Atlas Shrugged: The Mocking

Tuesday, May 19, 2015

The Release of Flatus by the Cerebellum As Emitted By Megan McArdle

Shorter Megan McArdle: Workers are to blame for poor working conditions.

Money quote:
[As] employees, we want to have maximum freedom to take better jobs, to withhold our labor until we get a better deal, or to take time off for stuff we think is important, while enjoying maximum income stability. As customers, however, we want folks who will work cheaply with no commitments and yet show up reliably, which is why we hate the cable company so much. The institutions that intermediate these two desires are employers: governments and companies. 
...  
Because we have these intermediaries standing between us and the other side, transforming the trades into something more suited to our tastes, it's easy to generate contradictory demands as voters, ones that ratchet up that risk because we ask officials to guard our interests as consumers as well as our interests as workers.
I think she's getting stupider. She quotes Arnold Kling and Tyler Cowen, blathers on at random for a while, and then it's cocktail hour. Bottoms up!

15 comments:

Downpuppy said...

Megan's mess is more like a release of squid ink, trying to hide the ongoing class struggle.

I don't get the point. Her readers are heavily invested in not seeing the obvious, and don't need her help. I suppose somebody has sent out the order to pump up the volume, pump up the noise, but really, this might as well be a random letter string.

Kathy said...

"As customers...we want folks who will work cheaply with no commitments and yet show up reliably..."

That's more idiotic bullshit. Most (non rich) people are happy to get value for their money: that is, pay a bit more for a quality product. It "the rich" who are both greedy and horribly stingy. I suppose its why they are rich.

As Susan says, Arglebargle is getting dumber even as we watch.

Downpuppy said...

Krikey, she's beating egg whites for pancakes - http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2015-05-22/friday-food-post-what-to-make-this-memorial-day-weekend

Susan of Texas said...

She has buttermilk + baking soda, baking powder, and beaten egg whites--three different ways to rise the batter.

Which might be understandable because the ratio of flour to liquid is very low. I use one egg and 3/4 c. milk for one cup of flour. You beat the wet ingredients in one bowl, whisk the dry ingredients in another, whisk well, and voila you're done.

1 c. flour
1 Tb sugar
1 Tb baking powder
1/2 tsp. salt
1 egg
2 Tb. oil
3/4 c. milk

I don't know if it's the best but it's the best I've found.

And most of the rest is the same stuff she says in every single food post--Aleppo, chicken thighs, chickpeas. And a potato salad that scares me a little. It must weigh 8 pounds. 28 ounces of dairy, an entire pound of bacon, most of a carton of eggs.

Downpuppy said...

Just having a recipe seems like too much work. I'm not a big fan of consistency in pancakes. With white flour, whole wheat & sometimes a bit of (Yes, I confess) mix, they'll be anything from brown & crepey to high & fluffy.

Because why not? They're pancakes. Mood & toppings vary.

Susan of Texas said...

I always have mix around for when I run out of eggs or milk and must have pancakes.

I like the variety too. Sometimes I'll add more milk and fry in butter and eat them thin and slightly crunchy on the edges with applesauce or a fruit filling, almost like a fat crepe. Or I'll add less milk and have them thick with lots of butter and syrup.

Not to mention the silver dollars dunked in syrup, the Mickey Mouse heads (never very successful) and the face pancakes.

I think I will make pancakes for dinner.

cynic said...

Shorter shorter McMegan:
I got mine. Screw You.

Anonymous said...

She has buttermilk + baking soda, baking powder, and beaten egg whites--three different ways to rise the batter.

My brother-in-law makes his pancakes this way and they are great. He learned it from his parents who ran a summer camp and fed the little campers blueberry pancakes regularly. The BIL is still amazed at how his dad could separate dozens of eggs and whip the whites with a whisk instead of a mixer.

Emily

Susan of Texas said...

Wow, that's dedication. Mine is very quick but I don't know if it is better.

Kathy said...

Krusteaz.

Mr. Wonderful said...

Late getting here, but Sweet Baby Ray's bbq sauce? Officer, arrest that fraud. Anyone who fancies herself a cook, and doesn't make her own bbq sauce (which literally consists of putting pantry ingredients in a pot and heating and stirring) should be ashame--

Oh, wait. It's Megan. Never mind.

Batocchio said...

"As customers...we want folks who will work cheaply with no commitments and yet show up reliably..."

Katy covered some of this already, but wow. McArdle, ever the narcissist, assumes that everyone is as venal as she is. Too bad her column can't be titled honestly – something like, "Unexamined Class Biases by a Selfish, Plutocratic Dolt."

Susan of Texas said...

It's so funny when she appeals to everyone's lowest instincts. "You don't want to be held accountable for your mistakes, do you?? So don't hold me accountable!"

aimai said...

As employees we want to...not be slaves or serfs. Is this really such an unusual request that she has to balance it, or offset it, by insisting that as consumers we want to enslave our working selves to get a better deal?

Clever Pseudonym said...

"As customers, we want peons we don't have to think of as human beings."

And since when is any work not a commitment?