mccMay 27, 2025

Airlines are like "instead of all those agents, we'll make a sort of assembly line manned by customers. Check in with one machine, drop your baggage off with another."

Then literally anything happens with the computer network requiring an elevated number of customers to need manual intervention, and suddenly you have an enormous immobile line while every single customer lines up before the two (2) remaining agents.

Corporations don't care about "efficiency" they just wanna fire people

Show threadmccMay 27, 2025
I really believe this. We were told capitalist entities will act to minimize costs and maximize profit. But what corporations actually seek to do, for whatever reason, is minimize *labor* cost. They prefer to bear any other kind of cost. They will minimize labor costs even if it increases overall costs and/or hurts profits
maymageMay 28, 2025
Show threadtef

@mcc fwiw there's literal studies showing the exact same thing

"This paper provides evidence from the US and Denmark that managers with an [MBA] reduce their employees' wages. [...] These business managers show no greater ability to increase sales or profits."

via: https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w29874/w29874.pdf

May 27, 2025 at 9:00pmWeb
Show threadRimuMay 28, 2025
@tef @mcc brb, adding "You got an MBA?" to my list of questions to ask during an interview
Show threadAndrocatMay 28, 2025

@rimu

"What percentage of managers at your company have business degrees?" is indeed a great question.

@tef @mcc

Show threadThe Long TailMay 28, 2025
@tef @mcc Interestingly enough there's also research that shows that in a similar way to most fund managers underperforming the market (i.e. worse than random selection) - most company executives underperform the market, and even successful ones cannot replicate their success in their next role (with rare exceptions).
This is why after Jack Welch left GE as CEO to take up a role as COO of IAC, there was no sequel to his book "Winning"...