[upbeat music] Welcome back to Tasteland. I am your co-host, Francis Zehrer. And I'm Daisy Alioto. And today I recorded a solo episode.
We're recording this intro together, but Kaila Scanlon joined us, who has over the last few years built up a reputation for her ability to digest what's happening in finance and the American economy into really sharp, accessible writing and social media videos.
Uh, last year she published her first book, In This Economy: How Money and Markets Really Work.
Um, and if you have not read, watched, or listened to her work, you may have heard the term vibe session, which she coined, and I think is a great example of her style, the way she translates these ideas into really accessible ideas for the internet era.
Um, yeah, it was a great conversation. We talked about friction, uh, one [laughs] of my favorite themes on this podcast.
She, she just wrote this, uh, essay in her newsletter about friction and friction being the most valuable commodity in the world about a month ago. So I really wanted to have her on to talk about that.
But it was just me today. No Daisy. Where were you, Daisy? I'm excited to listen.
I was still in the car on the way back from Atlanta, because if you're following the multi-episode arc, I did in- indeed drive to Atlanta and back.
Um, so I, I drove seven and a half hours today on my second leg, and then got out of my car and walked straight into the proverbial studio- [laughs]... to record this with Francis. Right here in the stu.
Um, how was, how was the drive? Did you like... Were you, were you like podcast mode or listening to music? Were you, were you logged in? Mm-hmm. Or were you logged up?
I knew you were gonna ask me this, so I kept like a careful log of everything I listened to. [laughs] Um, I was bumping the audiobook f- or Kitchen Confidential. Bumping even. Yeah. Um, I...
So I listened to parts of Kitchen Confidential. Um, I listened to a playlist that I had made for Herb Sundays, which is Sam Valenti's- Oh, yes... wonderful Substack. Mr. Graceland.
Um, I, I jumped around a lot, and it felt good. That is the benefit of, uh, driving solo. You can make weird decisions like listening to the same song three times in a row and then switching genres. Only three times?
I also... I don't know if you do this when you're driving alone, but you always have to have like a little bit of like a fake fight in your car. Hmm. Like an imagined conversation. I, um, [laughs] cannot relate.
Maybe that's not a specific issue that you have, but you know, you gotta like... I gesture in the air I'm like- Well, a- as a, as a non-car owner, I'm r- I'm very rarely driving alone to, to begin with.
You're not sitting in your car like, "You will never disrespect me like that again." [laughs] No, I'm not shadowboxing in my car. Well, I be shadowboxing. Mm-hmm. Why... Did you... Uh, you...
Were you listening to Kitchen Confidential because of the snoozy Weiss- No. Oh my God... thing that was just this week? I saw that, um, when I got to Atlanta.
I had already been listening to it, and I was like, "You know what? Shut up." You just turned it up, turned up the volume- Exactly... on Kitchen Confidential. [laughs] Yeah. Cool. Exactly. All right.
Well, let's get to the conversation. I had a good time. Daisy, you were missed, um, but- Wait, can I tell you one more thing? Oh. I think this actually- Okay... has to do with friction. Um, I- Well, that was...
[laughs] See, that was a good friction moment. [laughs] I was trying to, [laughs] trying to transition. I know. No. I broke, I broke the rules of improv, but I think this is interesting. Mm-hmm. So- Okay...
um, I also have listened to the How Long Gone episode, where they're talking about The New York Times piece about Gen Z and bar tabs- Uh, I know... which I do believe are- That came out like today or yesterday.
Yeah, written by our own Paula Mahea. Our own, yes. Mm-hmm. Okay. So anyway, uh, I've never mentioned this to you before. A- I think a couple months ago, a woman emailed me.
She had to email me twice because she astutely realized her first email had gone to my spam box, to tell me that she had a bunch of vintage animal cracker stuff, like paraphernalia, and she was wondering if I wanted it.
Because she had found my article on the internet about being related to the artist, the, the Nabisco artist who did the animal cracker box and the Ritz cracker box, among other, uh- Yeah... Nabisco art from that era.
And she emailed me to ask me do I want it, and for free. Like, "Can I- Yeah... just send this to you? I'm getting rid of stuff." That's nice. "I'm getting older. I'm cleaning out my house." And I said, "Absolutely.
That's so kind of you. I can pay shipping." And she said, "Don't worry about it." And we had a lovely exchange. And when I walked in my door from Atlanta about half an hour ago, there was a big box sitting on the stairs.
Oh, nice. And I was like, "What is this?" Um, and I, I looked at the return and I was like, "Oh, it's the animal cracker stuff."
And what made me think about friction was like, I kinda think we're like losing the recipes of I have this thing. I, I found this person online who has like a connection to it. Mm-hmm.
I'm gonna like just email them, cold email them. As opposed to throwing it out or hoarding it forever. It's just... I mean, it's a very old school interaction, right? She had to put effort- Mm... into that.
She had to go to the post office for me. Yeah. We don't know each other.
And I wanna be the type of person who would do that, but I feel like everything in, um, society right now is like molding a generation where the h- that whole start to finish interaction would feel kinda scary and weird for both of us, but- Precisely...
um, anyway, it was a high friction interaction that like touched me really deeply, and I'm so excited to unpack it. I haven't even opened it yet. Mm-hmm. A lot to unpack there. Yeah, a lot to unpack. So- The...
Wait Yeah... the, the Ritz thing, this reminded me of one of my earliest memories of falling for advertising.
Um, we had r- we always had Ritz crackers in the house when I was a kid, and I remember, I don't know if you remember this, on the sides of them, there would...
It was, it was like midnight- Did you try to make that specific sandwich? [laughs] Yeah, it was like midnight snack, and it's like ham and cheese, and I was obsessed with like I have- [laughs]...
I like I, I need to have ham and cheese [laughs] on Ritz crackers at midnight. Um- You were shadowboxing with the, uh... I was shadowboxing.
[laughs] No, uh, the, um-The Nabisco company simply had me by the, by the throat. Yeah. Well, shout out to Nabisco. Nabisco sponsor Tasteland. [laughs] No, I'm just kidding. Well, I would take that Nabisco money. Yeah.
I think it's Kraft money now, right? Probably. Anyways, speaking of money, Kyla Scanlon knows a lot about it. Let's get to the conversation. [upbeat music] Okay.
So you wrote this essay in early May called The Most Valuable Commodity in the World is Friction.
Um, and I've been thinking about friction as a lens through which to understand so much going wrong with our, our culture, our world, economy, etc. I've been thinking about this for about like six months or so.
So I was like, this is like the essay I was looking to read. Um, so to start, what do you mean exactly when you say that friction is the most valuable commodity in the world?
So the essay itself was written after [chuckles] I got stuck in the Newark disaster. You know, the air traffic controllers not being able to, like, even see the planes in the sky- Mm...
because their technology was breaking down, and this was the same week that the ChatGPT college essay came out from, I think, The New Yorker, where they were talking about how college students- Mm...
were using ChatGPT and just sort of outsourcing all of their cognitive burdens. And I was really...
I've been, like, sort of circulating around this idea of friction for a long time, and I was like, "Wow, there's so much friction [chuckles] in the real world," like, so much underinvestment, so much, you know, ignoring these really big problems.
And then in the digital world, you can kind of escape all of this. Mm-hmm.
And then there was another essay from The Cut talking about the West Village girl and kind of that archetype and how they're able to design a physical life through monetary means of avoiding all friction.
Like, it just, you know, it seems simple on paper.
But, um, so that was kind of the impetus of the essay was like, you know, noticing this, as many others [chuckles] have, uh, depicted, noticing these really big differences between the digital and the physical, and then those who can afford to curate their physical to have the same frictionlessness as the digital.
Mm-hmm. Yeah. The, the digital bit I think is, is the core for me.
Like, the way I came to it was working in, like, that software company is where you talk about, like, oh, we need to remove the friction in our sign-up process- Mm...
or we need to remove the friction, or we need to, you know, add friction to the, the de-side, the unsubscription process.
Whatever it is, it's all about, like, removing friction to decrease the distance between customer and desired outcome, right?
So I think when I started thinking about it, it was that, and it was about, like, the removal of friction as, like, a way for companies to get more out of consumers.
Sometimes, you know, ostensibly for the benefit of the consumer to make their life easier in using the product, but, um, ultimately for the benefit of company, right? So I thought that putting, like...
I'm gonna, I'm gonna sum, sum up your three dis- distinct worlds.
You kind of just did this, but you say that the digital world has almost no friction, the physical world is full of it, and in certain curated spaces, like you were just saying, like the West Village or your AI companion, friction has been turned into something you can pay to remove.
Um, a couple longer quotes and then I'll, [chuckles] and then I'll hand it back to you. Uh, you say that this is what a friction world, frict- frictionless world looks like.
Everything accelerates until you forget what it means to try. And regarding the physical world, you say, "Because while the digital world has removed all friction, the physical world is where the friction still lives.
Not the good kind, the effort of doing something hard, the kinetic potential of possibility, but the bad kind, the exhaustion of trying to hold together systems that no one's willing to invest in anymore."
So tell me more about these two, the good kind versus the bad kind of friction as you laid it out there. Yeah. I mean, I, I think, like, it's obviously personal.
Like, some people really like, [chuckles] you know, outsourcing everything to an AI agent and not having to worry.
Um, a- and then I think other people would say that there's a lot of value in trying hard and, like, doing things for yourself.
And so I think in the digital world, as you were saying, like, these companies have really optimized the apps as to where it is really frictionless, and if it even takes a couple of seconds to load, you're like, "Well, what's happening?"
[chuckles] I'm out. Yeah. Right. Yeah. You're like, "Okay, I'm gonna [chuckles] go to a different app now." And then in the physical world, you have so much friction.
Like, I think this example with the air traffic controllers is really important because, you know, there's people's lives that are at risk, and it's immense amount of friction that has to be solved by the correct allocation of capital, like some sort of investment, and we just refuse to do it.
But we're willing to invest so much money to reduce, you know, friction in the digital world and throw a bunch of money at, like, an AI startup, um, when we have, like, planes that are disappearing into the sky because ATCs can't find them.
Mm-hmm. So that was sort of the, the summary of the two types of worlds with one core example for each. So with... W- you know, we're talking about technology and how the digital world is frictionless, right?
I feel like the... It's not just like big tech, like, not just capital T tech, but the history of technology is basically about removing friction, right?
Like, you go back to the written word, and that's making it, like, decreasing the friction between ideas and their ability to travel, right? Like, making it so ideas can travel asynchronously.
Um, so where I'm going with this is, like, is this state of, like, ultra frictionlessism, um, [chuckles] kind of a mouthful, uh, is, is this kind, just kind of like an inevitable thing, though? Like, is... Are we...
Like, this is just the endpoint of, like, technological advancementI hope not. Yeah. [laughs] I mean, I, I think, like, there's two ways to look at technology.
Like, one is through the more optimist lens where it's, like, I think technology can be an aid and, you know, there might be some elements of frictionlessness. Mm-hmm.
Like, if we could use it to improve healthcare, improve educational outcomes, like, that's really great. But then we have sort of dipped into the simulation economy [laughs] right?
Like, where people are choosing to sort of- Mm... um, you know, more or less upload their consciousness and outsource that to an AI, um, machine. And, uh, so I think, like, it...
not all technology is bad, it's just the application of that technology that can make it bad. And, like, bad's a big word because- Yeah... like I said, some people like this stuff.
Um, I, I just think that there's consequences [laughs] to it. Yeah. Well, I mean, the liking it, like, like, I like, you know, that I can open my phone and check the weather and et cetera, et cetera- Right...
like do all these things, like, basically instantly. But it's like, is that... Like, when I think about, like, wh- if, if this is the endpoint of, of technology, it's like what do you do when there's no friction, right?
Like, it's just then, like, even like the service economy, right? The, the, the US is now more of a service economy, we're not a manufacturing economy, et cetera, et cetera.
Tariffs, um, trying to reverse that, not gonna happen. Summing up [laughs] a lot there. Mm-hmm. But like, in, like, I don't know. Like, once... If it's all services, it all just collapses in on itself.
I guess I don't know. [laughs] I guess I'm... I don't really know where I'm going with this other than it, it just does seem kind of hopeless. Um, but let's back out of this for a second and talk about- Yeah, yeah...
this, the simulation economy.
So I wa- I wanna read another quote, um, that you, you mention in this, that you write in this article, which is, "I think what we're witnessing isn't just an extension of the attention economy, but something new, the simulation economy.
It's not just about keeping you glued to the screen anymore, it's about convincing you that any sort of real-world effort is unnecessary, that friction itself is obsolete," which is kind of what we're talking about here.
"The simulation doesn't just occupy your attention, instead it replaces the very notion that engagement should require effort."
So tell me more about this simulation economy idea and why you think it's worth labeling it as, like, this separate thing from the attention economy. Well, I think the... I, [laughs]
I do like how you're like, "Let's stop talking about the end of the world [laughs] and start talking about this." [laughs] We'll go back to it. Don't worry, we're gonna go back to it.
[laughs] Um, but, uh, I mean, I think the simulation economy is just the next iteration of the attention economy. So in my mind, the attention economy is kinda like scroll, scroll, scroll. Mm-hmm.
You know, you're glued to a couple of screens at once. You have Netflix designing shows that you can listen to instead of have to watch. Like, the actual dialogue is changed so you don't have to, like, watch that screen.
You can, like, watch TikTok and hear Netflix at the same time. Classic MMOS. Like, that's sort of the attention economy. Mm-hmm. Is that... Yes. Yes, exactly.
Um, and then the simulation economy is, um, sort of you disappearing into the technology versus using it as a distraction. Um, so I think with some of the AI stuff, and, like, I think AI can have good applications.
I just think- Mm... perhaps we've been using it in ways that are not great. Like, ClueLe, uh, which I don't even wanna talk about this company [laughs] 'cause I, I think the founder is sort of an attention hack.
You're still putting ink on it already too. I know. I know a lot of people have. But I, I think that, like, they know what they're doing in terms of capturing the, you know...
It's very much flood the zone type stuff that they're- Mm... trying to accomplish, and I hate giving people, like, that attention, but, you know, they're a good example of this sort of stuff.
Like, they wanna help you cheat on everything and, like, have these glasses where you can be on a date and have, like, information about the date. And, um, their core thesis is that you never have to think alone again.
And so you're just like, that's a different version of the attention economy and it's one that is much more immersive.
Like, there was, I think, a Wired article about 60-hour raves that people are doing in their virtual headsets.
You know, um, job interviews can become b- browser tricks with things like ClueLe, and then you, of course, you can, like, outsource your writing to ChatGPT.
Um, and so you end up having identity as, like, this efficiency layer- Mm... as I write about.
And, um, I, I think that's when things get really dicey in terms of what the economy is relying on because then you're relying on people to totally tap out. Yeah.
This, no, this reminds me of something we ta- we had David Rudnick, the designer on, like, in November, and I forget how we got on this thread, but we were talking about, like,
you know, virtual reality headsets meeting, like, AI-generated experiences that are so unique to each consumer and how that then just creates this sort of, like, solipsistic society of people standing in their own corners b- having, everyone having their own unique dream, and you can't relate to people on, like, this specific cultural experience because you, you had one that was totally customized to you.
And so, I mean, that's kind of where my mind is going with how you're describing the simulation economy is it's like the ultimate, like,
fracturing of society into these, like, purely digital individualized kind of antisocial experiences. Yeah. And I think that is the root of a lot of our issues right now.
And people have been, you know, this has been sort of beaten to death in the essay world, this idea of, like, monoculture- Mm...
and how we used to all watch the same TV shows and, like, listen to the same music, and we were able to have, like, this thread of connectivity between us.
And, and now everybody's fragmented, and you have your own algorithm designed just for you and what you want. Um, and I think there, there's a lot of truth to that. Mm.
Like, when everybody, as you said, does have their own experience. You know, you work alone, you hang out alone, you get rewarded alone. This is a very extreme example.
Um, people of course are still hanging out and being together, but, you know, American individualism [laughs] is a strong force, and we're sort of setting it on fire right now with some of the- Mm...
technology that is available. So okay, American individualism. I wanted to talk about the American dream briefly. So- [laughs]... the American dream re-Frictionlessness.
Um, in like early March, S- Scott Bessent, US Treasury Secretary, right, uh, he was giving a speech to the Economic Club of New York defending the tariffs.
And he said this line that I, I haven't really been able to stop thinking about, as, as they say, uh, that access to cheap goods is not the essence of the American Dream.
The American Dream is rooted in the concept that any citizen can achieve prosperity, upward mobility and economic se- and economic security.
And so I kind of totally disagree with that because I think access to cheap goods and prosperity, upward mobility, and economic security are the same thing, just in a relative sense because those things imply the relative cost of goods being cheaper, right?
So in that same way, I think frictionlessness might be the American Dream. I mean, I, I think some elements of the American Dream are elements of frictionlessness, but the kind that is maybe, um, okay.
Like if you're- Yeah... you know, you don't wanna have to worry about if you can afford going to the doctor. Like that sort of- Mm-hmm... frictionlessness I think is okay.
But, um, Noam Chomsky, [laughs] I was listening to an interview that he was doing, and it's like, I don't know, 10 years old or something, and somebody asked him this exact question.
It was the guy, the man from Princess Bride. I can't remember his name. Oh, the- Um- Wait. It, it, one of the- The guy, the guy, the guy who's like poisoning, like the shorter guy? Yeah. Or- The shorter guy. Yeah.
What's... Andre something. Right? Anyways. No. Anyway, yeah. So it was the guy from Princess Bride [laughs] um, asking Noam Chomsky.
He was like, "Well, it seems," and this was like 10 years ago or so, and he was like, "It seems like the American Dream is to be able to sit on a couch, you know, have somebody bring you a hot fudge sundae, and then you're, you're clocked out."
And Noam Chomsky answers and he's like, "No, like, you know, you see people wanting to work. You see people still having that desire to like go out there, be in the physical world." And so I mean, I have been...
A lot of people have been circling this idea of like what it means to have phones and internet and technology in our lives, and I think that the phones and the social media are just like one of the most powerful drugs that we have- Yeah...
that we have ever had. And so I don't think that the American Dream is like outsourcing your entire life to social media and like living inside of an AI bot. I still believe that people like working hard.
It's part of the reason that we have such intense populism right now is because people want to bring manufacturing back- Mm... because they want [laughs] those jobs again, or so they say.
And so I sort of agree with Noam Chomsky here that the American Dream isn't bonbons on a couch. It's like having the opportunity to have that upward mobility, which oftentimes does come through working hard.
I could be wrong, um, but my research- No, I wa- I kind of, I agree with you- Yeah. Did I misunderstand you? No, no, no, no, no. Not at all. Okay. Sorry. I, I, I agree. I mean, there's, there's no like...
These are [laughs] kind of vague questions that I, I'm not, there's not necessarily one answer I'm looking for.
But I, I agree with you in that like I very much believe that like work is a social endeavor and it's good for people to work and like- Yeah... work alongside each other and all this.
But I- maybe it's that like the, in this, you know, you could say Treatlerite economy, um- [laughs]... where everything, where it's like, you know, you use DoorDash. In the frictionless economy, let's say, um- Right.
Right... like what's being sold is like frictionless. Not that frictionlessness is, is the American Dream- Mm... but that it is being sold as that in kind of the platform attention economy era maybe. Yeah.
No, I mean, it, I think so. I think to a certain extent, right? Um, and Trader Joe's is sort of [laughs] like an, like I think a good wrapper- Frictionless grocery with a little bit of friction Yeah.
Well, and like little treats. Stuff to go. Yeah. Yeah. Like, right, like everything is kind of optimized for a millennial experience.
[laughs] Um, and it's like relatively cheap and, um, and so I think that there's a lot of different threads, like really abstract threads that you can pull on and tie together to kind of get into this idea of like what does it mean to have a frictionless economy, and like the fact that you can get a private taxi for your burrito, it, you know, it makes your life pretty easy in a way that maybe it shouldn't be if you just think about- Mm...
the, you know, how important it might be just to go and get that burrito yourself from like a socialization standpoint.
Um, and so I think it is kind of complicated because some elements of frictionless are just always going to happen as we have a growing economy and as, um, you know, we, we are a service-based economy, so there are going to be more services that are offered.
And, uh, yeah, so like some of this is inevitable, but I, I think some aspects, especially those that are related to technology, are, um, making people disappear more than it's giving them opportunity. Yeah.
So I want to... When I, I'm gonna read you like my first articulation of this frictionless idea from, this was back in February.
I found this tweet which it was just like a kind of like throwa- throwaway tweet, but I, I keep... It ended up like feeling like a distillation of how I was thinking. So I said... It was, it was a reply to somebody else.
Did you tweet it? I forget who it was. I tweeted it, yeah. Yeah. Okay. But it's, uh, so it's the three tenets of our cultural moment, I say.
One is the removal of friction, uh, as seen in sports gambling apps, Zinn, and crypto. Uh, number two, entrepreneurialism, like the creator economy and gig economy.
And three, decentralization of meaning generally, like Doge or replacing fact checkers with community notes. And I was...
I, I put three there, but I felt like I was really trying to articulate one thing, which maybe just is- Hmm... frictionlessness.
Um, I'm curious what you think, if that's all just the same thing of like if removal of friction, this sort of like entrepreneurialist obsession with in, in our economy or with- in the platform economy really, which I would say is frictionlessness in that it's like removing labor protections and making it like seem like it's all a lottery, right?
Like, if you play this right as an entrepreneur, you can get rich- Mm-hmm... quite quickly, less fr- [laughs] I'm really throwing the word friction around it a lot, I guess multiple different ways. But, um, I don't know.
I guess my question is like is that all just frictionlessness and is that, is frictionlessness [laughs] the core of the definitive aspect of like this moment in culture?I, I, I think some of that is.
Yeah, I think everything is a little bit, like, different, and they all have different consequences. Mm-hmm.
Like, sports betting, that's a very interesting example of, uh [laughs] you know, how we've sort of allowed infrastructure in, and have really taxed human failure here. Mm-hmm.
Uh, if, if you think about, like, you know, states were allowing sports gambling because they wanted that revenue during COVID. Yeah. And so they were like, "Hey guys, you know, lose a bunch of money on, on the Bucs.
[laughs] It'll help us." Um, and so that's sort of a strange and perverse incentive, right? And I don't know...
Like, the elements of frictionless there are that you can just do everything from your couch versus, like- Mm-hmm...
in the, you know, 1980s, you would have to, like, go to a bookie and it, it was more underground, and now it's really normalized. Bowling Alone- And so I think-... was gambling alone. [laughs] Yeah, yeah.
I mean, like, he was so early with everything. Um, but yeah. So, so I think that there are many elements of frictionlessness, and everything is sort of, um, there. Yeah.
Okay, I promise I'll take us out of [laughs] frictionlessness soon. I feel kind of s- I keep saying frictionlessness, but there's gotta be a, a clear way to say that.
But, um, okay, another recent newsletter that came after the friction one, Economic Lessons from The Screwtape Letters. Yeah. Uh, you, you continue kinda working on this theme, so I'm gonna read another quote from this.
Um, Screwtape, for the listener, being this C.S. Lewis book about, like, a demon writing letters to his nephew, right? Mm-hmm. Um, about- The rookie... like, how to corrupt people, right? Uh-huh. Yeah.
Yeah, okay, so you say, "Screwtape would feast here, with that slow-" [laughs] "... untethering from reality. The irony is that this convenience was supposed to free us for deeper pursuits.
With food delivery, we wouldn't waste time cooking. With algorithmic entertainment, we wouldn't waste time browsing. With frictionless finance, we wouldn't waste time budgeting. But free us for what, exactly?
The promise was more time for meaningful connection, creative pursuits, deep thinking.
Exactly the things that require effort, patience, and resilience, the very muscles that convenience has allowed a, has allowed to atrophy."
So I think, I just really like this as, like, an articulation of, like, once you remove friction, you don't have a life because the purpo- [laughs] put it in, in another sense- [laughs]...
the purpose of life is friction management. Yeah, it's really crazy to hear your words read back to you. [laughs] When you're like, "Oh, no." Um- [laughs] My favorite thing to do at this point. Yeah, yeah.
It's a great way to be like, "Oh, I should've said that differently." But, um, [laughs] uh, yeah. No. I mean, so like C.S. Lewis- No, you said, you said it well... oh, thank you. But C.S.
Lewis and The Screwtape Letters- Mm-hmm... like, again, another guy that was very early, just like Bowling Alone and, and, um, Robert Putnam. Mm-hmm.
Uh, but I, I think that with that, like, you do have this demon that's, like, training his nephew, and he's like, "This is how you're gonna get people to defy God and, and come to our side," like, the demon side, the devil side.
And he's like, "The way that you do that isn't by making them evil, it's by making them boring, by making them flat-" Mm-hmm... by making them disengaged from the world around them.
And so I was rereading that book, um, coming home from a concert in San Francisco, so I was on the plane.
And I read the book a couple of times, but, like, this time I was like, I had just come off the back of the friction newsletter, and I was like, "Whoa. [laughs] This is crazy."
[laughs] Uh, he wrote everything that I was trying to write, and said it so beautifully, and through, um, through a story, which is always so powerful. Mm-hmm.
But yeah, I mean, I, I think that's kind of the thing is, like, um,
frictionlessness has allowed us to outsource a lot of our life and kind of, like, the, maybe the parts that you find meaning in without even knowing it, like making a budget or, you know, planning for the grocery store or cooking for yourself.
Um, like, there's a lot of value in doing those things and a lot of human spirit in doing those things.
And so that entire piece was just kind of, um, you know, talking about how we can pull forward a lot of the lessons from The Screwtape Letters to the present moment and, and kind of frame it around this idea of, like, if things get too simple, it's probably not, not good.
Mm-hmm. It's a very strange argument to make 'cause you would think that the goal of human life is that you get to the most simplest point possible.
Um, and it [laughs] sounds like a little man, like a little old man yelling at clouds, right? Mm-hmm. Where it's like, "No, things should be just a little complicated." But I think some elements of that are true.
No, I totally agree, and in that piece you, you write about how, like, the market responding to this with, like, uh, independent bookstores rising. And you didn't specifically- Mm-hmm...
use this example, but I think this is what you were referring to. Like, it's, uh... Is it Borders or Barnes & Nobles? I always forget which one that, like, now has- Barnes & Nobles... come back around.
Barnes & Nobles, okay, yeah. Now they're, like, doing this thing where they're telling their employees to treat the bookstore more like your typical indie bookstore with, like, staff favorites.
And each one can be slightly different and curated to the specific locale. Um, so I wanna talk about re-frictionalization.
[laughs] Uh, and, like, if there's hope for it, I don't know, or, like, how that happens, like real at-scale frictionalization. Because, you know, I like the idea of spending less time on my phone.
Um, but I don't- [laughs]... wanna look at my screen time 'cause it's quite high. Um, yeah, I guess I'm... That, that's... I'm curious where your thinking is on, like, how re-frictionalization is happening or could.
I mean, yeah, I think it's things like the independent bookstores. I think it's things like, you know, going to restaurants and doing simple things like that.
And of course, all of this is, like, very nuanced, and it's very broad strokes over a very big problem, so it doesn't apply to, like, all people. Like, some people are, you know, not terminally online- Mm-hmm...
and, and might not be facing these issues. And so I, I always think it's important to shout out that kind of stuff.
Um, but, yeah, I mean, I, I think that right now it's a very difficult time because there's almost this need-To be really connected because of the volatility of fiscal policy and just no one knows what's gonna happen next.
And so people are just constantly tuned in, and when people are constantly tuned in, that really reduces your faculties [chuckles] and it really makes you quite tired.
Um, and so you become more prone to doing frictionless type things like where you're, you know, using DoorDash or maybe outsourcing some of your work to an AI chatbot or something like that. Yeah.
Um, and so all of it does make sense, uh, you know, the convenience aspect. Yeah. I, I'll read one more... Maybe I have like one or two, one or two more quotes.
So the frictionless essay, uh, from the friction essay, but so at the end of it, you do start to kind of suggest an alternative.
You say, "But they suggest an alternative to both digital frictionlessness and physical collapse, a world where effort is neither eliminated nor wasted, but directed towards systems that actually sustain us.
Maybe it's things like requiring tech platforms to internalize costs they're currently, they currently externalize to physical systems and human attention, challenging, or educational models- [chuckles]...
that reward deep engagement rather than interface management, also challenging.
But we have to acknowledge that when we remove friction from one domain, we're not eliminating it, we're just moving it somewhere new," which previously in the essay you talked about how like every removal of friction is just kind of a- Hmm...
mortgaging of it, either like into the future or to another, you know, some other externality. Um, but my, my, my thought reading that is like, like how do we require tech platforms to do that, right?
I, I find it hard to believe that obviously this current government, but even the next government, whatever that may be, would institute these kind of regulations.
So I guess my question is like, do you think there-- Do you see, do you see that happening soon, this kind of like regulatory re-frictionization? No. I mean- [chuckles]... Germany is trying...
[chuckles] You don't either. No, I don't. Like, I don't think anybody does. No. [chuckles] Like, like nobody's, nobody's, uh, that, uh, rosy-eyed anymore- Yeah... or rose-colored, whatever.
Um, so, you know, Germany is trying to do a ten percent digi-digital tax on, on the tech platforms. I don't know about this. But the...
Yeah, Germany's trying to like be like, "Hey, you have a digital platform, like you're going to have to pay a certain tax on that- Mm-hmm... just because of the, the cost."
Um, but- Like a digi- Wait, but a tax, a tax on like any transaction that happens on it? A tax on, like a tax on what? Yeah. So Germany is considering a ten percent tax on large platforms like Google and Facebook.
Uh, a-and they're, they're mostly doing it to like be like Donald Trump, stop doing tariffs. Yeah. But they're just going to sort of tax these platforms that are really important to the United States.
Um, and they, the platforms are also, as Germany said, quite good at tax evasion. Mm-hmm. They make a lot of money- Famously [chuckles]... and they don't necessarily pay a lot in taxes. Um, and so I, I think like...
So Jony Ive- Mm-hmm... um, he just sold his company to OpenAI for like six point five billion- Mm-hmm... in equity.
Um, and he has this design company, and they're probably gonna make some design product, and he was a lead designer at Apple when Steve Jobs was there.
And he had this FT piece come out where he was like, "You know, there have been these harmful consequences of technology, and it's all unintentional."
And so I think there's a lot of that with, um, people who have sort of led the charge of technology is they're like, "Listen, we didn't know that the technology would be frying the kids.
Like we just thought it would be helping people."
Um, and, and clearly like it's really hurting, like, uh, Pearl Jobs, Steve Jobs's, um, wife was also interviewed in the ar-article and she was like, "We can see the aspects of technology, like how it's harmed young women especially, and just how it's really done a number on people."
And so I think in terms of just holding people accountable, um, that's gonna be the hardest part, much less making them pay a tax.
It's like somebody might have to just answer for the consequences that have been put forward by the platform. So it's really challenging because like with every sort of technology, there's good and bad, right?
Like t- you know, technology is enabling us to have- Yeah... this conversation via Riverside. Yeah. And, um, and it's also enabled me to like post videos about the economy on social media- Mm-hmm...
to have a newsletter, uh, that I distribute via social media. And so there's like good and bad, and that's the hard part about sort of holding people accountable is there is good- Yeah...
but there's also immense consequences, and I think that's where things get really challenging, and a lot of people way smarter than me have been working on these problems for a very long time, and nobody can really figure out how to execute properly.
Okay. We've probably talked enough about friction.
Uh, tell me more about the book tour and like any, I don't know, uh, questions that people asked you on the tour that, that stuck with you or, you know, conversations that have...
you've kind of been having over the course of the tour. Yeah. I mean, like any good newsletter writer, I wrote [chuckles] a newsletter about it, um, and it was, uh, called Gen Z and the End of Predictable Progress. Hmm.
Um, because like a lot of... You know, I, I study economy, I study finance, and, uh, translate that for, for people.
And one thing I just really noticed in talking to professors and talking to students is that they're just kind of worried, um, for the first time in a long time, the unemployment rate for college grads is quite high.
Kevin Roose talks about this quite well in his new piece on the AI job apocalypse, and, you know, the housing market is, is quite challenging, and it just feels like, you know, this equation where you would go to college, you'd have a rather predictable return on investment from that college degree, like at least find some sort of job.
Uh, you would be able to [chuckles] buy some sort of starter home, and then you would slowly progress in your career.
Like that has sort of been shattered, and every generation faces their own problems, like I'm not blind to that, but I think this specific set of circumstances for young people is really important.
Um, because when you think about the lack of early career training and the lack of early career investment, like that is setting them up for a lot of issues down the road because those first couple of years of your career are where you get...
If you choose to enter, you know, the workforce, that's where you get a lot of your training, get a lot of your-Preparation. Um, and so that's concerning.
And then of course, like housing is the foundation for the economy, and if people can't afford a house, like that brings up all sorts of other economic problems. Mm-hmm.
Um, and then, uh, of course, you know, just the progression of the career is interesting too, 'cause baby boomers are taking longer to retire 'cause they have their own financial problems, right?
Like 43% of boomers have no retirement savings. So it's just like [laughs] um, it, it can be, it... That's just what I've been sort of studying over the past year- Mm-hmm...
with, with the help of these students, is how they feel about their circumstances, and they're worried. Yeah. I mean, I can relate to that. Um, you- Yeah...
so in the intro to your book, you say that int- economic literacy for all, emphasis, emphasis on for all, has been your mission since high school when you dabbled in options trading and wrote about it for your first blog, Scanlan on Stocks.
So, um, my question there is like, y- you're just saying how, you know, every generation has its own unique problems with the economy. I think yes, but also, like it's always...
Uh, I mean, yes, unique problems now, but that it's always kind of like the new challenge of like explaining these things to people, and maybe people 50 years ago were more literate in some of these concepts and it was, you know, easier to, for your average person...
I don't know. I'm making this up, but maybe easier for your average person to pick up like an industry rag and read it cover to cover and kind of understand what's going on. Where now that's not necessarily the truth.
Now, you know, it's people getting stuff from you in, in your book or, [clears throat] or, uh, you know, on your social media videos or in your newsletter, et cetera. Um,
tell me some of your basic principles or ideas that you try to, I don't know, uh, flog over and over, like, in your work that you think, like, meet w- how people understand economic literacy now.
Like, what's most important in, like- Oh... on a repetitive scale for you to get out? So the book was designed to be a static place that people could go and hopefully have, you know, an accessible guide to the economy.
So it's illustrated. I... It's my drawings. Um, it's meant to be fun and not overwhelming in the way that sometimes economics can feel to a lot of people. Mm-hmm.
And so for me, like, the main goal of a lot of my work, the newsletter's [laughs] a little bit different, but like, a lot of my work is about, um, sort of taking these core economic concepts and using both financial and media literacy to explain them to people.
So I think the foundation of understanding the economy is understanding how the economy is talked about. Hmm.
And so using, you know, like, news and media headlines, and then now sort of the antics of the administration and being like, "Look, this is how people are talking about the economy, but this is, like, actually what inflation numbers mean," or, "This is actually what we're seeing in the data for the labor market."
And so it's a lot of, um, attempting to translate, uh, ideas and translate them into a way that's, uh, hopefully, [laughs] you know, applicable and hopefully they feel like they can take action on. Mm-hmm.
It's been more challenging in, in recent months just because of the general uncertainty. But all- The speed. Yeah.
Um, you know, you'll, you'll film a video and then, like [laughs] already the, the policy has changed by the time you're done. And, uh, people are quite tired too. Mm-hmm.
Um, and so, like before all of this, there was like, okay, I should understand the economy. Like, when I go and buy a coffee, like that's an economic transaction. Or like, I'm in the workforce- Yeah...
that's the economic transaction. I am paying my, for my car. Um, like every th- single thing we do is, [laughs] is an element of the economy and we just pretend that people don't need to know about it, and that, like...
It's like, what? Um, and so yeah. That, uh, that's the main driver of my work. Well, wait. So- And my... Yeah.
The way you're talking about, you know, buying a coffee, and I think this, you use this example, like right in the, it's like the first chapter of your book. [laughs] You talk about how like this is the economy. Yeah.
Um, later on in your book, at some point you say that people are the economy. Um- Yeah... and that this is the main theme of your book. I, I'm not a [laughs] very, very financially literate person, you know?
So, like, reading your book, it's like this does... Like for me, I feel like I am the audience, it makes it accessible for me.
Um, but the, the way that you say that people are the economy, and that's the theme of the book, implies to me that that's very different from traditional or mainstream, even maybe, like pop economic thinking or writing.
Mm-hmm. Um, is that true? Like how is it, how is it different? Is that, is that really your novel kind of edge? Hmm. I don't know.
Um, I mean, I, I think that like people are the economy is important because even just in the data, like 70% of GDP is consumer spending. Mm-hmm.
So it's like people out there spending money on people things, and then the foundation [laughs] of most economic things are just people, like buying stuff, or companies buying stuff, or companies selling things to people that they've bought from overseas, um, people going to restaurants.
And so the, the economy literally is just like the actions of people. Um, and, and so [laughs] I think sometimes people feel like the economy isn't relevant to them. Mm-hmm. You know? Yeah.
And it's kind of like, well, things- Well, 'cause the economy, you know, uh, your average person, probably me at some point when I'm younger, it's like, "Oh, the economy is just stocks and I don't own stocks, so why do I care about the economy?"
Oh. "It's irrelevant to me." Oh, no. Yeah, that's a very, that's a very common and understandable- Yeah... misconception.
Um, because like when, unfortunately, the way that we oftentimes talk about the economy is through the lens of the stock market. So we're like... And they're very different, right? Yeah. They're two different things.
Um, the stock market is a good barometer for where the economy might, might be headed because it measures the health of companies. Um, well at least it used to. [laughs] Now it measures share buybacks.
But, um, uh, so, so that is a very-Common misconception, and I think a lot of people run into that, where they're like, "This isn't relevant. I don't want to own stocks. I don't care about stocks."
Um, but then it's like, well, you know, when it's time for you to buy a house, you need to understand how a mortgage works. You need to understand what inflation is doing.
You need to understand, you know, what's going on in, in the labor market, or what the recent GDP print was, because that helps you be an informed citizen, and hopefully- Mm-hmm...
helps you make informed decisions, um, when you're voting, or just when you're existing [chuckles] in the economy. [scoffs] And so that's- Yeah... the goal. Yeah.
You also make a point in the book that GDP isn't really a good measurement- [coughs]... of, of the, of the economy, uh, anymore. Can you say more about that? Yeah, I'm not the first person [chuckles] to say that.
Uh, a lot of people would just be like, "This is not..." Like, you know, it's just not capturing the economy i- in a way that is most useful for understanding the needs and wants of, of the people, right? Mm-hmm.
So, like, it does a good job at capturing consumer spending, government spending, investment, exports and imports, but when you think about, like, what the average person is facing, like, they're facing healthcare costs, and elder care, and childcare.
Mm-hmm.
And like perhaps there's a better way to gauge, you know, the, the interaction of the average person with the economy, rather than this big metric of GDP, which, you know, the measurement can be a little funky sometimes and might not totally capture how people are feeling and how they're spending and what they're doing.
It, it does an okay job, but [chuckles] a lot of people- Yeah... think it doesn't do the best job. Mm-hmm. Um, okay.
So the book, your, your short-form videos, you have, you have a podcast, though you haven't updated it for, like, four months or so I think. Oh, my God, don't say that. [laughs] Um, [laughs] we can bleep that.
Uh, anyways, uh- I'm on... No, no, it's... I'm on break. I'm on break. You're on break. She's on break, everybody.
Uh, okay, book, short-form video, podcast, newsletter, all these different media where you do kind of express yourself in different ways, I think.
Like you were saying, the book is meant to be this static object, really accessible. The newsletter is maybe a little more, like, complex than the videos, which are, you know, pretty short and super digestible.
Um, tell me kind of the relationship between all the different media you put out and how this relates to your whole thing, like how this composes your whole thing. So the reason I've taken a break from the podcast- Mm...
and from making YouTubes is because I was having trouble figuring out how to do it in a way that was unique- Mm... in a way that was, like, really helping people.
And so my short-form videos I think are useful because, like, I am able to distill the day's news in an economic lens and hopefully give people something to chew on within a three-minute segment.
I hope to capture them on their daily scroll, and then they're like, "Oh, economics." And- Yeah... then hopefully they, you know- Which you do.
I mean, you've got, like, on Instagram alone, it's like 330,000 followers, and you get a lot of views. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. No, people, people, uh, have been very receptive, which I'm very grateful for.
And then the newsletter, um, is more of, like, the philosophical- Mm... exploration of the economy. So not just like, okay... It, it, it really is, like, the economy are people.
So, like, what is, what are people doing inside of the economy? And, like, what are people writing about what people are doing? Mm.
Like, I really love taking, [chuckles] you know, this week's think pieces and kind of tying a thread between all of them, because everybody- Mm...
sort of is saying the same thing [chuckles] a lot of the times, and it's really quite useful, I, I think, hopefully, for people to see how there's similarities between a lot of these more abstract think pieces.
Um, so those are... That's the short-form, and that's the newsletter.
And then the YouTube and the podcast, um, I'm trying to figure out how to sort of create like the Bill Nye the Science Guy, Reading Rainbow, Carl Sagan- Oh... aspects.
And it's just, like, I realized that I was getting caught in my own thesis. [chuckles] Like, I was getting caught in the attention economy.
I was getting totally captured by the algorithm and, like, feeling forced to post, post, post, and it's just like the quality was not great. And I was like, "I'm doing- Mm... a disservice to the audience.
I'm doing a disservice to the content." I've actually never talked about this publicly, um, sort [chuckles] of like why, why I did this. Um, I just have never acknowledged it actually. [chuckles] But, uh- Yeah...
and, and that was why I ended up taking a break from that.
But the main goal is to develop economic and financial education via media, and using it, um, to distill lessons in a way that is hopefully leaning toward artistic. [chuckles] Yeah.
Um, yeah. Well, no, this... Okay, so, uh, we'll ramble here for a second.
I, I feel like in preparing for this and, you know, trying to read some stuff other people have written on you or listening to podcasts you've been on- [laughs]...
and people always are referring to you as, like, the Gen Z economy whisperer, kind of, right? And that's how people have chosen to label you.
What it sounds like you're telling me now is that, like, that's kind of, like, this label that has been put on you, and you've been doing all this output across all these media, and now you're trying to, like, actually figure...
You, you're at, you're at a point of, like, needing to sharpen the point and, like, why am I doing X medium and Z medium and Y medium, and how do I, like, sharpen this into, like, a more legible
concept that's, like, really serving, not, I mean, serving you, but really serving the audience? Like, you're in kind of a, a phase of trying to figure that out.
Yeah, and I think the Gen Z thing happened 'cause I am, I'm an ancient Gen Z. [chuckles] And so- Yeah... uh, it became, I think, like, just the label, um, is like young person talks about young people. Yeah.
Wow, look at this. Which has been... [laughs] Yeah.
It's been fun, and I've been very grateful to, like, you know, be able to hopefully, um, share some of the things I hear from my audience and from the travels that I've done, from the stories of young people.
But yeah, like, my-That's just one part of it, is like- Yeah... okay, so [laughs] you know, everyone wants to understand younger generations and, uh, that's just, that's just one part of it.
But the whole goal I have is, um, really like, okay, so we have young people, they're feeling bad. What do we do about it? It's not just like going on shows- Mm-hmm... and being like, "The young people are sad."
It's like, how do we, you know, build a better economy for them, and build a better system and structure, and what are they struggling with? Mm-hmm.
And what is everybody struggling with in this time of like immense digital change and immense, um, [laughs] uncertainty from a policy level? And so I- a big goal of mine is just capturing that. Yeah. Yeah.
And then the mediums are important. And I was getting, um, I was getting lazy, and I was, uh- [laughs]... just like putting stuff up, and I was like, "This doesn't feel right.
I don't feel like it's the correct way to capture this." And I, I'm very resistant to, um, borrowing from other styles. Like- Mm...
you know, the talking head YouTube is very popular, and I just was like, I don't wanna be another talking head YouTube. Like, I wanna...
I think the main goal, if you're gonna use social media as a tool, and then also complain about how bad it is for people [laughs] like, you have to bring people somewhere. Mm.
You have to get them out of the digital world somehow, whether that be through a book, or whether that be through a video that brings them into the, the real world, rather than just some room where you're sitting and talking about things.
Um, so that's been a big effort, is, is like- Mm... how do I properly take people into the economy, teach them the lessons outside of a textbook? Uh, so yeah, it's very philosophical.
Obviously, like I, I [laughs] spend a lot of time in my brain. Yeah. But, um- No, wait, I- Yeah... okay. So, so on my... This is one of two podcasts I do. My other- Yeah...
thing is Creator Spotlight, which is a newsletter/podcast owned by Beehiiv, and, you know, I research the creator economy, what are creators, et cetera.
Um, but one of my big sh- shticks there is like defining creator, which I, I, I think I've read that, you know, people sometimes call you this, you sometimes balk at it.
Um, but the defi- [laughs] I kind of have two definitions, one of which is really broad, which is just like anybody contributing to the corpus of the internet, and then the second is a little more- Mm...
useful, and like a definition I came up with for like, okay, who are the people I interview for that podcast, and how... what are the questions I ask them?
Which is anybody, you know, creating and distributing digital media for an audience that they're trying to grow, um, in earnest that's beyond their immediate friends and family, who are s- also somehow monetizing it all.
Whether that's, you know, with typical like subscription or ad revenue, or even something as abstract as like just trying to build a presence to, as a resume to get a job, right?
So I think in this way, I definitely see you as a creator.
Bringing it back to, b- bringing it back to friction, I think a lot about texture in, in digital media, and like in, in newsletters, like with our newsletter, I- I think about it as like, have you ever been rock climbing?
Mm. Or do rock climbing? Yes, I love rock- J- Yeah. Yeah. Uh-huh. So, you know- Yeah... you ha- there's like a course or a problem that's laid out. Mm-hmm.
And like you don't wanna do one where it's just like a, a z- a zero, and it's just like basically a ladder straight up, right? Yeah. Like- Right... let's say a three- You're just like walking on the rock...
yeah, a three is much- Yeah... more compelling, where there's like, it's kind of a problem you have to figure out, and you, you, you, like you wanna do it. And I don't know. So it sounds like- Put slabs, yeah...
what you're trying to do is like figure out what the texture of your work is that draws people in, and like, I don't know, makes it like... What's, what, what is the unique texture and style of your work?
Which having read parts of your book and, you know, your newsletters, whatever, like to me it is this like real world analogies that kind of like, I don't know, take these complex things and make them simple.
But I, I don't know. I, I, [laughs] I guess I'm just, I'm just curious to like workshop this with you a little bit. Like, is it- [laughs]... do you think it is YouTube?
Clearly, you love writing and you've published a book. Yeah. I think you've hinted you're working on another one. Um- Yeah... but yeah, is it, is it books and video? Is it more video? Is it more books? Like, what is it?
I don't know. Um, I mean, I, I've loved writing since the beginning of my life. So I, I, you know, I published- Mm-hmm...
my first book when I was eight, and m- I think my mom was the only person who [laughs] who read it- Was it Little Penguin, what was it?... because it was bound. Yeah, Little Penguin, yeah. Um- Yeah...
so I've just, yeah, I've written forever, and was a big like voracious reader, and still am. Same. Uh, and s- yeah, yeah. I, I, it's just like everybody's already said everything.
[laughs] Um, and I think it's so beautiful to go back and, and see that. James Baldwin has a great quote about that. You know, like every sadness, every heartbreak that you think that you've al- Mm...
alone have experienced, like somebody's already written about it. He said it so much more beautifully than I just said. Yeah. But...
And, and then I think like my thing is we have so many powerful mediums to communicate with people right now. AI could disrupt all of this. I have no idea.
Like, it could [laughs] you know, deep fake Kyla could be making videos here soon, which would make me quite sad. No, let's hope not. Um, I hope not. But yeah, I mean, I think that there's a lot of power in video.
And, um, when I first started out, my videos were like super weird. Mm-hmm. So I was dressing up as Jerome Powell, who's the chair of the Federal Reserve. Um- [laughs]... I dr- like I was doing- I've seen these...
all of these skits. Oh, I... So [laughs] it's actually kind of funny.
My friend Regina, uh, was talking about it the other day, and she's like, "It's so weird that you got your start like pretending to be Jerome Powell, and now you have like op-eds in The New York Times."
[laughs] Well, this, to me, this is like, uh, like Jack Corbett from Planet Money. This... He was one of the first- Yeah... like kind of like- Jack's so great... finance creator type- Yeah...
of people, I guess, uh, that, that I, I, I first started like learning from- He's wonderful... where I was like, wow, this is such a good way to translate these concepts into like- Yes...
a scroll stopping way that I can- Yeah... understand as somebody- Dan Tumi... who doesn't know anything about this. Mm-hmm. Yeah, Dan Tumi from Morning Brew is like another- Dan Tumi's great, yeah. Yeah.
So like they're, they're... Dan Tumi and I did a couple videos together at the beginning of- Mm... like when we were both first starting, which is so crazy. But it was like, yeah, these skits.
And so for me, like I wanna make sure I'm always, you know, keeping up with style and pushing kind of the boundaries of like how you can talk about the economy. Mm-hmm.
Because what's sort of interesting, like Dan Tumi has the incredible channel, Good Work- Yeah...
where I think they like really push the boundaries of business, and like talking about economics, and talking about things in that lens.
But I think that there's a lot of-Like, the thing that always blew my mind is nobody really makes art about economics. We all just kind of treat it as this, like, really static, um, archaic, boring thing.
Um- Dusty science. Right.
And so f- and there's, like, a really cool way to make art about it, and so that's my goal is to, like, make art about the economy and do it in a way that reaches people, develop curriculum around it.
You know, just how do you [chuckles] sort of just help people understand the world that they're in and bring them to the point where they want to understand that? Yeah. Um, just a couple more questions. One, you did...
So in that Friction essay, in the footnotes, you do explicitly hint that you're, you're working on the outline of a new book maybe around these same themes. What can you say about that? Yeah.
I can't say a lot, um, but I am just, like, working on [chuckles] Newsletter subscribers [chuckles] will know that- [laughs]...
uh, I kinda end up writing about, like, almost the same thing a lot of the times but through a different lens. Um, so a lot of like- Very much kind of like- Yeah. 'Cause, like, you just have an obsession. Mm-hmm.
And so my obsession is, like, digital media and how that's impacting young people and how it's impacting the economy, and so just a lot of my essays are coalescing around that point.
And once you have, uh, [chuckles] a mass of essays, they can turn into a book. Uh, so yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Classic, classic, uh, way of writing a book, a little bit at a time. Um, okay.
Also, I think last week you were at the 2025 Reagan National Economic Forum, which I had not heard of- Yeah... until I started preparing for this. It's new. You were moderating. Yeah. Uh-huh.
Uh, scene report, vibe report, what's going on, observations, tell us about it. Sure. Yeah, so it was the first RNF. Okay. Um, so, so yeah.
And then I got to moderate a panel with, uh, Douglas Holtz-Eakin [chuckles] and Jason Furman, and we were the opener at 7:00 AM, and it was really cool because- 7:00 AM, wow. Yeah, we were the coffee conversation. Yeah.
Um, and then after we did our panel, Doug and Jason totally killed it. They're incredible thinkers with such a breadth of experience. Like, Doug was working during the Bush administration.
Jason was Obama's, uh, chair of the Council of Economic Advisers and teaches at Harvard. Um, so just, like, a wealth of knowledge.
But after our panel, Jamie Dimon, the CEO of JPMorgan, came on, and he just [chuckles] was like, "We need to get it together, America. Like, you know, we don't need to worry about China.
Like, our enemy is the enemy within." [chuckles] And it's like, "Oh, okay." And so the whole rest of the day was kind of that. Like, Marc Andreessen came on from a16z, was saying quite similar things.
Uh, there was a bunch of, like, just really excellent panels, and I think it was the first time that people have kind of been honest about some of the policies that are being put forward in terms of, like, the impact that it's going to have on the economy, the impact that it's going to have on trade.
And so it was an excellent forum, and, uh, yeah, it was very, very interesting to hear all of those perspectives. Nice. Um, what do you mean they were being honest about some of the policies? Like, what, in what way?
Well, you host podcasts, right? Mm-hmm. So you know that people kind of, like, dance around topics- Talk to the book... sometimes. Mm-hmm. Yeah. They weren't... I didn't notice that as much. I...
There was some stuff where it was like, like Jamie Dimon was talking about how the wages for lower, um, income workers haven't grown over the past 20 years, which is just, like, factually not true. [chuckles] Yeah.
Uh, so there was, like, some stuff like that where it's like, "Okay." But he's, I think, preparing for a [chuckles] presidential run. Um, so yeah, I... He said he wasn't, but I was like- But he's talking...
you're talking, you're talking like you are. And it would be smart. Like, if you look at Mark Carney in Canada- Mm-hmm... Jamie Dimon could run that same playbook. Hmm. Um, okay, last thing.
Uh, we spent a lot of time, maybe somewhat pessimistically, talking about [chuckles] frictionlessism, perhaps too long. Uh, what are you... That was maybe, yeah, pessimistic. What are you optimistic about right now?
I mean, I'm always optimistic about, like, the human spirit. Mm-hmm. Unfortunately, I do love C.S... I mean, not unfortunately. I love C.S. Lewis. Yeah, no shame. And I love... Yeah. Like, I, I just, I,
I find a lot of hope in reading about the past and knowing that we've been here before. It's just, like, we have new demons that we have- Mm-hmm... to figure out where they fit and how we're going to manage them.
And I think right now there's a lot of, um, ostriching. Like, people are just putting their heads in the sand. Mm-hmm.
And it's easy to do that, and it's much easier to go on a podcast and talk about it versus, like, [chuckles] actually doing something about it. Yeah.
And so I'm, I'm optimistic that if we can sort of talk about these problems, begin to understand what they are, the issues that we're facing, you know, be able to have a podcast about them where we're able to talk in detail about where the issues are stemming from, then, like, we can provide solutions from, from that.
So I think it's great that we have the problems clearly defined because that means that the solutions are coming. Like, there's no easy answers, but there are simple answers, as Ronald Reagan once said.
[chuckles] I think, too... I mean, this reminds me of the Baldwin quote you said where it's like all, every emotion has been felt before, and like- Yeah. [chuckles]... the idea that there's nothing new.
It's like that's the, the point. I mean, people have probably been saying that for three f- million years, you know, th- there's nothing new.
[chuckles] But I think the point of that is it's like th- there's nothing new, but y- you just have to tell it in new ways because not everybody is reading those same books, right?
And you might read the, like, Ulysses, and you're like, "Wow, I relate to this," whatever it is, some book from like 100 years ago. Yeah.
But, like, o- other people aren't gonna read that, but maybe they'll read you, and the point is that- Right... like, you tell these stories and surface these ideas- Hear this...
and these solutions, which may be the same solutions as previously, but people just forgot them or have never read them, so. Eventually they'll stick. Yeah. Eventually they'll stick. That's a good place to end it.
This has been Taste Lead. Kyla, thank you for coming on. Is there anything else you'd like to plug, though- Thank you... before we stop? Um, so I do have a book. [laughs] It's available wherever books are sold.
I have a newsletter, kyla.substack.com, and I do post short-form videos across the short-form video sites. Check it out. Listeners, we will see you next week. Thank you.
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