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- 5SR - July 26, 2023
Today’s curator is the founder of #5SmartReads, Hitha Palepu. She’s a consummate multihyphenate - CEO of Rhoshan Pharmaceuticals, author of WE’RE SPEAKING: The Life Lessons of Kamala Harris and How to Pack: Travel Smart for Any Trip, and professional speaker. Hitha is an unabashed fan of Taco Bell, Philadelphia sports teams & F1, romance novels, and is a mediocre crafter. She lives in NYC with her husband and two sons.
Labor enabled the disruptions that define life in the 2010s - streaming in entertainment, on-demand cars and food delivery, near-instantaneous retail delivery - and those that generated this income and impact rarely received any of the financial upside they drove for the now-massive corporations they work for.
In the 2020s, they’re fighting back.
The WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes have dominated the news cycles, but viewers haven’t felt much of the impact given how many finished films and shows are currently airing.
We will absolutely feel the impact of a Teamsters-led strike of UPS, both at the individual level and the macroeconomic level:
“A 10-day strike at UPS would cost the U.S. economy a total of more than $5 billion, according to a recent estimate from the Anderson Economic Group. Workers would lose about $1.1 billion in wages, while customers would lose around $4 billion, the firm projected.
"The biggest losses are to people who are not striking and not connected to UPS. This is highly unusual for a strike," said Patrick Anderson, the group's principal and CEO.
"With a UPS strike, everyone in America will feel it if it happens," he said.“
The current and forthcoming strikes have had me reflecting on my own spending habits. More in-store shopping at local and independently owned stores, using my Libby app first to read new books, and picking up takeout instead of delivery (and tipping all delivery workers generously). And if you want to learn more about the history of the modern labor unions, I highly recommend The Great Stewardess Rebellion.
Candidates from both parties often parrot the line “who do you trust to make a 2 am call to defend our nation?” It evokes an image of a President being swiftly ushered into a secure room with tons of maps on display, a large briefcase opening on the table and cards and keys being inserted, and “launch” said in a cold, controlled voice with a stoic expression.
It gives me some comfort that this mental image is not as instantaneous as shows or my imagination leads me to believe, and that many women stand between us and nuclear war.
I’m immensely grateful for all of our armed forces who literally put their lives on the line to defend our country and our freedom, and really appreciated this peek into the critical work of the Air Force’s Nuclear and Missile Operations Officers.
And I also hope these missileers never have to launch the weapons whose readiness they oversee.
You’ve likely heard of precision medicine. You’ve certainly been bombarded with clean beauty products and brands.
L’Oreal’s new partnership with Verily is both chasing the market and the science to merge the two precision beauty, to first understand the impact on skin and hair health (environmental, clinical, biological) and using the latest technologies (AI, data from wearables, telehealth) to recommend products.
Make no mistake - this investment is certainly directed by the massive potential upside (projections show this market could reach $63B by 2027), but it’s also an opportunity to study and develop products for underrepresented groups who have different skin and hair needs and for people with disabilities.
I’ll be the first to tell you to see a dermatologist twice a year for skin checks and to use the products that work for you (also, less is more when it comes to skincare). But I also know that in our modern healthcare system, this advice is unfortunately the exception and not the rule. I hope L’Oreal lives up to the DEI commitments it boldly made a few years back and embarks on this venture with a focus on who rarely is served by the market.
The Merch-ification of Book Publishing (Esquire)
I think the millennial and Gen Z obsession with book merch can be tied back to library bookmarks and Book It! Pizza Hut gift certificates.
And like everything else, the hyperconsumerism fueled by social media over the past decade has also changed what sells books. Right now, it’s merch - items curated or created by authors and publishers to help market a launch, licensing deals between major authors and independent creators to create stickers and shirts and totes, and even custom packaging.
This is such a smart piece on the rise of book merch (focused more on the products included in influencer and editor mailings for forthcoming releases), and it’s something I’ve dealt with both as an author and as a board member of the Feminist Press (my shirt from the Press is still one of my favorites).
My opinion? Less is more, and I want to personally oversee a relaunch of Book It!, expanding it to adult readers who love their books and the promise of a personal pan pizza. Pizza Hut - call me.
content warning - sexual assault and violence
Manipur’s internet connection has been suspended since early May, so much of the reporting from the area has been minimal (which is a news story in itself, and one that Western media doesn’t cover).
The latest from the area - where women have been raped and assaulted and paraded through the streets, and are now fighting back - is well reported in this piece.
Please read it, and please keep devoting some of your attention to the women of the world who are fighting for what we take for granted - freedom to live with safety.
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