The Fifth Risk
by Michael Lewis, Ramón González Férriz · first published 2018
64% recommend36% neutral
Why HN recommends it
Stories of career civil servants at agencies like NOAA and the Department of Energy, and what was lost when a new administration took over. For readers wanting an accessible look at unglamorous government work.
Summarised by Claude from recommending comments
Michael Lewis's brilliant narrative takes us into the engine rooms of a government under attack by its own leaders. In Agriculture the funding of vital programs like food stamps and school lunches is being slashed. The Commerce Department may not have enough staff to conduct the 2020 Census properly. Over at Energy, where international nuclear risk is managed, it's not clear there will be enough inspectors to track and locate black market uranium before terrorists do. Willful ignorance plays a role in these looming disasters. If your ambition is to maximize short-term gain without regard to
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…before, sufficient military air traffic controllers were willing and able to take on the job, today there is no such reserve. One book I read recently on the topic of arbitraging the social trust was "The Fifth Risk"; it's a good read. https://smile.amazon.com/Fifth-Risk-Michael-Lewis/dp/1324002...
on “US shutdown: Flight delays caused by staff shortages” ↗…experts without whom we would all be exposed to grave risks every day. They do their work conscientiously and seriously, largely out of the spotlight. Let me recommend you read Michael Lewis’s book The Fifth Risk, or at least listen to one of these interviews about it: https://www.scpr.org/programs/fresh-air/2018/10/02/65410/ https://cafe.com/stay-tuned-what-is-the-fifth-risk-with-mich...
on “Amazon is now delivering half its own packages, rivaling FedEx and UPS” ↗>Let me recommend you read Michael Lewis’s book The Fifth Risk, or at least listen to one of these interviews about it: I'm not sure I need to read a biased polemic about how big government is good and the Trump admin is bad. >The US civil service is full of highly…
on “Amazon is now delivering half its own packages, rivaling FedEx and UPS” ↗Sad to see NOAA continue to be gutted. Michael Lewis's book the Fifth Risk provides a good look at the individuals behind services like Accuweather and how they're trying to monopolize public, tax-funded data for private profit.
on “Trump’s 2021 budget drowns science agencies in red ink, again” ↗A major thing the DOE does is keep track of where the world's plutonium is— it's energy-related, but also a national security matter. Michael Lewis's excellent book The Fifth Risk examines some of these agency functions in the context of what was lost when there Trump administration stepped into power with essentially no transition plan or concept of how to run them.
on “Lyft lays off 17% of workforce, furloughs hundreds more” ↗This is a great time to check out Michael Lewis's The Fifth Risk (https://www.amazon.com/Fifth-Risk-Michael-Lewis/dp/132400264...), which does a deep dive into NOAA, the weather service, and the wretched attempts to strangle the usefulness of this public service while…
on “Weather Service faces bandwidth shortage, proposes limiting key data” ↗Your use of the term "unelected bureaucrats" as a delegitimizing pejorative is risible. Do yourself a favour and read Michael Lewis's The Fifth Risk. The EU's civil servants are, by and large, an exceptionally talented bunch of people, most of whom are multilingual in addition to being experts in the fields they were hired for. As for their having…
on “EU will require Apple to open up iMessage” ↗Yes! The Michael Lewis book is called _The Fifth Risk_, and it's an amazing read. It's a series of contrasting stories: earnest government workers who have dedicated their careers to protecting all of us from threats like nuclear proliferation, on the one…
on “Congress Is About to Ban the US Government from Offering Free Online Tax Filing” ↗For those interested in more background on NOAA and making money from it, I highly recommend reading The Fifth Risk[0] by Moneyball author, Michael Lewis[1]. It details how a couple private companies make a lot of money using NOAA data in interesting ways (e.g.: crop insurance (now acquired by Monsanto)). Another of…
on “NOAA upgrades the U.S. global weather forecast model” ↗It's another indication of the danger of the incompetency of the current administration as outlined in Michael Lewis' excellent book "The Fifth Risk". The Fifth Risk being "Project management", or lack thereof. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Fifth_Risk
on “Cyber memo warns of new risks to White House network” ↗…NOAA. He withdrew his nomination for health reasons, but believes the government shouldn't provide any type of direct forecasts to the public. Michael Lewis has a good write up of this in his book The Fifth Risk.
on “Weather.com Has Become the Pawn of a Data Theft Scheme” ↗…far more comparable to the first situation than the second. And most of the departments are extremely effective when they have leadership that believes in the mission of the agency. Michael Lewis' the Fifth Risk highlights this pretty well.
on “Bloomberg bankrolls a social-media army” ↗…(former CEO of Accuweather), NOAA dramatically curtailed its public data access in lieu of exclusive access to large companies like Weather Underground. For more on this, check out Michael Lewis's The Fifth Risk.
on “Personal Weather Station Network” ↗I feel ya. I'm in a life phase where I have to believe most people are just trying to do a good job most of the time. The alternative is too bleak. Michael Lewis' The Fifth Risk most closely captures my current thinking. My TLDR: Strive to create systems and orgs which will increase likelihood of good outcomes. Peace.
on “US raises ‘deep concerns’ over WHO report on Covid’s Wuhan origins” ↗…Trump likes it when people call him an orange racist because it plays to his base, call him a poor businessman and a fraud and he's not so happy. P.S. on the subject of trump, Michael Lewis's book "The fifth risk" is very good. It's a good insight into the man, his team, and basically everything you shouldn't do in their shoes. My favourite piece of trivia from the above book is that Trump never fires anyone…
on “The latest campus cancellation is different” ↗