➺ January 22, 2026

Hey {{ first_name | Neighbor }}. The other day I took an angry afternoon walk after spending my morning answering emails. A mile or so in, I came to a place where two paths diverged in a wood. I took the one less traveled.

And it made no particular difference. The two paths converged 30 feet later. – AB

➺ Everything You Wanted to Know: So, yeah, our new “LUSTFUL YEARNING SURVEY” is about white-collar sex (the kind with a GCal invite). Participate to get the results – or become a member.

➺ Passing Thought: I see a lot of people talking about how to get a passive income, but I don’t want one. I want an aggressive income.

Want to earn up to $200-an-hour for your insights, get three free months of Upper Middle’s member-only content, and get half off our (pretty cheap, tbh) $50 annual membership? Join Upper Middle Research, our professional research platform.

What we’re drinking about while talking.

➽ Playing Operation
Why are we pretending to have coherent jobs? 
In a new paper, a Brown University sociologist proposes an “occupational similarity index” measuring how similar the work done by different professionals is, using self-reported task data from roughly 20 million workers in the American Community Survey. The results suggest many white-collar jobs aren’t really jobs at all – at least not in the sense of having consistent work attached to a title. This is most pronounced in business operations roles, where the study finds minimal task overlap among people labeled strategist, analyst, senior analyst, or coordinator, and similarly low overlap among those with associate, manager, or lead in their title. Why do these titles exist at all?

The study suggests promotions function as non-monetary incentives, allowing firms to reward workers without clarifying pay expectations, a dynamic reinforced by the finding that titles with lower internal similarity exhibit higher earnings inequality. Workers accept these titles because they narrativize careers built on recursive work – work about work – making them sound more coherent than they are. Sense-making labor is valuable, but, as it turns out, barely makes sense.

➽ Eccentric Cities
Why is the smartest man in fashion betting against subtlety?
Thanks to the sadly relentless “stealth wealth” trend, many HBO subscriber believe the wealthy camouflage themselves by dressing in expensive but simple Loro Piano ish. Sometimes, sure, but it's an aberration. Historically speaking, when the rich wanted to confound people, they dress all crazy-like. Dior designer Jonathan Anderson knows this. It’s why, he just sent a phalanx of yellow-wigged, be-cloaked, sack-tailored aristo-punks¹ down a runway in Paris. He's reviving Vivienne Westwood’s old project: making clothes for the disaffected rich. Rather than leaning on plaid and leather, Anderson takes a more Gallic approach, iterating on the outfits worn by the generation of bohemian artists living in Le Marais apartments paid for by their fathers (with a few Regency flourishes thrown in for the would-be British rakes).

The return of eccentricity is not, thank goodness, about authenticity. It’s about having fun while short-circuiting interpretation. Anderson isn’t rejecting stealth wealth so much as restoring it to its historical form: dazzle camouflage.

➽ Safe Bet
Why aren’t your friends tipping you off?
On January 7, Chris Hayes taped an appearance on The Late Show at 5:30 p.m. A few hours later, a friend texted him a screenshot of a Kalshi betting market based on whether he’d mention Trump, China, or affordability on air. Hayes was shocked. "What really stunned me was that this wasn’t a future event. It had already happened." He was even more stunned when the market grew to almost $900,000. (And, no, he didn't place a bet.)

But Hayes is not the most compelling character in the story. The most compelling character is the dude that sent the screenshot, who found himself in the position to monetize proximity to power/attention at zero risk. Betting market operators either assume equal access to information or, more likely, don't care that some of their users are taking an open book test and others are not. As these markets scale, they won’t democratize futurecasting, which is their big pitch. They’ll financialize being well connected.

The “LUSTFUL YEARNING SURVEY” is an attempt to understand what is attractive to members of the Oat Milk Elite and what, if anything, we’re willing to do about it. Full results will be shared with Upper Middle Research members and those that complete the survey.

CHOOSING AN ADULT EXTRACURRICULAR

Well after graduation, high achievers continue seeking extra credit in the form of adult extracurriculars: socially sanctioned solo pursuits that ensure no civic-minded smoothie drinker ever has to sit alone with his thoughts. To remain defensible to partners, spouses, and coworkers, these activities must:

➺ Require work.
➺ Require investment.
➺ Produce nothing².

Participation in various types of extracurriculars (see below) shifts as the compulsively well-hydrated age, facing time constraints and physical limitations. By their late 30s and early 40s, avoiding introspection becomes impossible and a crisis ensues..

Self-Help
Meditating, journaling, lighting candles, mindfulnessing, and engaging in other therapeutic practices while making a daily practice of gently correcting better-looking friends.

Self-Expression
Gallery wall planning, shelf styling, playlist creation, coffee-table book arranging, and other forms of curation that invite personal questions with compelling, tking answers.

Self-Discipline
Cold showers, intermittent fasting, rigid morning routines, and light cock and ball torture performed in the hope pain – correctly administered – might finally build some character.

Self-Motivation
Building a social presence, moderating panels, and facilitating professional groups. Expressing dissatisfaction with doing paid work accretive to large corporations by doing unpaid work accretive to large corporations.

Self-Aggrandizement
Running marathons, competing in Ironmans, writing a novel in a month, and watching the AFI Top 100. Competing with no one in particular while filling a calendar light on social engagements.

Self-Sabotage
Calling home, monitoring an ex’s LinkedIn, checking crypto prices, practicing Judaism, and other activities that invariably lead to self-contempt.

Freaking the Fuck Out

Enjoying Upper Middle? Please share with your friends. It makes a huge difference for us and allow you to gently mock the very basic people you love so dearly. We did you a favor and pre-wrote the email….

Don’t retreat into econospeak.

The World Economic Forum in Davos is where the rich and powerful go to tell on themselves. 

Here's what's most telling: There are conflicts, but very few fistfights. Imagine a Davos for religion, or justice, or sex, or culture, or meaning. The attendees would die on hills rather than politely differing in a valley. But that's not how Davos Man do. A fully financialized human, Davos Man calmly econospeaks into his lavalier mic and sounds... adult. 

The econospeak taught in the University of Chicago’s econ department, which John D. Rockefeller bankrolled on the condition it provide post-hoc justifications for unjustifiable wealth, is no further from Orwellian newspeak than “efficiencies” is from “layoffs.” The idea that anyone would root for a native speaker is, frankly, insane. But here we are, countless NYT, WSJ, and FT readers rooting for Davos Man to talk down America’s orange kaiju before he stomps out the global financial system.

Given the choice between technocratic hedging and incoherent roaring, we (educated and credentialed types) invariably run for the hedges. But the danger isn’t Trump alone – it’s the temptation to respond to him by retreating further into the language and mental models that created the wealth inequalities which fuel his brand of populism. Econospeak has been the language of the status quo for a long time, but it plainly isn’t up to the task of describing a better world. If anything, it has created a society full of people whose success can be measured and whose disappointment cannot.³

The choice between cold calculation and hot temper is a trap.

Most oat milk elites learn econospeak in college despite the fact that the college experience – for those fortunate enough to get the Hollywood version – is not best understood in economic terms. College takes place primarily in what Jürgen Habermas calls "lifeworld," a domain of meaning governed by relationships, ideas, and activities rather than metrics. It's fairly easy to make an economic argument that college is a waste of time, but Habermas would counter convincingly that it's a productive waste of time. Not everything can be measured.

The problem – as new grads figure out by mid-August – is those things that can't be measured can't be justified to worried parents demanding a plan and or bosses demanding "transparency.” As soon as we enter the “real world,” we’re incentivized to lean on econospeak in order to sound like adults. After all, it’s hard to secure respect, much less employment talking about your feelings. It is also hard to demonstrate your intelligence to someone in a different field using technical terms endemic to your own. Econospeak provides conceptual common ground. Thus the cultural creep.

After Freakonomics came Planet Money came Margin Call came Moneyball came The Big Short came Succession came Parasite came Industry. These things are fun to talk about because it’s possible to talk about them. You can have an opinion on Moneyball without having ever played catch. 

Econospeak is now so culturally prevalent that Kyla Scanlon, the economics writer and TikToker, got a whole press tour out of reframing America's sour national mood as a “vibe recession.” The novel term rendered a lifeworld phenomena in econospeak and would have particularly irked mid-century critics of "Imperial economics," the tendency of economic reasoning to colonize non-economic domains. 

One of the most convincing anti-imperialists was Amartya Sen, who gets extra credit for creating an alternative framework for describing the world. Sen, an economist himself, argued that life ought to be understood as a series of possibilities and quality of life ought to be understood as access to those possibilities. He explained his "Capability Approach" by talking about bicycles. Owning a bicycle seems like a good proxy for having a higher quality of life. But if you don't have legs (or live in Brooklyn and value your pre-frontal lobe), it's immaterial. Sen's thinking suggested a way econospeak could reflect the reality of lifeworld. But it wasn’t broadly adopted (though the UNDP did get on board). Instead, lifeworld came to reflect econospeak.

Consider a humble four-bedroom, three-bath suburban manse Zestimated at $2.1M. If a 39-year-old VP of Marketing can afford the down payment and secure a mortgage, she (and the bank) can own it. But if she can't afford to lose money on that investment and therefore can't modify it to suit her particular needs or desires, it's not precisely her house. She's got a commodity, but lacks the capability an economist might infer based solely on ownership. Her relationship with her residence is different than her Boomer parents' relationship with the similar residence they bought decades earlier because the lower initial cost of their house relatively to their income provided them more capability. They could install a sauna (or w/e). Put differently, they had the same stuff but more freedom. (This is a big part of why Millennials don't understand Boomers and Boomers don't understand much.)

The lifeworld word “own” is no longer correct. The econospeak phrase “has home equity” is more relevant.

Now, let’s say this lucky VP of Marketing with family money works at a FAANG company. She has made an economically rational decision to have a stable job and, presumably, a transferable skillset. What she has not done is take advantage of her privilege to pursue a passion or a more meaningful life. This might reflect a deep desire for more money – normal enough – but it's just as likely that it reflects capability-focused thinking. She felt the effects of the 2008 financial crisis. She knows she has a bike, but she's unconvinced she has legs.

Wild as it may sound to those accustomed to econospeak, she doesn't feel particularly free.

Econospeak is really bad at describing feelings and worse at describing freedom. Economics textbooks tend to be devoid of that kind of political language. Anyone who expects Davos Man to speak truth to power is a fool. He lacks the language. Trump, on the other hand, excels at speaking about freedom because he’s fluent in plainspeak, lifeworld language inherently at odds with econospeak. Because his language – "They want to take away your freedom, they want to take away your rights, they want to take away your country" – speaks directly to capability, it's powerful. 

In and of itself, plainspeak is a good thing. It can describe the declining quality of life responsible for the vibe recession, which is a critical step toward change. The trouble is not the language, but the source. 

Because so many educated people dislike both Trump and the unenlightened self-interest that drives him, many have and will double down on econospeak as he doubles down (then backs off, then doubles down) on various threats aimed at various people. Park Slope dads are going to be wearing vintage rock tees that say "Bretton Woods" before the week is out. But that's a reactionary and self-defeating posture.

The cost of econospeak is unmeasurable, but it’s surely steep. It obscures lost capability. It can't describe freedom. It provides common ground that erodes as soon as power lumbers onto the scene. Plainspeak is better so long as it’s not disingenuous. The trouble is that most liberals can’t speak it – or won’t because they have an overwhelming complexity bias. It’s basically just Bernie and his avuncular approach doesn’t always travel well.

The solution is not to eschew or abandon econospeak – though it is good policy to kick anyone who says “marginal gains” right in the shins⁴. Understanding markets is important. Understanding aligning incentives helps us help each other. But embracing the language of Davos Man, however tempting, is inherently self-defeating for anyone who actually works for a living. 

As tempting as it may be right now to go all in on econospeak, countering outlandish claims about Venezuelan oil production and Greenlandish claims about rare earth mineral extraction with hard talk about supply and demand, it's more accurate to just say what Trump is doing is wrong. Whether or not it decreases the deficit or increases share prices, it will diminish the capability. Any annoyingly moralistic college student would get that.

As Davos Man clashes with the American kaiju, the best course isn't to root for either side, but to run shrieking into the Rhaetian Alps and hope they punch each other out..

[2] No, that scarf you made doesn’t count.

[3] I think I’ve mentioned this before, but there’s a scene in J.M. Coetzee’s Childhood of Jesus where a child compellingly refutes the idea that 1+1=2, insisting that 1+1= two ones. I think about this constantly.

[4] Better yet, gamble with on Kalshi. It’s not that hard to win against people uninterested in human nature.