EP 645 Tech Workers Benefits(And Jobs)Reset in the Changing American Landscape
From my curiosity generated by the headline of an op-ed piece in the New York Times titled “The Boss Is Back in Silicon Valley” came the following wide ranging conversation with Carol Schultz, the founder and CEO of Vertical Elevation and author of “Powered By People: How Talent-Centric Organizations Master Recruitment, Retention, and Revenue(and How to Build One)” discussing the changing workplace in America as its most valued sector has employees taking a haircut when it comes to perks and benefits. We discuss the new hybrid work environment, the great resignation, quiet quitting, the four day work week, labor’s moment because of supply and demand and other buzzwords in the world of work. It’s a lively discussion sure to find issues you can relate to whether your are a manager or a person being managed.
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Few of us can imagine the difficult life circumstances that bring teenage children into a detention facility, which to them is simply another word for a jail. Jeff Hobbs, an author who immersed himself in different kinds of facilities to capture first hand accounts of the experience from these children describes in vivid, and painful, detail what happens there in his book “Children of the State: Stories of Survival and Hope in the Juvenile Justice System.” While some in society might look at these kids as society’s throwaways, to Hobbs there’s always hope, even if it turns out to be difficult to find redemption in a society that offers few choices and low ceilings once you have been detained in this way. Circumstances are different, state by state, county by county, in America but given the ongoing brain development research, it seems defeatist not to believe that even these troubled teens cannot rebound from these early interactions with the system. Our guest will introduce you to what he saw as part of his immersive reporting on juvenile justice in three different facilities.
The Constitution reserves many responsibilities to states and enumerates clearly those that the federal government can undertake. Wildlife management was one of those state focused responsibilities until the earliest days of the 20th century and then with the Lacey Act and Migratory Bird Treaty Act, responsibilities began to be shared or taken over by the federal government. In the case of wildlife management, such as migratory birds or many other species of animals who traverse boundaries of states, it makes sense that policy be directed from a national perspective. In 1973 with the passage of the Endangered Species Act further duties were taken on by the federal government but still much of the work on the ground was being done by the states. The friction now results in where the funding comes from to protect species further impacted by climate change. If you care about critters, please listen in and make your voice heard about public policy debates ongoing. Lawyer, conservationist, historian and author, Lowell Baier, joins us today on the podcast to discuss.
Our guest, David Auerbach has coined the term that is the title of his book, “Meganets”. The scope of various social networks and interactive platforms has grown to such a proportion because of the sophistication of the technology and the abundant use by individuals that it is creating an autonomous digital force, as uncontrollable as the weather, and is transforming lives,society, culture and politics. Implicit in this description is the notion that no matter how many times tech execs are hauled in front of Congress or new regulations written to moderate content, the most startling fact is that there is no hand on the tiller of some of the largest global digital forces that influence our lives. This includes Facebook, Amazon, Google,Instagram and others. In effect, Auerbach argues that these companies have a created a Frankenstein. He’ll explain on this podcast.
For more than a century the go to move of governments facing a financial crisis has been the implementation of austerity policies, like cutting wages, decreasing spending on social programs and public benefits as the answer to restoring fiscal health. We’re in such a period now in America where we are pursuing monetary belt tightening to deal with inflation and fiscal austerity is put forward to insure an increase in the nation’s debt ceiling. Our guest, political economist, Clara Mattei, in her book “The Capital Order” posits a provocative thesis that solvency has never been austerity’s goal, but rather it is used to keep sending the spoils of capitalist societies to the makers and entrepreneurs to the detriment of the workers. As our wealth and income inequality grow even more, it’s worth listening to her rarely espoused point of view by either party’s leadership or by the economic brain trusts with whom they surround themselves.
The Constitution clearly states that Congress shall write our laws. But as the federal government grew larger and more complex, executive branch agencies were given more authority to bring greater definition to Congressional intent because of their expertise in a particular area. Even more power has shifted to those agencies as Congress fails to keep up with the challenges of a modern society. Clearly, courts remain arbiters of whether those same agencies have overstepped the Congressional authority granted to them. Since the Supreme Court’s 1984 decision in what is called the Chevron case, judicial review has been highly deferential and courts are left to uphold agency interpretations as long as they are determined to be “reasonable.” But now the Supreme Court is pushing back on the Chevron decision which has been THE most written about, most cited administrative law decision of all time. Columbia Law Professor Thomas Merrill joins us to discuss the influential thoughts he offers about the decision’s future in his book “The Chevron Doctrine: It’s Rise and Fall and the Future of the Administrative State.”
With a hot war raging in Ukraine, it is easy to lose sight of a zone of growing tension in the cold ice terrain of the Arctic. American military planners have taken notice of the growing Russian military presence building land bases and launching a string of provocative aerial missions. America is playing catch-up in a climate where it has little experience and capabilities, knowing that the threats of climate change and the Russian dominance of the Arctic demands a more comprehensive strategy. Our guest, journalist Kenneth Rosen explored the activity in the region in a lengthy article online in Politico Magazine. We discussed with him the various challenges for America as it builds its fleet of nuclear-capable icebreakers, ships and submarines, in a region where experts agree any battles in the future will be fought in the air or on water. More importantly, he discusses the need for America to have a more comprehensive strategy, with its Allies, in order to address the growing importance of the Arctic.
Tik Tok. Huawei. Tencent. Giant Chinese companies have become controversial players in the United States as we try to determine their motives and whether they are just another arm of the Chinese government as they vacuum up incredible amounts of data on American citizens. Data which we willingly provide as we ignore terms of service so we can post another picture or video or interact with our friends. And given the lax regulation of social media companies in America, allowing them to sell our information as a key part of their revenue stream, our data flows like a faucet to China at a moment in time when they are severely restricting the information coming back to us. In her book, “Trafficking Data”, author Aynne Kokas explains how, in her view, China is winning the battle for digital sovereignty as it more broadly defines information that is important to its national security. Beijing is collecting data on people nearly everywhere. Their platforms track people’s preferences and whereabouts, while also giving the Chinese government control over a powerful tool for shaping people’s worldview.
Cryptocurrency has been in the news recently and not in a good way. The chicanery of Sam Bankman-Fried and the FTX Exchange now stands in league with other great financial swindles, like Bernie Madoff’s. There are large questions that need to be addressed both about the economic utility of this relatively new asset class and the role that government oversight should play in the regulation of it. To address those issues and all things cryptocurrency is Lee Reiners, the Policy Director of the Duke Financial Economic Center and a lecturing fellow at Duke University. He explains what cryptocurrency is and why in his mind it has a murky future given that it does not perform the common functions of money, as we know it, and its volatility makes it, indeed, risky business.