I'd appreciate very deep dives into the four Trump proposals Matt outlines above -- A larger budget deficit (tax cuts), More trade restrictions (tariffs), A smaller labor force (mass deportation / immigration restrictions), and Curbs on Federal Reserve independence.
I have an economics / policy background, so I can very clearly see how each of these would lead to higher inflation (or as Matt suggests, high interest rates to combat inflation). I'd like deeper dives into each, outlining in detail the likely impacts to different industries, the way these proposals would impact every day life for an average American, unintended consequences, connecting it to economic / policy research, and pointing toward the (perhaps) more reasonable approach of the Biden admin.
I would argue that newsrooms absolutely are safe spaces. Nobody in the NYT press room is going to argue that gender dysphoria should be considered a mental illness and treatable with therapy.
I am fully supportive of trans rights and do not believe it is a mental illness. But let's not pretend there aren't radioactive topics.
Slow Boring is the only substack or blog I pay for. I'm a rather left-wing person, more so than Matt, but he's become my favorite politics and policy commentator and definitely changed my views on a number of things. Popularism, housing supply, regulatory reform... these are not the heart and soul of the immortal science of socialism, but they are important and he's right on the merits. The comments section always reminds me that most subscribers are if anything more likely to be a bit more conservative than Matt, and I feel good knowing that my primary source of longform discourse in ambidextrous in that way.
Matt might be surprised to hear that there's an entire group chat out there of 30-some people who met mostly online and have become friends over the years in large part due to all being lefty people on twitter who broadly agree with him and David Shor.
By coincidence I also really like counterfactual history, AND Matt has the exact same musical tastes and urban preferences and age as myself, and we are both parents of an elementary school age boy. So this substack is just a slam dunk for me, first thing I pull up each morning after my email. There probably is some level at which I have inherent trust in a commentator who went to ABC NO RIO in the late 90s the same time I did and who loves old Lookout Records and furthermore is encountering the same youth trends through his kid as me, and so I can be persuaded of some bitter pills (like moderation being key to winning, or markets having some important roles in society) that I'd rather not otherwise.
All of which is to say that I am clearly a Slowboring superfan, and so will Matt please write out a piece further elaborating on the political economy of the left-leaning multinational Habsburg Federation in Central Europe. The people demand this piece! Does tensions in keeping half of the Romanian speaking lands in despite their relative poverty and cultural estrangement from the German speaking richer west, lead to the socialist parliamentary majority to try to harness the power of the atom to bring electricity to every home in the federation far earlier than any other society? Or rather is the major development that the other half of German lands, still ruled by a reactionary nationalist Kaiser after no WW1 leads to no collapse of that monarchy, mean that the federation is in constant military tension with their German militarist neighbor. What happens downstream of a world in which Lemburg becomes the de facto urban Jewish national home-- do so many Jews try to leave the Pale of Settlement for big city Lvov that eventually the Russian tsar declares war on them? Or does he welcome the outmigration and Lemburg becomes something as dynamic as early 20th century Manhattan?
Glad it is all paying the bills for you and feels good. What you are doing here is working for me and I am sure for many of us. I find myself quoting or parroting you a good deal.
Proud to be a paid subscriber since mid-November 2020. Echo today's comments that the comments section here adds a lot and is a lot better than most of what's on the internet.
As it appears many others are commenting about today, I am also proud to say that I was one of the original class of subscribers. (I see that John from FL - one of my favorite community members! - beat me by 5 days :) )
I do not comment often, but I echo the numerous others who have shared that the comments section of Slow Boring is comprised overwhelmingly insightful contributions which only serve to enhance the original article, rather than detract from it and descend into trolling. So thank you to Matt and team for offering a best-in-class product, well worth the humble annual subscription, and thanks to all of you for adding to that.
"What happened to Paul Krugman’s 2007-vintage views on immigration? What does he think about Gaza?"
I love this idea! One thing that I think is unique about Slow Boring as opposed to other generalist commentator's outputs, is you never are wondering what Matt's views are or who he's going to vote for. Before you yell at me and say I am immature/stupid for only seeking out voices from my tribe, that's not what I do, but I think it helps to know the perspective people originate from. That can actually form the basis for the evolution of more independent thinking. While they have many disagreements, there is probably not zero overlap between Matt and Tom Cotton on DEI programs. I, and I think many other Dems, are probably going to be much more receptive to the same argument coming from Matt than we would coming from Cotton. The problem with a lot of left-of-center people in terms of discourse, is we are too unreceptive of heterodox opinions. If more center-left and progressive commentators express heterodox views confidently, that will take some of the anxiety out of calling out woke excesses and counter-productive climate rhetoric.
There just seems to be less nuance, rigor, sophistication, other when it comes to even national “newspaper” outlets, even worse for local publications. I guess being driven by the current business model inevitably leads to that - and that’s why the cafeteria style that Substack offers really works. Not only can I choose writers whose subject matter fits my interests, but those writers can forge their own paths. Don’t know what I would do without SB and the like.
I’m just going to be (slow) boring and n-th everyone who said that this is the best comment section on the internet! Thoughtful, informative, frequently witty comments, some corny dad jokes/puns but rarely anyone being mean, and no trolls. (Pour one out for spiky.) Thank you, Matt Y and team!
"I think we’re still left with a mainstream media that is both too detached from the actual stakes of American politics and also too out of touch with the cultural mores of the typical American."
THIS THIS THIS THIS!!!
The Trump GOP is an electoral juggernaut in part because it is very good at making politics "about" the cultural mores stuff, at least at the level of discourse. And it's true that hazy annoyance at the existence of a conference about queer food, and the desire to assert conservative cultural mores more generally, are the kinds of things that drive many people to vote Republican.
But at the level of substance, politics is NOT primarily about this! The stakes of this election include things like "should we give the rich a gigantic tax cut and pay for it by gutting social programs?" and "should people have reproductive rights, or should we have a national abortion ban and maybe fetal personhood?" The President and Congress have a lot more control over these things than they do over the existence of conferences about queer food. And even if Trump were to successfully ban such conferences, that would be a world where he has consolidated quite a bit of authoritarian power - it's certain possible that he will (perhaps even likely, given the GOP's electoral might), but it would genuinely be a quite different and far less free society than we currently have, in ways that I think even people who have hazy annoyance at non-conservative forms of expression would regret.
"[T]here is still an important role for niche publications in general and, I believe, for this niche publication in particular." I couldn't agree more.
This is a bit of a tangent to the point but am curious how you'd imagine centrist cultural coverage. The reason people engage with writing on arts and culture is to feel adventurous and frankly probably a bit more worldly than they actually are. There was an article about noise music in the New Yorker and even if i'll probably never listen to that stuff I felt like a more interesting person for having read it. Of course I also read their reviews of Maggie Rogers and Taylor swift's albums which are much more conventional, but I think for many readers of mainstream cultural coverage the non-mainstream stuff and sligghtly off center takes are a pretty important part of the cultural coverage.
Matt - as you've noted many times the political coalitions are increasingly sorted with Liberals being more open to new experiences. In this environment what kind of cultural coverage would be "down the middle?"
I would be interested in careful analysis of the polls, especially whether likely voter polls (which tend to be good for Biden) are to be trusted, whether this is likely to be a low-turnout election, can the impact of the abortion issue be discerned, are polls that tend to show Trump doing relatively well among minorities can be trusted.
One thing you could write is a re-think of what "mainstream media" is these days.
I'd appreciate very deep dives into the four Trump proposals Matt outlines above -- A larger budget deficit (tax cuts), More trade restrictions (tariffs), A smaller labor force (mass deportation / immigration restrictions), and Curbs on Federal Reserve independence.
I have an economics / policy background, so I can very clearly see how each of these would lead to higher inflation (or as Matt suggests, high interest rates to combat inflation). I'd like deeper dives into each, outlining in detail the likely impacts to different industries, the way these proposals would impact every day life for an average American, unintended consequences, connecting it to economic / policy research, and pointing toward the (perhaps) more reasonable approach of the Biden admin.
The next level should be meet ups, but not just in DC.
I would argue that newsrooms absolutely are safe spaces. Nobody in the NYT press room is going to argue that gender dysphoria should be considered a mental illness and treatable with therapy.
I am fully supportive of trans rights and do not believe it is a mental illness. But let's not pretend there aren't radioactive topics.
Slow Boring is the only substack or blog I pay for. I'm a rather left-wing person, more so than Matt, but he's become my favorite politics and policy commentator and definitely changed my views on a number of things. Popularism, housing supply, regulatory reform... these are not the heart and soul of the immortal science of socialism, but they are important and he's right on the merits. The comments section always reminds me that most subscribers are if anything more likely to be a bit more conservative than Matt, and I feel good knowing that my primary source of longform discourse in ambidextrous in that way.
Matt might be surprised to hear that there's an entire group chat out there of 30-some people who met mostly online and have become friends over the years in large part due to all being lefty people on twitter who broadly agree with him and David Shor.
By coincidence I also really like counterfactual history, AND Matt has the exact same musical tastes and urban preferences and age as myself, and we are both parents of an elementary school age boy. So this substack is just a slam dunk for me, first thing I pull up each morning after my email. There probably is some level at which I have inherent trust in a commentator who went to ABC NO RIO in the late 90s the same time I did and who loves old Lookout Records and furthermore is encountering the same youth trends through his kid as me, and so I can be persuaded of some bitter pills (like moderation being key to winning, or markets having some important roles in society) that I'd rather not otherwise.
All of which is to say that I am clearly a Slowboring superfan, and so will Matt please write out a piece further elaborating on the political economy of the left-leaning multinational Habsburg Federation in Central Europe. The people demand this piece! Does tensions in keeping half of the Romanian speaking lands in despite their relative poverty and cultural estrangement from the German speaking richer west, lead to the socialist parliamentary majority to try to harness the power of the atom to bring electricity to every home in the federation far earlier than any other society? Or rather is the major development that the other half of German lands, still ruled by a reactionary nationalist Kaiser after no WW1 leads to no collapse of that monarchy, mean that the federation is in constant military tension with their German militarist neighbor. What happens downstream of a world in which Lemburg becomes the de facto urban Jewish national home-- do so many Jews try to leave the Pale of Settlement for big city Lvov that eventually the Russian tsar declares war on them? Or does he welcome the outmigration and Lemburg becomes something as dynamic as early 20th century Manhattan?
I'll take my answers off the air.
Glad it is all paying the bills for you and feels good. What you are doing here is working for me and I am sure for many of us. I find myself quoting or parroting you a good deal.
Proud to be a paid subscriber since mid-November 2020. Echo today's comments that the comments section here adds a lot and is a lot better than most of what's on the internet.
As it appears many others are commenting about today, I am also proud to say that I was one of the original class of subscribers. (I see that John from FL - one of my favorite community members! - beat me by 5 days :) )
I do not comment often, but I echo the numerous others who have shared that the comments section of Slow Boring is comprised overwhelmingly insightful contributions which only serve to enhance the original article, rather than detract from it and descend into trolling. So thank you to Matt and team for offering a best-in-class product, well worth the humble annual subscription, and thanks to all of you for adding to that.
"What happened to Paul Krugman’s 2007-vintage views on immigration? What does he think about Gaza?"
I love this idea! One thing that I think is unique about Slow Boring as opposed to other generalist commentator's outputs, is you never are wondering what Matt's views are or who he's going to vote for. Before you yell at me and say I am immature/stupid for only seeking out voices from my tribe, that's not what I do, but I think it helps to know the perspective people originate from. That can actually form the basis for the evolution of more independent thinking. While they have many disagreements, there is probably not zero overlap between Matt and Tom Cotton on DEI programs. I, and I think many other Dems, are probably going to be much more receptive to the same argument coming from Matt than we would coming from Cotton. The problem with a lot of left-of-center people in terms of discourse, is we are too unreceptive of heterodox opinions. If more center-left and progressive commentators express heterodox views confidently, that will take some of the anxiety out of calling out woke excesses and counter-productive climate rhetoric.
Thank you for doing your thing, writing smart things about important topics, sans bothsideism.
There just seems to be less nuance, rigor, sophistication, other when it comes to even national “newspaper” outlets, even worse for local publications. I guess being driven by the current business model inevitably leads to that - and that’s why the cafeteria style that Substack offers really works. Not only can I choose writers whose subject matter fits my interests, but those writers can forge their own paths. Don’t know what I would do without SB and the like.
I’m just going to be (slow) boring and n-th everyone who said that this is the best comment section on the internet! Thoughtful, informative, frequently witty comments, some corny dad jokes/puns but rarely anyone being mean, and no trolls. (Pour one out for spiky.) Thank you, Matt Y and team!
"I think we’re still left with a mainstream media that is both too detached from the actual stakes of American politics and also too out of touch with the cultural mores of the typical American."
THIS THIS THIS THIS!!!
The Trump GOP is an electoral juggernaut in part because it is very good at making politics "about" the cultural mores stuff, at least at the level of discourse. And it's true that hazy annoyance at the existence of a conference about queer food, and the desire to assert conservative cultural mores more generally, are the kinds of things that drive many people to vote Republican.
But at the level of substance, politics is NOT primarily about this! The stakes of this election include things like "should we give the rich a gigantic tax cut and pay for it by gutting social programs?" and "should people have reproductive rights, or should we have a national abortion ban and maybe fetal personhood?" The President and Congress have a lot more control over these things than they do over the existence of conferences about queer food. And even if Trump were to successfully ban such conferences, that would be a world where he has consolidated quite a bit of authoritarian power - it's certain possible that he will (perhaps even likely, given the GOP's electoral might), but it would genuinely be a quite different and far less free society than we currently have, in ways that I think even people who have hazy annoyance at non-conservative forms of expression would regret.
"[T]here is still an important role for niche publications in general and, I believe, for this niche publication in particular." I couldn't agree more.
This is a bit of a tangent to the point but am curious how you'd imagine centrist cultural coverage. The reason people engage with writing on arts and culture is to feel adventurous and frankly probably a bit more worldly than they actually are. There was an article about noise music in the New Yorker and even if i'll probably never listen to that stuff I felt like a more interesting person for having read it. Of course I also read their reviews of Maggie Rogers and Taylor swift's albums which are much more conventional, but I think for many readers of mainstream cultural coverage the non-mainstream stuff and sligghtly off center takes are a pretty important part of the cultural coverage.
Matt - as you've noted many times the political coalitions are increasingly sorted with Liberals being more open to new experiences. In this environment what kind of cultural coverage would be "down the middle?"
I would be interested in careful analysis of the polls, especially whether likely voter polls (which tend to be good for Biden) are to be trusted, whether this is likely to be a low-turnout election, can the impact of the abortion issue be discerned, are polls that tend to show Trump doing relatively well among minorities can be trusted.