Meaning & Belonging · Human agency
Don’t Drown Five Feet from the Beach
Getting close is not the same as getting there. The last five feet still have to be crossed.
Read today's essayThe governing argument
The search for human agency.
In an era of concentrated power, broken government and artificial intelligence.
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Editorial selections
Today's Six Picks
Six picks. Updated daily.
01 · AI & TechnologyStanford Digital Economy Lab
No Widespread Displacement, but the AI Employment Gap for Young Workers Has Widened to 19%
Using ADP payroll data revised through June 2026, the Stanford Digital Economy Lab finds no broad economy-wide employment displacement attributable to AI.
Read the selection02 · Government & ReformProPublica
The Pentagon Gave $350 Million in Contracts to a Firm Closely Tied to a Senior Defense Department Official
ProPublica’s review of records found that Alvarez & Marsal received nearly $350 million in Pentagon consulting work after George Kollitides entered senior Defense Department roles.
Read the selection03 · Meaning & BelongingPLOS Mental Health
Associations between community engagement, human flourishing, and mental illness symptoms among college students
In a survey of 379 college students, researchers found that engagement with family, peers, church and school was associated with greater human flourishing.
Read the selection04 · Media & AttentionMedill Local News Initiative, Northwestern University
The State of Local News: 2026 Report
Northwestern Medill’s 2026 report finds that 238 U.S.
Read the selection05 · Money & PowerPew Research Center
Trends in Income and Wealth Inequality
Pew Research Center pairs Federal Reserve wealth statistics with a nationally representative survey of 5,166 U.S.
Read the selection06 · Money & PowerJournal of Political Economy Microeconomics
Trends in Competition in the United States: What Does the Evidence Show?
Carl Shapiro and Ali Yurukoglu review evidence on competition in the United States across market concentration, markups, business dynamism and other measures.
Read the selectionLatest video
Thoughts Along the Way.
Short observations on the forces shaping our lives—and the choices still available to us.
View all on YouTubeInflation is the currency collapse and bond default - redirected at the non-super rich.
Watch on YouTube“Longest way round is the shortest home.”—James Joyce
Watch on YouTubeThe tax code is the most honest document in America. Honestly corrupt..
Watch on YouTubeWe’ve been here before. We found our way through. We’ll do so again.
Watch on YouTubeWithout AI, Are We Already in Recession?
Watch on YouTubeYour phone screen is biologically optimized to capture your attention using dopamine science 
Watch on YouTubeNo one knows the future of AI.
Watch on YouTubeIt’s all for sale - a government Contractor revealed just how corrupt the US government is.
Watch on YouTubeThe definition of insanity is trying to do the same thing again and expecting a different result 
Watch on YouTube5 things our politicians will never do - unless we force them.
Watch on YouTubeWhat if America is the problem in the Middle East not the solution?
Watch on YouTubeThe stock market is measuring the Monopoly squeeze on all of us.
Watch on YouTubeSeptember 23, 2026
Watch on YouTubeWe are being technologically engineered into isolation
Watch on YouTubeThe essence of America. You can change your life.
Watch on YouTubeAnti/trust. Anticorruption. Radical transparency.
Watch on YouTubePhones are an isolation machine
Watch on YouTubeSubscribe free
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All Writing & Essays
The Dylan Ratigan Essay Bank
0117 essays
Money & Power
How money moves, who owns it and how concentrated capital shapes public life.
Begin with: Monopoly Is the Enemy of Capitalism0214 essaysGovernment & Reform
How institutions are captured—and what can restore accountability, competition and trust.
Begin with: The Courage to Make American Mythology True038 essaysAI & Technology
Who owns the machine, who benefits and whether technology expands human capability.
Begin with: AI Is the World’s Most Powerful Utility and We Need to Treat It as Such042 essaysMedia & Attention
How questions, incentives and platforms decide what enters public life.
Begin with: Who Does the Media Work For?055 essaysMeaning & Belonging
Identity, impermanence, spirit and the inner conditions of human agency.
Begin with: Don’t Drown Five Feet from the Beach065 essaysLives & Places
People, journeys, work and the lived experiences that make large systems visible.
Begin with: America & The House Next DoorThe throughline
Inside the systems. Focused on the people.
For thirty years, Dylan has followed money, power and the choices institutions make from inside the rooms where decisions are made. The work now asks how people retain the freedom to shape their own lives.
01 / 1995
Bloomberg
One of the organization's first reporters, beginning in its training program. Established the mergers and acquisitions coverage, created and hosted Bloomberg Television's flagship morning show. Later Global Managing Editor for Corporate Finance.
02 / CNBC · MSNBC
Fast Money & The Dylan Ratigan Show
Co-creator and founding host of Fast Money, one of the most successful financial television shows in US history, opening the conversation among Wall Street traders to the public. Led CNBC's coverage of the financial crisis, becoming the most outspoken critic of the government response before resigning in March 2009 to question the government directly as the host of The Dylan Ratigan Show on MSNBC, which became the most-watched daytime show on the network.
03 / Reform
Politics
After a viral clip protesting government corruption in 2011, he created Get Money Out, accumulating nearly 300,000 petitioners in a matter of weeks. Dylan then left television to found Helical Holdings. For five years, he worked with returning combat veterans from Camp Pendleton, California, to design and build a system of resilient distributed grid resource hubs that could establish a small piece of civilization anywhere in the world, producing three acres of agriculture, power, clean water and Wi-Fi. He then ran for Congress in 2018 on an anti-corruption political reform platform.
04 / Enterprise
Business
Dylan is the president of Reservations.ai, the CEO of Euforia Group, which designs, produces and sells Italian-made sneakers, bags and travel accessories. He is also the Chairman of Samba Biologics, which develops regenerative tissue therapies for heart attack and stroke. He offers advisory services on a selective basis in industrial development, hospitality, entertainment and biotechnology.
05 / Global perspective
Travel
Dylan has traveled through more than 75 countries and lived in four, from Myanmar, China and Japan to Russia, Peru, Bolivia, the Middle East and Europe. He works today from Milan and New York. Those experiences inform his work in travel and his commentary on global affairs.
06 / Today
Human Capital
Essays and a book in progress about capitalism, concentrated power and the human spirit. Dylan's first book, Greedy Bastards, was published by Simon & Schuster in January 2012 and spent six weeks on The New York Times bestseller list. It diagnosed deeply misaligned interests extracting from America while exposing abundant solutions that remain available but ignored.
Speaking · Media · Advisory
In the room.
Clear conversations about the incentives shaping our institutions and the choices still available to people.
Dylan connects financial journalism, public debate and operating experience to the people living inside larger systems.
- Artificial intelligence and human agency
- Capitalism, competition and human value
- Money and political power
- Trust, accountability and institutional reform
- Media, attention and the extraction economy
Keynotes · Moderated conversations · Panels · Interviews
Explore speaking and media
The New York Times bestseller
Greedy Bastards
A book about complex systems with misaligned interests—and the terrible outcomes those systems produce. It follows the incentives through banking, education, healthcare, politics, trade and energy.
The question running through it still drives Dylan's work: Who benefits from the rules, and what happens to everyone living with the result?
BankingEducationHealthcarePoliticsTradeEnergy
Buy the book on AmazonAbout Dylan
Dylan Ratigan.
Journalist, author, executive and explorer. Following money, power and technology back to the people living with the result.
Read Dylan's storyFollow the work
What do we build when the old bargains break?
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