378
the wall street journal today literally asking "but what do dead kids mean for the GDP?"
(sh.itjust.works)
At least dead kids are giving value to the shareholders
/s
this post was submitted on 18 Mar 2026
378 points (98.2% liked)
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Orphan Crushing Machine
That is, basically, how the MBA class operates. Everything comes down to what they can do to exploit a situation.
I don’t think OP knows what literally means. The wsj did not ask the question in the title. It asked a different question.
Thanks for the link, this was a good read. OP’s title still sucks.
Oh I’m with you, but I stopped fighting for the word “literally” when the damn dictionaries gave up and added shit like this:
2 informal : in effect : VIRTUALLY —used in an exaggerated way to emphasize a statement or description that is not literally true or possible
I literally died of embarrassment.
… will literally turn the world upside down to combat cruelty or inju
So literally is literally when not literally now?
Literally.
I still think there are different standards for filler words during conversations and titles in writing. In this case, the post title is simply a lie. For example:
Title: Florida Man Actually has Three Legs.
Content: guy’s got such a big dick, he’s practically a tripod.
In this case, that’s a misleading title.
Edit: I also wanted to add that a title is parsed on its own, without context. Of course, “literally” can mean “not literally”, but one needs context to figure that out. In this title, such context is not there.
In English, the plural "there are" is collapsing into the singular "there's" such as "there's five cars over there". A lot of language changes happen this way. It annoys people who think about language.
"There's" is at least easier to say and is only a grammar issue, English has always been really flexible about grammar. The "literally" thing is lexical, they just straight-up turned a useful word into a decorative but meaningless one. Now I always have to ask people if they mean "literally" literally, only I can't know if they'll answer me correctly because if they're misusing "literally" then they probably don't know the literal definition of "literally". It's insidious!
It's very unlikely that a galaxy collision would meaningfully affect anything for us except our view of the night sky (over millions of years).
Well over the course of the collision, the solar system could get ejected from the galaxy. But also the collision is predicted to occur nearly 10 billion years from now so the sun would have already consumed Earth. Overall, probably a bad thing for the economy
smh somebody needs to reinsert the solar system back into the VHS player, it came out again
E: ejecto seato cuz!
Even if the solar system was ejected, I don’t think anything would change. As long as no large objects came into the solar system to disrupt our orbit of the sun, we probably wouldn’t notice.
I believe in a star trek future that lasts billions of years. I mean hopefully we're exploring other galaxies at that point, but if we're still only galactic, losing the cradle of humanity would be devastating
It depends whether we're observing, involved, or committed. (A la TV viewer, TV chef, chicken)
This is why my Dad thinks climate change is hysteria. WSJ ran an article (basically) positing that geoengineering will fix it anyway, and it’s best to pump the economy (with oil) to get there.
…Which I was particularly hurt by.
I've been reading geoengineering papers for a decade+, and the most practical theoretical ones boil down to desperate plans like “bathe the South Pole in sulfuric acid rain” that are still so heinously expensive it’s basically sci fi. And that’s assuming “tipping points” don’t materialize. Gah.
There's also the, cause massive algae blooms in-between shipping lanes to try to soak up lots of carbon.
The method is by dumping millions of tons of iron ore dust into the open ocean.
One guy tested it, and it did cause an algae bloom. He didn't do smaller scale tests, just dumped a ton or so of iron ore dust into the ocean.
Doesn't all that algae kill off water life?
So using this logic 9-11-2001 was ultimately good for the economy
It’s been commonly held for a long time that the deficit spending and industrial gear up for World War 2 are what finally shook the US out of the Great Depression, which has created a deeply-seated association between war and economic stimulation. It’s worth revisiting that question for today’s extremely different conflicts and economy. It may not be true anymore, and if not, that seems worth knowing.
Similarly, there’s a long history of warfare driving technological innovation. I think this one is even less controversial. It’s just a fact. But pointing that out doesn’t mean I’m recommending we go to war for the sake of innovation.
Sounds like it, they seem to think that the hate that motivates people to work harder for no extra pay out of revenge against the current boogeyman is a good way to extract more from "the cattle".
Rule 34 applies.
No, not that one. Rule of acquisition #34.
"Peace is good for business"?
No, that's the 35th rule.
Oh, what's 34?
They must have meant #35
The DOW, the DOW right now...
We're all just a number on a spreadsheet to them. A unit of input labor, a liability, etc. You shove this number of laborers in one side, and you get this amount of profit out the other side.
Usernames to mistake for communities
So wait... If Hell is good for the economy... That must mean the economy...
Keep going! You're so close!
*
literally asked
It's a newspaper: how else are they gonna ask?
Well actually, newspapers are incapable of posing questions as they are not sentient beings
They have the most disgusting reporting. It arrives at my office, and sometimes when I want to punish myself or know my enemy I’ll crack it open.
March 14 – 15
today
this is ticking off my "bot repost!!" heuristics...
At the end of the day, we have to consider that the orphan crushing machine also generates jobs.
and yet its sooo wrong to shoot pharma CEOs