33 Comments
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Ken Klippenstein's avatar

Hey all, will answer any questions you might have here. Please become a paid subscriber if you can!

Pete Gaines's avatar

I already have because I'm a good person. Can't speak for the other people here, though.

Anyways, I don't know if this is a question or just a gripe, but I genuinely don't understand how this "quiet quitting" thing has taken such root as an "issue" among the, well not even manager class, but the billionaire owner/majority investor class. I know I shouldn't be surprised they're all this obtuse and as someone who has worked in corporate America for the past 25 years I *do* believe that benefits and corporate culture matter to some extent, but how are these people THIS committed to the idea that "doing one's job adequately but not really more than that" is some sort of huge crisis? Anyways big fan long time listener I'll hang up and listen to your answer

Ken Klippenstein's avatar

Thanks Pete. My sense is the labor market is unusually tight and so employers are paranoid that workers are getting lazy since they finally have some options (relatively speaking)

Adam_Freeman's avatar

great article man!

Jason's avatar

Nice juxtaposition of 'quiet quitting' and then two US senators high-fiving a rule that prevents them from doing meaningful work while still cashing checks... I guess they need to work on the "quiet" part!

Good read.

gadflybytes's avatar

Excellent synopsis. Thank you. I am baffled by the banal acceptance of war criminals on panels and in media by the general public. I get why the lackeys of empire obsequiously fawn over people like Kissinger.

NLTownie's avatar

I don’t understand why lackeys of empire fawn over Kissinger. He’s not the least bit repentant. I would bet he’d do it all over again given a chance. I seriously would appreciate some insight.

Seth Sam's avatar

Just going by the general tone of these panels, they’re not the least bit concerned with Kissinger’s war crimes. Obviously, economic growth and wealth enrichment is the central animating factor. Otherwise, none of this stuff would be tolerated; instead, it’s the whole point. You watch, when (if) Kissinger (ever) dies, you will be hard-pressed to find any mainstream criticism of his record.

Ken Klippenstein's avatar

Glad you found it helpful, Jennie

Ferd finster's avatar

Why don’t They just make corporate slavery legal. Indentured servitude. Provide housing and food and healthcare. Free cable, internet and gym. Then every one should be happy. We can work till we die.

Ken Klippenstein's avatar

They’re working on it !

Steve Saideman's avatar

I notice you don't say what Kissinger said. He is wildly overrated as a font of wisdom that people are likely to overreact. Still, I am curious if K had anything interesting to say.

Jazzme's avatar

Where is the sanity....the protectors of the 1%ers are psychopaths.

Chloe Humbert's avatar

"conducting hourlong, open-ended meetings with no agenda" ???

This sounds like it's straight out of that declassified 1944 sabotage manual!!!

Did they also recommend "complain against ersatz materials” and “bring up irrelevant issues as frequently as possible”?

Who needs quiet quitting when you can create loud learned helplessness in your firm?

Christopher Brunet's avatar

> No, Davos is not a secret plan to raise a stadium of babies in Matrix-style incubator pods

Easy to dismiss concerns about WEF cabal: by building a strawman and making it seem like schizo tinfoil hat stuff. Classic.

I am old enough to remember when liberals stood against the elite globalist class, rather than running cover for them

Ken Klippenstein's avatar

The whole article is critical of Davos' agenda!

Christopher Brunet's avatar

Nominally.

But when you write an article on the "Top 5 creepiest panels at Davos" without mentioning say, the panel with Tony Blair calling for centralized digital database to track who's taken what injections, it makes me think you're running cover for the authoritarian agenda. You're conspicuously ignoring the most insidious parts of the conference, dismissing them as tinfoil hat conspiracy.

Focus on Henry Kissinger and Quiet Quitting instead!! That's what really matters! Yea, sure.

Edit: Ohhhhhh I get it now: https://twitter.com/kenklippenstein/status/1436185671912370183

Pete Gaines's avatar

Man you might wanna look into antipsychotics

Andrew Cockburn's avatar

A couple of years old, but a perfect analysis of Davis https://youtu.be/GeykREAlYSg

Pete Gaines's avatar

Sorry, got to the point where he called Davos a "hard core leftist" thing and laughed so hard I closed the tab.

gadflybytes's avatar

Were they also discussing a digital central bank currency? With an end to paper currency, we can say good bye to any semblance of privacy in transactions. Could this be why decentralized digital currencies were undermined, bitcoin, or appropriated, ethereum? One sticking point to that motivation...how would the Davos crowd pay for their party favors?

Our Better Angels's avatar

Love the bit about Grandma having to go back to work. They might, just MIGHT have to fix the little problem of age discrimination in the workplace for that to happen. I'm in my fifties and have sent out hundreds of resumes and have only gotten two interviews in over 6 months. Grandma may WANT to work, but will anyone hire her?

Uncivil's avatar

I felt visceral disgust reading this. Thanks for enduring all of that conference so we don't have to.

terry smythe's avatar

When the Time Study guys at ALCOA came around with their clipboards & stopwatches, I'd immediately slow down 30%. My version of quiet quitting. Fuck 'em.

Adam_Freeman's avatar

Also if these dumb idiots who have a bunch of paper money think they can stop onshoreism with media manipulation and stock trades they have some hard walls they are speeding towards lmao. Excited to watch them 💥 crash!!!

Susan Herrick Luraschi's avatar

Thanks, Ken, for your demystification of the CIA, etc. Such a good reminder.

Robert G.'s avatar

Spoiler alert for an 1891 novel:

At the end of Dorian Gray, the picture is beautiful again and hanging above the now-hideous corpse of Dorian Gray himself. Therefore, the picture was not a good comparison for Kissinger's appearance, unless you thought he was "in all the wonder of his exquisite youth and beauty". The picture is at its most hideous earlier in the final chapter.

FunDoug's avatar

I thought your comments on majority report were prescient, that a fanatical devotion to 2% inflation, somewhat disturbing as I read the front page of the WSJ today!