Boeing 737 MAX

Flying Blind: The 737 MAX Tragedy and the Fall of Boeing
by Peter Robison
Published 29 Nov 2021

For marketing: “Boeing Introduces 737 MAX with Launch of New Aircraft Family,” August 30, 2011, https://boeing.mediaroom.com. Over the next two years: Final Committee Report, p. 47. The proposal they sent: Dominic Gates, “Boeing Pushed FAA to Relax 737 MAX Certification Requirements for Crew Alerts,” Seattle Times, October 2, 2019. Early testing revealed: Dominic Gates, “The Inside Story of MCAS: How Boeing’s 737 MAX System Gained Power and Lost Safeguards,” Seattle Times, June 22, 2019; Jack Nicas et al., “Boeing Built Deadly Assumptions into 737 Max, Blind to a Late Design Change,” New York Times, June 1, 2019.

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“You have to know”: “Status of the 737 Max,” Hearing Before the Subcommittee on Aviation of the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure, House of Representatives, May 15, 2019, https://www.govinfo.gov/, p. 5. “Absolutely”: “Status of the 737 Max,” p. 36. But Elwell met: Author interviews with anonymous sources, October 2020. A PowerPoint presentation: 737 MAX Flight Standardization Board, “FAA/Operators Meeting: Return to Service/FSB Information Briefing,” April 12, 2019. “I’d say we come”: Dominic Gates, “Muilenburg Says Boeing Brings ‘A Tone of Humility and Learning’ over 737 MAX to Paris Air Show,” Seattle Times, June 16, 2019.

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Dickson said he’d look: Natalie Kitroeff and David Gelles, “At Boeing, C.E.O.’s Stumbles Deepen a Crisis,” New York Times, December 22, 2019. Boeing put out a statement: Boeing, “737 MAX Progress Report,” November 11, 2019, https://boeing.mediaroom.com. He sent a memo: David Shepardson and Eric M. Johnson, “U.S. FAA Regulator Head Tells Team to ‘Take Whatever Time Is Needed’ on 737 MAX,” Reuters, November 15, 2019. The next month: David Schaper, “FAA Chief Pushes Back on Boeing Pressure to Return 737 Max Jets to Service,” NPR, December 12, 2019. Muilenburg at last: Boeing, “Boeing Statement Regarding 737 MAX Production,” December 16, 2019, https://boeing.mediaroom.com. Walking away with $59 million: The executive compensation was detailed in a lawsuit filed by Seafarers Pension Plan against Boeing and other top executives in the U.S.

Vulture Capitalism: Corporate Crimes, Backdoor Bailouts, and the Death of Freedom
by Grace Blakeley
Published 11 Mar 2024

I would highly recommend consulting these sources for a fuller understanding of the events surrounding the disasters: Maureen Tkacik, “Crash Course,” New Republic, September 18, 2019, https://newrepublic.com/article/154944/boeing-737-max-investigation-indonesia-lion-air-ethiopian-airlines-managerial-revolution; Alec MacGillis, “The Case against Boeing,” The New Yorker, November 11, 2019, https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/11/18/the-case-against-boeing; Peter Robison, Flying Blind: The 737 MAX Tragedy and the Fall of Boeing (London: Penguin UK, 2021); Gregory Travis, “How the Boeing 737 Max Disaster Looks to a Software Developer,” IEEE Spectrum, April 18, 2019, https://spectrum.ieee.org/how-the-boeing-737-max-disaster-looks-to-a-software-developer. 2. Sinéad Baker, “This Timeline Shows Exactly What Happened on Board the Lion Air Boeing 737 Max that Crashed in Less than 13 Minutes, Killing 189 People,” Insider, October 29, 2019, https://www.businessinsider.com/lion-air-crash-timeline-boeing-737-max-disaster-killed-189-2019-10. 3. Ibid. 4.

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This propensity to pitch up with power application… increased the risk that the airplane could stall… Worse still, because the [engines] were so far in front of the wing and so large, a power increase will cause them to actually produce lift, particularly at high angles of attack… And the lift they produce is well ahead of the wing’s center of lift, meaning the [engines] will cause the 737 Max at a high angle of attack to go to a higher angle of attack.” Ibid. 25. Ibid. 26. Ibid. 27. As Travis puts it, “The major selling point of the 737 Max is that it is just a 737—any pilot who could fly a 737 could fly a 737 Max with no new training.” Ibid. 28. Tkacik, “Crash Course.” 29. Ibid. 30. Robison, Flying Blind; Tkacik, “Crash Course.” 31. Dominic Gates, “Why Boeing’s Emergency Directions May Have Failed to Save 737 MAX,” Seattle Times, April 8, 2019, https://www.seattletimes.com/business/boeing-aerospace/boeings-emergency-procedure-for-737-max-may-have-failed-on-ethiopian-flight/. 32.

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Micheline Maynard, “Wife of Ousted Boeing Chief Seeks Divorce After 50 Years,” New York Times, March 14, 2005, https://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/14/business/wife-of-ousted-boeing-chief-seeks-divorce-after-50-years.html. 17. Tkacik, “Crash Course.” 18. Robison, Flying Blind. 19. Ibid. 20. Ibid. 21. John Cassidy, “How Boeing and the F.A.A. Created the 737 MAX Catastrophe,” The New Yorker, September 17, 2020, https://www.newyorker.com/news/our-columnists/how-boeing-and-the-faa-created-the-737-max-catastrophe. 22. Travis, “How the Boeing 737 Max Disaster Looks to a Software Developer.” 23. “The GE-manufactured LEAP engines had a 40% larger diameter than the original 737s and weighed twice as much.” Ibid. 24. Gregory Travis, a former pilot and software engineer, explains: “The angle of attack is the angle between the wings and the airflow over the wings.

The Man Who Broke Capitalism: How Jack Welch Gutted the Heartland and Crushed the Soul of Corporate America—and How to Undo His Legacy
by David Gelles
Published 30 May 2022

“You don’t want to”: Dominic Gates and Mike Baker, “The inside story of MCAS: How Boeing’s 737 MAX system gained power and lost safeguards,” Seattle Times, June 22, 2019, https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/times-watchdog/the-inside-story-of-mcas-how-boeings-737-max-system-gained-power-and-lost-safeguards/. “The timeline was extremely”: David Gelles, Natalie Kitroeff, Jack Nicas, and Rebecca R. Ruiz, “Boeing Was ‘Go, Go, Go’ to Beat Airbus With the 737 Max,” New York Times, March 23, 2019, https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/23/business/boeing-737-max-crash.html. “This airplane is designed by clowns”: David Gelles, “ ‘I Honestly Don’t Trust Many People at Boeing’: A Broken Culture Exposed,” New York Times, January 10, 2020, https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/10/business/boeing-737-employees-messages.html.

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“This airplane is designed by clowns”: David Gelles, “ ‘I Honestly Don’t Trust Many People at Boeing’: A Broken Culture Exposed,” New York Times, January 10, 2020, https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/10/business/boeing-737-employees-messages.html. “Frankly right now all”: David Gelles, “Boeing 737 Max Factory Was Plagued With Problems, Whistle-Blower Says,” New York Times, December 9, 2019, https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/09/business/boeing-737-max-whistleblower.html. “That liberal asshole!”: Lane, Jacked Up, 130–131. “You’ve lost your mind”: Simone Foxman, “Twitter laughs at Jack Welch’s suggestion that the US jobs report was manipulated,” Quartz.com, October 5, 2012, https://qz.com/12540/twitter-laughs-at-jack-welchs-suggestion-that-the-us-jobs-report-was-manipulated/

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AB InBev, 178 Adbusters magazine, 150 age discrimination, 72, 113 AIG, 125–26, 144 Ailes, Roger, 53–54, 194–95 Airbus, 86, 102, 153, 155 Albertsons, 9, 77, 104–5, 106, 107 Aldrin, Buzz, 22 Allen, Robert, 71 AlliedSignal, 78–80, 220–21 Alstom, 161, 163 Amazon, 134, 171–74, 182, 184, 185, 203, 214, 216, 222–23 Ambev, 177–78 American Airlines, 153, 186 American Express, 70, 168–69 American Mortgage Insurance, 58 America’s Talking, 53–54 Amgen, 77, 106 Anheuser-Busch, 178 antitrust enforcement: GE acquisition of Alstom and, 161 impact of loosening, 38–39, 51, 79 market concentration vs., 79–80, 176–78, 219 in stakeholder capitalism, 219 Antitrust Paradox, The (Bork), 38 Apple, 214 Apprentice, The (NBC TV program), 121, 135, 195 Arctic Cat, 77 Armco, 66–67 Armstrong, Neil, 22 Arpey, Gerard, 153 Arthur Andersen, 124 AT&T, 71, 169, 175–76, 177, 182, 221, 223 Avakian, Stephanie, 225 Baker, George Fisher, 184 Baldwin, Alec, 140 Ballmer, Steve, 102, 171 Bank of America, 144, 149, 214 Barra, Mary, 199 B Corp movement, 212–13 Bear Stearns, 67, 143–44 Beasley, Jane, 118–20 Belichick, Bill, 221 Bennett, Steve, 105–6 Bennett, William, 95 Bennis, Warren, 132 Bergers, David, 147–48 Berkshire Hathaway, 222 Berle, Adolf A., Jr., 24–25, 212 Bertelsmann, 51 Bethlehem Steel, 165 Bezos, Jeff, 134, 171–74, 184, 185, 222–23 Bezos Academy, 134 Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, 133–34 Bin Hussain, Muath, 135 Black Monday (October 19, 1987), 53 BlackRock, 213–14 Blitzer, Wolf, 90–91 Bloomberg, Michael, 132–33 Blumenthal, Richard, 82 Blystone, John, 105 Boeing, 9, 75, 77, 86–90, 126–30, 137, 186–94, 203 bailout, 224 Business Jet Project, 102, 119 Dave Calhoun as CEO, 189, 190–94, 224 Congressional investigations of 737 Max, 156, 189, 194 Covid-19 pandemic and, 224 Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 crash (2019), 187–89, 190, 194 headquarters relocation to Chicago, 88–89, 219 Leadership Center (near St. Louis), 87, 191–94 Lion Air Flight 610 crash (2018), 185–87, 190 Jim McNerney as CEO, 113, 127–30, 153–54, 194, 200 Dennis Muilenburg as CEO, 154–56, 187–90 pension plan elimination, 128 737 Max with MCAS (737 redesign), 153–56, 186–90, 192–94, 224 787 Dreamliner, 128–30, 153, 190–91 whistleblower complaints to the FAA, 130, 190 Boeing, William, 86 Boesky, Ivan, 54 Bork, Robert, 38 Bossidy, Larry “the Knife,” 78–80, 83–84, 120, 220–21 Boulware, Lemuel, 46–47 Boulwarism, 46–47 Brady, Tom, 121 Brito, Carlos, 179 Brokaw, Tom, 52, 53 Brooks Brothers, 169 Brown, Tina, 121 Buckley, George, 113 Budweiser, 177, 178 Buffenbarger, Tom, 128 Buffett, Warren, 8, 124, 145, 160, 179–81, 196, 222 Buntrock, Dean, 123–24 Burger King, 177, 179 Bush, George H.

Visual Thinking: The Hidden Gifts of People Who Think in Pictures, Patterns, and Abstractions
by Temple Grandin, Ph.d.
Published 11 Oct 2022

Sedimentology 55, no. 6 (2008). Koren, M. “Who Should Pay for the Mistakes on NASA’s Next Big Telescope?” Atlantic, July 27, 2018. Lahiri, T. “An Off-Duty Pilot Saved Lion Air’s 737 MAX from a Crash the Day before Its Fatal Flight.” Quartz, March 19, 2019. https://qz.com/1576597/off-duty-pilot-saved-lion-airs-737-max-the-day-before-its-fatal-flight/. Langewiesche, W. “System Crash—What Really Brought Down the Boeing 737 MAX? A 21st Century Aviation Industry That Made Airplanes Astonishingly Easy to Fly, but Not Foolproof.” New York Times Magazine, September 22, 2019, 36–45, 57. “Lion Air: How Could a Brand New Plane Crash?”

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“A Systematic Review of Geological Evidence for Holocene Earthquakes and Tsunamis along the Nankai-Suruga Trough, Japan.” Earth-Science Reviews 159 (August 2016): 337–57. dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.earscirev.2016.06.011. Gates, D., and D. Baker. “The Inside Story of MCAS: How Boeing’s 737 MAX System Gained Power and Lost Safeguards.” Seattle Times, June 22, 2019. https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/times-watchdog/the-inside-story-of-mcas-how-boeings-737-max-system-gained-power-and-lost-safeguards/. Gibson, E. J., and R. D. Walk. “The ‘Visual Cliff.’ ” Scientific American 202, no. 4 (1960): 64–71. Glantz, J., et al. “Jet’s Software Was Updated, Pilots Weren’t.”

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National Safety Council. https://injuryfacts.nsc.org/all-injuries/preventable-death-overview/odds-of-dying/. Jensen, A. R. “Most Adults Know More Than 42,000 Words.” Frontiers, August 16, 2016. Johnston, P., and R. Harris. “The Boeing 737 MAX Saga: Lessons for Software Organizations.” Software Quality Profession 21, no. 3 (May 2019): 4–12. https://asq.org/quality-resources/articles/the-boeing-737-max-saga-lessons-for-software-organizations?id=489c93e1417945b8b9ecda7e3f937f5d. Kaiser, J. “Key Cancer Results Failed to Be Reproduced.” Science 374, no. 6573 (2021): 1311. Kalluri, P. “Don’t Ask If AI Is Good or Fair, Ask How It Shifts Power.”

Competition Overdose: How Free Market Mythology Transformed Us From Citizen Kings to Market Servants
by Maurice E. Stucke and Ariel Ezrachi
Published 14 May 2020

“Fatal Flaw,” 60 Minutes Australia; Dominic Gates, “Long before First 737 Max Crash, Boeing Knew a Key Sensor Warning Light Wasn’t Working, but Told No One,” Seattle Times, May 5, 2019, https://www.seattletimes.com/business/boeing-aerospace/long-before-first-737-max-crash-boeing-knew-a-key-sensor-warning-light-wasnt-working-but-told-no-one/. 12.“Fatal Flaw,” 60 Minutes Australia. 13.Boeing, “About the Boeing 737 MAX,” accessed May 10, 2019, https://www.boeing.com/commercial/737max/index.page; Boeing, “737 MAX: By Design,” accessed May 10, 2019, https://www.boeing.com/commercial/737max/by-design/#/max-reliability. 14.Dominic Gates, “Facing Sharp Questions, Boeing CEO Refuses to Admit Flaws in 737 Max Design,” Seattle Times, April 29, 2019, https://www.seattletimes.com/business/boeing-aerospace/facing-sharp-questions-boeing-ceo-refuses-to-admit-flaws-in-737-max-design/. 15.Laurent Belsie, “‘Too Cozy.’ Boeing Crashes Raise Doubts over FAA Certification,” Christian Science Monitor, March 26, 2019, https://www.csmonitor.com/Business/2019/0326/Too-cozy.

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Feezell, Coaching for Character: Reclaiming the Principles of Sportsmanship (Champaign IL: Human Kinetics, 1997), 15. 5.Brooksley Born, interview, Frontline, PBS, October 20, 2009, https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/warning/interviews/born.html. 6.The Financial Crisis Inquiry Report, 34. 7.Testimony of Alan Greenspan before the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission, April 7, 2010, https://fcic.law.stanford.edu/hearings/testimony/subprime-lending-and-securitization-and-enterprises, 92–93. 8.Financial Crisis Inquiry Report, xviii. 9.Theo Leggett, “Boeing Admits Knowing of 737 Max Problem,” BBC News, May 6, 2019, https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-48174797. 10.Dominic Gates, interview, “Fatal Flaw,” 60 Minutes Australia, Nine Network, May 5, 2019, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QytfYyHmxtc. 11.“Fatal Flaw,” 60 Minutes Australia; Dominic Gates, “Long before First 737 Max Crash, Boeing Knew a Key Sensor Warning Light Wasn’t Working, but Told No One,” Seattle Times, May 5, 2019, https://www.seattletimes.com/business/boeing-aerospace/long-before-first-737-max-crash-boeing-knew-a-key-sensor-warning-light-wasnt-working-but-told-no-one/. 12.

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-Boeing-crashes-raise-doubts-over-FAA-certification. 16.Leslie Josephs, “DOT’s Watchdog Says FAA to Improve Air Safety Oversight Procedures by This Summer,” CNBC, March 27, 2019, https://www.cnbc.com/2019/03/27/faa-boeings-737-max-to-face-heat-in-congress.html. 17.Government Accountability Office, Aviation Safety: FAA Efforts Have Improved Safety, but Challenges Remain in Key Areas, statement of Gerald L. Dillingham before the US Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, April 16, 2013, https://www.gao.gov/assets/660/653801.pdf. 18.GAO, Aviation Safety, 3; Susan Webb Yackee and Simon F. Haeder, “Boeing 737 Max: The FAA Wanted a Safe Plane—but Didn’t Want to Hurt America’s Biggest Exporter Either,” The Conversation, March 22, 2019, https://theconversation.com/boeing-737-max-the-faa-wanted-a-safe-plane-but-didnt-want-to-hurt-americas-biggest-exporter-either-113892; Testimony of Daniel K.

A Hacker's Mind: How the Powerful Bend Society's Rules, and How to Bend Them Back
by Bruce Schneier
Published 7 Feb 2023

At pickup, the driver and passenger agree to “go karura,” which means that the passenger cancels the ride and pays the driver the entire amount in cash. The Boeing 737 MAX debacle provides a particularly high-profile example of the regulatory negligence that results from overly close relationships between regulators and regulated industries. In this case, FAA regulators applied insufficient scrutiny to the 737 MAX’s Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS), which the company had modified. As a result of this failure of oversight, two 737 MAX airplanes crashed in Indonesia (2018) and Ethiopia (2019), killing 346 people. Let’s be explicit about the hack here.

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Labour subjectivities and contestation in Nairobi’s gig economy,” DSA2019: Opening Up Development, Open University, Milton Keynes, https://www.devstud.org.uk/past-conferences/2019-opening-up-development-conference. 117FAA managers took Boeing’s side: Natalie Kitroeff, David Gelles, and Jack Nicas (27 Jun 2019), “The roots of Boeing’s 737 Max crisis: A regulator relaxes its oversight,” New York Times, https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/27/business/boeing-737-max-faa.html. 117The FAA even waived: Gary Coglianese, Gabriel Scheffler, and Daniel E. Walters (30 Oct 2020), “The government’s hidden superpower: ‘Unrules,’ ” Fortune, https://fortune.com/2020/10/30/federal-law-regulations-loopholes-waivers-unrules. 29.

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See AI hacking; AI systems ATM hacks, 31–34, 46, 47, 63 attention, 183–87 authoritarian governments, 174–75 AutoRun, 58, 68 Bank Holding Company Act (1956), 75 banking hacks, 74–78, 119, 260n Barrett, Amy Coney, 121 beneficial ownership, 86, 88 Berkoff, David, 42 Biden, Joseph, 129, 130 Big Lie technique, 189 biological systems, 19–20 Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (2002), 169 Black Codes, 162–63 Boeing 737 MAX, 116–17 Bongo, Ali, 193 border closures, 126 Borodin, Andrey, 87 bots, 188, 210, 220, 221–22, 225–26, 274n Boxie, 218 brands, 194 Breaking Bad, 32 Breakout, 236–37 Briffault, Richard, 151 bug bounties, 56–57 bugs, 14–15 bureaucracy hacks, 115–18 Burr, Aaron, 155 business email compromise, 53–54, 192 buyers’ agency, 99 capitalism.

Risk: A User's Guide
by Stanley McChrystal and Anna Butrico
Published 4 Oct 2021

newly installed automated control system: Michael Laris, “Changes to Flawed Boeing 737 Max Were Kept from Pilots, DeFazio Says,” The Washington Post, June 19, 2019, https://washingtonpost.com/local/trafficandcommuting/changes-to-flawed-boeing-737-max-were-kept-from-pilots-defazio-says/2019/06/19/553522f0-92bc-11e9-aadb-74e6b2b46f6a_story.html. pilots could have responded: Jack Nicas, James Glanz, and David Gelles, “In Test of Boeing Jet, Pilots Had 40 Seconds to Fix Error,” The New York Times, March 25, 2019, https://nytimes.com/2019/03/25/business/boeing-simulation-error.html. But the updated control system: Laris, “Changes to Flawed Boeing 737 Max Were Kept from Pilots.”

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crash and burn ■ On October 29, 2018, Lion Air Flight 610 crashed less than thirteen minutes after takeoff—plunging into the Java Sea. Months later, on March 10, 2019, Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 crashed only six minutes after takeoff. Both planes were Boeing 737 MAX 8 aircraft. Post-crash analysis placed great focus on the newly installed automated control system of the 737 MAX—when it malfunctioned, the planes were forced into irrecoverable nosedives. Subsequent examination found that the pilots could have responded effectively if they had been trained and familiar with all aspects of the new automated system.

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Based on the nature of your business, your organization will focus more on some Risk Control Factors than others. For example, a fast-food restaurant will focus on timing, while communication and adaptability will be more important for a highway safety authority. But resist the temptation to assess only factors that feel relevant—as Boeing did during the crashes of the 737 MAX. Pairing your quantitative and qualitative responses will give you a robust understanding of the strength of your organization’s Risk Immune System. Fine-Tuning the System The greatest risk to us is us. Our own weaknesses and vulnerabilities stand in our way to best respond to and counter threats.

Green Swans: The Coming Boom in Regenerative Capitalism
by John Elkington
Published 6 Apr 2020

See also: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silent_Spring. 9.Theo Leggett, “What Went Wrong Inside Boeing’s Cockpit?,” BBC News, May 17, 2019. See also: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/resources/idt-sh/boeing_two_deadly_crashes. 10.Henry Grabar, “The Crash of the Boeing 737 Max Is a Warning to Drivers, Too,” Slate, March 12, 2019. See also: https://slate.com/technology/2019/03/boeing-737-max-crashes-automation-self-driving-cars-surprise.html. 11.John Gapper, “Boeing’s Hubris Blinded It to a Lurking Danger,” Financial Times, April 11, 2019. 12.Jared Diamond, Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed. New York: Viking Press, 2005.

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As it happens, Boeing had played a significant part in my family’s story, with cousins working with the company, the eldest of whom was Mr. Boeing’s personal lawyer for many years. It was one of those brands you trusted, literally, with your life. But what caught the world’s attention was that this crash was the second of its type involving Boeing’s commercially successful 737 Max 8 aircraft. I have never been afraid of flying, though I have certainly had frightening moments in flight. But reading the transcripts of the last words of the doomed crew certainly gives one pause. Here is how the BBC described the last moments of the Ethiopian Airlines crew: “As alarms sounded in their cockpit, the captain and first officer struggled to regain control of their stricken aircraft.

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Soon all that was left was a smoking crater. Boeing initially denied any connection between the crashes of Lion Air flight 610 and Ethiopian Airlines flight 302, but the evidence increasingly pointed to systemic defects in the aircraft’s anti-stall software. This was designed to point the plane downward to counterbalance the 737 Max 8’s heavy, forward-mounted engines.10 Confounding the expectations of the designers, of the crew of the doomed flights, and of the regulators whose job it is to make sure such things do not happen, it turned out that in certain conditions the software made fatal nosedives virtually inevitable. Software, you might conclude, with strong Black Swan characteristics.

How Boards Work: And How They Can Work Better in a Chaotic World
by Dambisa Moyo
Published 3 May 2021

“Global Investors Driving Business Transition.” www.climateaction100.org. Coase, R. H. “The Nature of the Firm.” Economica 4, no. 16 (November 1937): 386–405. www.jstor.org/stable/2626876?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents. Cohan, Peter. “Delays in Boeing’s 737 MAX and 777X Could Weigh on Stock.” Forbes, June 6, 2019. www.forbes.com/sites/petercohan/2019/06/06/delays-in-boeings-737-max-and-777x-could-weigh-on-stock/#61de1af3e678. Cohn, Yafit. “Independent Chair Proposals.” Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance, August 22, 2016. https://corpgov.law.harvard.edu/2016/08/22/independent-chair-proposals-2/. Collins, Jim.

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After all, the board-approved strategy will ideally withstand not just an ordinary economic downturn but also a significant crisis of unknown size and duration. The 2020 global pandemic is an example of such a crisis. One can imagine being on the board of Boeing, the US aircraft maker, in March 2019, as it was dealing with the fallout from two fatal crashes of their new 737 MAX 8 aircraft within the span of five months. These crashes led to the entire line of planes being grounded and precipitated a 20 percent decline in Boeing’s stock price. The causes and consequences of the crashes were shrouded in uncertainty, so the board was largely seen as impotent and unable to shape the company’s narrative.

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This could come from managing a global employee base, with multiple jurisdictions governing the employment rights, or from experience with the political and economic risks inherent in global trade. Achieving a balance of expertise in the boardroom is crucial. Often, in times of trouble, an imbalance in a board’s composition can help explain why a company is facing challenges. For instance, in 2019, when Boeing was dealing with two fatal 737 MAX crashes, the company was criticized for having too many board members with financial backgrounds and too few who had engineering or technological expertise and may have been better equipped to grapple with safety issues. As part of the company’s response to this criticism, in September 2019 Boeing created an aerospace safety committee on its board to oversee the development, manufacturing, and operation of its aircraft and services and to boost the transparency of engineering decisions.

Succeeding With AI: How to Make AI Work for Your Business
by Veljko Krunic
Published 29 Mar 2020

When it comes to gorillas, Google Photos remains blind. WIRED. 2018 Jan 11 [cited 2018 Jul 2]. Available from: https://www.wired.com/story/when-itcomes-to-gorillas-google-photos-remains-blind/ Gallagher S. UK, Australia, others also ground Boeing 737 MAX after crash [Updated]. Ars Technica. 2019 Mar 12 [cited 2020 Jan 8]. Available from: https:// arstechnica.com/information-technology/2019/03/another-737-max-jet-crashprompts-groundings-by-china-indonesia-ethiopia/ Wikimedia Foundation. Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System. Wikipedia. [Cited 2019 Sep 10.] Available from: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/ index.php?title=Maneuvering_Characteristics_Augmentation_System&oldid=9148 99059 Leggett T.

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title=Maneuvering_Characteristics_Augmentation_System&oldid=9148 99059 Leggett T. What went wrong inside Boeing’s cockpit? BBC News. [Cited 2020 Jan 8.] Available from: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/resources/idt-sh/boeing_two _deadly_crashes Wikimedia Foundation. Boeing 737 MAX groundings. Wikipedia. [Cited 2020 Jan 8.] Available from: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Boeing_737 _MAX_groundings&oldid=934819447 Wikimedia Foundation. Smart city. Wikipedia. [Cited 2019 Sep 10.] Available from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smart_city Tesla Autopilot—Review including full self-driving for 2019. AutoPilot Review. 2019 Apr 23 [cited 2019 Sep 7].

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Building safety-critical software systems isn’t trivial, even if there’s no AI involved.a And it only gets more difficult when you add AI to the mix. Before you implement good AI-based control of a physical system, you must first master the development of good software for controlling physical systems. All the rules of good software engineering must be respected first. a The 737 MAX grounding is still an ongoing story as I’m writing this sentence—for example, the Wikipedia page covering it currently has 749 references [142], with more likely to be added by the time you’re reading this book. The events that occurred are tragic, and I’m not taking any position on MCAS development, or regulatory and certification processes.

Exponential: How Accelerating Technology Is Leaving Us Behind and What to Do About It
by Azeem Azhar
Published 6 Sep 2021

We also need external parties to be given oversight of the outcomes of that process, such as the operation of the algorithms that shape what we do and don’t see on digital platforms. When two Boeing 737 MAX aeroplanes crashed in quick succession in 2018–19, Boeing was forced to redesign key aspects of the aircraft. The 737 MAX was not allowed to fly again until it had passed a number of safety inspections. Boeing did not decide when the revamped 737 MAX was safe to fly; the Federal Aviation Administration did. We might learn from this example when thinking about our digital infrastructure. The potential harms brought about by digital networks’ algorithms, and their wider processes of deliberation and judgement, need regular inspection – and not behind the closed doors of the companies themselves.

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This was assumed to hold true for Wright’s Law too: eventually, the market saturates, and the decrease in prices slows to a halt. Wright, who died in 1970, might have been disgruntled to discover what ultimately happened to the prices of the aircraft he studied. The original Boeing 737, first built in 1967, cost $27 million in 2020 terms. The latest variant, the 737 MAX which first flew in 2016, cost as much as $135 million – five times more. So much for price declines. Yet a striking feature of our age is that the hard limits to Wright’s Law seem much more distant – and in some cases they might not even exist. Today, the prices of new technologies seem able to drop endlessly.

Four Battlegrounds
by Paul Scharre
Published 18 Jan 2023

Mulvehill, Social Machines: The Coming Collision of Artificial Intelligence, Social Networking, and Humanity (New York: Apress, 2016), 57. 230Failures in real-world applications: Sean Mcgregor, “When AI Systems Fail: Introducing the AI Incident Database,” Partnership on AI Blog, November 18, 2020, https://www.partnershiponai.org/aiincidentdatabase/. 230multiple fatalities: Jim Puzzanghera, “Driver in Tesla Crash Relied Excessively on Autopilot, but Tesla Shares Some Blame, Federal Panel Finds,” Los Angeles Times, September 12, 2017, http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-hy-tesla-autopilot-20170912-story.html; “Driver Errors, Overreliance on Automation, Lack of Safeguards, Led to Fatal Tesla Crash,” National Transportation Safety Board Office of Public Affairs, press release, September 12, 2017, https://www.ntsb.gov/news/press-releases/Pages/PR20170912.aspx; “Collision Between a Car Operating with Automated Vehicle Control Systems and a Tractor-Semitrailer Truck Near Williston, Florida” NTSB/HAR-17/02/ PB2017-102600 (National Transportation Safety Board, May 7, 2016), https://www.ntsb.gov/news/events/Documents/2017-HWY16FH018-BMG-abstract.pdf; James Gilboy, “Officials Find Cause of Tesla Autopilot Crash Into Fire Truck: Report,” The Drive, May 17, 2018, http://www.thedrive.com/news/20912/cause-of-tesla-autopilot-crash-into-fire-truck-cause-determined-report; “Tesla Hit Parked Police Car ‘While Using Autopilot,’” BBC, May 30, 2018, https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-44300952; and Raphael Orlove, “This Test Shows Why Tesla Autopilot Crashes Keep Happening,” Jalopnik, June 13, 2018, https://jalopnik.com/this-test-shows-why-tesla-autopilot-crashes-keep-happen-1826810902. 231“dominate their local battle spaces”: Phil Root, interview, February 6, 2020. 232machine learning was “alchemy”: Ali Rahimi and Ben Recht, “Reflections on Random Kitchen Sinks,” arg minblog, December 5, 2017, http://www.argmin.net/2017/12/05/kitchen-sinks/. 232fatal crashes of two 737 MAX airliners: Jon Ostrower, “What Is the Boeing 737 Max Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System?” Air Current, November 13, 2018, https://theaircurrent.com/aviation-safety/what-is-the-boeing-737-max-maneuvering-characteristics-augmentation-system-mcas-jt610/. 232failures can arise at multiple stages: Ram Shankar Siva Kumar et al., “Failure Modes in Machine Learning,” Microsoft Docs, November 11, 2019, https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/security/engineering/failure-modes-in-machine-learning#details-on-unintended-failures; Ortega, Maini, and the DeepMind safety team, “Building Safe Artificial Intelligence”; Amodei et al., Concrete Problems in AI Safety. 232three main types: Ben Buchanan and Taylor Miller, Machine Learning for Policymakers: What It Is and Why It Matters (Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University, June 2017), https://www.belfercenter.org/sites/default/files/files/publication/MachineLearningforPolicymakers.pdf; Greg Allen, Understanding AI Technology (Joint Artificial Intelligence Center, U.S.

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Air Force, August 30, 2021), https://www.safety.af.mil/Portals/71/documents/Aviation/Mishap%20Summaries/USAF_Aviation_Class_A_Summary.pdf. 255much higher accident rate: “Major Russian Submarine Accidents Since 2000,” Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, July 2, 2019, https://www.rferl.org/a/major-russian-submarine-accidents-since-2000/30033592.html; Peter Suciu, “Steel Tomb: The Worst Russian Submarine Disasters of All Time,” National Interest, May 12, 2020, https://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/steel-tomb-worst-russian-submarine-disasters-all-time-153216. 256Challenger explosion: Diane Vaughan, The Challenger Launch Decision: Risky Technology, Culture, and Deviance at NASA (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996, 2016). 256desire to beat others to market: Charles Duhigg, “Did Uber Steal Google’s Intellectual Property?” The New Yorker, October 15, 2018, https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/10/22/did-uber-steal-googles-intellectual-property; David Gelles, et al., “Boeing Was ‘Go, Go, Go’ to Beat Airbus with the 737 Max,” New York Times, March 23, 2019, https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/23/business/boeing-737-max-crash.html. 256“I’m less worried right now about autonomous weapons”: Shanahan, interview. 257United States demonstrated a swarm: Aaron Mehta, “Pentagon Launches 103 Unit Drone Swarm,” Defense News, January 10, 2017, https://www.defensenews.com/air/2017/01/10/pentagon-launches-103-unit-drone-swarm/. 257China followed with its own swarm: Xinhua, “China Launches Record-Breaking Drone Swarm,” China Daily, June 11, 2017, https://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2017-06/11/content_29702465.htm. 257superhuman AI dogfighting system: Liu Xuanzun, “PLA Deploys AI in Mock Warplane Battles, ‘Trains Both Pilots and AIs,’” Global Times, June 14, 2021, https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202106/1226131.shtml. 257“There might be an artificial intelligence arms race”: Brandon Knapp, “DoD Official: US Not Part of AI Arms Race,” c4isrnet.com, April 10, 2018, https://www.c4isrnet.com/it-networks/2018/04/10/dod-official-us-not-part-of-ai-arms-race/. 257“digital arms race with China”: Will Roper, “There’s No Turning Back on AI in the Military,” Wired, October 24, 2020, https://www.wired.com/story/opinion-theres-no-turning-back-on-ai-in-the-military/. 257Security scholars define an arms race: Michael D.

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AI scientists struggle to fully understand AI systems because of the massive complexity of the contemporary systems they are building, such as neural nets with hundreds of millions of parameters. The complexity of AI systems means they can sometimes exhibit surprising behaviors. The fatal crashes of two 737 MAX airliners arose from rule-based systems interacting in unpredictable ways with the environment and human operators, who despite being highly qualified were baffled by the machine’s behavior. In machine learning systems, failures can arise at multiple stages of the learning process, including from flawed training data or a mis-specified goal.

The Myth of Artificial Intelligence: Why Computers Can't Think the Way We Do
by Erik J. Larson
Published 5 Apr 2021

Another reason deduction falls endlessly victim to relevance problems is that there are, invariably, many possible causes for the occurrence of something in our day-to-day experience (and in science). Accidents like aircraft crashes, for instance, can typically be analyzed by pointing to proximate (close by) and distal (farther away) causes, together explaining the disaster. Take the recent Boeing tragedies. After two crashes of Boeing 737 Max planes occurred in the span of six months in 2018, investigators discovered a software glitch in an anti-stall system, the Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAT). A redesign of the older Boeing 737–800 had enabled larger engines to be fitted, but only by placing them forward of and slightly above the wings.

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It was also discovered that pilots of the new Max received inadequate training. This was surely not helped by Boeing’s marketing pitch for its redesigned aircraft, claiming that the Max would not require expensive retraining of pilots already trained on the 737–800. Thus, the tragic crashes can be attributed to multiple causes. Inferring why Boeing’s 737 Max crashed involves considering a number of possible causes, and perhaps no single cause by itself fully accounts for the catastrophes. Deduction can’t speak to these real-world scenarios. By requiring that inferences must certainly be true, deduction invariably misses what might be true, in contexts where relevance is determined by a mix of factors that aren’t necessary but still are operative in certain situations.

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By requiring that inferences must certainly be true, deduction invariably misses what might be true, in contexts where relevance is determined by a mix of factors that aren’t necessary but still are operative in certain situations. In Plato’s universe of unchanging forms, triangles must have three sides, and some things are True with a capital T. In messy experience, few things we witness or analyze are like triangles. They’re like the Boeing 737 Max—or an ordinary conversation (as we’ll see). Intelligence—whatever it is—is more than deductions. We are cognitive systems ourselves, and it’s clear that we’re not only deductive systems. Successful human-level AI, this suggests, can’t be wholly deductive either. After the failure of what critics dubbed “good old-fashioned artificial intelligence,” which dominated AI before the modern era (up through the 1990s), AI scientists abandoned deductive approaches to inference en masse.

The Pyramid of Lies: Lex Greensill and the Billion-Dollar Scandal
by Duncan Mavin
Published 20 Jul 2022

These could have all been different loans, though most likely each Atlantic 57 loan was simply paid off with a new one.) Haywood had also invested $430 million in six deals brokered by Greensill tied to aircraft leasing payments. Five of those deals related to Norwegian Air, for whom Greensill had arranged the purchase of several Boeing 737 Max 8s. Lex had said in a press release at the time that the aircraft deals showed how Greensill combined ‘capital, technology and expertise’. Greensill was particularly proud of the transactions, which were developed from a new insurance-based aircraft leasing programme established by Lex’s insurance brokers at Marsh.

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The consultants suggested that the investment decision by Haywood was made too quickly, with no time for adequate due diligence. They found that the deals didn’t pay enough, given the risks involved, and that the investment decision was likely entirely dependent on the associated insurance policies. Later, when aviation authorities around the world grounded all the 737 Max 8s because of a series of crashes, those Greensill press releases disappeared from the top of Greensill’s site. Another aircraft investment also raised some red flags. This time, Greensill had set up a special purpose entity, in Ireland, called ‘Panamera Aviation Leasing XII DAC’. Panamera bought a Boeing cargo jet on behalf of a US-registered leasing group called Intrepid Aviation, which leased it on to a Russian air freight company that was part of the Volga Dnepr Group – an air transport operator with close ties to the government in Moscow.

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Index Aar Tee Commodities ref1 Abengoa ref1, ref2 Accenture ref1, ref2 Agritrade ref1 Ahearn, John ref1 AIG ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 Aigis Banca ref1, ref2 Allesch-Taylor, Stefan ref1, ref2 Allin, Patrick ref1 anti-money-laundering (AML) questions ref1 ANZ ref1 Apollo Global Management ref1, ref2 Apple ref1 Aramco ref1 ArcelorMittal ref1 Archegos ref1 Arthur Andersen ref1 Asda ref1 Atlantic 57 Consultancy ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 Auditing Association of German Banks ref1 Augustus Asset Managers ref1 Austin, Jason ref1, ref2 Australia ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11, ref12, ref13, ref14, ref15, ref16, ref17, ref18, ref19 Australian Taxation Office ref1 Aviva ref1 BAE Systems ref1 Baer, Julius ref1, ref2 BaFin ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11 Bailey, Andrew ref1 Bank of America ref1 Bank of England ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 Barclays ref1, ref2 Barnes, Rob ref1, ref2, ref3 Barrell, Neil ref1 Barron’s ref1, ref2, ref3 Bates, Chris ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 Battershill, William ref1, ref2 Baylis, Natalie ref1 BBB see British Business Bank BBC News ref1 BBVA ref1 BCLP see Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner BDO ref1, ref2 Becker, Arthur ref1 Berkshire Hathaway ref1 Bethell, Richard, 6th Baron Westbury ref1, ref2 Bingera ref1 Bishop, Julie ref1, ref2 BlackRock ref1, ref2, ref3 Blackstone ref1 Blair, Tony ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 Bloomberg ref1, ref2, ref3 Bloomberg News ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 Bluestone Resources Inc. ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 Blunkett, David ref1, ref2 BNP Paribas ref1 Boeing ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 737 Max 8 aircraft ref1 Bond and Credit Company, The (TBCC) ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7 Borbely, Barnabas ref1 Borneo ref1 Breedon, Tim ref1 Breedon report ref1 Brereton, Greg ref1 Brexit referendum ref1 Brierwood, David ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8 Brighthouse ref1 British Business Bank (BBB) ref1, ref2, ref3 British Gas ref1 Brown, Eliot ref1 Brown, Gordon ref1, ref2 Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner (BCLP) ref1 BSi Steel ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 Buckingham Palace ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 Buffett, Warren ref1 Bundaberg, Queensland, Australia ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10 Bunge ref1 Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy committee ref1 Cabinet Office ref1, ref2, ref3 Caillaux, Gabe ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6 Callahan, Mark ref1 Cameron, David ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 ‘Big Society’ policy ref1 and Earnd ref1 Greensill remuneration ref1 and Greensill’s collapse ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 hired as Greensill adviser ref1, ref2 lends credibility to Greensill ref1 and Lex ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9 and Mohammed Bin Salman ref1 and the pharmacy plan ref1 role at Greensill during the Covid-19 pandemic ref1 and The Bond and Credit Company ref1 Cameron, Samantha ref1 Cameron administration ref1, ref2 Cantor Fitzgerald ref1, ref2, ref3 Carillion ref1, ref2 ‘early payment facility’ ref1 Carlyle Group ref1 Carna ref1 Carnell, Kate ref1, ref2 Carney, Mark ref1 Carrington ref1 Carson Block ref1 Carusillo, Mickey ref1 Casey, Dame Louise ref1 ‘cash-less rolls’ ref1 Catfoss group ref1, ref2, ref3 central banks ref1 Chap (magazine) ref1 Charles, Prince ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 Chase Manhattan ref1 CHBG Limited ref1 Chehaoduo ref1, ref2 Chelsea Group ref1 Chelsea Village ref1 Chicago Police Pension Fund ref1 Chilean mining ref1 Chubb ref1 Chuk ref1 CIMIC ref1, ref2 Citibank ref1 Citigroup ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11, ref12, ref13 City, the ref1 Clarke, Tracy ref1 Clearbrook Capital ref1 Cleland, Robert ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7 coal mining ref1, ref2, ref3 Coca-Cola ref1, ref2 CoFace ref1 Comerford, Robert J. ref1, ref2 Commerzbank ref1 Companies House ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 Confederation of British Industry (CBI) ref1 Conservative government ref1, ref2 Copenhagen ref1 Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme (CBILS) ref1, ref2 Coronavirus Large Business Interruption Loan Scheme (CLBILS) ref1, ref2 corporate espionage ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 Coupe, Mike ref1 Covid-19 Corporate Financing Facility (CCFF) ref1, ref2 Covid-19 pandemic ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11 government loan schemes ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 restrictions ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 Crain’s (magazine) ref1 Credit Suisse ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8 and the Covid-19 pandemic ref1 and Greensill Capital ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11, ref12, ref13, ref14, ref15, ref16, ref17, ref18, ref19, ref20, ref21, ref22, ref23, ref24, ref25, ref26, ref27, ref28, ref29, ref30, ref31, ref32, ref33 and Sanjeev Gupta ref1 Crothers, Bill ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7 Crown Representatives programme ref1 Cunliffe, Sir Jon ref1 CWB ref1 de Botton, Alain ref1 de Botton, Gilbert ref1 de la Rue, Tom ref1 Deal Partners ref1, ref2, ref3 Degen, Michel ref1, ref2, ref3 Dell ref1 Deloitte ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 Demica ref1 Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy ref1, ref2 Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs ref1 Department of Health ref1 Department of Health and Social Care ref1 Department of Work and Pensions ref1 Deutsche Bank ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6 Deutsche Börse ref1 Doordash ref1 Doran, James ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11, ref12 dotcom boom ref1, ref2 Dow Jones ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11 Downes, Brett ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 Dragon Technology ref1, ref2, ref3 Eadie, Al ref1 Earnd ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 Ecclestone, Bernie ref1 Edelman ref1 1860 Munich ref1 Ellis, Brett Easton, American Psycho ref1 Enterprise Investment Schemes (EISs) ref1 equity warrants ref1 Ernst & Young ref1 see also EY Euler Hermes ref1, ref2 European Banking Association ref1 Ewing, Fergus ref1 EY ref1, ref2 see also Ernst & Young Eyjafjallajökull ref1 factoring ref1, ref2, ref3 see also supply chain finance Fair Financial ref1, ref2, ref3 Fairmac Reality ref1 Fairymead ref1 Fan, Colin ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 Farrell, Maureen ref1 FCA see Financial Conduct Authority ‘fee ramp agreements’ ref1 Feeney, Chuck ref1 Ferrin, Ronald ref1 Fidelity ref1 5th Finger ref1 Finacity ref1 Financial Accounting Standards Board ref1 Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10 Skilled Persons Reviews ref1, ref2 financial crisis 2008 ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 aftermath ref1, ref2, ref3 and central banks ref1 and fintechs ref1 tougher regulations following ref1, ref2 Financial News (banking publication) ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6 Financial Reporting Council ref1 Financial Times (newspaper) ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7 Finews (Swiss news site) ref1 ‘fintechs’ ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6 Fitch ref1 ‘flash title’ ref1 Fleetsolve ref1 Food Revolution Group ref1 Forbes (magazine) ref1 Ford ref1 Ford, Bill ref1 Formula One ref1 ‘Four Eyes Principle’ ref1 FreeUp ref1, ref2 Friedman, Alex ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7 Galligan, Shane ref1, ref2 GAM Greensill Supply Chain Finance fund (GGSCF) ref1, ref2 Gapper, John ref1 Garrod, Neil ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 GBM Banca ref1 General Atlantic (GA) ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11, ref12, ref13, ref14, ref15, ref16, ref17, ref18, ref19, ref20 General Mills ref1, ref2, ref3 Gentleman’s Journal (magazine) ref1 German Deposit Protection Authority ref1 Global Asset Management (GAM) ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11, ref12, ref13, ref14, ref15, ref16, ref17, ref18, ref19, ref20, ref21, ref22, ref23, ref24, ref25, ref26 Absolute Return Bond Fund (ARBF) ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9 regulators ref1 Global Supply Chain Finance Forum ref1 Global Trade Review (trade finance publication) ref1 Goldman Sachs ref1, ref2 Gorman, John ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 Gottstein, Thomas ref1, ref2 government loans ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 ‘GovTech’ firms ref1 Grant Thornton ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 Gray, Sue ref1 Green, Philip ref1, ref2 Greenbrier hotel ref1 Greene, Stephen ref1 Greensill, Alexander ‘Lex’ David ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 ambition ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 ascent ref1 Australian property investments ref1, ref2 Australian tax obligations ref1 awards ref1, ref2, ref3 CBE ref1, ref2, ref3 birth ref1 and Carillion ref1 celebrity status ref1 childhood ref1, ref2 at Citigroup ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9 on the Crown Representatives programme ref1 CV ref1 and Daniel Sheard ref1 and David Cameron ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9 directorships ref1 double down strategy ref1, ref2 and Downes ref1 dresses the part ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 and Duncan Mavin ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6 eager to own bank ref1, ref2 education ref1 legal studies ref1 MBA at the Alliance Manchester Business School ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6 and 5th Finger ref1 and Greensill Bank AG (formerly NoFi) ref1 and Greensill Capital ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 acquisitions ref1, ref2 aircraft leasing deals ref1 attempts to raise emergency finance ref1, ref2, ref3 avoids toughest regulators ref1 BaFin probe ref1 Bluestone ref1, ref2 BSi ref1 Covid-19 pandemic ref1, ref2, ref3 Credit Suisse involvements ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 demise ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8 Dragon Technology ref1 expansion ref1, ref2, ref3 ‘flak’ (PR advisers) ref1 General Atlantic ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6 Global Asset Management ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 harmful effect of SCF on small businesses ref1 insurance ref1, ref2, ref3 malpractice ref1 multi-obligor programmes ref1 National Health Service venture ref1, ref2 new category of loans ref1 payroll finance ref1 perilous state ref1 premier ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 sells company private jets ref1 Softbank dealings ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9 start-up ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 Tower Trade ref1 Tradeshift Networks ref1, ref2 and Jeremy Heywood ref1 and John Gorman ref1 legal work ref1 marriage ref1 and Masayoshi Son ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 mentors ref1 mission statement, ‘helping out the little guy’ ref1 and Mohammed Bin Salman ref1 at Morgan Stanley ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11, ref12 remuneration ref1 moves to the UK ref1, ref2 at OzEcom ref1 and politics ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 ‘rewilding’ project ref1 risk-taking ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11, ref12 and Sanjeev Gupta ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10 and Saudi Arabia ref1 sits on Bank of England committee on SCF ref1 skiing ref1 spending ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6 takes loan from the Greensill family ref1 and Tim Haywood ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10 at TRM ref1, ref2 wealth ref1 billionaire status ref1, ref2 hits the big time ref1, ref2 Greensill, Andrew (Lex’s brother) ref1 Greensill, Judy (Lex’s mother) ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 Greensill, Lloyd (Lex’s father) ref1, ref2, ref3 Greensill, Peter (Lex’s youngest brother) ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10 Greensill, Roy (Lex’s grandfather) ref1, ref2 Greensill, Victoria (Lex’s wife) ref1, ref2 Greensill Bank AG (formerly NoFi) ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7 and the Atlantic 57 loan ref1, ref2 and the BaFin probe ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 and the end ref1, ref2 and General Atlantic ref1 and government loans ref1 and Gupta ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7 private aircraft ref1 regulation ref1 and Softbank ref1, ref2 technology ref1 and trade credit insurance ref1, ref2 whistle-blower at ref1 Greensill Capital ref1, ref2 aircraft leasing deals ref1 allegations of corruption at ref1 and the Atlantic 57 loan ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 avoids toughest regulators ref1 and the BaFin probe ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9 and Bill Crothers ref1 billion dollar plus valuation ref1 and Bluestone ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 and BSi ref1 business cards ref1, ref2 cash burner ref1 client list ref1 collapse ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10 corporate events ref1 corporate governance ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7 and the Covid-19 pandemic ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6 and Credit Suisse ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11, ref12, ref13, ref14, ref15, ref16, ref17, ref18, ref19, ref20, ref21, ref22, ref23, ref24, ref25, ref26, ref27, ref28, ref29, ref30, ref31, ref32, ref33 Credit Suisse’s investigation into ref1, ref2, ref3 crisis mounts ref1, ref2, ref3 and David Cameron ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7 and David Solo ref1, ref2, ref3 defaults ref1, ref2 and Dragon Technology ref1 early backers ref1 early struggles ref1, ref2 evergreen loans ref1 ‘everyone wins’ pitches ref1 expansion ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9 external public relations ref1, ref2 EY investigation into ref1 fault lines ref1 as ‘fintech’ company ref1, ref2 fraud and misconduct allegations ref1 and General Atlantic ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11, ref12, ref13, ref14, ref15 and Global Asset Management ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11, ref12, ref13, ref14, ref15, ref16, ref17, ref18, ref19, ref20, ref21, ref22 gossipy culture ref1 and Greensill Bank ref1 and Griffin Coal ref1 and Gupta/Gupta Family Group ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11, ref12, ref13, ref14 harmful impact on small businesses ref1 headquarters on the Strand ref1 ‘High Risk Franchise Names’ document ref1 hits the big time ref1, ref2 illiquid investments ref1 insolvency ref1, ref2 investment protection ref1 investors abandon ref1, ref2 IPO ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8 and John Gorman ref1 and Katerra ref1 and the Lagoon Park SPV ref1 launch ref1, ref2 lavish spending at ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 Lex’s claims about ref1 liquidity ref1, ref2 and Lloyds ref1 loan book ref1 losses ref1 and Maurice Thompson ref1 Morgan Stanley employees ref1 and the NHS ref1, ref2, ref3 obligors ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8 offices ref1, ref2, ref3 and payroll finance ref1 and Pemex ref1 perilous state ref1 and the pharmacy plan ref1 pre-IPO funding (‘Project Olive’) ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 profitability issues ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6 ‘reasonably permanent’ funding ref1 reducing the early risks of using ref1 remuneration ref1, ref2, ref3 retrenchment ref1, ref2 risk team ref1, ref2 risky ventures ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8 and Roland Hartley-Urquhart ref1 and Saudi Arabia ref1 as ‘shadow bank’ ref1 and SoftBank ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11, ref12, ref13, ref14, ref15, ref16, ref17, ref18, ref19, ref20, ref21, ref22, ref23, ref24 SPAC talks ref1 start-up style management ref1, ref2 takes loan from the Greensill Capital family ref1 technology ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 and Tim Haywood ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10 and Tower Trade ref1, ref2, ref3 and trade credit insurance ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11, ref12 ‘Unicorn’ status ref1 and the US capital markets ref1 whistle-blower allegations emerge ref1 and the Wickham SPV ref1 Greensill Corporation Pty ref1 Greensill Farming Group ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 Greensill Trust ref1 Grenda Investments ref1 Griffin Coal ref1, ref2 Gross, Bill ref1 Guazi ref1 Gulf Petrochem (GP Global) ref1 Gupta, Nicola ref1 Gupta, Sanjeev ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11, ref12, ref13, ref14, ref15, ref16, ref17 Australian property ref1 and Bluestone ref1 and the demise of Greensill ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 and German steel ref1 and Grant Thornton ref1 and Greensill Bank ref1 Gupta Family Group (GFG) ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11 and Bluestone ref1 and government loans ref1 and Greensill ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11 and Greensill Bank ref1 Guttridge, Jane ref1, ref2 Guy, Toby ref1 Gymshark ref1 Haas, Lukas ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 Hambro, Jay ref1 Hanafin, Dermot ref1 Hanafin, Sean ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 Harris, Piers ref1 Harry, Prince ref1 Hart ref1 Hartley-Urquhart, Roland ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10 Havens, John ref1, ref2 Haywood, Tim ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11, ref12, ref13, ref14, ref15, ref16, ref17, ref18 Henkel ref1 Hewlett Packard ref1 Heywood, Jeremy ref1, ref2, ref3 Highways Agency ref1 HM Revenue & Customs ref1 HM Treasury ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 Hobday, Neil ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 Holmes, Elizabeth ref1 House of Lords ref1 HSBC ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 Huawei ref1, ref2, ref3 Hutton Inquiry ref1 IAG see Insurance Australia Group ICBC Standard Bank ref1 Indonesia ref1 Industrial Cadets ref1 Inflexionpoint ref1 ING ref1 Insurance Australia Group (IAG) ref1, ref2, ref3 International Chamber of Commerce ref1 Intrepid Aviation ref1 ‘Iran Notices’ ref1 Iraq, UN weapons inspectors ref1 Isle of Dogs ref1 Jacob, David ref1, ref2, ref3 Jahama Highland Estates ref1 Jain, Anshu ref1 Jakarta ref1 Jardine Matheson ref1 Johnson, Boris ref1 Jones, Karen ref1 J.P.

The Great Post Office Scandal: The Fight to Expose a Multimillion Pound Scandal Which Put Innocent People in Jail
by Nick Wallis
Published 18 Nov 2021

To respond, a pilot can input further instructions, but if the code implementing those further instructions has one dodgy line in it, and it is now trying to override an instruction in some code which itself isn’t doing what it should, the new instruction could fail, or have the opposite intended effect, or not be told it is succeeding. Planes rarely fall out of the sky just because of dodgy lines of code. In 2019, two Boeing 737 Max crashes led to the worldwide grounding of the 737 Max fleet. The crashes were not caused by bugs in source code but by fundamental errors in the software design, which, when combined with sensor failures, in specific circumstances, caused disaster. These were bad back-end inputs at a different level to coding inputs, but they were bad inputs which had terrible outputs – in this case, pilots not being in control of what they were flying.

…

It therefore became an article of faith within the Post Office that Horizon errors were (depending on your technical aptitude) either a thing of fantasy, or spotted and fixed before they caused any problems in Subpostmasters’ branch accounts. All discrepancies were considered the Subpostmasters’ fault, and their responsibility. It was the equivalent of Boeing blaming the 737 Max pilots for crashing their own planes.3 The alternative was too reputationally toxic to contemplate. As well as the IT, another key part of the Subpostmasters’ bind is the contractual situation they were forced into on taking over a Post Office branch. We’ve covered some of these already, but to summarise: – Subpostmasters were contractually liable for all cash and stock losses caused by ‘negligence, carelessness or error.’

…

INDEX A Abdulla, Naushad 329 Abraham, Ann 409 Adedayo, Teju 316, 450 Allan, Lucy, MP 387 Allen, Nigel 147, 230, 236 Allen, Roger 450 Altman, Brian, QC 194, 431–436, 437–438, 447, 459–461, 465, 473 Andre, Dionne 391 Apparent bias 348 Appeals system in England & Wales 345 Arbuthnot, Lord (James) 86, 100–101, 101, 158, 168, 171, 175, 177, 186–190, 191, 198, 205, 211, 214, 215, 240–246, 271, 333, 381, 423, 434, 438, 474, 476 accuses the Post Office of lying 435 appears on Inside Out 158 asks David Cameron to intervene 271 calls for judge-led inquiry 423 calls on Paula Vennells to resign 291 gets involved 100 goes on Today 241 leads parliamentary campaign 171 role in the Chinook campaign 86 secures adjournment debate 241 tells Alice Perkins about Horizon 168 writes to the CCRC 333 Arch, Nicki 354–363, 355, 376, 403, 457, 471 Aria Grace Law 400, 425, 428, 430, 432 Ashraf, Kamran 62–68, 83, 396, 425, 440–442, 471 conviction quashed 441 Aujard, Chris 206–208, 240, 412 Automated Teller Machines (ATMs) problems with 196, 219 training 196 B Bailey, Adrian, MP 256 Bajaj, Amar 89 Baker, Colin 32, 146, 148 Baker, Mark 128, 146–148, 225, 243, 249, 256, 257, 331, 344, 453, 454 appears at BIS Select Committee hearing 256 appears at the inquiry 453 concerns over Horizon 146 helps Pete Murray 249 helps Taro Naw 93 helps Wendy Buffrey 128 is described by the High Court as ‘redoubtable’ 344 is snubbed by Alan Bates 243 Baker, Simon (former Post Office project manager) 172–176, 180–182, 187, 197, 206 Baker, Simon, QC (barrister for Post Office) 441 Baker, Sue 363 Balancing to zero 40 requirement to 47 Barang, Jasvinder 316, 440 conviction quashed 441 Bardo, Matt 281, 394, 398 Bates, Alan 58–61, 83, 88, 89, 100, 151, 155, 159, 169, 171, 177, 186, 188, 190, 198, 203, 213, 217, 221, 240, 243, 247, 252, 256, 269–271, 273, 285, 290–295, 309, 338, 345, 366, 369, 386, 392, 398, 404, 408, 419, 420, 421, 423, 436, 469, 474, 475 becomes a Subpostmaster 51–54 cross-examination in Common Issues trial 325–327 founds the JFSA 97–99 given notice by the Post Office 59 launches legal action 295 launches Parliamentary Ombudsman complaint 408 settles legal action 372 snubs Mark Baker 243 Bates v Post Office 306 case management conference 335 Common Issues judgment 343–346 appeal against 349 dismissal of appeal against 367 Common Issues trial 309, 315–334, 343–346 Group Litigation Order hearing 298 Horizon trial 335–341, 346–349, 364–365 judgment 376 recusal application 348 appeal 352 hearing 350 settlement agreement 372, 383, 419 Steering Committee 419 strikeout judgment 313 BBC News website 218 BBC North East 218 BBC Radio 4 218, 378, 406 BBC South West 225 BBC Surrey 155 Beal, Nick 329, 344 cross-examination in Common Issues trial 330 BEIS Select Committee inquiry 411–419 Fujitsu’s written evidence 415 Nick Read’s written evidence 413 oral evidence hearing 392 Paula Vennells’ written evidence 411 Bell, Peter 419 Benefits Agency 8 Bentwood, Richard 434 Binley, Brian, MP 266–267 BIS Select Committee inquiry 49, 254–269, 273 Angela van den Bogerd 260–266 George Thomson 254–259 Ian Henderson 260–266 Paula Vennells 260–266 Blackstone’s ratio 397 Blakey, David conviction quashed 473 Bloom, Detective Sergeant Hayley 434 Boeing 737 Max crashes 45 Bourke, Patrick 289 Branch Focuses 258 Branch suspense account 37 Branch user forum 260 Brennan, Lisa conviction quashed 472 Bridgen, Andrew, MP 177, 240, 244 Bristow, David 100, 155, 158 Brooks, Richard 170 Brown, Alan 89 Brown, Tom 190, 224 Buffrey, Doug 125 Buffrey, Wendy 125–131, 355, 376, 392, 396, 425, 426, 427, 470, 471, 474 conviction quashed 472 Burden of proof 122 Burgess-Boyde, Sarah 278 Burgess, Tim conviction quashed 472 Busch, Lisa, QC 444–448, 455, 460 Butoy, Harjinder 474 conviction quashed 473 C Cable, Sir Vince 273 Callanan, Lord 390, 435 Callendar Square bug 46, 89 Cameron, Alisdair 24, 313, 391 Cameron, David, former PM 173, 271, 273 Capon, Barry conviction quashed 472 Carter, Julie 277, 391 Carter, Kevin 391 Cartwright King Sift Review 192–193, 209, 224 Cash, Andy 193 Castleton, Lee 78–84, 89, 97, 383 Castleton, Lisa-Marie 78 Caveen, Jayne 382 Cavender, David, QC 323–329 Centre for Effective Dispute Resolution (CEDR) 238 Chatur, Mahebub 471 Chinook helicopters 85–87, 100–101, 160 Chip and pin machine 71 Clark, Nicholas conviction quashed 472 Clarke Advice 191–193, 224, 430–436, 444, 459–461 disclosure management document 432 first Advice 191, 459 second Advice 193, 459 Clarke, Simon 191–193, 410, 432, 459 Cleife, Julie 440 conviction quashed 441 ‘Clint’ 3, 11–16, 192 Coffey, Jonathan 273 ‘Colin’ 173–174, 183, 187, 212–213, 274 Collins, Tony 88 Collinson, Patrick 18 Common Issues trial 309, 315–334, 343–346 Alan Bates’ evidence 325 first day 315 judgment 343 Pam Stubbs’ evidence 327 Post Office witness evidence 329–333 Communication Workers Union (CWU) 30, 148, 254, 258, 401, 453 Compensation payments, receipt of 403 Computer Weekly 86, 88–92, 101–102, 118, 134, 151, 155, 282, 430, 469 breaks the story 88 Contempt of court 430–436 Convictions, quashed 426, 472 Coomber Rich 119 Cooper, Joe 284 Cormack, Lord 423 Coulson, Lord Justice 352 Court of Appeal hearings 428–435, 457–467 Flora Page stands down 434 judgment day 470–474 limb 2 argument (affront to the public conscience) 428, 444–449 Paul Marshall stands down 444 Post Office alleges contempt 431 Cousins, Wendy 466 Coyne, Jason 336–337, 364–365 Craddock, Jenny 155 Credence system 166 Crichton, Susan 171, 176, 179, 180, 182, 193, 196, 206 Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC) 292, 311, 333, 387, 396–400, 423–425, 440, 450, 466, 472 grounds for referral 424 Croft, Jane 318 Crowdfunding 309 Kickstarter 311 Crown Post Offices 4 losses at 83 Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) 20 D Daily Mail 76, 277, 382, 398 Darlington, Scott 316, 421, 426, 458 conviction quashed 472 Dar, Louise 329, 371 Davies, Mark 240, 254, 271, 354, 363 appears on Today 241 meets the Panorama team 289 Davies, Olivia 445, 471 Davison, Margaret 16, 56 Debt notices (debt recovery letters) 38, 347 de Garr Robinson, Anthony, QC 299, 307, 338, 339, 341, 349, 350 Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) 386 Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) 135, 243, 254, 273, 274, 330, 331, 386, 413, 435, 470 Detica Report 195–196 Dickinson, Helen 332 cross-examination in Common Issues trial 332 Dickson, John 167 Dinsdale, Mark 236, 237 Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) 378 Disclosure 120, 140, 307 Horizon error logs 416 Discrepancies acceptance of 37 access granted to Subpostmasters 53 balance to zero 40 debt notices 38, 347 Settle Centrally 38, 109, 347 in dispute 347 Settle to Cash or Cheque 37, 109 suspected or unreported 49 Transaction Acknowledgements 56 Transaction Corrections 38, 56 applying for 56 challenging 56 Donnelly, Kathleen 307, 309 Duncan, Lord 387 Dunks, Andy 417 E Edwin Coe 279 Ernst and Young audit 166 F Falconer, Lord Charlie 433 False accounting 39, 132–133 definition 133 plea bargaining 42, 222, 268, 458 strict liability offence 132 Theft Act 1968, section 17 132 the trap 222, 268, 458 Farbey, Mrs Justice 431, 437 Fed, The See National Federation of Subpostmasters (NFSP) Fell, Stanley 465 Felstead, Tracy 4–6, 27–30, 280, 355, 376, 392, 396, 425, 426, 428, 444, 457 conviction quashed 472 Flinders, Karl 318, 338, 373 Fontaine, Senior Master 298–300, 424 Ford, Julie 89, 147 Fowles, Dr Sam 445 Fraser, Mr Justice 306–307, 313, 314, 319, 323–324, 330, 336, 339, 341, 343, 377–378, 387, 417 recusal application 349–354 Freeths 293, 474 French, Jane 155 commissions first Inside Out investigation 155 commissions second Inside Out investigation 220 Fujitsu 320, 323, 348, 365, 366, 378, 379, 382, 411, 413, 415–418 accountability 417 cross-examination of Richard Roll 336–342 evidence to BEIS Select Committee inquiry 415 headquarters 156, 181 ICL takeover 8 judicial criticism 417 provision of witness evidence 416 Full Authority Digital Engine Control (FADEC) 85 Furey, Andy 256, 314, 392 Furniss, Gill, MP 391 G Gahir, Rajinder 231 Galaxy software 195 Garrard, Roch 88 Gilhooly, Donna 302 Gill, Bal 363 Gill, Kashmir conviction quashed 472 Glover, Amanda 159, 166 Goddard, Jane 220 Godeseth, Torstein 348 Gordon, Ben 461 Gould, Nick 400 Grabiner, Lord 350–352 Graham, William conviction quashed 472 Grant Funding Agreement (GFA) 330, 331, 344 Greenhill, Sam 318 Greenhow, Calum 382, 392 Green, Patrick, QC 294, 298–299, 323, 330–333, 338, 346–353, 366, 370–371, 378, 384, 420 addresses Master Fontaine 299 cross-examines Post Office witnesses 329 explains the mediation process 384 responds to the recusal application 351 sets out the claimants’ case 319 Griffiths, Gina 199–204, 247–248 withdraws from the mediation scheme 247 Griffiths, Martin 199–204 Group litigation/Bates v Post Office first judgment 306 Group Litigation Order (GLO) 295, 305 H Hadrill, Keith 141 Hall, Alison 428 conviction quashed 472 Hamilton, David 70 Hamilton, Jo 70–77, 83, 88, 89, 95, 97, 100, 118, 143, 158, 159, 162, 179, 221, 241, 252, 271, 290, 310, 316, 333, 338, 343–345, 350, 371–372, 376, 425, 426, 428, 458, 470 appears in Computer Weekly 89 appears in Taro Naw 95 appears on BBC Inside Out South 159 appears on BBC Panorama 290 attends Bates v Post Office 310 attends founding JFSA meeting 97 conviction quashed 472 finds out her conviction will be quashed 426 has her conviction quashed 472 helps Seema Misra 118 is prosecuted and sentenced 77 is referred by the CCRC 396 meets James Arbuthnot 100 takes on a Post Office 70 Harrison, Sian 318 Hartley, James 294, 298, 305, 309, 325, 345, 348, 349, 369, 370, 372 attends mediation 369 defends the settlement 383 putting the case together 306 reacts to Common Issues judgment 345 reacts to the recusal application 349 teaming up with the JFSA 294 Head, Andy 214 Head, Chris 390 Head Postmasters definition 23 Hedges, Tom 413, 439, 475 conviction quashed 472 Henderson, Allison 428 conviction quashed 472 Henderson Chambers 293 Henderson, Ian call for a judge-led independent inquiry 392 contradicts Paula Vennells 263 is told about remote access 181 Second Sight appointed 176–179 starting the Second Sight investigation 179–185 Henry, Edward, QC 437 Herbert Smith Freehills 370, 389, 401 Higginson, Andrew 439 Hill, Max 378 Historical Shortfall Scheme 401, 421, 425 application window 401 eligibility criteria 401 History of the Post Office 18 Hogg, Issy 77, 97–99, 118, 133, 155, 159, 171, 177, 245 Hollinrake, Kevin, MP 400 Holmes, Marion 475 Holmes, Peter 252, 458 conviction quashed 472 Holroyde, Lord Justice 431–436, 437, 444, 447–449, 459–464, 471–472 Hooper, Sir Anthony 197, 206, 208–209, 213, 215, 245 Horizon system arrival of Horizon Online 98 back-end data input 55 balancing the books 35 bugs Callendar Square bug 46, 141 one-sided transactions 184 Receipts and Payments Mismatch 139, 143, 188, 320, 458 Reversal bug 46 Riposte Lock/Unlock bug 46 business impact analysis 16 cash account 14 Clint’s involvement 11 dealing with a surplus 36 development of EPoS system 12 discrepancies 37, 38, 49, 109 auditors’ visit 49 level of access granted to Subpostmasters 53 early days 3 fixing bugs by Fujitsu 160 helpline 35–41, 49, 53, 55, 63–64, 71–73, 78–80, 98, 107, 111–112, 126, 136, 143, 147, 164, 169, 180, 216, 229–230, 278, 347, 356 balance to zero option 40 Software Support Centre 40 Horizon Online 136, 140, 167, 171, 172, 188, 192, 299, 379 Legacy Horizon 379 length of time data kept 56 locating errors 36 logging on and off 4 logistics 9 NFSP endorsement 32 prototype 14 Riposte message store 13, 46, 342 rolling discrepancy over into next trading period 36 rollout 22, 134, 136 Sio Lohrasb 22 training 4, 35, 43, 71, 104, 105, 110, 112, 126, 164, 187, 216, 257, 258, 356, 465 Transaction Acknowledgements 56 Transaction Corrections 38, 55, 72, 105, 110, 126, 127, 139, 180, 184, 236, 422 applying for 56 challenging 56 Transaction Information Processing (TIP) 16 upgrades and patches 45 Horizon trial 335–341, 346–349 Howard, Gillian conviction quashed 473 Howe and Co 49, 50, 269 submission to BIS Select Committee inquiry 470 Hudgell, Neil 400, 402 Hudgells 400, 474 Humphrys, John 241 Hussain, Neelam 466 Hutchings, Lynette conviction quashed 472 I Information technology (IT) 11, 44 Boeing 737 Max crashes 45 Callendar Square bug 46, 89, 141 classification of 12 fixing of by Fujitsu 160 Horizon upgrades and patches 45 logging of by Fujitsu 416 Receipts and Payments Mismatch 139, 143, 320, 458 Reversal bug 46 Initial Complaint Review and Mediation Scheme 197 application window 198 BIS Select Committee inquiry 254–269 Angela van den Bogerd 260 Paula Vennells 260 Case Questionnaire Response (CQR) 198 Case Review Report (CRR) 198 eligibility criteria 198 Post Office Investigation Report (POIR) 198 Post Office’s Final Report 271 refusal to allow convicted claimants 241 suitability for 213 Westminster Hall adjournment debate 241, 243–246 Working Group 197 terminated 271 Inquiry first evidence heard 453–455 first oral evidence session 453 MPs call for 393 review announced 423 review made into statutory inquiry 476 scope 423 Sir Wyn Williams appointed 423 Inside Out South 155, 158, 163, 214, 220, 234 International Computers Ltd (ICL) 8 Irranca-Davies, Huw, MP 241 Ishaq, Khayyam conviction quashed 472 Ismay report 136–137, 166, 410, 457 Ismay, Rod 136 J Jackson reforms 370 Jenkins, Gareth 124, 138, 181, 191, 348, 430 Johnson, Boris, PM 390 Jones, Bryn 92 Jones, Darren, MP 411, 455 Jones, David, MP 100, 101 Jones, Dylan 95 Jones, Kevan, MP 244, 393 Justice for Subpostmasters Alliance (JFSA) 102, 134, 136, 151, 166, 169, 174, 177, 181, 186, 190, 194, 197, 198, 205, 213, 217, 220, 234, 242, 245, 251, 252, 254, 256, 258, 279, 286, 291, 292, 294, 305, 309, 313, 314, 346, 373, 383, 385, 401, 402, 408, 436, 454, 471 approves Second Sight 178 is formed 99 joins forces with Kay Linnell 177 jointly launches the Mediation Scheme 197 makes complaint to the Parliamentary Ombudsman 408 meets MPs at Portcullis House 171 reacts to dissolution of the Working Group 273 settles High Court litigation 372 starts working towards a High Court litigation 292 K Kalia, Parmod 321–323, 450 conviction quashed 450 reply from Angela van den Bogerd 322 Kamran, Siema 62–68 Kickstarter campaign 311 Kit swapouts 217 Knight, Nigel 316 Knight, Sue 190, 224, 252, 316 L Latif, Adrees 381 Law Commission 121–122, 455 Lawrence, Patrick, QC 437 Legacy Horizon 192, 379 Legal aid 292 Legal presumption of reliability in computers 455 Letwin, Oliver, MP 101, 175 Lewell-Buck, Emma, MP 391 Lewis, Julian xiii Lilley, Peter, MP 32 Limb 2 428, 444–449 Linnell, Kay 177, 206, 208, 209, 211, 214, 256, 257, 258, 292, 298, 338, 343, 369, 384, 404, 408, 420, 421, 474 Litigation funding 293, 294, 305 ‘Local’ Post Offices 168 Lock, Pamela 451 conviction quashed 473 Lohrasb, Sio 22 Longman, Jon 115 Lyons, Alwen, OBE 182, 188, 412 M Machines and Artificial Intelligence 455 Mahmood, Tahir conviction quashed 472 Malicious prosecution 420, 421, 426, 428 Mandelson, Peter, MP 100 Manning, Frank 227, 319 Marshall, Paul 400, 420, 428, 430–435, 437–438, 444, 459, 476 McCormack, Tim 16 McDonald, Jackie 143, 145, 458 conviction quashed 472 McFadden, Pat, MP 134 McLachlan, Professor Charles 123–124, 134, 138–142, 144, 218, 283, 332, 336 Media coverage BBC News website 218 BBC regional programmes 218, 225, 252 BBC Surrey 155 Computer Weekly 86, 88–91, 92, 101, 102, 118, 134, 151, 155, 282, 430, 469 Daily Mail 76, 277, 382, 398 Inside Out, other regions 220 Inside Out South 155, 158, 163, 214, 220, 234 Panorama 281, 290, 393, 400 Private Eye 166, 170, 171, 218 Radio 4 218, 378, 406 Taro Naw 92–96, 155 The One Show 238, 242, 245, 298, 302 Today 241 Mediation 369–375 See also Initial Complaint Review and Mediation Scheme Meggitt, Graham 92 Membury, William 418 Merritt, Tracey 101, 179, 252, 316 Message store 13 See also Riposte message store Metropolitan Police Service 387, 430, 479 Miliband, Ed, MP 433 Miscarriage of justice 86, 120, 137, 194, 214, 268, 277, 278, 282, 323, 393, 411, 413, 435, 451, 477 Misra, Davinder 102 first meeting with Nick Wallis 151 Misra, Seema xi, 102–119, 123, 138–145, 151–154, 162, 178, 179, 221, 290, 336, 350, 376, 396, 425, 426, 428, 444, 457 conviction quashed 472 Moloney, Tim, QC 431, 447, 455, 457–461 Murray, Ian, MP 244 Murray, Pete 249–250, 453 N National Federation of Retail Newsagents 81 National Federation of Subpostmasters (NFSP) 30, 31–34, 51, 60, 115, 127–128, 146, 156, 254, 291, 321, 330, 344, 363, 382, 392, 451, 458, 477 Baker, Colin 148 Baker, Mark 146 denials of problems with Horizon 32–33, 51, 60, 96, 146, 291 formation of 24 Grant Funding Agreement (GFA) 330, 344 Greenhow, Calum 382, 392 Rudkin, Michael 156 Thomson, George 148, 256 National Lottery 110 Network Transformation scheme 173, 330 Nicholson, Bob 406 Norris, Adrian 114 Noverre, Keith 106, 114 NT event log 141 O Oates, Graham 97 O’Connell, Dawn 461–464 conviction quashed 472 O’Connell, Mark 462 O’Connell, Matthew 462 Official Secrets Act 1989 25 One Show, The 238, 242, 245, 298, 302 One-sided transactions 184 Osborne, Kate, MP 390, 393 Overnight Cash Holding 69 Owen, Albert, MP 244 Owen, Damien conviction quashed 472 Owens, Les 171 P Page, Carl conviction quashed 472 Page, Flora 401, 425, 428, 432–435, 437–438, 459, 474–475 Page, Lewis 431–435 Panorama 281, 393, 400 Scandal At The Post Office (2020) 408 Trouble At The Post Office (2015) 290 Parekh, Vijay conviction quashed 472 Parker, Stephen 417 Parker, Tim 345, 427 Parliamentary Ombudsman complaint 408, 423, 436 Patel, Sandip, QC 425 Patel, Varchas 441 Patel, Vipin 440 conviction quashed 441 Pathway 8 Perkins, Alice 168, 172, 175, 186, 412 Peters and Peters 425, 458 Phillips, Dawn 346 Phillips, Steve 225, 245, 252 Picken, Mr Justice 431, 437, 460 Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 (PACE) section 69 121 Pooler, Michael 318 Post Office annual reports 367 apologies to Subpostmasters 373, 475 attitude to MPs xiii, 190, 197, 240, 244, 266, 271 attitude towards Subpostmasters 81 audit function 21, 50, 195, 231 automation of the network 7–16, 32 belief in Horizon 50, 120, 121, 187 board sub-committee 411 concerns over Horizon 410, 457 debt recovery process 347 dependency on government 173, 274, 293 document shredding 192, 457, 459, 473 enforcement of the Subpostmasters Contract 194, 388 estate 15 evidence to select committees 260, 411, 413, 435 history 18 inability to function as a going concern 425, 468 interpretation of the Subpostmasters Contract 83, 309, 345 Investigation Branch (IB) 19 investigation function 184, 189, 217, 267, 276 Investigations Department (POID) 20 joins Time to Change 354, 363 lack of concern over Horizon 79, 136, 410, 471 number of prosecutions xiii, 30, 155, 158, 171, 397, 398, 408, 466, 500, 501 publicly defends Horizon 95, 175, 178, 477 recusal attempt 346 relationship with Fujitsu 10, 120, 161 relationship with the NFSP 32, 96, 330 responses to media 89, 158, 189, 299, 478 response to CCRC 397 Security and Investigation Services (POSIS) 20 Security Group 20 services available 7 strategy for litigation 312, 313, 314, 415 PostOfficeTrial.com 311 Post Office Victims website 60 Pre-action letters of claim 169 Private Eye 166, 170, 171, 218 Richard Brooks 170 Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 (POCA) 42, 117 orders under 333 Prodger, Matt 178, 189, 221 Prosecution statistics 397, 466 Putland, Rob 411, 415 R Ramms, Joseph 23 Rasul, Mohammed conviction quashed 472 Read, Nick 371, 411, 413, 468 Reasons to Urge (RTU) meeting 80 Receipts and Payments Mismatch 139, 143, 320, 458 Recusal application 348 apparent bias 348 appeal dismissed by the Court of Appeal 352 halts the Horizon trial 349 hearing 350 refusal 352 Rees-Mogg, Jacob, MP 387 Remote access 181, 299, 341, 366, 413, 414, 415 Gareth Jenkins’ confirmation of 181 Post Office denial of 183 Richard Roll’s confirmation of 341 Robert Worden’s confirmation of 366 Reversal bug 46 Ridge, Elaine 332 Riposte Lock/Unlock bug 46 See also Callendar Square bug Riposte message store 13, 341 Robinson, Anna Marie 92 Robinson, Della 354 conviction quashed 472 Robinson, Tim 220, 282, 394 Rodgers, Shann 454 Rolfe, Martin 156 Roll, Richard 159, 181, 338 at Fujitsu 160–162 cross-examination in Horizon trial 339 Panorama 290 the recorded conversation 285–289 Royal Mail 19 Rozenberg, Joshua 350 Rudkin, Michael 156, 252 Rudkin, Susan 252, 426, 440 conviction quashed 441 S Sabir, Mohammad 329 Sayer, Siobhan conviction quashed 472 Schedule of Sensitive Material 121, 458 Scott, John 136, 192 Scully, Paul, MP 390, 477 Second Sight 175, 176–191, 205–209 appointment 177 Briefing Reports 215 Post Office’s reply to Briefing Report 2 218 summit following the Post Office’s reply to Briefing Report 2 240 evidence to 2015 select committee 260 Final Report 276 Post Office’s response 276 Interim Report 186, 188 launch of 190 Spot Review SR05 189 notice of termination 271 Post Office board sub-committee 412 Security Group 20 Service level agreement between the Post Office and Fujitsu 161 Settlement agreement announced 372 finally revealed 419 Sewell, Lesley 182 Shaheen, Mohamed 222 Shaheen, Rubbina 222, 458 conviction quashed 472 Shaikh, Eleanor 376 Shepherd, David 354 Shoosmiths 159 withdrawal from case 206 Shredding of documents 192, 459 Sidhpura, Chirag 376 Simpson, Alan 140 Singh, Jarnail 124, 138, 144, 180, 192 Singh, Nippi 100 Skinner, Janet 393, 396–398, 403, 428 conviction quashed 472 Smith, Dave 136 Smith, Jacqui 134 Smith, Martin 191 Smith, Sandy 238 Software Support Centre (SSC) 40, 160, 338 Spackman, Conor 282 Stanley, Peter 172 Stein, Sam, QC 455, 458 Stockdale, Liz 329 Stock units 5 Storey, Susannah 412 Strict liability offence 132 Strikeout application by Post Office 311 Stubbs, Martin 226 Stubbs, Pam 225, 226–238, 252, 319, 371 cross-examination in Common Issues trial 327–334 gives evidence 327 is suspended 232 moves into a temporary branch 228 Sturgess, Geoffrey 26 Subpostmasters appointment of 61 definition 21, 23 Subpostmasters Contract 25, 47, 293, 309, 319, 323 Section 12:12 25, 59, 324 Suspense accounts, branch 37 removal of 37 Suspense accounts, internal 208 Sweeney, John 281 Sweetman, Stuart 32 Swinson, Jo, MP 188, 245 T Taro Naw 92–96, 155 Tatford, Warwick 142, 143 Taylor, Andrew 474 Tecwyn, Sion 92 Theft Act 1968 section 17 132 Therium 293, 383 Thomas, Eira 34 Thomas, Noel (Hughie) 34–43, 89, 252, 426 conviction quashed 472 Thomas, Sian 95 Thomson, George 148, 256 Thomson, Pauline conviction quashed 472 Thomson, Rebecca 88 Time to Change 354, 363 Tobin, Sam 459 Tolhurst, Kelly, MP 386 Training 4, 35, 43, 71, 104, 105, 110, 112, 126, 164, 187, 216, 257, 258, 356, 465 Branch Focuses 258 Transaction acknowledgements 56 Transaction corrections 38, 55, 72, 105, 110, 111, 126, 127, 139, 180, 236, 422 applying for 56 challenging 56, 110 Transaction Information Processing (TIP) 16 Trousdale, Chris 440 conviction quashed 441 Turner, Karl, MP 394 Tweedie, Neil 277 U ‘Unders and overs’ tin 36 V Valters, Jon 155 van den Bogerd, Angela 180, 197, 208, 218, 240, 254, 256, 289, 318, 322, 331, 332, 338, 344, 346 cross-examination in Common Issues trial 331 cross-examination in Horizon trial 346 questioning at Select Committee hearing 261–266 Vennells, Paula 174, 175, 176, 178, 188, 273, 291, 297, 322, 330, 335, 368, 382, 385, 393, 411, 476–479 apologises 382, 475 call to be stripped of CBE 476 gives evidence to BIS Select Committee 260–265 incentive payments 368 is appointed as Post Office CEO 172 is doorstepped 382, 478 meets James Arbuthnot 175 meets the JFSA 178 resignation boards of Dunelm and Morrisons 476 Cabinet Office 393 Chair of the Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust 438 Church’s ethical investments advisory group 413 response to BEIS questions 410–414 Short Term Incentive Payments (STIP) 368 Verity, Andy 273 W Wagstaff, Caroline 372 Wakely, Mike 58 Walker, Janet 187 Ward, Gail conviction quashed 472 Warman, Matt, MP 455 Warmington, Ron 474 call for a judge-led independent inquiry 392 frustration at lack of progress 208 querying destination of ‘missing’ money 381 Second Sight appointed 176–179 starting the Second Sight investigation 179–185 Warren, Ian conviction quashed 472 Westminster Hall adjournment debate 243–246 Post Office’s response 251 Wildblood, Mark 354 Williams, Margery conviction quashed 472 Williams, Paul 329 Williams, Rachel 252 Williams, Sir Wyn 423, 453–454 Wilson, Julian 97, 169, 252, 296–297 conviction quashed 472 Wilson, Karen 98, 169, 252, 316 Wilson, Rob 140 Winn, Andrew 237 Witherow, Tom 382, 398, 438 Withers, Jim 278 Wood, Mike, MP 177 Worden, Dr Robert 336–337, 364–365 Wyllie, Kym 190 Y Yates, David conviction quashed 473 Z Zahawi, Nadhim, MP 261–264 Alan Bates A Horizon terminal in 2003 Jo Hamilton and Seema Misra Noel Thomas Lee Castleton Pete Murray outside Hope Farm Road Post Office Ron Warmington Lord Arbuthnot Kay Linnell Kamran Ashraf and Siema Kamran Mark Baker Nicki Arch Pam Stubbs Chirag Sidhpura Julian Wilson David Hill, Emma Jones, Karen Wilson and Trevor Wilson Henry Warwick, Patrick Green, Ognjen Miletic, Deirdre Connolly, Kathleen Donnelly and Reanne Mackenzie Cheering Subpostmasters and their supporters on 16 December 2019 Seema Misra with the Horizon trial judgment Jayshreeben Patel, Varchas Patel and Vipin Patel Richard Roll Sue Knight Victorious Subpostmasters celebrate after their convictions were quashed on 23 April 2021 Tom Hedges and Marion Holmes Wendy Buffrey Scott Darlington and Steve Darlington Seema Misra, Janet Skinner and Tracy Felstead Peter Holmes and Marion Holmes Chris Trousdale, Neil Hudgell, Vipin Patel, Varchas Patel, Jayshreeben Patel, Siema Kamran, Kamran Ashraf, Jasvinder Barang and family Parmod Kalia and Teju Adedayo Martin Griffiths Photo credits: Nick Wallis, Erika Baker, Marion Holmes, the Wilson Family, the Griffiths Family, Pete Murray, Nicki Arch, Unknown.

Making It in America: The Almost Impossible Quest to Manufacture in the U.S.A. (And How It Got That Way)
by Rachel Slade
Published 9 Jan 2024

Under CEO James McNerney, Boeing offshored most of the production of its 737 MAX to hundreds of small companies around the globe. The results were disastrous. Parts and pieces didn’t quite work together as planned, costing the company inordinate time and money to fix issues. The plane also had a fatal flaw in its design—a flight control system that would override pilots’ commands, plunging the plane’s nose down during takeoff. After two commercial flights crashed in 2018 and 2019, killing 346 passengers and crew, Boeing finally grounded the 737 MAX. The company paid $2.5 billion to settle the Department of Justice’s conspiracy and fraud case, but McNerney’s wealth was safe.

…

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z A Abercrombie & Fitch, 257, 257n AFL-CIO, 53, 64, 197, 216 American Roots and, 160, 177, 200, 216 CEO-to-worker pay ratio tracked, 257 conventions and meetings, 112, 112n, 129, 160–62, 200 Democratic Party and candidates, 52–53, 70, 74 promotes domestic manufacturing, 73 Trumka and, 62, 70, 73–74, 160, 274 Washington headquarters, 63, 220 Waxman working for, 52–53, 61, 62, 67, 82, 94, 188–89, 199, 289 Whirlpool plant shutdown and, 78–80 See also labor unions; Trumka, Richard; specific unions Africa, 4, 26, 122–23, 123n, 262n, 284 Made in Africa consortium, 123n used clothing exported to, 22 See also specific countries agricultural monoculture, 152–54 Alfond, Harold, 189, 191–92 Alfond, Justin, 189–91, 193, 211 Alibaba, 224 Alibrio, Gina, 221, 293 Allen, Tom, 52 Allende, Salvador, 72 Alliance for Retired Americans, 67, 91–92 Allied Textiles, U.K., 46–47 Alloiding, Simeon, 39, 51 Amalgamated Bank, 287–88 Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America, 287 Amalgamated Housing Cooperative, 287 Amazon, 261 Bessemer warehouse, 241, 242 business model, 269–70 damage to U.S. manufacturers, 269 problematic labor practices, 112n selling Chinese goods, xii, 270 as start-up, in Kentucky, 268–69 turnover rate, 269 unionization effort at, 241–42, 269 American Apparel, 232, 232n, 252, 264–67 American Cord & Webbing, Woonsocket, Rhode Island, 156 American Fabrics, New York City, 166–71, 235–36 American manufacturing academia abandons, 74 automation and, 300–301 benefits of, 300 Biden administration and, 286–87, 301 company closures, 18, 20, 74, 77–78 costs and profits, 247–48 China’s takeover of global markets and, 68, 69 Covid pandemic and, 238 Devlin on bringing it back, 196–98 as essential to the nation, 5, 29, 113 generational shift and demise of, 103 government’s role in reviving, 7, 8, 114, 296–97, 300–301 greed’s destruction of, 69, 78, 94 Hamilton and, 7–8, 296 health insurance burden, 296–97, 297n immigrant/New American employees, 121, 301–3 (see also American Roots) innovation and, 296, 298, 299 Jefferson’s vision, 9 labor crisis and, 118, 282 last days of Carleton Woolen Mills and, 45–48 Lawrence, Massachusetts, and witnessing the life cycle of, 106–11 “made in America” products, 171, 240 NAFTA’s destruction of, number of manufacturers and jobs lost, 18, 45–46, 118 number of companies, employees today, 5 offshored amount by 1990, 68 offshoring and, 4, 18, 26, 27, 68, 69, 77, 129, 257, 260, 261–62, 263 (see also Bangladesh; China; Mexico; Vietnam; specific countries) onshoring revival, 113–14, 238, 242, 290–91, 293, 296 Pilchman’s pessimism about, 170–71 poor management training, 294, 294n quality of, 22, 300, 300n shareholder profit and, 263n shipbuilding and, 204 size of (2022), 4 sourcing as difficult, 193 tariffs as important to, 198 Taylorism and, 255–57 union investment in, 161, 287–88 unions and, 20, 73, 99, 288 (see also labor unions) Walmart and, 261–62 Waxman’s dream and, 95, 99 WeatherTech and, 227–28 worker protections and, 183 workforce training, 297, 301 workplace safety, 22, 183 work satisfaction and, 298–99 WTO and the destruction of, 192 See also labor unions; NAFTA; supply chain; textile and clothing production American Revolution, 5–6, 7, 11, 13 American Roots, Westbrook, Maine, 28, 234, 287 American-sourced materials and, 29, 111, 129, 231–37, 295 Bailey as consultant, 252–55, 264–68, 271–73, 278–81 branding alliances and, 289 business model, 176, 236 cash and investment capital shortage, 176, 186–88, 289–90 cost-saving decisions, 119 Covid pandemic and, 200–201, 209, 210, 213–15, 223–24, 239, 242–43, 276, 285 Covid pandemic PPE manufacturing pivot, 214–19, 224, 225, 226 customer targeted by, 111–12, 149, 158, 160, 177–78, 179 downsizing workforce, 225, 276 economic impact of, 242, 295 employee diversity, 299 employee hiring, 120, 121, 123, 282 employee hiring, immigrants/New Americans, 123, 127, 179–80, 215, 221–22, 245, 272–73, 283–84, 285, 294, 303–4 employee priorities, 281–82 employee recruitment, 285 employee salaries, benefits, 175, 248, 250, 269, 286 employee stress, 178–79, 248, 254, 279–80 employee training, 112, 119–20, 121, 248 employee welfare, 113, 114 financial problems (2017), 160 founding of, 111–15 goals for growth, 254 hoodie made by, 28, 140, 149, 150–52, 158–60, 271 hoodie manufacturing, finding suppliers, 141–44, 152, 156–57, 159–60, 225 hoodie order by Painters Union, 157, 158–60 hoodie order by TWU, 163–71 hoodie zipper, 142–44, 147 industrial sewing machines for, 149 January 6 response by, 229–30 kaizen method and, 264–65 logo, 239, 243, 273 management, 178–79, 220–21, 252, 254, 277–78 mission statement, 28–29, 239–40, 251 monthly overhead and payroll, 209 murder of George Floyd and, 221 naming of, 113 new equipment and improvements (2021), 227, 239 office of Ben Waxman at, 175–76, 195, 220, 253, 254, 291 online presence, 209 patternmaker for, 116–19, 150–51, 244 piece-rate payment, 265–67, 280, 281 Pilchman and, 170, 231–32 PolarFleece vests and, 105, 111, 114–16, 119, 127–31, 132 post–Covid pandemic, pivoting back to clothing, 239 pricing of merchandise, 171, 247, 286 production costs and problems, 119, 243–45, 247–55, 267–68, 279 production revamped, 255, 271–73, 278–81, 290 raising capital, investors, and strategic team, 188, 189, 193–94, 199, 211, 214, 227, 291 revenue (2016), 128 revenue growth (2018 to 2023), 172, 179, 186, 224, 226, 254, 276, 290 salary of founders, 113, 257 sales and marketing, 127–28, 157, 158, 177–78, 209–10, 239–40, 276 (see also Waxman, Ben) size, number of employees, 179, 226 success of, 290–92 testimonials and accolades, 171 union labor and, 28, 29, 175 union leader Jabbir and, 160–62, 175 union support for, 165, 176, 177–80 values of, 188 Waxman home as collateral, 201 “wearing your values” and, 240 WeatherTech T-shirt order, 227–28 Westbrook factory, 172, 174–75, 189, 217, 219, 278–79 white supremacists target, 179–80 See also Waxman, Ben; Waxman, Whitney Reynolds Andersen, Kurt, Evil Geniuses: The Unmaking of America, 11 Anderson, Wes, 119 Angola, 124, 125, 126, 283, 285 Antonelli, Paola, 132 Appalachian Mountains, 53 Ares, Jessica, 39 Arkwright, Richard, 6–7 Arlington Mills, Lawrence, Massachusetts, 106, 109 ASHP (American Society of Health-System Pharmacists), 299, 300n Asplundh tree service, 136 As Steel Goes (Brooks), 58 Atkinson, Robert, 68 B Bailey, Marty, 252–55, 257–60, 262–68, 301 American Roots and, 271–73, 278 Moroccan T-shirt video, 265, 272 Bangladesh, 24, 25, 27n, 29, 114, 257 banking deregulation, 94 Glass-Steagall Act, 94 subprime mortgages and mortgage-backed bonds, 94–95 Barchiesi, Rich, 60 Bartram, David, 18 Bassett Furniture Company, North Carolina, 69 Bella + Canvas, Los Angeles, 244 Bernstein, Leonard, 106 Bethlehem Steel, 77 Bezos, Jeff, 240–41, 269 Biaya, Robert Mbaya, 122, 123–27, 284 Biden, Joe, 32, 112n, 286 pro-union administration, 286–87 trade agenda, 235, 286–87 Black Mass (film), 119 Bobe, Ludovic Ndengabeka, 244, 247, 273 Boeing, 262 offshores 737 MAX production, 262 Born, Doug, 216 Boston Globe, 173 Bottle of Lies: The Inside Story of the Generic Drug Boom (Eban), 299n Boyle, Tony, 64–65, 67 Bradley, Bill, 50–51 Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, 174 British East India Company, 12–14 Brooks, Robert R., As Steel Goes, 58 Brown, Roxanne, 218 Buffett, Warren, 192–93 Bullshit Jobs: A Theory (Graeber), 298 Bureau of Labor Standards, 183–84 Burkhardt, Jonathan, 61–62, 92 Burns, Cam, 239–40 Bush, George H.

Numbers Don't Lie: 71 Stories to Help Us Understand the Modern World
by Vaclav Smil
Published 4 May 2021

Including that incident, as the International Civil Aviation Organization does in its statistics, raises the rate to 3.0—still much lower than between 2009 and 2011. And the subsequent years were safer still: fatalities declined to 474 in 2015, 182 in 2016, and to just 99 in 2017. There was a reversal in 2018, with 11 fatal accidents and 514 deaths (still lower than in 2014), including the Lion Air Boeing 737 Max falling into the sea off Jakarta in October. And in 2019, despite another Boeing 737 Max crash—this time in Ethiopia—the total number of fatalities was half of those in 2018. In any case, it’s better to personalize the problem by putting it in terms of the risk per passenger per hour of flight. The necessary data are in the annual safety report by the International Civil Aviation Organization, which covers large jetliners as well as smaller commuter planes.

Why We Drive: Toward a Philosophy of the Open Road
by Matthew B. Crawford
Published 8 Jun 2020

These character dispositions of pilots are formed through long bodily practice and cognitive formation. Of course, confidence and assertiveness are desirable only if the pilot (or driver) really does have an adequate grasp of the situation—a better grasp than the automation does. In October 2018, a Boeing 737 MAX 8 crashed in Indonesia, and then another plane of the same model crashed in Ethiopia in March 2019. As it happens, the 737 is one of those legacy designs that has been kept viable through iteration, as new systems get retrofitted to an airframe that never anticipated their necessity. In particular, it has been fitted with newer engines that are more fuel efficient, to keep the plane competitive.

…

At this point, he is not feeling deference. He is engaged in an intense mental effort to diagnose the situation. Maybe he also suffers panic, which makes thinking difficult. He oscillates between a determination to seize control back from the automation, and second-guessing himself. Maybe the computer knows best? In the case of the 737 MAX, this second-guessing was in fact appropriate, because pilots were underinformed—and for reasons that in retrospect are not surprising, given the business logic of selling airplanes. (The deployment of driverless cars on public roads has in some cases revealed a similarly cavalier attitude about public safety, likely due to the imperative of being “first to market.”11) How much trust does the pilot place in things beyond his own comprehension?

…

See also driverless cars; semiautonomous cars; Uber efficiency of, 246–247 experimental designs for, 246 predictive problems of, 259 programming local social norms, 259 safety of, 86–87, 301 virtues of, 122 autonomous intersections, 21, 245–246 Autosteer, 86–89 Barbe, Emmanuel, 226 Basic Rider course, 236–237 behavior constraint, 258 behavior modification, 309 behavioral data, 304 behavioral surplus, 273, 302 behind the Martin’s, 1 being scared, tonic effect in, 15 Belgium, 267 Bennett, Bob, 290 Bergson, Henri, 169 Berkeley High School, 108 Berlin Auto Show, 139 Berlinski, Claire, 226 better self, 170 bicycle moralists, 179–183 bicycles, 12, 182–183 big data, 303 Bills, John, 221–222 The Black Box Society (Pasquale), 286–287 blueprinting an engine, 148–149 Boeing 737 MAX 8, 124 Bogost, Ian, 9–10 Boyle, T. Coraghessan, 299–300 braking, automated, 97 Brexit, 271–272 Brin, Sergey, 292 British Ford Escort, 80 brittleness of navigation systems, 99–100 Brooks, Rodney A., 113 Brown, Arthur Roy, 176 Bruges, Belgium, 267 Bulgaria, 250 Burke, Edward, 221 Cadogan, Garnette, 2 Caliente, Nevada, 200–202 Caliente 250, 22–23.

Tools and Weapons: The Promise and the Peril of the Digital Age
by Brad Smith and Carol Ann Browne
Published 9 Sep 2019

To the contrary, the reaction to the FAA’s delegation of some regulatory certification to Boeing during the 737 MAX certification process has reflected official and public unease. The response quickly focused on requiring that the FAA base its assessment of the plane’s safety fixes on additional outside review. Steve Miletich and Heidi Groover, “Reacting to Crash Finding, Congressional Leaders Support Outside Review of Boeing 737 MAX Fixes,” Seattle Times, April 4, 2019, https://www.seattletimes.com/business/boeing-aerospace/reacting-to-crash-finding-congressional-leaders-support-outside-review-of-boeing-737-max-fixes/. Back to note reference 10. Ballard C.

Your Computer Is on Fire
by Thomas S. Mullaney , Benjamin Peters , Mar Hicks and Kavita Philip
Published 9 Mar 2021

Increasingly, as corporations have been able to place themselves in the role of arbiter of their own products and value, it has meant that democratic input into the process of deciding which technologies are safe, useful, or worthwhile has been short-circuited. Even with established technologies with good safety records, like commercial airliners, this can create a disaster surprisingly quickly. Before the automated MCAS system forced two Boeing 737 Max airplanes to drop out of the sky in quick succession in 2019, killing hundreds of people, Boeing engineers had argued that the system was unsafe. But they were overruled by management. Boeing was able to force the dangerous new feature through, undetected, because the government agency meant to regulate them was instead letting the corporation largely call the shots.

…

After the first crash, Boeing’s CEO continued to insist the system was safe, blaming the crash on pilot error even though Boeing had removed the relevant parts of the manual that might have allowed the pilots to recover from the malfunction. Had it not been for whistleblowers and dedicated investigative journalists, Boeing may have gotten away with this, and more. The larger lesson, however, is that regulatory agencies that should have prevented disasters like the 737 Max tragedy had been stripped of their ability to do so, and whole sectors that require regulation, like web technologies and online communication platforms, effectively have no external oversight bodies. In the US since 2016, instead of more regulatory safeguards put into place by a democratically elected government, we have seen runaway centralization and the destruction of regulatory and safety agencies under an increasingly authoritarian federal government.

…

See also Accent, bias algorithms, 121, 127–128 antisemitic, 265 class, 4–6, 88, 136, 161–162, 174, 184, 265 class in India, 299, 302–303, 308 data, 66, 205 design-value, 81 discrimination (see Discrimination) facial recognition, 118–119 hiring, 256–257, 260–263, 267 implicit, 257, 262 societal, 152, 179–180 speech technology, 180–181, 190–191, 193 technical training, 253–254, 265 technology, 214, 218, 232 unconscious, 6, 256 Big tech, 12, 87, 191, 254–255, 257 Biometrics, 121, 128–129, 208 Bioshock, 237–238 Bioshock Infinite, 238–239 Bitcoin, 5, 44–45 BITNET, 323–324 Black. See African American(s) Black Girls Code, 255, 263 Block switching, 83 Blockchain, 44–45 Body economic, 79 national, 77–78, 86, 86t Boeing, 19–20, 23 MCAS, 19 737 Max tragedies, 19–20 Bolivia, 45 Bonaparte, Napoleon, 39 Borsdorf, Johannes H., 168–169 Boston Marathon Bombing, 120 Business Process Management, 308 Brandenburg v. Ohio, 373 Brazil, 103–104, 234, 324 BSD (programming language), 273 Bug. See also Thompson hack feature, not a, 4, 7, 18–19, 148–151, 153, 214, 223, 262, 303 Bureaucracy, 78, 80, 86t, 88, 109, 150, 175 Burmese, 339, 344, 354 Bush, Randy, 324–326 Bush, Vannevar, 348 C (programming language), 273–277, 279, 281–284, 286 backslash, 279, 281–282 commands, 279, 282–283, 285, 287 C++, 273, 275, 290 C#, 273 Objective C, 273 Cable, 5, 100–102, 104, 107, 111, 321 infrastructure, 103–104 internet, 95, 98–99 materials, 94 networks, 5 television, 315, 317 undersea, 72, 93, 99 Caldwell, Samuel Hawks, 348–350 Call centers, 5, 56 Amazon, 37 Indian, 105, 298, 302, 305, 307 Cambridge Analytica, 118 Capital, 6, 31, 202, 316, 378, 380 cultural, 299 global, 88 intensive, 277, 313–314 investment, 44, 301, 314–315, 332 physical, 46, 107 venture, 15–16, 53, 175, 255–256, 267 Capitalism, 46, 87, 171, 368 welfare, 160–161, 167, 170–174 Carceral state, 206, 208 Carlin, George, 59 Carnegie Mellon University, 257 Cart Life, 241 Cartography, 95–96, 107 Catholicism, 171, 173–175 CCM (Commercial content moderation), 56–58, 62, 66, 122 CDC (Center for Disease Control), 20 CDU (Christian Democratic Union), 170 Cellular phones (cell), 7, 306, 317, 332, 365, 378 and M-PESA, 7, 322, 326–328, 333 Safaricom, 326–328, 333 SIM card, 326–328 Chex Quest, 237 Child pornography, 6, 117–125, 127–130 limit case, 129 server storage, 383 Child Victim Identification Program, 122–123, 125 China, 7, 45, 104, 227 accent bias, 188, 189t apps, 332 Communists, 348 IMEs, 351, 357 Input Wars, 351 language, 188 People’s University (Beijing), 357 rising superpower, 153 writing interfaces, 381 Chinese keyboard, 345, 345f, 348–350, 353, 367 Chinese typewriter, 346, 350 dian, 351, 352f, 352 difficulty score, 344–345 MingKwai keyboard, 346–349, 347f, 353 and QWERTY keyboard, 338–339, 342, 346, 350–351, 353–354, 357 retrieval system, 346–347, 349–350, 353 script, 221 search writer, 350 Christian, 161, 170–171, 187 Central Intelligence Agency, 80 Cisgender, 154 Clark, David D., 71 Class bias, 4–6, 88, 136, 161–162, 174, 184, 265 capitalist, 171 dominant, 180–181, 190 equality, 80, 86t exposure, 301–302 India, 299, 302–303, 308 investor, 53 lower, 162 management, 142 Marxist, 171–173 meritocracy, 138, 150 middle, 73, 80, 86, 139, 241 technocratic, 21 upper, 300- 302 upper-middle, 18 working, 79, 141–142, 288, 301, 309 Cloud definition, 33–34 and electricity, 33–34, 44 enables other industries, 46 as factory, 7, 35–36, 42–43, 45–46, 321 and infrastructure, 33–35 kilowatt-hours required, 34 physical, 31–32, 34, 44–46 supply chain, 45 Code Arabic, 191 Assembly, 275, 277, 281, 286 Black Girls Code, 255, 263 breaking, 138–139 (Colossus) Code.org, 253, 255, 259 Code2040, 255, 260 Coding, Girls Who Code, 253, 255, 263 cultural, 302 digital, 284, 289 dress, 145, 164–165, 298 education, 6 empire, 76 #YesWeCode, 253, 264–266 HLL (high-level language), 275, 277–278, 284, 290 Hour of Code, 253, 263–264 is law, 126 platforms, 321 robotics, 201, 203, 205 social media, 59 source, 273–292 passim (see also Source code) switching, 184, 190 typing, 188, 351 writers, 24, 145, 256–259, 262–267, 300, 381 Yes We Code, 255 Code.org, 253, 255, 259 Code2040, 255, 260 Coding, Girls Who Code, 253, 255, 263 Cold War, 137, 152, 169 computer networks, 75–76, 83–84 network economy, 87 technology, 17–18, 94, 137 typewriter, 227 Collision detection, 242–243 Colonialism, 19, 91, 93, 105, 109, 245 cable networks, 93, 99, 101 colonization, 186, 378 digital, 331 Europe, 110, 147–148, 343 internet, 111, 129 language as, 186–188 metaphors, 94 stereotypes, 96, 102, 104 technocolonialist, 103–104 Colossus, 17, 139, 143 Comcast, 35 Commercial content moderation (CCM), 56–58, 62, 66, 122 Commodity computational services, 33 Common sense, 73, 96 Communications Decency Act, 60–61 Compaq, 318 Complex scripts, 188, 222, 344–345, 350 CompuServe, 320, 325 Computer anthropomorphized (see Robots) conservative force, 15 control and power, 23 critiques of, 5 men, 142 utility, 35, 320 humans as, 43, 140, 384 Computer science, 18, 58, 66, 112, 367 artificial intelligence, 58, 66 education, 256, 263 Thompson hack, 275, 291 women in, 254 Computing, 135–155 passim artificial intelligence, 56 Britain and, 21, 138, 148–152 Chinese, 350–351, 353–354 and class, 142–143 cloud, 78, 87 companies, 13, 18–19 devices, 40–41, 45 education, 368 and empire, 147–148 environment, 382 global, 350, 377 hacking, 289–291 history of, 7, 17, 35, 38, 43, 46, 137, 153–154 Latin alphabet, 357 masculinity, 263 management, 23 manufacturing, 39 media, 4–8, 377–380 meritocracy narratives, 137, 153–154, 381 networks, 77, 199, 320–321 personal, 354 power, 328 software, 318 typing and, 220, 226, 337, 339, 341, 344 underrepresented groups and, 253, 255–256, 264, 266 and women, 17, 43, 135, 139–142, 144–147 Concorde, 145, 146f Congress, 11–12, 82, 154 Content antisemitic, 265 app, 319, 321 child abuse, 118–119, 122, 125 commercial content moderation (CCM), 56–58, 62, 66, 122 filtering, 57 illegal, 62 internet, 317, 319 moderation, 54–57, 123, 126, 380–382 moderators, 5, 380–382 review, 121, 128–130 social media, 59, 61–63, 66, 232, 321, 329–331 terrorism, 57, 66, 130 violent, 117 web, 317 Contractor, 35, 53, 56, 266 CorelDraw, 298 COVID-19, 14, 20, 377 Cox, Chris, 61 Creating Your Community, 266 Creative destruction, 4 Crisis, 4, 6, 16, 21, 150, 235, 297, 383–384 Covid-19, 20 identity, 58–60 point, 13 Y2K, 104 CSNET, 81 Cybernetics, 75, 78–80, 83, 86, 86t, 88 cyberneticist, 77, 81–82 Cyberpunk, 100–101, 107, 110 Cybersyn, 75, 79–80, 85, 86t CyberTipline, 125 Dalton gang, 287–289 DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency), 383 Dartmouth College, 235 Data biased, 66, 205 due process, 206 objective, 205 processing, 38, 40–41, 119, 206, 300 socially constructed, 205 value-neutral, 372 Data broker Salesforce, 87 SAS, 87 Data entry, 5, 104, 150, 367 David, Paul, 337–338, 351, 353, 357–358 Davies, Donald, 83 Death, 15, 120, 186, 371, 373, 379 Covid-19, 12 gaming, 233–234, 236 life-or-, 6, 206, 266 technology and dying well, 378 Decolonization, 91, 104, 111–112 Deep Blue, 7 De Kosnik, Benjamin, 108–109, 110 Dell, 318 Delphi, 290 Democratic Republic of Congo, 45 Denmark, 44, 128–129 de Prony, Gaspard, 39–40 Design values, 73–76, 84–88 American, 81–84 Chilean, 79–81 Soviet, 77–78 state, 75, 78, 80, 83, 86, 86t Devanagari, 339, 342, 344, 350, 354 Developing world, 93, 103, 105, 180, 325, 330–332 Devi, Poonam, 304 Diamond, Jared, 338, 351, 353, 357–358 Difference Engine, 40 Digital coding, 284, 289 colonialism, 91, 93–94, 103, 331 computers, 38, 41, 138 connectivity, 379 economies, 13, 22, 29, 31, 33, 35, 45, 145 forensic work, 123, 126, 128, 354 future, 101 gaming, 241 imperialism, 186–187, 191 inclusion, 303 infrastructures, 126, 151, 155 invisibility, 98, 100, 204 labor, 6, 147, 101, 354 materiality, 5 networks, 83 platforms, 66, 118, 199, 201 politics and, 110, 112 predigital, 96–97, 152 revolution, 29, 32 surveillance state, 119, 130 technology, 40, 64, 123–124, 200, 382 vigilantism, 120 Disability, 12, 15, 160 Disasters, 11–15, 19–20, 22–24, 54, 204, 338, 364 Discrimination.

The Disappearing Act
by Florence de Changy
Published 24 Dec 2020

The results of several famous crash investigations were at first presented to the public as being probable pilot suicide or pilot error, and were subsequently always known as such, even when years, sometimes decades, later the real causes were identified and the pilots were cleared. The most recent saga of the 737 MAX disasters has sadly proved no exception. The trend is surprisingly blatant, but it has its logic. Blaming the pilot exonerates the plane and engine manufacturers from any wrongdoing, as well as the airline, whose business has got to continue uninterrupted. The insurers split the bill of the disaster and life goes on, albeit not without a sigh at yet another example of ‘human error’.

…

This incident – shameful for a country like France, where the rule of law prevails – happened in addition to the unjustifiable treatment of former pilot Norbert Jacquet. Today, Jacquet continues to be a whistleblower on all civil aviation issues related to the ultra-automation of planes. To him, the 737 MAX double disasters are further cases in point.17 Last time I talked to him, he said he would rather not reveal where he was based. He told me that his tenacious battle ended up ruining him and made him spend a total of 20 months locked up, including one month in emergency psychiatric detention. But what exactly was his crime?

…

Gendre, ‘Habsheim ou la Raison d’État’, SNPL, available at www.crashdehabsheim.net/Dossier%20SNPL%20presentation.htm. 15 Ina, ‘Suite crash Airbus Mulhouse’, 2 June 1989, available at www.ina.fr/video/CAC90001481. 16 Norbert Jacquet, Airbus, L’assassin habite à l’Élysée, Éditions Premières Lignes, 1994, p. 75. 17 Lion Air Flight 610 crashed on 29 October 2018, killing 189 people. Five months later, on 10 March 2019, Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 crashed, killing 157 people. It was quickly established that both accidents resulted from the malfunction of a new automated control called the Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS). All 387 Boeing 737 MAXs used by 59 airlines across the world at the time were grounded. 18 Dutch Safety Board, Crash of Malaysia Airlines light MH17, The Hague, October 2015. 19 Press release, The Hague, 13 October 2015. 20 Dutch Safety Board, Crash of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17, op. cit., p. 253. 21 The 17 May 1987 attack on the USS Stark left 37 Americans dead. 22 International Court of Justice, ‘Aerial incident of 3 July 1988’ (Islamic Republic of Iran v.

The Crux
by Richard Rumelt
Published 27 Apr 2022

Microsoft’s high current earnings come because its software products have become standards that almost everyone must have to be productive and to work with others. In the same vein, costs borne today may well be the key to future harvests of profit. And, of course, it works the other way around. Once great Boeing has been struggling with design flaws in its 737 MAX, with an overenthusiasm for international outsourcing, with overheating lithium batteries, and more. All of these depress earnings, but the lower earnings are not due to how hard or skillfully today’s managers, engineers, and employees work. They are almost all due to the culture brought in by its “merger” with McDonnell Douglas in 1997.

…

If investors are to stay with you through ups and downs, they must have trust in you as a person, in your strategy, and in your management system. Trust is hard to gain and all too easy to lose. If you are running Boeing, the market has trusted you for years to make long-term investments. If you betray that trust by approving a 737 MAX design that puts the front stairway in the wrong place just to satisfy Southwest Airlines, the trust built up over decades can evaporate in months. One radical way of escaping the 90-Day Derby is to run a very simple business or set of businesses. When the accounting results are an accurate picture of performance, things get easier.

The System: Who Rigged It, How We Fix It
by Robert B. Reich
Published 24 Mar 2020

Wells Fargo’s Carrie Tolstedt departed with a $125 million exit package after being in charge of the unit that opened more than 2 million unauthorized customer accounts. Boeing CEO Dennis Muilenburg raked in $23 million in 2018, up 27 percent from the year before, notwithstanding the corporation’s deadly, defective 737 Max airliner. McDonald’s CEO Stephen Easterbrook, fired in 2019 for having an inappropriate relationship with an employee, received a severance package of nearly $42 million—more than double the $15.9 million he made in 2018. In 2019, OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma sought bankruptcy protection from lawsuits seeking to hold it accountable for its role in the nation’s opioid epidemic.

Radical Uncertainty: Decision-Making for an Unknowable Future
by Mervyn King and John Kay
Published 5 Mar 2020

Struggling fifty years after that launched to compete with the more modern Airbus A320, Boeing chose not to design a new plane but to fit fuel-efficient engines to its ageing blockbuster. This modification proved more difficult than anticipated, requiring complex adjustments to the aircraft’s handling, and the two crashes of the 737 Max in 2018 and 2019 were uncannily reminiscent of the Comet disasters of 1954 – the result of unforeseen consequences from the decision to adapt an earlier design to new circumstances. Unk-unks are inevitable in aviation, and understanding of systems does not necessarily keep pace with their complexity.

…

(2019) which reviews several of the puzzles and paradoxes in the early chapters of this book. ____________ * Ronald L. Wasserstein, Allen L. Schirm and Nicole A. Lazar, ‘Editorial: Moving to a world beyond “p <0.05”’, American Statistician , Vol. 73, No. 51 (2019), 1–19. INDEX 10 (film, 1979), 97 737 Max aircraft, 228 9/11 terror attacks, 7 , 74–6 , 202 , 230 Abbottabad raid (2011), 9–10 , 20 , 26 , 44 , 71 , 102 , 118–19 , 120 , 174–5 ; reference narrative of, 122–3 , 277 , 298 ; role of luck in, 262–3 ; and unhelpful probabilities, 8–19 , 326 abductive reasoning, 138 , 147 , 211 , 388 , 398 ABN AMRO, 257 Abraham (biblical character), 206 Abrahams, Harold, 273 Abramovich, Roman, 265 accountancy, 409 aeronautics, 227–8 , 352–6 , 383 Agdestein, Simen, 273 AIDS, 57 , 230 , 375–6 Airbus A380, 40 , 274–6 , 408 Akerlof, George, 250–1 , 252 , 253 , 254 , 382 Alchian, Armen, 158 alien invasion narratives, 295–6 Allais, Maurice, 134–5 , 136 , 137 , 437 , 440–3 Allen, Bill, 227–8 Allen, Paul, 28 , 29 Altair desktop, 28 Amazon, 289 , 309 Anderson, Roy, 375 ant colonies, 173 anthropology, 160 , 189–91 , 193–4 , 215–16 antibiotics, 40 , 45 , 284 , 429 Antz (film, 1998), 274 apocalyptic narratives, 331–2 , 335 , 358–62 Appiah, Anthony, 117–18 Apple, 29–30 , 31 , 169 , 309 Applegarth, Adam, 311 arbitrage, 308 Archilochus (Greek poet), 222 Aristotle, 137 , 147 , 303 Arrow, Kenneth, 254 , 343–5 , 440 artificial intelligence (AI), xvi , 39 , 135 , 150 , 173–4 , 175–6 , 185–6 , 387 ; the ‘singularity’, 176–7 Ashtabula rail bridge disaster (1876), 33 Asimov, Isaac, 303 asteroid strikes, 32 , 71–2 , 238 , 402 astrology, 394 astronomical laws, 18–19 , 35 , 70 , 373–4 , 388 , 389 , 391–2 , 394 AT&T, 28 auction theory, 255–7 Austen, Jane, 217 , 224–5 , 383 autism, 394 , 411 aviation, commercial, 23–4 , 40 , 227–8 , 274–6 , 315 , 383 , 414 axiomatic rationality: Allais disputes theory, 134–5 , 136 , 137 ; Arrow– Debreu world, 343–5 ; assumption of transitivity, 437 ; and Becker, 114 , 381–2 ; and behavioural economics, 116 , 135–6 , 141–9 , 154–5 , 167–8 , 386–7 , 401 ; capital asset pricing model (CAPM), 307–8 , 309 , 320 , 332 ; completeness axiom, 437–8 ; consistency of choice axiom, 108–9 , 110–11 ; continuity axiom, 438–40 ; definition of rationality, 133–4 , 137 , 436 ; definition of risk, 305 , 307 , 334 , 420–1 ; efficient market hypothesis, 252 , 254 , 308–9 , 318 , 320 , 332 , 336–7 ; efficient portfolio model, 307–8 , 309 , 318 , 320 , 332–4 , 366 ; and evolutionary rationality, 16 , 152–3 , 154–5 , 157 , 158 , 166–7 , 171–2 , 386–7 , 407 ; and ‘expectations’ concept, 97–8 , 102–3 , 121–2 , 341–2 ; extended to decision-making under uncertainty, xv , 40–2 , 110–14 , 133–7 , 257–9 , 420–1 ; and Friedman, 73–4 , 111–12 , 113–14 , 125 , 257–9 , 307 , 399–400 , 420 , 437 ; hegemony of over radical uncertainty, 40–2 , 110–14 ; implausibility of assumptions, xiv–xv , 16 , 41–4 , 47 , 74–84 , 85–105 , 107–9 , 111 , 116–22 , 344–9 , 435–44 ; independence axiom, 440–4 ; as limited to small worlds, 170 , 309–10 , 320–1 , 342–9 , 382 , 400 , 421 ; and Lucas, 36 , 92 , 93 , 338–9 , 341 , 345 , 346 ; and Markowitz, 307 , 308 , 309–10 , 318 , 322 , 333 ; maximising behaviour, 310 ; ‘pignistic probability’, 78–84 , 438 ; and Popperian falsificationism, 259–60 ; Prescott’s comparison with engineering, 352–6 ; ‘rational expectations theory, 342–5 , 346–50 ; and Samuelson, xv , 42 , 110–11 , 436 ; and Savage, 111–14 , 125 , 257–9 , 309 , 345 , 400 , 435 , 437 , 442–3 ; shocks and shifts discourse, 42 , 346 , 347 , 348 , 406–7 ; Simon’s work on, 134 , 136 , 149–53 ; triumph of probabilistic reasoning, 15–16 , 20 , 72–84 , 110–14 ; Value at risk models (VaR), 366–8 , 405 , 424 ; von Neumann–Morgenstern axioms, 111 , 133 , 435–44 ; see also maximising behaviour Ballmer, Steve, 30 , 227 Bank of England, xiii , 45 , 103–5 , 286 , 311 Barclays Bank, 257 Barings Bank, 411 Basel regulations, 310 , 311 Bay of Pigs fiasco (1961), 278–9 Bayes, Reverend Thomas, 60–3 , 66–7 , 70 , 71 , 358 , 431 Beane, Billy, 273 Bear Stearns, 158–9 Becker, Gary, 114 , 381–2 Beckham, David, 267–8 , 269 , 270 , 272–3 , 414 behavioural economics, 116 , 145–8 , 154 , 386–7 ; and Allais paradox, 442 ; ‘availability heuristic’, 144–5 ; biases in human behaviour, 16 , 136 , 141–8 , 154 , 162 , 165 , 167–8 , 170–1 , 175–6 , 184 , 401 ; and evolutionary science, 154–5 , 165 ; Kahneman’s dual systems, 170–1 , 172 , 271 ; Kahneman–Tversky experiments, 141–7 , 152 , 215 ; ‘noise’ (randomness), 175–6 ; nudge theory, 148–9 Bentham, Jeremy, 110 Berkshire Hathaway, 153 , 319 , 324 , 325–6 Berlin, Isaiah, 222 Bernoulli, Daniel, 114–16 , 199 Bernoulli, Nicolaus, 199 , 442 Bertrand, Joseph, 70 Bezos, Jeff, 289 big data, 208 , 327 , 388–90 billiard players, 257–8 bin Laden, Osama, 7 , 8–10 , 21 , 44 , 71 , 118–19 , 120 , 122–3 , 262–3 , 326 Bismarck, Otto von, 161 Bitcoin, 96 , 316 Black Death, 32 , 39–40 BlackBerry, 30 , 31 blackjack, 38 Blackstone, Sir William, 213 BNP Paribas, 5 , 6 BOAC, 23–4 Boas, Franz, 193 Boeing, 24 , 227–8 Boer War, 168 Bolt, Usain, 273 bonobos, 161–2 , 178 Borges, Jorge Luis, 391 Borodino, battle of (1812), 3–4 , 433 Bortkiewicz, Ladislaus, 235–6 Bower, Tom, 169–70 Bowral cricket team, New South Wales, 264 Box, George, 393 Boycott, Geoffrey, 264–5 Bradman, Don, 237 , 264 Brahe, Tycho, 388–9 Brånemark, Per-Ingvar, 387 , 388 Branson, Richard, 169–70 Brearley, Michael, 140–1 , 264–5 Breslau (now Wrocław), 56 Brexit referendum (June 2016), 241–2 ; lies told during, 404 bridge collapses, 33 , 341 Brownian motion, 37 Brunelleschi, Filippo, 143 , 147 Buffett, Warren, 83 , 152 , 179 , 319–20 , 324 , 335 , 336–7 Burns, Robert, 253 Bush, George W., 295 , 407 , 412 business cycles, 347 business history (academic discipline), 286 business schools, 318 business strategy: approach in 1970s, 183 ; approach in 1980s, 181–2 ; aspirations confused with, 181–2 , 183–4 ; business plans, 223–4 , 228 ; collections of capabilities, 274–7 ; and the computer industry, 27–31 ; corporate takeovers, 256–7 ; Lampert at Sears, 287–9 , 292 ; Henry Mintzberg on, 296 , 410 ; motivational proselytisation, 182–3 , 184 ; quantification mistaken for understanding, 180–1 , 183 ; and reference narratives, 286–90 , 296–7 ; risk maps, 297 ; Rumelt’s MBA classes, 10 , 178–80 ; Shell’s scenario planning, 223 , 295 ; Sloan at General Motors, 286–7 ; strategy weekends, 180–3 , 194 , 296 , 407 ; three common errors, 183–4 ; vision or mission statements, 181–2 , 184 Buxton, Jedediah, 225 Calas, Jean, 199 California, 48–9 Cambridge Growth Project, 340 Canadian fishing industry, 368–9 , 370 , 423 , 424 cancer, screening for, 66–7 Candler, Graham, 352 , 353–6 , 399 Cardiff City Football Club, 265 Carlsen, Magnus, 175 , 273 Carnegie, Andrew, 427 Carnegie Mellon University, 135 Carré, Dr Matt, 267–8 Carroll, Lewis, Through the Looking-Glass , 93–4 , 218 , 344 , 346 ; ‘Jabberwocky’, 91–2 , 94 , 217 Carron works (near Falkirk), 253 Carter, Jimmy, 8 , 119 , 120 , 123 , 262–3 cartography, 391 Casio, 27 , 31 Castro, Fidel, 278–9 cave paintings, 216 central banks, 5 , 7 , 95 , 96 , 103–5 , 285–6 , 348–9 , 350 , 351 , 356–7 Central Pacific Railroad, 48 Centre for the Study of Existential Risk, 39 Chabris, Christopher, 140 Challenger disaster (1986), 373 , 374 Chamberlain, Neville, 24–5 Chandler, Alfred, Strategy and Structure , 286 Chariots of Fire (film, 1981), 273 Charles II, King, 383 Chelsea Football Club, 265 chess, 173 , 174 , 175 , 266 , 273 , 346 Chicago economists, 36 , 72–4 , 86 , 92 , 111–14 , 133–7 , 158 , 257–8 , 307 , 342–3 , 381–2 Chicago Mercantile Exchange, 423 chimpanzees, 161–2 , 178 , 274 China, 4–5 , 419–20 , 430 cholera, 283 Churchill, Winston: character of, 25–6 , 168 , 169 , 170 ; fondness for gambling, 81 , 168 ; as hedgehog not fox, 222 ; on Montgomery, 293 ; restores gold standard (1925), 25–6 , 269 ; The Second World War , 187 ; Second World War leadership, 24–5 , 26 , 119 , 167 , 168–9 , 170 , 184 , 187 , 266 , 269 Citibank, 255 Civil War, American, 188 , 266 , 290 Clapham, John, 253 Clark, Sally, 197–8 , 200 , 202 , 204 , 206 Clausewitz, Carl von, On War , 433 climate systems, 101–2 Club of Rome, 361 , 362 Coase, Ronald, 286 , 342 Cochran, Johnnie, 198 , 217 Cochrane, John, 93 coffee houses, 55–6 cognitive illusions, 141–2 Cohen, Jonathan, 206–7 Colbert, Jean-Baptiste, 411 Cold War, 293–4 , 306–7 Collier, Paul, 276–7 Columbia disaster (2003), 373 Columbia University, 117 , 118 , 120 Columbus, Christopher, 4 , 21 Colyvan, Mark, 225 Comet aircraft, 23–4 , 228 communication: communicative rationality, 172 , 267–77 , 279–82 , 412 , 414–16 ; and decision-making, 17 , 231 , 272–7 , 279–82 , 398–9 , 408 , 412 , 413–17 , 432 ; eusociality, 172–3 , 274 ; and good doctors, 185 , 398–9 ; human capacity for, 159 , 161 , 162 , 172–3 , 216 , 272–7 , 408 ; and ill-defined concepts, 98–9 ; and intelligibility, 98 ; language, 98 , 99–100 , 159 , 162 , 173 , 226 ; linguistic ambiguity, 98–100 ; and reasoning, 265–8 , 269–77 ; and the smartphone, 30 ; the ‘wisdom of crowds’, 47 , 413–14 Community Reinvestment Act (USA, 1977), 207 comparative advantage model, 249–50 , 251–2 , 253 computer technologies, 27–31 , 173–4 , 175–7 , 185–6 , 227 , 411 ; big data, 208 , 327 , 388–90 ; CAPTCHA text, 387 ; dotcom boom, 228 ; and economic models, 339–40 ; machine learning, 208 Condit, Phil, 228 Condorcet, Nicolas de, 199–200 consumer price index, 330 , 331 conviction narrative theory, 227–30 Corinthians (New Testament), 402 corporate takeovers, 256–7 corporations, large, 27–31 , 122 , 123 , 286–90 , 408–10 , 412 , 415 Cosmides, Leda, 165 Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction, 32 , 39 , 71–2 Crick, Francis, 156 cricket, 140–1 , 237 , 263–5 crime novels, classic, 218 crosswords, 218 crypto-currencies, 96 , 316 Csikszentmihalyi, Mihaly, 140 , 264 Cuba, 278–80 ; Cuban Missile Crisis, 279–81 , 299 , 412 Custer, George, 293 Cutty Sark (whisky producer), 325 Daily Express , 242–3 , 244 Damasio, Antonio, 171 Dardanelles expedition (1915), 25 Darwin, Charles, 156 , 157 Davenport, Thomas, 374 Dawkins, Richard, 156 de Havilland company, 23–4 Debreu, Gerard, 254 , 343–4 decision theory, xvi ; critiques of ‘American school’, 133–7 ; definition of rationality, 133–4 ; derived from deductive reasoning, 138 ; Ellsberg’s ‘ambiguity aversion’, 135 ; expected utility , 111–14 , 115–18 , 124–5 , 127 , 128 – 30 , 135 , 400 , 435–44 ; hegemony of optimisation, 40–2 , 110–14 ; as unable to solve mysteries, 34 , 44 , 47 ; and work of Savage, 442–3 decision-making under uncertainty: and adaptation, 102 , 401 ; Allais paradox, 133–7 , 437 , 440–3 ; axiomatic approach extended to, xv , 40–2 , 110–14 , 133–7 , 257–9 , 420–1 ; ‘bounded rationality concept, 149–53 ; as collaborative process, 17 , 155 , 162 , 176 , 411–15 , 431–2 ; and communication, 17 , 231 , 272–7 , 279–82 , 398–9 , 408 , 412 , 413–17 , 432 ; communicative rationality, 172 , 267–77 , 279–82 , 412 , 414–16 ; completeness axiom, 437–8 ; continuity axiom, 438–40 ; Cuban Missile Crisis, 279–81 , 299 , 412 ; ‘decision weights’ concept, 121 ; disasters attributed to chance, 266–7 ; doctors, 184–6 , 194 , 398–9 ; and emotions, 227–9 , 411 ; ‘evidence-based policy’, 404 , 405 ; excessive attention to prior probabilities, 184–5 , 210 ; expected utility , 111–14 , 115–18 , 124–5 , 127 , 128–30 , 135 , 400 , 435–44 ; first-rate decision-makers, 285 ; framing of problems, 261 , 362 , 398–400 ; good strategies for radical uncertainty, 423–5 ; and hindsight, 263 ; independence axiom, 440–4 ; judgement as unavoidable, 176 ; Klein’s ‘primed recognition decision-making’, 399 ; Gary Klein’s work on, 151–2 , 167 ; and luck, 263–6 ; practical decision-making, 22–6 , 46–7 , 48–9 , 81–2 , 151 , 171–2 , 176–7 , 255 , 332 , 383 , 395–6 , 398–9 ; and practical knowledge, 22–6 , 195 , 255 , 352 , 382–8 , 395–6 , 405 , 414–15 , 431 ; and prior opinions, 179–80 , 184–5 , 210 ; ‘prospect theory’, 121 ; public sector processes, 183 , 355 , 415 ; puzzle– mystery distinction, 20–4 , 32–4 , 48–9 , 64–8 , 100 , 155 , 173–7 , 218 , 249 , 398 , 400–1 ; qualities needed for success, 179–80 ; reasoning as not decision-making, 268–71 ; and ‘resulting’, 265–7 ; ‘risk as feelings’ perspective, 128–9 , 310 ; robustness and resilience, 123 , 294–8 , 332 , 335 , 374 , 423–5 ; and role of economists, 397–401 ; Rumelt’s ‘diagnosis’, 184–5 , 194–5 ; ‘satisficing’ (’good enough’ outcomes), 150 , 167 , 175 , 415 , 416 ; search for a workable solution, 151–2 , 167 ; by securities traders, 268–9 ; ‘shock’ and ‘shift’ labels, 42 , 346 , 347 , 348 , 406–7 ; simple heuristics, rules of thumb, 152 ; and statistical discrimination, 207–9 , 415 ; triumph of probabilistic reasoning, 20 , 40–2 , 72–84 , 110–14 ; von Neumann– Morgenstern axioms, 111 , 133 , 435–44 ; see also business strategy deductive reasoning, 137–8 , 147 , 235 , 388 , 389 , 398 Deep Blue, 175 DeepMind, 173–4 The Deer Hunter (film, 1978), 438 democracy, representative, 292 , 319 , 414 demographic issues, 253 , 358–61 , 362–3 ; EU migration models, 369–70 , 372 Denmark, 426 , 427 , 428 , 430 dentistry, 387–8 , 394 Derek, Bo, 97 dermatologists, 88–9 Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC), 27 , 31 dinosaurs, extinction of, 32 , 39 , 71–2 , 383 , 402 division of labour, 161 , 162 , 172–3 , 216 , 249 DNA, 156 , 198 , 201 , 204 ‘domino theory’, 281 Donoghue, Denis, 226 dotcom boom, 316 , 402 Doyle, Arthur Conan, 34 , 224–5 , 253 Drapers Company, 328 Drescher, Melvin, 248–9 Drucker, Peter, Concept of the Corporation (1946), 286 , 287 Duhem–Quine hypothesis, 259–60 Duke, Annie, 263 , 268 , 273 Dulles, John Foster, 293 Dutch tulip craze (1630s), 315 Dyson, Frank, 259 earthquakes, 237–8 , 239 Eco, Umberto, The Name of the Rose , 204 Econometrica , 134 econometrics, 134 , 340–1 , 346 , 356 economic models: of 1950s and 1960s, 339–40 ; Akerlof model, 250–1 , 252 , 253 , 254 ; ‘analogue economies’ of Lucas, 345 , 346 ; artificial/complex, xiv–xv , 21 , 92–3 , 94 ; ‘asymmetric information’ model, 250–1 , 254–5 ; capital asset pricing model (CAPM), 307–8 , 309 , 320 , 332 ; comparative advantage model, 249–50 , 251–2 , 253 ; cost-benefit analysis obsession, 404 ; diversification of risk, 304–5 , 307–9 , 317–18 , 334–7 ; econometric models, 340–1 , 346 , 356 ; economic rent model, 253–4 ; efficient market hypothesis, 252 , 254 , 308–9 , 318 , 320 , 332 , 336–7 ; efficient portfolio model, 307–8 , 309 , 318 , 320 , 332–4 , 366 ; failure over 2007–08 crisis, xv , 6–7 , 260 , 311–12 , 319 , 339 , 349–50 , 357 , 367–8 , 399 , 407 , 423–4 ; falsificationist argument, 259–60 ; forecasting models, 7 , 15–16 , 68 , 96 , 102–5 , 347–50 , 403–4 ; Goldman Sachs risk models, 6–7 , 9 , 68 , 202 , 246–7 ; ‘grand auction’ of Arrow and Debreu, 343–5 ; inadequacy of forecasting models, 347–50 , 353–4 , 403–4 ; invented numbers in, 312–13 , 320 , 363–4 , 365 , 371 , 373 , 404 , 405 , 423 ; Keynesian, 339–40 ; Lucas critique, 341 , 348 , 354 ; Malthus’ population growth model, 253 , 358–61 , 362–3 ; misuse/abuse of, 312–13 , 320 , 371–4 , 405 ; need for, 404–5 ; need for pluralism of, 276–7 ; pension models, 312–13 , 328–9 , 405 , 423 , 424 ; pre-crisis risk models, 6–7 , 9 , 68 , 202 , 246–7 , 260 , 311–12 , 319 , 320–1 , 339 ; purpose of, 346 ; quest for large-world model, 392 ; ‘rational expectations theory, 342–5 , 346–50 ; real business cycle theory, 348 , 352–4 ; role of incentives, 408–9 ; ‘shift’ label, 406–7 ; ‘shock’ label, 346–7 , 348 , 406–7 ; ‘training base’ (historical data series), 406 ; Value at risk models (VaR), 366–8 , 405 , 424 ; Viniar problem (problem of model failure), 6–7 , 58 , 68 , 109 , 150 , 176 , 202 , 241 , 242 , 246–7 , 331 , 366–8 ; ‘wind tunnel’ models, 309 , 339 , 392 ; winner’s curse model, 256–7 ; World Economic Outlook, 349 ; see also axiomatic rationality; maximising behaviour; optimising behaviour; small world models Economic Policy Symposium, Jackson Hole, 317–18 economics: adverse selection process, 250–1 , 327 ; aggregate output and GDP, 95 ; ambiguity of variables/concepts, 95–6 , 99–100 ; appeal of probability theory, 42–3 ; ‘bubbles’, 315–16 ; business cycles, 45–6 , 347 ; Chicago School, 36 , 72–4 , 86 , 92 , 111–14 , 133–7 , 158 , 257–8 , 307 , 342–3 , 381–2 ; data as essential, 388–90 ; division of labour, 161 , 162 , 172–3 , 216 , 249 ; and evolutionary mechanisms, 158–9 ; ‘expectations’ concept, 97–8 , 102–3 , 121–2 , 341–2 ; forecasts and future planning as necessary, 103 ; framing of problems, 261 , 362 , 398–400 ; ‘grand auction’ of Arrow and Debreu, 343–5 ; hegemony of optimisation, 40–2 , 110 – 14 ; Hicks–Samuelson axioms, 435–6 ; market fundamentalism, 220 ; market price equilibrium, 254 , 343–4 , 381–2 ; markets as necessarily incomplete, 344 , 345 , 349 ; Marshall’s definition of, 381 , 382 ; as ‘non-stationary’, 16 , 35–6 , 45–6 , 102 , 236 , 339–41 , 349 , 350 , 394–6 ; oil shock (1973), 223 ; Phillips curve, 340 ; and ‘physics envy’, 387 , 388 ; and power laws, 238–9 ; as practical knowledge, 381 , 382–3 , 385–8 , 398 , 399 , 405 ; public role of the social scientist, 397–401 ; reciprocity in a modern economy, 191–2 , 328–9 ; and reflexivity, 35–6 , 309 , 394 ; risk and volatility, 124–5 , 310 , 333 , 335–6 , 421–3 ; Romer’s ‘mathiness’, 93–4 , 95 ; shift or structural break, 236 ; Adam Smith’s ‘invisible hand’, 163 , 254 , 343 ; social context of, 17 ; sources of data, 389 , 390 ; surge in national income since 1800, 161 ; systems as non-linear, 102 ; teaching’s emphasis on quantitative methods, 389 ; validity of research findings, 245 ‘Economists Free Ride, Does Anyone Else?’

Clean Agile: Back to Basics
by Robert C. Martin
Published 13 Oct 2019

I certainly have. To understand just how severe this problem is, consider the shutdown of the Air Traffic Control network over Los Angeles due to the rollover of a 32-bit clock. Or the shutdown of all the power generators on board the Boeing 787 for the same reason. Or the hundreds of people killed by the 737 Max MCAS software. Or how about my own experience with the early days of healthcare.gov? After initial login, like so many systems nowadays, it asked for a set of security questions. One of those was “A memorable date.” I entered 7/21/73, my wedding anniversary. The system responded with Invalid Entry.

One Billion Americans: The Case for Thinking Bigger
by Matthew Yglesias
Published 14 Sep 2020

But the Chinese are in a position to know, broadly speaking, what kinds of airplanes there is a robust market for. They also knew from the start that the 737 wing design, which was originally developed in the 1960s, is too low to the ground for the bigger, more fuel-efficient modern engines that Boeing tried to stick on the 737 MAX with infamous results. Today’s developing countries are aware of what a modern rich country looks like—and they even have the example of past catch-up success stories to look to, whereas the original industrializers were flying blind. Because the United States is already rich, it has trouble growing quickly, particularly in a sustained way.

The Last President of Europe: Emmanuel Macron's Race to Revive France and Save the World
by William Drozdiak
Published 27 Apr 2020

China agreed to buy up to three hundred new Airbus passenger planes, nearly twice as many as China intended when the contract was first discussed during Macron’s visit to China. The aviation deal came as a huge boost to the fortunes of Airbus, a French-German-led consortium that had been lagging well behind its American rival Boeing until two fatal crashes resulted in the grounding of all 737 MAX planes, once Boeing’s most profitable aircraft. Xi also announced that China would lift its previous import restrictions on French beef, poultry, and cheese products. (China had banned imports of Brie, Camembert, and Roquefort because they contain bacteria that the Chinese thought were harmful, until the French proved otherwise.)

Test Gods: Virgin Galactic and the Making of a Modern Astronaut
by Nicholas Schmidle
Published 3 May 2021

The board hired an outsider, Dennis O’Donoghue, to review the program in search of weaknesses and vulnerabilities. O’Donoghue was a former marine and NASA test pilot. He had spent a decade at Boeing before retiring in Oregon to grow pinot noir grapes. He was the right guy at the right time for the job. Boeing’s 737 Max was having all kinds of problems—two recent accidents that killed hundreds of innocent people, grounding the fleet—and O’Donoghue, who had not conducted the safety review of that jet, felt somehow responsible; according to one Virgin employee who spoke with him, O’Donoghue felt confident that had he done the review, he would have caught the problem and those people would still be alive.

Deaths of Despair and the Future of Capitalism
by Anne Case and Angus Deaton
Published 17 Mar 2020

Pain is also highly correlated with the risk of serious mental distress—a correlation that is twice as large for those without a four-year degree. As the summer fades, along with happiness and joy, “pain stalks in to plunder.” 8 Suicide, Drugs, and Alcohol IN 2017, 158,000 Americans died from what we call deaths of despair: suicide, overdoses, and alcoholic liver disease and cirrhosis. That is the equivalent of three full 737 MAXs falling out of the sky every day, with no survivors. In this chapter and the next, we look at the background of these deaths, at what is known about how and why they happen, and whether this can help us understand why they have risen so rapidly among less educated Americans in the last two decades.

The Fifth Domain: Defending Our Country, Our Companies, and Ourselves in the Age of Cyber Threats
by Richard A. Clarke and Robert K. Knake
Published 15 Jul 2019

What the Stuxnet attack, the hack of the Saudi petrochemical facility, and many other incidents demonstrate is that what sensors think is happening may not always be accurate and what control boards show is the condition may not always reflect reality. When simple artificial intelligence applications are given too much autonomy to act with too little verification of the readings they are employing, bad things can happen on the Internet of Things. They can happen without malicious activity, as may have been the case in the crashes of the 737 Max aircrafts (where a bad sensor reading may have caused an AI program to take control of the aircraft without telling the pilot), or they can be the result of hacking, as in the case of the two Ukrainian electrical power grid blackouts (where the control boards were hacked to indicate all was well, even after the GRU hackers had thrown the breakers on transformers all across the region).

The Dying Citizen: How Progressive Elites, Tribalism, and Globalization Are Destroying the Idea of America
by Victor Davis Hanson
Published 15 Nov 2021

Or that the international containment and quarantine protocols of the World Health Organization (WHO) would make something like the coronavirus outbreak virtually impossible—or at least allow a united world to combat its global spread. Or that the world would shrink as tens of millions flew on identical American Boeing 737 MAX jets. History does not end in one something. It is erratic, unpredictable, and heads in lots of directions rather than following a single fated trajectory. Tribalisms, nations, empires, and globalizations grow and collapse—not unlike natural long-term, cyclical changes in climate. Or, as the Greeks believed, societies are like the endless natural phases of birth, aging, and decline of humans themselves.

Pandora's Box: How Guts, Guile, and Greed Upended TV
by Peter Biskind
Published 6 Nov 2023

Kelly’s Love & Death are presented as “MAX originals,” not “HBO originals.” Says Fuchs, “This is a fifty-year-old company. I consider that it died at fifty. There’s no longer an HBO. Max has made HBO become like Kleenex. It’s fucking crazy.”36 (By the way, while “Max” may recall the 2018/2019 twin crashes of Boeing 737 Max jets, on the other hand, in 2022, it enjoyed the distinction of being the most popular name for male dogs in America.) Then, along came Succession. Writer-producer Jesse Armstrong had approached Bloys with an idea about a powerful media family. Bloys explains, “The thesis was, ‘All families are somewhat dysfunctional, siblings fight or your brother’s getting more of your father’s attention, but when you add this other element, the obscene wealth and the power and the influence, their dysfunction affects the entire planet.’

This Is How They Tell Me the World Ends: The Cyberweapons Arms Race
by Nicole Perlroth
Published 9 Feb 2021

If the next 9/11 struck tomorrow, the first question we would ask ourselves is the same question we asked some two decades ago: How did we miss this? But in the two decades since 9/11, the threat landscape has been dramatically overhauled. It is now arguably easier for a rogue actor or nation-state to sabotage the software embedded in the Boeing 737 Max than it is for terrorists to hijack planes and send them careening into buildings. Threats that were only hypotheticals a decade ago are now very real. Russia proved it can turn off power in the dead of winter. The same Russian hackers who switched off the safety locks at the Saudi petrochemical plant are now doing “digital drive-bys” of American targets.

Artificial Intelligence: A Modern Approach
by Stuart Russell and Peter Norvig
Published 14 Jul 2019

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