Horace Mayonnaise → Oolong Tea Party→ How We Fight

Hey Neighbor. True story. A Boston couple is out to dinner at Contessa. The wife is noticeably better looking, but she’s wearing an expression of confusion. “I don't know what to do with these Aesop samples,” she says, scanning a distinctly sans serif post-work crowd ordering dark and stormies.

“We're a Kiehl's household."

➺ Thanks to those who answered our “Big Fight” Survey (results below) and congrats to all of us: We have sex more often than we fight.

➺ This week’s survey is a bit weird because it’s about the future of this business. All insights welcome!

➺ If you haven’t read The Flag, The Cross, and the Station Wagon, this is the right weekend to do it.

➺ Betsy Ross made the flag. Ralph Lipschitz made it acceptable to wear in Connecticut.

Upper Middle is growing fast (+/-150,000 readers), but we’re not exactly sure… what to do with this thing? Please take a moment to help us figure out how to excite and challenge you (while avoiding getting real jobs).

STATUS ❧ Department of Overeducation

When slavery enthusiast Francis Scott Key scribbled the phrase “land of the free, home of the brave" on the back of an envelope in 1814, he wasn’t just writing patriotic ad copy. He was articulating a civic goal today’s – one today’s College Board aristocracy rarely pays more than sotto voce lip service. In the 19th century reformers like Horace Mann insisted that America education be about building character and courage, rather than simply sifting out intelligence. Today, Mann’s name adorns a prep school that uses standardized tests in kindergarten admissions. 

Psychologist Carol Dweck calls the education shift from focusing on character to focusing on intelligence the adoption of a “fixed mindset” because it assumes young peoples’ salient qualities don’t change. As Dweck points out, this creates perverse incentivizes: Smart kids don’t risk looking dumb^[1] by (bravely) trying new things. In 2013, a study out of Columbia’s teaching college demonstrated that this dynamic has led to elevated anxiety in affluent adolescents, many of whom don’t see themselves as having an excuse to fail and thus treat any setback as a referendum on their immutable self. 

But we are mutable – the product of not just our qualities but our choices. That’s why bravery matters; it’s the quality that allows us to enjoy freedom as more than a buzzword. “Our potential is one thing,” as the veteran and Senator Angela Duckworth puts it. “What we do with it is quite another.” The first thing matters. The second thing is worth singing about. Failing isn’t just a fact of life, it’s a civic obligation.

➺ Meditation can be very, very bad for mental health. ➺ Airlines have gotten amazingly good at exploiting cognitive biases and class consciousness. ➺ Lazy summers are high-status and high logistics.

MONEY ❧ Regressive Behavior

Donald Trump is rarely at odds with the Heritage Foundation—the group behind his policy roadmap, Project 2025. But his plan to, as part of the Big Beautiful Debt Bomb Bill, raise the SALT deduction cap from $10,000 to $40,000, allowing high-earners to reduce their effective federal tax rate by claiming deductions for property and state income taxes, has Heritage dropping diss tracks with words like “unjustifiable” and“giveaway.” No surprise. Heritage isn’t a think tank so much as a thought tank. That thought: “Let’s make sure Katherine in legal can’t afford to send her second kid to Montessori.”

Inspired by the Powell Memorandum—a tin-foil fedora manifesto warning that pinko professors, journalists, and lawyers were intent on constraining American capitalism–far-right beer baron Joseph Coors Sr.^[2] bankrolled Heritage in 1973 with the hope of dismantling the postwar progressive consensus. At the time, Nixon was flirting with universal basic income and Coors Sr. was wiretapping UC Boulder undergrads. In the decades since, the effective tax rate for the top 1% has fallen from 44% to 26% (and that’s ignoring capital gains).  What the dustup over SALT makes clear is that the foundation’s staff will never take the “W.” They will continuing persecuting a war on Morning Edition listeners even after it has become economically dubious (consumer confidence is iffy as hell^[3]), ideologically inconsistent, and politically stupid. 

Democratic socialist Zohran Mamdani just won a primary in New York by talking about cost of living—the same issue that helped Trump retake the White House. Tossing a bone to swing voters outside Philly or Madison would be good pre-Midterm politics. But Heritage don’t care. They remain squarely focused on policies that redistribute wealth from the top 10% to the top .10%. After all, if Katherine child’s natural curiosity is fostered in child-led, hands-on learning environment… what next?

➺ Complexity bias makes working for growth-oriented companies kinda miserable. ➺ There’s a grumbling about Meta “poaching” A.I. talent. This is dumb. Nerds don’t have ivory tusks and companies should compete for talent. ➺ The GOP has literally announced plans to lie about the budget. Gonna start doing this at home. ➺ If the Big Beautiful Bill goes through the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is screwed. Buy new reading glasses; you’re going to want to start reading the fine print.

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