I need to understand the economics of this... there's no way that his columns bring in enough revenue to justify his salary plus that of an assistant. Like the ROI here must be atrocious, right?

I probably written more words on Bluesky in the same period. With no assistant, and better quality too, I add modestly.

He can’t even summon more than one opinion a week? Not exactly. Impressive.

And not one of them showed an ounce of fact-checking. This must be one of those no-show big city union jobs I’m always hearing about.

That's why he needs an assistant! Think how many more columns he could get done if someone else were writing half of them!

Think how many more he could've written if he had an assistant searching for his name on social media?

i think what annoys me the most is this telegraphs how much money his columns make for them, with that level of effort (plus of course the uh, "quality" of it)

Sounds like he needs the assistance then!

Doesn’t that discount the possibility that he wrote many more columns, maybe all filled with super smart takes and deep wisdom, that the NYT just chose not to publish? Unrelated: have you seen Everything, Everywhere, All at Once?

Is he WFH?

You’d think they’d be more interesting since he is given the time to let his pieces breathe.

So he’ll pay me 82k for what exactly?

Picking up coffee, getting his hood & robe from the dry cleaners, etc.

He won't pay you, he only hires women

Well, you also have to assist David French

🛌 🐞

Yo, I don't have the cache of being the lead singer from Poison, or whatever, but I could write better columns than that guy for the amount they want to pay the assistant.

three quarters of a column each week. I'll tell you what, if i could work 30 hours a week max for the same pay I'd do it in a heartbeat

also what the fuck are they paying him that it's worth 80k for an assistant? (I'm guessing this person will effectively be a ghost writer)

At least he's paying a pretty decent wage I guess?

Well, the Times is. Putting extraordinary resources into a single opinion column writer with low output.

80k is practically poverty wages in NYC. The median income for a one bedroom household is almost 115k. You’d qualify for section 8 housing with that wage.

I was wondering about this because if you have to live in NYC it's not amazing but if you can work remotely...

Think how much more Bret could get done with a proper assistant!