Assorted Links Friday

The No. 1 reason Americans are quitting their jobs amid this Great Resignation is "toxic company culture," according to a Flex Jobs survey.

The cost of the 2000s: By one estimate, the 2000s slowdown has cost the average American some $10,000.

Where does the supply chain crisis stand now? There are signs the tide may be turning even as challenges continue in some sectors.

States help business owners save big on federal taxes with SALT-Cap workarounds: Laws in 27 states let owners circumvent $10,000 limit on state and local tax deductions to the tune of $10 billion in annual savings.

⤴ Imagine a US political party: Built around faster economic growth and technological progress.

The bottom quantile of US households now has less excess savings than in 2019. Note that the top two quantiles represent over 61% of US consumption.

More than half of Americans live within an hour of extended family:

An interview with Katherine Boyle, venture capitalist and proponent of an American that builds:

In recent months, a number of people have come out with manifestos declaring that America needs to refocus on building more stuff and creating abundance. Most of those manifestos came from people at think tanks or in the media, but a couple came out of the venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz. There was Marc Andreessen’s famous “It’s Time to Build” essay in April 2020. Marc put his money where his mouth was, funding a new investment practice called “American Dynamism”, investing in “founders and companies that support the national interest, including but not limited to aerospace, defense, public safety, education, housing, supply chain, industrials and manufacturing”.

Heading that effort were General Partners Katherine Boyle and David Ulevitch. Boyle wrote a manifesto for the strategy back in January, declaring: “We believe technology is the font of this reversal [of pessimism], and the only immediate way to kickstart American renewal is through startups building for critical problems.” In April, Boyle followed that up with a very well-read essay over at Bari Weiss’ Substack, called “The Case for American Seriousness”, in which she called on the American “builder class” to build more.