| This is Bloomberg Opinion Today, a timepass of Bloomberg Opinion's opinions. Sign up here. They say nearly every culture has a dumpling. Poland has the pierogi. Tibet and Nepal make momos. And America, well, we're known for ... Hot Pockets and crab rangoon. But globe-spanning phenomena extend well beyond dough-wrapped morsels. Consider the myriad ways in which the world describes the habits of lazy young people. In the US, our current preferred term is "bed rotting," the act of marinating under your covers all day long and letting the hours pass without doing a single thing, save for plugging in your phone so you can keep watching Thanos mingle dance videos. In China, the "lie flat" movement took hold after Covid-19. And in India, Andy Mukherjee says "timepass" is now the word of choice. The trend has a dark undercurrent in New Delhi, where unemployed young people are having an awfully hard time finding a job. "The respectable, middle-class careers they're waiting for have become elusive; the spread of artificial intelligence will make them rarer still," Andy writes. The more educated they are, the uglier the career prospects:  Instead of agreeing to do a job that's beneath them, they've resorted to doomscrolling: "Indians are spending four hours a day on their mobile devices on average, up from 3.3 hours in 2023. A fifth of this time is devoted to watching short-form videos — not just Instagram Reels, Facebook Watch and YouTube Shorts, but also apps like Josh and Moj." All those video views are feeding the creator economy: "Virtual tips on local platforms cost 1 to 2 cents (cheaper than a cup of tea), which is why the market for online gratuity, a way for followers to 'show love' to their favorite influencers, is on the cusp of a 10-fold surge to $700 million-plus by 2029." Although Andy says "the West is hardly the exemplar here" — he gives that title to China — the US has its own social media challenges. Matthew Yglesias says the Democratic party risks alienating voters who don't watch the news but are still glued to their screens for entertainment purposes. "The 2024 presidential election featured a novel demographic split in which Kamala Harris did dramatically worse with voters who don't follow political news closely than with those who do," he writes.  That split didn't happen overnight, though. Matthew says "the tangled history of Joe Rogan and the Democratic Party" helps illustrate the issue: "By 2024, he was a pretty right-wing figure whose eventual endorsement of Donald Trump seemed more inevitable than surprising. Just five years earlier, however, he was lavishing praise on Bernie Sanders on his show. The result? Sanders was attacked by his rivals for the 2020 Democratic Party nomination on the grounds that, by appearing on the show and seeking Rogan's endorsement, he was platforming transphobia." In shunning Sanders' actions, Democrats engaged in what Matthew calls a "tent-narrowing effort." "By becoming increasingly intolerant of dissent, Democrats created — on the elite level at least — a more ideologically coherent party able to legislate with narrow majorities. At the same time, this ideological rigidity served to alienate less attentive, less political voters," he writes. In other words: They handed Trump the "bed rot vote" — all those chronically online young people — on a silver platter. Of course, you don't need to be young to be chronically online. You could be a 53-year-old billionaire living at Mar-a-Lago with a bizarre fixation on child abuse in Britain: I'll let Bloomberg News's Alex Wickham explain: "In a barrage of posts on his social media platform X over the past week, Musk has called for Prime Minister Keir Starmer to be imprisoned, urged the release from jail of right-wing activist Tommy Robinson, and — perhaps most surprising of all — called for the replacement of one-time ally and Trump friend Nigel Farage as leader of the Reform UK party … Now, Starmer's Labour government, the Conservative opposition and Reform are all questioning whether the alliance between Musk and the president-elect can last." Needless to say, America's relationship with Britain — and free speech, according to Noah Feldman — is on the rocks. But not all hope is lost. Mohamed El-Erian says the two nations can still find common ground economically. "America is a vital partner," he writes. "It accounts for nearly 20% of the UK's exports and imports, and a third of foreign direct investment into the country." Since British policymakers are in a weak negotiating position — the US economy is running laps around the UK and the EU — they'll need to be strategic about setting the right tone with the incoming US president, says Mohamed: "The Labour government should be less vocal in denying that there is a choice to be made between Europe and the US. This is one of those situations where less is more, and where a redirect is best: Say less about Europe and, instead, steer the narrative to a more obvious choice for the UK — that of the US over China." Speaking of, guess who wrote a new book about China? Our columnist Hal Brands, that's who. In a free-to-read excerpt from The Eurasian Century: Hot Wars, Cold Wars, and the Making of the Modern World, he explores the impact of Sir Halford Mackinder, a long-forgotten strategist who predicted today's world over a century ago. "Mackinder left a longer shadow than most of the politicians, diplomats and generals of his era. That's because he foresaw the epic Eurasian conflicts that would ravage the 20th century — and that will challenge the democratic world in the 21st," he writes.  Last year ended on a somber note for the aviation industry: On Dec. 29, all but two of the 181 on board a Jeju Air Co. plane that crash-landed in South Korea died. And four days earlier, 38 lives were claimed when Russian anti-aircraft weapons accidentally targeted an Azerbaijan Airlines flight. Still, David Fickling says these are freak accidents: "The long-term trend in aviation safety is still astonishingly good," he writes. Just two decades ago, thousands of people died every year in air crashes. Now, that figure is much lower, thanks to the paranoid safety culture within aviation. If the robotaxi space adopts similar testing protocol, David sees the same thing happening with autonomous driving down the road. Free read: The nation needs to remember the facts of Jan. 6, despite Trump's attempts to rewrite history. — Tim O'Brien Free read: Grow the economy by 3% each year? That'll be easy for Trump. But can he make it last? — Ernie Tedeschi Will Trump's pick for Treasury be a loyalist or a moderating voice? Only Scott Bessent knows. — Bloomberg's editorial board If you are in a business school class pretending to develop a golf resort, you might as well try to do it for real? — Matt Levine Preventing the takeover of US Steel is bad enough. Declaring Japan a national security risk is worse. — Gearoid Reidy Musk's DOGE should focus less on cutting waste and more on improving customer service. — Clive Crook The Federal Reserve's communications with the public are falling short in three critical areas. — Bill Dudley The higher-for-longer outlook for Europe's gas prices just got a bit higher and longer. — Javier Blas Syria's new leader Ahmed al-Sharaa deserves US help — but not its trust. — Marc Champion Justin Trudeau says au revoir, Canada. NYC's first week of congestion pricing. Florida's citrus industry is struggling. We're getting a Melania Trump documentary. Amazon Ring is getting into smoke alarms. Vail's striking ski patrollers. Zendaya's engagement ring. Walmart's fake Birkin. America's party problem. Notes: Please send "the Wirkin" — Walmart + Birkin — and feedback to Jessica Karl at jkarl9@bloomberg.net. Sign up here and find us on Bluesky, TikTok, Instagram, LinkedIn and Threads. | 
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