Cheezhead

Joel loves him some Twitter, and he notes that long-form blogging is hard, while tiny blogging is easy. Here is some medium form blogging: four items that caught my attention. To start, on a light note:

The Ohio Supreme Court has decided that crack dealers are employed in the eyes of the law. This leads to all kinds of interesting scenarios; let your imagination be your guide. As lifelong resident of the august state of Ohio, nothing surprises me. Not too long ago, our state workers comp leaders thought it would be a good idea to invest in rare coins and sports memorabilia, so when it comes to this kind of thing, the sky is the limit.

Speaking of the sky being the limit, here is an item in the New York Times about the falling status of professions. Seems that Doctors and Lawyers are no longer enjoying automatic express trips to the top of the social ladder. Who has displaced them ? Internet startup founders and other be-your-own-boss types. I don’t know about you, but even as a non-math type, it seems like there can never be that many slots for startup billionaires available in the economy-Joel excepted, of course. Seems that there are going to be a lot of let down younger folks, especially if the economy turns.

For some possibly very helpful nuts and bolts recruiting information, check this item from the EEOC: using a pre-employment assessment that has different outcomes for different protected classes can cost you a ton of money. Anything you use needs to be recently validated, especially for disparate impact. With the barriers to entry in the assessment biz being pretty low, and the use of these procedures apparently growing, you need to be very careful about the items you use. The EEOC has a handy new page to give you the basics. I imagine the EEOC is like any other organization- they move in response to what is working for them, so we can probably expect more actions like this one.

Lastly, for those of you raising children, here is a very interesting study on teen attitudes toward materialism. Although it seems obvious, the higher their self-esteem, the less they care about buying and showing off their stuff. Read the study for some thought provoking dimensions around age and various impacts on self-esteem by parents and peers.