America’s left-wing Democrats have become radicalized to violence, new research suggests, with over one-third of finding assignation of political opponents justified.
Revisiting the genius of Christopher Walken.
Some intuitive evidence is that venture capital has limited the number of high-quality IPOs.
Live longer? Be happy. Optimism is correlated with positive longevity outcomes.
The Met dives deep into gladiator training.
Discussing and charting the employment of U.S. Air Traffic Controllers.
Can’t buy favorability – but more importantly, why would any sane person want to? To be loved by mobs is, by definition, a form of vice:
Deconstructing the wandering tale of cancer cells.
Common sense confirmed – short breaks improve work performance, research confirms.
Counter-narrative:
Mandatory higher-minimum wage laws decrease job hunting.
And as expected, kill summer jobs.
According to some research, soldiers who enlist with extrinsic motivation have more positive experiences than those with intrinsic motivation.
The normalization of political violence from the Left is taking hold. (Noted above.)
The kids are not alright. Happiness rises with age, but it’s more challenging for young people to be happy than ever the evidence notes.
Get outdoors! Bad weather worsens (increases) social media over-consumption.
This is more evidence that a “clean audit” is a low bar for a firm’s health, given the auditors' disincentives.
The history of the American golf course, here.
“AI Robots” continue to generate better patient outcomes than human doctors.
Sure to cause a howl, a new study concludes that pets are bad for the environment, whatever that means.
Research suggests screen time before bed pumps up your insomnia risk by nearly 60%.
A fresh remembrance of the Nazi Holocaust is here.
A life without pain?
Let the arguments begin! The top 100 Sci-Fi movies of all time are here.
Pew charts each state’s “religious landscape.”
Does the color of your office impact productivity – research suggests it does.
And speaking of colors, apparently, they can now signal gentrification.
Charting the world’s top income tax rates (note: the UK has been shedding top earners by the horde in response to its recent hikes).
Ranking the states by per capita state and local debt burden. Yikes!
Unpacking America’s latest self-harming entertainment – the rise of sports gambling.
The ideal talents to lead FEMA? The Amish. Seriously, click this.
Stressed? Dance it away, a study recommends.
Speaking in tongues and zen mediation may have the same wellness benefits.
The weakness in prices was breathtakingly broad-based last month (inflation report):
Airline fares were down -5.3% MoM sequentially after sliding -4.0% in February.
Hotels/motels sank -4.3% MoM in the sharpest falloff since April 2020!
Car/truck rental prices sagged -2.7% MoM on top of a -1.3% decline in February.
Motor vehicle insurance rates, a prior culprit of inflation, reversed to -0.8%, in a negative print of a size we last saw in October 2021.
Medical care commodities (prescription and non-prescription drugs) fell by -1.1% in the sharpest deflation on record (back to 1967).
Toy prices slumped by -0.9% MoM after the -0.2% dip in February.
Used cars fell by -0.7% in the sharpest decline since last July.
Video/audio equipment receded -0.3%.
Sporting goods came in at -0.6% MoM as well — down in six of the past seven months.
Home improvement dipped -0.4% and has shown no pricing power at all over the past year.
Appliances fell by -0.1% and are down now in three of the past four months.
Then there were other areas where pricing power was limited, like restaurants and information services, both eking out +0.2% and +0.1% gains, respectively.
