| This is Bloomberg Opinion Today, a backdoor for privatizing Bloomberg Opinion's opinions. On Sundays, we look at the major themes of the week past and how they will define the week ahead. Sign up for the daily newsletter here. It's August: The sun is bright, the beach is balmy and the woods are beckoning. So naturally, I spent a my week thinking about nuclear Armageddon. The global catastrophe that, fortunately, we avoided for two generations of children — just in time to replace it in our nightmares with climate Armageddon. So, let's see who had the scariest childhoods: Baby boomers with their Bert the Turtle duck-and-cover drills, Gen X with fears of a Red Dawn and China Syndrome, or millennials with rising temperatures and mom and dad constantly on their case? Why, Gen Z of course. Just ask them, and keep making eye contact. They have a legit case: even higher global temperatures, the Covid pandemic, a Capitol riot, the return of the mullet. The greatest thing the kids have going for them? AI. The worst? AI. Conor Sen dissects the paradox. "There are plenty of signs that AI is making the job market tougher for young college graduates, but for the 22 million people with jobs that are categorized as professional and business services, wage growth has actually accelerated over the past year to levels solidly above pre-pandemic rates," he writes. "This suggests that the state of the labor market for white-collar workers is best described as bifurcated — one where there are both winners and losers rather than one where most workers are worse off." But Gen Z is about to learn a hard lesson they forced millennials to accept: The next generation is sure to believe they have it much worse. I'm sure that Generation Alpha (really, we are starting over already??), born between 2010 and last year, is chilling into snowflake mode this very moment. Imagine, if you can, a society where adolescents have no TikTok, Instagram, Facebook or YouTube. Now give it a silly accent, and you have … Australia. "Keeping young people safe online is a rallying cry we can all get behind. But the furor in Australia over plans to ban children under 16 from social media shows it's not as simple as it sounds," warns Catherine Thorbecke. "At the center of the latest debate over the rules set to come into effect later this year is Alphabet Inc.'s YouTube. Officials last week said they were reversing a promised exemption from the legislation for the video-sharing site. Part of the reason YouTube's inclusion has struck such a nerve is because it's impossible to overstate how intertwined it has become with pop culture for a generation who grew up on it." If a ban doesn't succeed, there's always Plan B: Simply wipe the existence of social media from Gen A's still-developing brains. "One of the more subtle and insidious threats posed by artificial intelligence and related technology is its ability to tamper with memories," writes F.D. Flam. Researchers are finding that "AI can manipulate what we think we remember. This manipulation occurs even when subjects know they're looking at AI-generated text and images. The findings suggest that artificial intelligence could amplify humans' ability to implant false memories." While Big AI looks to enter the kids' minds, a different industry is already in there: Big Plastic.  Source: X "Here's a fact that might make you feel a little strange inside: You and I have plastic in our brains. Tiny particles of polymers are also hanging about in our livers, kidneys, heart and bloodstream," writes Lara Williams. Half of all the plastic ever made has been produced since 2010 — the year Gen Alpha first came on the scene! Lara warns: "As well as tainting us with chemicals, the tiny fragments of the polymers – micro- and nano-plastics – are accumulating in our bodies, bypassing our built-in protective mechanisms such as the blood-brain barrier and placenta."  Who's behind this problematic production of polymers? Zimomo, Tycoco, Pato and their pals. "That freaky-cute Labubu doll you just bought (made largely of polyester and polyvinyl chloride) and the bento meal you got delivered in four separate containers (polypropylene and polyethylene) are evidence that we need to work a lot harder to break our plastics habit," adds David Fickling. "That demand picture is worrying, but the supply situation may be worse. It might even be exacerbated by some of the progress the world is making in capping our usage of fossil fuels. The rise of electric vehicles, for instance, will force refiners to produce more naphtha, since it's chemically similar to gasoline, which is starting to suffer from falling demand. Naphtha, in turn, is mostly processed into plastic feedstocks." That's feedstock — not to be confused with livestock, another climate evil. Which brings me to my next question: What's worse for your health, microplastics or Monster Double Thickburgers? Well, we know which is worse for you waistline. And while most people probably think Americans' ballooning BMI is caused by a lack of willpower, FD warns us that food companies are engineering their "snacks, fast food and sweets to addict us the same way cocaine and nicotine do." "While the blame game has been good for stirring public outrage, it hasn't led to anything useful for improving our health. Meanwhile, some health officials have been undermining potentially useful research on novel causes of overeating," she writes. "There is credible evidence that our obesity rate — about 40% — is related to our heavy consumption of fast food, packaged and instant foods, sweets and sweetened drinks — all of which were recently lumped into the giant category of ultra-processed food. These so-called UPFs make up about 53% of the average American diet." My existential threat growing up was an ICBM. For Gen Alpha, it's an AI ad for an ice cream sandwich wrapped in … you guessed it, plastic. Bonus Existential Threat Reading: What's the World Got in Store? - US CPI, Aug. 12: The Fed Needs Economists Who Aren't Politicians — Robert Burgess
- IEA oil market report, Aug. 13: The Bullish Case for Oil Is Real — But Far, Far Away — Javier Blas
- US retail sales, Aug. 15: Kohl's Can Turn Its Meme Moment Into Something More — Andrea Felsted
So who comes after the Alphas? Betas, a fitting name perhaps for kids who may lose their YouTube, their abs and their minds. But at least they may be rich! Last week, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent committed a Kinsley Gaffe when he referred to the Trump administration's new children's retirement accounts as "a backdoor for privatizing Social Security," but the truth is that the third rail of politics is going to lose its juice sooner or later. Enter my unpaid financial advisor and Bloomberg columnist, Nir Kaissar. "Two years ago, I proposed that the federal government put away $10,000 for each baby born in the US in a tax-free account invested in US stocks and accessible only at retirement. If that investment grows 7.5% a year after inflation, which is roughly what the S&P 500 Index has produced over the past 100 years, it will blossom into roughly $1.8 million in today's dollars when that baby turns 70," Nir suggests. "Even if US stocks were to produce a lower return than they have historically, supplementing retirement income for those who need it would still probably cost a lot less than Social Security and Medicare do today." China's babies, it seems, won't get a windfall on that scale. "No longer the most populous nation and confronted with projections that its citizenry will dwindle significantly in a couple of generations, China is trying something new," Daniel Moss reports. "Beijing announced last week it will subsidize households to have children. Babies born after Jan. 1 this year will receive 3,600 yuan ($500) annually until age three. While not a large amount, it represents a further step away from rules imposed in the 1970s that constrained fertility." China is welcoming Gen Beta and so am I. Let's just hope they have a world left to whinge about.  Source: Reddit Note: Please send Monster Double Thickburgers and feedback to Tobin Harshaw at [email protected] | 
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