WEBVTT - 404, Fun Not Found 0:00:02.560 --> 0:00:08.480 Bloomberg Audio Studios, Podcasts, Radio news. 0:00:12.720 --> 0:00:16.200 Stacy, I'm a little concerned this this studio that we're 0:00:16.440 --> 0:00:19.840 recording this episode of Everybody's Business in is good. I'd 0:00:19.880 --> 0:00:23.720 say it's like sixty nine seventy degrees, so very cool. Cool. 0:00:23.760 --> 0:00:25.480 What's cool may too cool? 0:00:26.200 --> 0:00:29.520 Well, that's a good point we have. We are in 0:00:29.600 --> 0:00:31.760 New York where there have been lots of heat warnings 0:00:31.880 --> 0:00:35.239 and we have gotten a lot of encouragement to temper 0:00:35.960 --> 0:00:37.479 the coolness of our at home us. 0:00:37.640 --> 0:00:40.160 Yeah, both for our grids and also for the data centers. 0:00:40.159 --> 0:00:44.280 We don't want to stop the AI companies from doing 0:00:44.320 --> 0:00:48.640 their their the important work of building chatbots. Anyway, we'll 0:00:48.680 --> 0:00:52.400 have Noriine Malik, energy reporter with Bloomberg taking with us 0:00:52.400 --> 0:00:54.440 to take a deep dive into the state of the 0:00:54.440 --> 0:00:58.280 world energy grids and why Combo of Heat and the 0:00:58.320 --> 0:01:00.800 AI boom are putting them under strain exactly. 0:01:00.920 --> 0:01:03.480 And another thing that I should say about this weather 0:01:03.800 --> 0:01:06.640 is it's really hard to get out and enjoy the 0:01:06.720 --> 0:01:10.080 summer when it is this hot. And as a matter 0:01:10.120 --> 0:01:13.200 of fact, this is not an isolated issue that we're 0:01:13.280 --> 0:01:17.319 having in this country. Apparently here in the US we 0:01:17.400 --> 0:01:18.440 have a fun deficit. 0:01:18.560 --> 0:01:21.880 That's right, Sacy Fund traders on Wall Street have been, 0:01:22.160 --> 0:01:27.280 you know, ringing the alarm bells. The fun markets are scarcity. Yeah, 0:01:27.280 --> 0:01:32.160 there's not enough fun in the world. We're getting more expensive. 0:01:32.240 --> 0:01:35.559 Sorry for all the Wall Street metaphors, We're legally required 0:01:35.600 --> 0:01:37.680 to do that. But in any case, we have Bloomberg 0:01:37.720 --> 0:01:42.760 reporter Ben Steverman here to talk about why basically, all 0:01:42.840 --> 0:01:45.039 of the fun things that one might want to do 0:01:45.080 --> 0:01:47.119 in the summer, go on a trip, go to the beach, 0:01:47.400 --> 0:01:50.040 send your kid to camp, they're all getting harder and 0:01:50.120 --> 0:01:50.880 more expensive. 0:01:50.920 --> 0:01:53.360 It is a bonafide fun shortage. 0:01:53.480 --> 0:01:56.520 Yes, it is fun, it's not for everybody. Can you 0:01:56.600 --> 0:01:57.800 afford fun? 0:02:06.840 --> 0:02:07.200 Max? 0:02:07.440 --> 0:02:11.160 It has been very hot here in New York. 0:02:11.440 --> 0:02:14.000 It's hot now, it's hot now. 0:02:13.720 --> 0:02:16.000 It's been hot like over the fourth of July. I 0:02:16.080 --> 0:02:19.200 was invited to a barbecue. It got canceled for heat, 0:02:19.520 --> 0:02:20.480 which has never happened. 0:02:20.560 --> 0:02:23.480 Everything is getting canceled for weather. Staysy even for a 0:02:23.520 --> 0:02:25.280 brief moment. Now, I was out last week. You and 0:02:25.320 --> 0:02:29.160 brad Stone were doing the lord's work here. Yeah, everybody's 0:02:29.200 --> 0:02:32.959 even the Great American State Fair was briefly I know 0:02:33.639 --> 0:02:34.359 it sounded like. 0:02:34.320 --> 0:02:45.320 It got pretty dramatic. Here's some tape. It sounds like 0:02:45.360 --> 0:02:47.880 a little more like War of the World's than a 0:02:47.960 --> 0:02:51.480 heat related to evacuation. But apparently this is where we 0:02:51.520 --> 0:02:54.680 are in this world. But also, of course, this heat 0:02:54.880 --> 0:02:59.400 has huge implications beyond just this. We've got so much 0:03:00.080 --> 0:03:02.919 pressure on our grid right now, both the heat wave 0:03:02.919 --> 0:03:05.160 which has been going on all across the US, but 0:03:05.240 --> 0:03:07.760 also data centers. And this is not just isolated to 0:03:07.840 --> 0:03:10.120 the US. This is going on all over the place. 0:03:10.200 --> 0:03:13.239 And we're really lucky to have Noreene Malick, an energy 0:03:13.280 --> 0:03:15.800 reporter at Bloomberg who is based in London, dealing with 0:03:15.880 --> 0:03:19.040 heat of her own. Noreene, thanks for joining us. 0:03:19.320 --> 0:03:22.079 Thanks for having me. Those screams sounded like they were 0:03:22.120 --> 0:03:24.360 watching a World Cup game. I wasn't sure what was happening. 0:03:25.800 --> 0:03:27.200 Well, yes, that was. 0:03:27.160 --> 0:03:30.800 The sound of Belgium destroying the Oh. 0:03:31.000 --> 0:03:33.560 Noreen, first of all, before we kind of dive into 0:03:33.639 --> 0:03:36.400 the particulars of this, talk to us a little bit 0:03:36.480 --> 0:03:41.560 about this summer so far and what we've seen in 0:03:41.680 --> 0:03:45.360 terms of weather and electricity and some of the challenges 0:03:45.360 --> 0:03:46.040 that are coming up. 0:03:46.560 --> 0:03:49.560 Yeah, we've definitely seen some severe heat already on the 0:03:49.600 --> 0:03:54.360 East coast, especially and even when it wasn't that hot, 0:03:54.400 --> 0:03:57.920 and I mean like in the eighty degrees low eighty degrees, 0:03:58.000 --> 0:04:00.560 we started to see signs of stress on the grid, 0:04:00.960 --> 0:04:05.000 especially around like northern Virginia, which is part of a 0:04:05.040 --> 0:04:08.280 thirteen state grid that stretches from like Chicago roughly to 0:04:08.440 --> 0:04:11.440 like North Carolina, the northern edge of it in up 0:04:11.440 --> 0:04:15.280 to New Jersey and includes Washington, DC. So we've seen 0:04:15.320 --> 0:04:18.200 stress more frequently in the last couple of years, especially 0:04:19.279 --> 0:04:21.880 because you have a lot of data center demand growth there. 0:04:21.960 --> 0:04:23.880 It's growing so quickly. 0:04:24.360 --> 0:04:28.120 That it is kind of like keeping an elevated demand 0:04:28.279 --> 0:04:31.640 around the clock. And then anytime you get a weather event, 0:04:31.920 --> 0:04:35.960 even if it's not that extreme, although in DC and 0:04:36.040 --> 0:04:38.479 Virginia it's like a swamp even when it's like eighty 0:04:38.600 --> 0:04:40.120 or seventy degrees, so I would. 0:04:39.960 --> 0:04:40.919 Consider that extreme. 0:04:41.000 --> 0:04:43.920 But you do see a significant ramp up in grid 0:04:43.920 --> 0:04:46.560 stress and how this is manifested, as you'll see like 0:04:46.920 --> 0:04:51.000 emergency postings on the grid operator saying this transformer which 0:04:51.040 --> 0:04:54.640 is meant to like keep voltage like flowing smoothly on 0:04:54.680 --> 0:04:56.640 a grid at safe levels. You'll start to put out 0:04:56.680 --> 0:04:59.720 alerts saying stress is popping up here and there, and 0:04:59.800 --> 0:05:02.600 then and last week during the heat wave, we had 0:05:02.880 --> 0:05:07.159 PGM the thirteen state Eastern grid operate in an emergency situation. 0:05:07.400 --> 0:05:08.919 It was a low level emergency. 0:05:09.080 --> 0:05:12.800 It's meant to put everyone on like the right foot, like, hey, 0:05:12.839 --> 0:05:17.360 shore up your supplies, stop maintenance, kind of like everyone 0:05:17.520 --> 0:05:19.920 has to be ready to serve demand. And even then 0:05:20.000 --> 0:05:24.400 you saw like power prices like jump to like hundreds 0:05:24.400 --> 0:05:27.920 of dollars or thousands of dollars per megawatt hour at 0:05:27.960 --> 0:05:30.200 a time when it's not supposed to be that stressed. 0:05:30.240 --> 0:05:31.520 These are becoming more frequent. 0:05:31.920 --> 0:05:34.359 Noreen, you talked about the kind of how the grid 0:05:34.400 --> 0:05:38.040 operators experience these moments of stress, Like what does it 0:05:38.240 --> 0:05:41.720 mean for like a regular power consumer, Like, so I 0:05:41.800 --> 0:05:46.160 assume because I got these messages in New York, you know, 0:05:46.520 --> 0:05:50.000 you get text messages from your utility saying, like, you know, 0:05:50.080 --> 0:05:54.440 turn the air conditioning up to seventy eight degrees, which 0:05:54.480 --> 0:05:56.520 is kind of like that's like a standard thing they 0:05:56.560 --> 0:05:58.920 put out it seems like every summer. But like, what 0:05:58.920 --> 0:06:02.039 what happens for concernsumers both in terms of kind of 0:06:02.080 --> 0:06:05.440 like what they're being asked to do? What they're paying outages, 0:06:05.480 --> 0:06:06.920 they might experience that sort of thing. 0:06:07.680 --> 0:06:11.000 Yeah, I mean we've definitely seen great operators ask consumers 0:06:11.000 --> 0:06:15.240 to voluntarily conserve more in recent years, Like it really 0:06:15.240 --> 0:06:17.920 started in California in twenty twenty when they had blackouts. 0:06:17.920 --> 0:06:20.800 After that, Texas in twenty twenty one when they had blackouts, 0:06:21.320 --> 0:06:23.400 and on the East Coast like New York and New England, 0:06:23.760 --> 0:06:27.000 they'll ask like utilities will say like, hey, there's going 0:06:27.040 --> 0:06:30.760 to be high demand just in case, Like power supplies 0:06:30.839 --> 0:06:33.080 on the East Coast are constrained and much of the 0:06:33.160 --> 0:06:35.480 US are constrained because there's a well higher demand. So 0:06:35.480 --> 0:06:37.960 what it means is for consumers is one you have 0:06:38.000 --> 0:06:40.680 to more proactively think about it. There are solutions, like 0:06:40.720 --> 0:06:44.440 some thermostats will automatically like smart thermostats will automatically like 0:06:44.800 --> 0:06:47.880 pre cool your home so that like when it's like 0:06:47.920 --> 0:06:49.320 the middle of the day and there's a lot of 0:06:49.320 --> 0:06:51.960 solar for instance, you can take advantage of like cheaper 0:06:52.000 --> 0:06:54.359 prices and pre cool your home. So there is like 0:06:54.400 --> 0:06:57.200 a behavioral change that is starting to happen, and it 0:06:57.279 --> 0:07:01.120 depends like utility by utility. Happened during the heat wave 0:07:01.279 --> 0:07:03.880 was like the grid operator was like, hey, like in 0:07:03.920 --> 0:07:06.640 New York State, the grid operator was like supplies or 0:07:06.680 --> 0:07:09.800 stri is tight across the entire grid. They put out 0:07:09.840 --> 0:07:13.560 an order to utilities, and the utilities will ask skyscrapers 0:07:13.600 --> 0:07:16.280 in Manhattan to curtail. Now, these guys when they curtail, 0:07:16.320 --> 0:07:19.440 they're getting often paid to like dim the lights and 0:07:19.760 --> 0:07:23.400 run fewer elevators. But as a consumer, the programs aren't 0:07:23.560 --> 0:07:26.720 as developed. They're starting to increase, but like you're not 0:07:26.760 --> 0:07:29.720 really getting compensated, so you're voluntarily doing this. 0:07:30.040 --> 0:07:32.400 But then there you brought up the data center's nourine 0:07:32.480 --> 0:07:35.440 and so how much of this is that, like we 0:07:35.800 --> 0:07:39.520 are getting our electricity prices jacked up or being told 0:07:39.560 --> 0:07:42.760 to like turn our make our homes too warm because 0:07:42.800 --> 0:07:46.080 like some meta engineer is doing a really awesome prompt 0:07:46.240 --> 0:07:48.400 right now on you know, on clawed or whatever. Like 0:07:48.480 --> 0:07:52.640 do we have any sense of how impactful these data 0:07:52.640 --> 0:07:54.960 centers are? I mean, I know that it's a subject 0:07:54.960 --> 0:07:57.360 of a lot of controversy, and you have the industry 0:07:57.400 --> 0:07:59.680 is pushing in one direction, politician or the other. Can 0:07:59.720 --> 0:08:01.360 you just break it down for us, or at least 0:08:01.360 --> 0:08:02.960 break down the different points of view on this. 0:08:03.880 --> 0:08:06.480 Yeah, So as you said, this is super controversial and 0:08:06.480 --> 0:08:09.280 there's a big battle being thought over even just. 0:08:09.240 --> 0:08:11.440 The perception of this. The truth is there is not 0:08:11.560 --> 0:08:12.480 much transparency. 0:08:12.560 --> 0:08:16.040 What we do now is I've talked to several CEOs 0:08:16.080 --> 0:08:19.800 of like utilities and PJM and traders and across the 0:08:19.840 --> 0:08:23.920 gamut to understand this. And anytime you PLoP big demand 0:08:24.120 --> 0:08:28.160 into any area of the grid, if it's like Virginia 0:08:28.280 --> 0:08:31.600 or Ohio, where there's a lot of like people already 0:08:31.640 --> 0:08:34.480 living there and the grid may already be tight, then yes, 0:08:34.559 --> 0:08:36.920 it's going to overall increase prices. 0:08:36.920 --> 0:08:37.960 There's no way around it. 0:08:38.080 --> 0:08:41.440 I found it interesting in Europe, like when I went 0:08:41.480 --> 0:08:45.160 to like Finland or Lisbon for conferences, it is a 0:08:45.280 --> 0:08:48.960 natural assumption or it's taken for granted that they bring 0:08:49.000 --> 0:08:51.440 in data centers, your power prices are going to go up. 0:08:51.480 --> 0:08:54.680 That's like, yeah, a given. In the US, this is 0:08:54.720 --> 0:08:55.800 like a battle ground. 0:08:56.360 --> 0:09:01.080 So does that mean that like we are competing against 0:09:01.240 --> 0:09:06.640 tech companies for energy because consumers are never going to 0:09:06.720 --> 0:09:09.599 have as much more? But is this what's happening or 0:09:09.760 --> 0:09:12.400 like tech companies competing with regular consumers. 0:09:12.679 --> 0:09:15.760 It's more like this grid had so much slack on 0:09:15.840 --> 0:09:20.439 the system like thirty forty percent spare capacity, and data 0:09:20.440 --> 0:09:23.320 center demand growth is the fastest growing demand. That's why 0:09:23.360 --> 0:09:26.200 we're like focused on them instead of like EVS and 0:09:26.280 --> 0:09:29.079 other electrification that takes like a decade to ramp up. 0:09:29.360 --> 0:09:31.520 So much has come online that it's like eating up 0:09:31.559 --> 0:09:33.480 all the excess supply, and so now the grid is 0:09:33.559 --> 0:09:36.400 under stress in a couple of short years. We're facing 0:09:36.400 --> 0:09:39.760 a shortfall next year if things don't turn around in 0:09:39.840 --> 0:09:41.120 terms of demand projections. 0:09:41.520 --> 0:09:44.680 So on that level, it's not that the. 0:09:44.440 --> 0:09:47.680 Household is competing with it, but somebody has to pay 0:09:47.720 --> 0:09:50.360 for the new supply, and that's the battle that's being 0:09:50.400 --> 0:09:52.680 fought out, is like who's going to pay for the 0:09:52.720 --> 0:09:56.440 new power plants needed for data centers because right now 0:09:56.520 --> 0:10:00.920 all costs are socialized, like every time you build transmission lines, 0:10:00.960 --> 0:10:03.240 and in some states you build power plants depends on 0:10:03.280 --> 0:10:07.200 your regulation, then every consumer pays for a split of it. 0:10:07.360 --> 0:10:10.199 And so this is like federal regulators are weighing in 0:10:10.360 --> 0:10:12.640 and in the next month and a half or so, 0:10:12.679 --> 0:10:15.360 we're going to see the grid operators share with the 0:10:15.400 --> 0:10:18.040 federal regulators how to split the cost and how to 0:10:18.040 --> 0:10:19.520 make sure data centers pay for it. 0:10:19.960 --> 0:10:23.080 I know that utilities tend to be more expensive in 0:10:23.160 --> 0:10:23.800 other countries. 0:10:23.840 --> 0:10:24.720 I know you are. 0:10:24.800 --> 0:10:27.640 You're in London, and I believe utilities are more expensive there, 0:10:27.679 --> 0:10:30.319 and I know in like continental Europe they're more expensive. 0:10:30.600 --> 0:10:33.480 Is the US moving more towards a European model where 0:10:34.080 --> 0:10:37.400 energy just costs more because more things are kind of 0:10:37.400 --> 0:10:41.160 baked into those costs, or is this a totally different situation. 0:10:41.840 --> 0:10:44.160 I think there's a lot of the same stressors. 0:10:44.720 --> 0:10:48.640 The difference with the US is there is plentiful gas, 0:10:48.640 --> 0:10:52.480 and it feels like a lot of the push towards 0:10:52.559 --> 0:10:56.280 zero carbon energy is like not really being talked about, 0:10:56.320 --> 0:10:58.880 even though the hyperscalers say they're really committed to it. 0:10:59.120 --> 0:11:02.640 So the US does have a lot of like energy, 0:11:02.760 --> 0:11:05.520 it's a matter of like delivering it to the right 0:11:05.559 --> 0:11:09.079 places and then maybe like increasingly converting it to electricity. 0:11:09.480 --> 0:11:12.440 In Europe they seem to be very committed to zero 0:11:12.480 --> 0:11:16.360 carbon energy and trying to like take a more considered 0:11:16.400 --> 0:11:19.680 approach to like how do you integrate them these data centers. 0:11:19.880 --> 0:11:24.000 They want them for digital sovereignty, for national security, economic reasons, 0:11:24.360 --> 0:11:27.079 but they also really want it to be clean energy. 0:11:27.280 --> 0:11:30.120 So on that level, like that's where they bifurcate is like, 0:11:30.520 --> 0:11:32.720 can you have a US that's very fossil fuel and 0:11:32.760 --> 0:11:36.560 increasingly fossil fuel focused, like pursue that strategy and like 0:11:36.640 --> 0:11:40.600 keep prices low for everyone versus like Europe, which sees 0:11:40.679 --> 0:11:44.640 like its advantage as solar as keeping prices lower plus batteries. 0:11:45.080 --> 0:11:48.880 So I think the problem statement is the same across them. 0:11:48.920 --> 0:11:52.800 They're moving at different paces, and so what happens in 0:11:52.840 --> 0:11:55.880 the US could become lessons learned for Europe. Like people 0:11:56.640 --> 0:11:59.240 are moving much faster in the US with the data 0:11:59.240 --> 0:12:02.959 center boom, and that's making all the difference right now. 0:12:03.040 --> 0:12:06.320 Should we just become more copathetic about being sweaty? 0:12:06.559 --> 0:12:09.200 Yeah, I don't know. I mean in New York City, 0:12:09.280 --> 0:12:11.280 I don't know if you've noticed. I've never paid attention 0:12:11.320 --> 0:12:13.120 to the due point, but the due point has been 0:12:13.160 --> 0:12:15.280 a big issue in the last few years. 0:12:15.600 --> 0:12:16.600 What is the due point? 0:12:16.720 --> 0:12:19.600 It's like a humidity Oh yeah. 0:12:19.120 --> 0:12:21.680 It's like it's not just humidity, it's like the temperature 0:12:21.800 --> 0:12:25.559 of like when sweat evaporates, is higher. So even if 0:12:25.559 --> 0:12:29.200 it's like humid, not and the temperatures aren't that high 0:12:29.240 --> 0:12:31.960 at like seventy the high due point makes you feel 0:12:32.000 --> 0:12:34.679 like it's ninety. So that has gotten worse, and that 0:12:34.760 --> 0:12:36.840 is like a whole other level of suffering we've seen 0:12:36.880 --> 0:12:41.800 in New York. In London, I've seen something I haven't 0:12:41.840 --> 0:12:44.640 seen anywhere, which is like everyone seems to have a 0:12:44.679 --> 0:12:47.360 tiny fan, like an electric fan. 0:12:47.280 --> 0:12:49.280 And just kind of basting with them everywhere. 0:12:49.360 --> 0:12:51.400 Yeah, on the subway I saw a woman with like 0:12:51.400 --> 0:12:53.880 a fan this big on the subway yester or the 0:12:53.920 --> 0:12:55.319 tube yesterday. 0:12:56.720 --> 0:13:00.200 As large as as a basketball. 0:12:59.400 --> 0:13:02.520 Yeah, it was surprising. I had no idea how she 0:13:02.559 --> 0:13:05.200 fitted in her bag. So that might be what our 0:13:05.240 --> 0:13:07.600 future looks like, is that everyone just carries like a 0:13:07.640 --> 0:13:10.640 personal fan now. So the argument is like, shouldn't the 0:13:10.720 --> 0:13:14.120 new users be the ones paying for the new infrastructure 0:13:14.320 --> 0:13:17.840 instead of having the average American make that sacrifice of 0:13:17.840 --> 0:13:19.120 feeling hot and icky? 0:13:19.400 --> 0:13:21.079 Nori Malick, thank you for joining us. 0:13:21.280 --> 0:13:22.840 Thanks, thank you, stay cool. 0:13:29.200 --> 0:13:32.840 I was reading the pages of Bloomberg recently. 0:13:33.120 --> 0:13:34.360 I learned some disturbing news. 0:13:34.400 --> 0:13:37.440 We've been talking about all sorts of sort of supply 0:13:37.559 --> 0:13:42.640 constraints and shortage or cres, the oil price, the chip shortage, 0:13:42.640 --> 0:13:44.920 and there is a shortage I think we were all 0:13:44.960 --> 0:13:46.400 aware of, but I had not No one had put 0:13:46.400 --> 0:13:46.960 their finger on. 0:13:47.200 --> 0:13:52.160 Tell me what fun shortage? A shortage of fun? Fun? 0:13:52.840 --> 0:13:55.520 There's not enough fun in this world, at least according 0:13:55.559 --> 0:13:57.160 to our guest Ben Steven. 0:13:56.960 --> 0:14:00.320 Who is reporter here at Bloomberg who joins us. Now, Ben, 0:14:00.360 --> 0:14:02.440 how are you? I'm doing great? Ben? 0:14:02.960 --> 0:14:06.640 What is the fun shortage? What are you talking about? 0:14:06.800 --> 0:14:10.520 What I'm talking about? My definition of fun is shared 0:14:10.600 --> 0:14:14.200 experiences with others, So that is a good definition. Vacation 0:14:14.480 --> 0:14:18.480 with family, going out on a Friday night with friends, 0:14:19.280 --> 0:14:21.760 just even small talk with strangers, kind of interacting with 0:14:21.760 --> 0:14:24.880 people in your community. You know, if you talk to 0:14:24.960 --> 0:14:29.280 happiness researchers, the fun that really matters, that changes your 0:14:29.280 --> 0:14:31.960 life is not like scrolling through TikTok. In fact, that 0:14:32.000 --> 0:14:35.080 makes you just more bored and like and more unhappy. 0:14:35.280 --> 0:14:38.960 Oh yeah, Like fun needs to be shared to actually 0:14:39.000 --> 0:14:40.680 be something that's lasting and fun. 0:14:41.280 --> 0:14:45.040 Okay, So I was laughing when you said happiness researchers. 0:14:45.160 --> 0:14:48.080 But your article has a lot of data in it. 0:14:48.160 --> 0:14:50.480 So how do you know there's a happiness shortage? 0:14:50.960 --> 0:14:53.520 Well, first of all, if you just ask people about 0:14:53.520 --> 0:14:57.120 their life satisfaction, and there's a World Happiness report that 0:14:57.160 --> 0:14:59.800 a bunch of academics, like serious people put together every 0:14:59.880 --> 0:15:02.840 day year from more than one hundred and forty countries. 0:15:03.560 --> 0:15:06.600 If you ask people about their happiness in the United States, 0:15:06.600 --> 0:15:11.760 our happiness has gone down steadily for like fifteen years. Oh, 0:15:12.000 --> 0:15:13.680 most of the rest of the world is actually getting 0:15:13.720 --> 0:15:19.160 happier despite the fact that they are online just as 0:15:19.200 --> 0:15:21.200 much as we are in most countries, in a lot 0:15:21.240 --> 0:15:21.720 of countries. 0:15:22.240 --> 0:15:24.240 So something's going on there. 0:15:24.280 --> 0:15:27.360 Like when you analyze how Americans are spending their days 0:15:27.480 --> 0:15:31.600 or time, we're interacting face to face a lot less 0:15:31.680 --> 0:15:35.040 than we used to, true, and we're working at screens 0:15:35.040 --> 0:15:38.800 a lot more. I spent a lot of time this year, 0:15:38.960 --> 0:15:40.360 you know, the last couple of months, just sort of 0:15:40.400 --> 0:15:44.640 looking at what are the places and activities that actually 0:15:44.640 --> 0:15:47.360 bring people together and get them out in the world, 0:15:47.760 --> 0:15:50.240 Like how do you get people out of their homes? 0:15:50.640 --> 0:15:53.400 How do you tempt them to like go do things together? 0:15:53.680 --> 0:15:57.400 And I really believe that the supply that's available of 0:15:57.480 --> 0:16:01.680 fun activities, the industries that provide the supply is shrinking 0:16:01.760 --> 0:16:03.160 and the demand is at a peak. 0:16:03.280 --> 0:16:05.000 So you go through a lot of this in the story. 0:16:05.040 --> 0:16:08.240 But bars and restaurants on the decline lots of sort 0:16:08.280 --> 0:16:12.720 of outdoorsy things are popular, but also constrained in terms 0:16:12.760 --> 0:16:15.840 of supply. There's more people playing golf than like what 0:16:15.880 --> 0:16:18.160 in the sometime in the last like fifteen or twenty years, 0:16:18.560 --> 0:16:21.480 and yet the number of golf courses is going way down. 0:16:21.760 --> 0:16:24.280 The number of bowling alleys is going down. Like a 0:16:24.320 --> 0:16:28.520 lot of these places where people congregate, where people have fun, 0:16:28.840 --> 0:16:31.560 there are fewer of them, and you know, supply and demand. 0:16:31.800 --> 0:16:34.040 The natural sort of consequences that of that is a 0:16:34.040 --> 0:16:35.600 lot of them are getting more expensive. So you have 0:16:35.640 --> 0:16:37.680 this sense that like if you want to go on vacation, 0:16:37.720 --> 0:16:39.400 you want to send your kids to a summer camp, 0:16:39.520 --> 0:16:41.040 You want to go to a show, you're going to 0:16:41.080 --> 0:16:41.400 be spending. 0:16:41.400 --> 0:16:42.360 You want to go on a boat. 0:16:42.200 --> 0:16:44.760 Trip even yeah, something is simple, or take your kids 0:16:44.800 --> 0:16:47.760 to whatever, an amusement park. 0:16:47.680 --> 0:16:48.440 Yeah, exactly. 0:16:48.720 --> 0:16:50.760 I was surprised to learn there was like there's no 0:16:50.960 --> 0:16:54.720 beachfront hotels being built in America today. A new one 0:16:54.880 --> 0:16:57.000 just opened and it was like such a rare event 0:16:57.040 --> 0:17:01.000 that Bloomberg did a story about where was it, m Florida. 0:17:01.040 --> 0:17:05.160 I can't remember, but like it's so hard to build 0:17:05.320 --> 0:17:12.000 new stuff and because of interest rates, well, construction interest 0:17:12.080 --> 0:17:14.520 rates have gone up. There's also just like a lot 0:17:14.520 --> 0:17:17.520 of the places you would want to put this stuff 0:17:17.720 --> 0:17:20.960 is already taken up because maybe a billionaire owns has 0:17:21.000 --> 0:17:25.120 built a mansion there. There's just like we are geographically constrained, 0:17:25.119 --> 0:17:27.440 and then we're also financially constrained in terms of how 0:17:27.520 --> 0:17:29.000 much fun we can provide people. 0:17:29.680 --> 0:17:33.840 Our producer Jasmine made an interesting point that it seems 0:17:33.880 --> 0:17:37.520 like fun might be becoming kind of a luxury good. 0:17:38.119 --> 0:17:39.680 And you make this point in your piece that. 0:17:39.720 --> 0:17:43.280 Like a lot of sort of entertainment and diversions are free, 0:17:43.320 --> 0:17:46.080 but they tend to be on screens, and then a 0:17:46.080 --> 0:17:48.119 lot of the kind of experiential stuff that gets you 0:17:48.160 --> 0:17:50.439 out in the world, get you interacting in real life 0:17:51.200 --> 0:17:53.800 is costing more. Is there is there something to that? 0:17:53.840 --> 0:17:55.800 Is there like a K shaped fun economy? 0:17:56.440 --> 0:17:58.400 Yes? I think there definitely is. 0:17:58.520 --> 0:18:02.040 Like you have people the top who actually can afford 0:18:02.359 --> 0:18:07.080 six hundred, seven hundred dollars a night for the vacation 0:18:07.240 --> 0:18:09.800 rental that used to cost three hundred and fifty dollars. 0:18:09.840 --> 0:18:12.720 Like I've seen this happen with like the beach locations 0:18:12.720 --> 0:18:15.040 that I used to love, and like they're just so expensive, 0:18:15.080 --> 0:18:16.919 so you have to cut either cut your vacation in 0:18:17.000 --> 0:18:20.159 half or just pay through the nose. But there are 0:18:20.200 --> 0:18:23.320 people in this in America today who can afford that. 0:18:23.400 --> 0:18:25.480 If you look at that's just the amount of wealth 0:18:25.480 --> 0:18:27.840 that's been created in the last decade. There are people 0:18:27.840 --> 0:18:29.800 who can do that. And then the people who get 0:18:30.080 --> 0:18:32.560 squeezed out, I think are first of all lower income 0:18:32.680 --> 0:18:35.640 or even middle class people, but then also young people 0:18:35.640 --> 0:18:37.920 who are at the beginning of their career and then're like, well, 0:18:37.960 --> 0:18:40.840 I can't go out and pay twenty dollars for a cocktail. 0:18:42.000 --> 0:18:44.240 We're going to stay home and like, you know, watch 0:18:44.280 --> 0:18:45.479 Netflix or whatever insteap. 0:18:46.040 --> 0:18:49.280 So one thing that I was wondering as I was 0:18:49.280 --> 0:18:51.399 reading this story is kind of like, how do you 0:18:51.600 --> 0:18:56.240 untangle trends. There are fewer bowling alleys, but I'm guessing 0:18:56.280 --> 0:18:59.919 there are more gyms. There are fewer bars, but they are. 0:19:00.000 --> 0:19:02.920 There are more coffee shops than there were twenty years ago. 0:19:03.280 --> 0:19:05.680 And so is it that we have like fewer of these, 0:19:05.720 --> 0:19:10.240 you know, like third place type places, or that they're 0:19:10.280 --> 0:19:11.080 just changing. 0:19:11.440 --> 0:19:12.439 That's a really good question. 0:19:12.720 --> 0:19:15.520 I think that they to the extent that they're changing, 0:19:15.600 --> 0:19:19.800 they're changing to places that allow less kind of face 0:19:19.840 --> 0:19:23.720 to face and community time together. So talk about coffee shops. 0:19:24.000 --> 0:19:27.920 We've had to shift in coffee shops from like Starbucks, 0:19:27.960 --> 0:19:32.520 which was never a very social place into the social 0:19:32.680 --> 0:19:35.840 it was more social than the drive through coffee shop, 0:19:35.840 --> 0:19:37.560 which is the new trend right now. 0:19:37.640 --> 0:19:39.520 Well, and that's the thing. Even Starbucks. There are tons 0:19:39.560 --> 0:19:42.119 of Starbucks is, but many of them look like what 0:19:42.200 --> 0:19:44.919 you just described. They're basically drive through windows and people 0:19:44.960 --> 0:19:47.120 just order on their phone and they don't even interact 0:19:47.119 --> 0:19:50.400 with the person behind the counter. There's more gems, there's 0:19:50.440 --> 0:19:53.399 more fitness centers, but like, are you interacting with that 0:19:53.480 --> 0:19:53.920 many people? 0:19:53.920 --> 0:19:55.280 Some people do, some people don't. 0:19:55.359 --> 0:19:58.399 But nightlife in America per capita is like a third 0:19:58.480 --> 0:20:00.600 the size it was when I was born in the 0:20:00.680 --> 0:20:04.480 late seventies. Like, that's incredible that we've lost that much 0:20:04.680 --> 0:20:07.600 of sort of bars and clubs where people just kind 0:20:07.600 --> 0:20:08.680 of let loose and had fun. 0:20:09.040 --> 0:20:11.280 Yeah, I just wonder if we're more talking about drinking. 0:20:12.320 --> 0:20:15.560 Oh yeah, like drinking is like are we is this 0:20:15.640 --> 0:20:19.639 just like a way of talking about the decline of 0:20:19.680 --> 0:20:21.920 alcohol consumption or something like that, and that wants. 0:20:21.720 --> 0:20:23.280 To have a beer and go bowling. I think this 0:20:23.440 --> 0:20:25.520 is what I'm hearing. 0:20:26.200 --> 0:20:28.320 Because a lot of these new places, like a lot 0:20:28.320 --> 0:20:30.720 of what you're describing as sort of like drinking culture, 0:20:31.000 --> 0:20:32.560