By Charles Hugh Smith
OfTwoMinds.com
March 9, 2026
A Monster Id of self-reinforcing perverse incentives is gathering strength with every click, every data point collected and every unseen algorithmic adjustment of the addictive dosage.
Much of what we rightly decry as dysfunctional is the result of perverse incentives built into systems not from malice but from the self-reinforcing nature of self-interest: whatever mechanisms serve self-interest are reinforced by those benefiting the most from their institutionalization as "the way the world works."