Calling stuff a "conspiracy theory" is just a thought-terminating cliché, and measuring the ability of humans to conspire [0] by equating that ability with stuff like Elvis still being alive isn't the attempt of an argument, it's just a slogan.
[0] for which there is no communication between them required, or even conscious desire to "conspire" of single one of them. Consider how mobbing can go. People don't go "so, we're all racist, and this new guy is X, so I propose you are kinda sarcastic to him, and I forget to remind him of the thing tomorrow". It doesn't even happen that way in bad fiction, much less so in real life.
Or put more positively, consider how teamwork and healthy group behavior can go, too. Most of it is simply done, gets fine-tuned by doing, and only some of it is thought, spoken or written about, usually in hindsight, often as a rationalization.
What is "cliché" is to offer up "McKinsey is this shady organization we all hate!" as some sort of evidence that they could conspire to organize this sort of thing.
Getting back to the original thesis of the article, the author is stating that people making the decision on RTO (the "elites", another nebulous scary term...) are doing so because commercial real estate is so critical to their decision making process. If anyone can provide any evidence that McKinsey could orchestrate such a thing (with actual details), I'm all ears.
The claim was that "the world is not this coordinated", not that McKinsey specifically is orchestrating it all by themselves. And my response to that claim was that it doesn't even have to be "coordinated". Do you disagree? I'm talking about the most rudimentary social dynamics we can observe and take part in daily. We can "conspire with" total strangers even, ad hoc, if we both realize our interests are otherwise endangered. It starts with body language and tone of voice, not memos saying "let's do a crime".
Yes, I thoroughly believe that behaviors can be coordinated without explicit agreements. That is essentially what the entire field of economics is about: decomposing how people respond to different incentives to act in an "agglomerated" fashion.
The thing I hate about articles like this one, and claims like "look at the shady stuff McKinsey has done" is that they never really even attempt to provide evidence about how the incentives around propping up com. real estate values would be enough to sway decision makers. They just try to tie some loose threads together, and use scary terms like "elites" as if all of the elites acted with one mind.
There have been plenty of comments elsewhere in this thread making the argument that the connection between com. real estate values and people making the actual RTO decisions is far too tenuous to have that be a primary motivator. Also, having been a director and had lots of interactions with C-suite folks, I find it laughable to think that of all the concerns high-level execs have that "helping the stock portfolios of other rich people" is their primary driver.
It’s not really about the numbers. My pile of money at retirement would definitely be larger if I moved across the pond. But here my children walk themselves to school from the age of six. I don’t worry about them getting killed by a madman. And even the homeless get healthcare, including functional mental health support. Things no employer can offer in the US.
This a very reasonable viewpoint. As a different personal opinion, I am glad that I live on my side of the pond.
I am in my early 50s, and having worked in tech for the last 24 (with sane hours and never at the FAANG salaries) I own my condo in a nice town, my kids college is paid for and my personal accounts are well into 7-digits.
This is not all roses: schools in the US stink (I have grown up on the other side of the pond and was lucky to get a great science education in school so I can see the difference), politics are polarized, supermarket produce is mediocre, etc.
The biggest issue for me though is that I suspect that the societies on both sides of the pond are going to go through major changes in the next 10-15 years and many social programs will become unaffordable. I see governments of every first world country making crazy financial and societal choices so rather than depending on government to keep me alive and well I much prefer US salaries allowing me to have money in my own hands. I can put some of that into gold or Bitcoin, or buy an inexpensive apartment in a quiet country with decent finances and reasonable healthcare. Not being totally beholden to the government is what helps me sleep well at night. My 2c.
Im in western europe and I would never let my children walk themselves to school at 6. europe is far from being a safe place minus some eastern europe.
That depends on location within Western Europe. Where I live (also W. Europe), it's common for kids to walk to school from the age of 6, or soon after if the kids are not yet mature enough.
In similar places in the US it may not even be the risk of criminals that is the largest threat. It may simply be that the road network is built for cars only, with few safe ways to cross roads without a vehicle.
By comparison, where I live, parents are expected to act as a kind of traffic police a couple of mornings every year. That means that every place where the kids have to cross the road will have an adult blocking all cars from passing even if a kid is merely getting close (even if the speed limit is only 30km/h or 20mph)
In other words, pedestrians get the highest priority while motorists are treated as second class.
Nation wide, about 50-60% of the kids will walk or ride a bike to school in my country (and those who don't tend to either live far from the school or in a higher crime area).
Compared to ~10% in the US.
Also, while in the US kids of low income households are more likely to (have to) walk to school.
In my country, it's possible that the relationship is, if anything, inversed. Having the kids walk to school is seen by many resourceful families as healthy, both from the physical activity in a screen-rich world and to teach them to be independent and confident.
That means that in neighborhoods with a large percentage of such parents the parents are likely to ensure that the route to school is safe and walkable for kids.
> It's not that Google doesn't know technically how to give good results.
Can you explain this sentiment? I’m a Googler and I believe the incentives bias very heavily towards offering the best organic search. When the user goes elsewhere (and quality competition exists) Google loses everything…
I, and perhaps the other people on the thread, distrust Google actually trying hard to give you the best organic search.
The monetary incentives are simply too large to circumvent imo
If they really are, then perhaps the problem is that there's so much attention and competition to game the search engine, that it's an impossible-to-beat cat and mouse game. Due to their success, they're basically guaranteed to constantly have "parasites" trying to game the system to their advantage. (cf. the SEO industry and companies like ahrefs)
I don’t think it is, but I’ve seen someone make a browser extension to transparently add query parameters to always exclude some sites. I imagine doing the opposite (for some queries search only this list of sites) is also achievable.
How can you call literally feeding the people “broadly unproductive”? It’s low margin, but you can’t have a society supporting your margins without someone doing the bottom jobs.
I suggest you read or watch something about McKinsey.