What we’re reading (11/12)
“Why Jerome Powell Must Go” (Joseph Stiglitz, Project Syndicate). A blistering, contrarian view from a giant of economics.
“How NFTs Create Value” (Harvard Business Review). “NFTs have fundamentally changed the market for digital assets. Historically there was no way to separate the “owner” of a digital artwork from someone who just saved a copy to their desktop. Markets can’t operate without clear property rights: Before someone can buy a good, it has to be clear who has the right to sell it, and once someone does buy, you need to be able to transfer ownership from the seller to the buyer. NFTs solve this problem by giving parties something they can agree represents ownership. In doing so, they make it possible to build markets around new types of transactions — buying and selling products that could never be sold before, or enabling transactions to happen in innovative ways that are more efficient and valuable.”
“Tesla Had 5 Founders. Why Did Only Two Get Really Rich?” (Forbes). “‘When I got kicked out of Tesla I had no money—I mean I really had no money,’ Eberhard says. ‘Worse than that, I had no possibility of employment for about a year’ because of a restrictive intellectual property agreement with Tesla, he says. ‘I did not participate in any investment rounds after I left.’”
“Time For Businesses To Humanize — Or Die” (The Week). “[S]ome employers may have to rethink their entire production model if they want to survive. For instance, as Alex Press writes at Jacobin, business owners are bizarrely resistant to the idea of letting workers, like cashiers, sit down, even when it wouldn't interfere with their jobs. That compulsively controlling attitude isn't uncommon (as most people who have ever worked at a restaurant can attest), and it needs to go.”
“Renters Who Abandoned Their City Apartments During Covid Are Coming Home to a Crazy Leasing Market” (Wall Street Journal). “It turns out you can’t go home again. At least, that is the case for many of the Americans who left their homes in major metropolitan areas during the pandemic, relocating to the countryside for more living space and access to nature. Now they are returning in droves as vaccines become more widespread, employers call their workers back to the office and schools reopen for in-person instruction. They are arriving to find bidding wars and skyrocketing prices in their former neighborhoods, where everyone now wants the same things: outdoor space, a home office, and move-in readiness.”
