My mid-week morning train WFH reads:
• Marketplaces Year in Review 2021 It was the year of broken supply chains, Amazon aggregators, more advertising, Shopify’s almost-marketplace, and one unanswered question – did the pandemic boost e-commerce after all? For now, the world of marketplaces revolves around Amazon – it has doubled in size in two years. (Marketplace Pulse)
• Welcome to Covid-19’s “junior year.” It’s not pretty. The physical and psychic consequences of the pandemic with no end are shaping up to be devastating. What are Americans to do? (Vox) see also Why Covid Death Rates Are Rising for Some Groups The virus is now responsible for a higher share of deaths from all causes for younger Americans and white Americans than it was before all adults were eligible for vaccines. (New York Times)
• Ten Economic Questions for 2022 Economic growth, Employment, Unemployment Rate, Participation Rate, Inflation and more (Calculated Risk)
• The space station race The ISS will burn up in Earth’s atmosphere in a few years, paving the way for new businesses in space. (Recode)
• The Pet-Food Shortage Is Real, and Owners Are Scrambling. ‘It’s Been a Waking Nightmare’ Your dog wants chicken and rice flavor but has to make do with dry kibble, because import and production holdups have hit dog food and cat food just like human food. ‘He looks at me with these sad eyes.’ (Wall Street Journal)
• Yes, most Americans own capital: But our housing-based system of capital ownership is unsustainable. The most important part of capital ownership: Housing. The rationale for this is that your house is part of the means of production — it produces “housing services” by giving you a place to live. A majority of American households — consistently a little less than 2/3 — are homeowners: (Noahpinion)
• The architect making friends with flooding: One Chinese landscape designer has pioneered a new approach—working with water instead of trying to bend it to our will. (MIT Technology Review)
• You’re not rich (if you’re constantly doing this) While these clients were traveling to their Hamptons summer homes, attending exclusive Super Bowl parties and skiing on private mountains – they always lamented one required behavior. The need to constantly check their email. They were ridiculously rich. But attention poor. (Rad Reads)
• The James Webb Space Telescope Has Launched: Now Comes the Hard Part: After years of delay, the most ambitious observatory ever built has at last left Earth. It now faces a high-stakes series of deployments in deep space (Scientific American)
• Rethinking Kandinsky: The problem with many of Kandinsky’s abstractions is that they don’t offer enough immediate visual information to “crack” his expressive code for color and form. (Hyperallergic)
Be sure to check out our Masters in Business this week with, Max Chafkin is a features editor and tech reporter at Businessweek. His work has also appeared in Fast Company, Vanity Fair, and the New York Times Magazine. His most recent book is “The Contrarian: Peter Thiel and Silicon Valley’s Pursuit of Power.”
IPOs Had a Record 2021. Now They Are Selling Off Like Crazy.
Source: Wall Street Journal
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