Michael Hobbes lives in Berlin. His essays from his blog, Rottin’ in Denmark, were featured on Longreads this year. I read news when I want to be entertained. I read features when I want to learn something. Here’s nine articles I read this year that changed the way I look at the world, and made […]
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Reading List: Believe in Your Selfie
Emily Perper is a word-writing human for hire. She blogs about her favorite longreads at Diet Coker. I’m tired of middle-aged white dudes critiquing my generation as selfish and narcissistic. Often, the selfie is held up triumphantly as the very symbol of our self-degradation. Here, four other, more intelligent perspectives on selfie culture: 1. “A […]
Reading List: Stories From the Working Class
Emily Perper is a word-writing human for hire. She blogs about her favorite longreads at Diet Coker. I read a brilliant piece, “Zen and the Art of Cover Letter Writing,” that reminded me that I had not yet featured the stories of those suffering under the yoke of this abusive economy. These are stories about […]
The Good Girls Revolt
In 1970, Lynn Povich and 45 other women sued Newsweek for discrimination. Here is what the workplace was like for them.
How to Write About Tax Havens and the Super-Rich: An Interview with Nicholas Shaxson
Last year Shaxson published a Vanity Fair article, “A Tale of Two Londons,” that described the residents of one of London’s most exclusive addresses—One Hyde Park—and the accounting acrobatics they had performed to get there.
What It’s Like to Grow Up Gay in Russia
“I had a career in Russia, a nice apartment, friends, family. I sacrificed all that to be with Ana.”
Anyone who has lived through the global bubble and bust of the last few years may wonder what’s so great about a consumer society. In the United States, the idea that we have reoriented our economy toward consumption and don’t make things anymore has become a standard lament, not a sign of progress. But China […]
Out of Lehman's Ashes Wall Street Gets Most of What It Wants
Out of Lehman’s Ashes Wall Street Gets Most of What It Wants “We continue to listen to the same people whose errors in judgment were central to the problem,” said John Reed, 71, a former co-chief executive officer of Citigroup Inc., who estimated only 25 percent of needed changes have been enacted. “I’m astounded because […]
The Atlantic: The Rise Of The New Global Elite
The Atlantic: The Rise Of The New Global Elite theatlantic: F. Scott Fitzgerald was right when he declared the rich different from you and me. But today’s super-rich are also different from yesterday’s: more hardworking and meritocratic, but less connected to the nations that granted them opportunity—and the countrymen they are leaving ever further behind. […]
Opium Wars: Can Afghan Farmers Really Stop Growing Poppies?
Opium Wars: Can Afghan Farmers Really Stop Growing Poppies? “We have two forms of money here: poppy, and American dollars,” says a beardless 33-year-old Helmand farmer named Rehmatou as he leaves the Marine base with his fertilizer. “This is our economy. The Taliban aren’t pressuring me—that’s just a story you see on TV. I grow […]
