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That is the subject of my latest Browser Bets episode with Andrew Flowers of AppCast.

Here’s a snippet:

Andrew: The quits rate in the US had an all-time high of three percent in November of last year, that's the latest data we have. So what does that mean? It means in November three percent of all workers quit their job and in the 20 years that the bureau of labor statistics has been tracking this that's the highest point. My bet in quantitative terms is that the quits rate in the US by the end of 2022 is going down below two and a half percent which is where it it peaked before the pandemic.

I respect Andrew a lot, but I actually think he’s wrong here. I mention this in the show, but I’ll say it more succinctly here. I think three things are going to keep this number high for the rest of the year:

1. A structural shift towards remote work. I’m on the record as thinking that back-to-the-office is never going to happen for a certain categories of workers. But adjusting to this new normal is going to take time and some employers are going to try to force employees back… and these employees are going to quit to take jobs that allow for more flexbility.

2. The retirement of the Baby Boomers. This is simply a demographic tailwind, perhaps pulled forward by employers trying to enforce return to work (if you’re going to retire in 6 months anyway, do you really want to commute again?)

3. Remote jobs will have a higher natural quit rate. If you’re a remote worker, there’s way less friction in quitting a job. There’s no new commute, there’s minimal disruption in your schedule. You get shipped a new computer and log in to different video calls. For remote first workers, it’s going to be easier to hop between jobs and this will show up in the numbers.

Only time will tell who is right. You can join in on the bet here.

Another episode of Browser Bets, this time with Tom Chivers. We made bets about Boris Johnson’s future as Prime Minister of England and the likelihood of AI wiping out humanity.

Bets aside, my favorite part was processing the experience of going through COVID together. Tom and I had never met before this conversation and live thousands of miles away from each other, yet we instantly had this shared experience to talk about. This is pretty unique. Watch the whole thing.

I did an interview with Helen Toner for The Browser where we made bets on China’s economic development, the possibility of an AI delivered milkshake, and quantum computing.

The brilliant Dr. Maggie Lieu aka Space Mog was kind enough to join me on Browser Bets. I was surprised to learn that she volunteered to go to Mars and was very nearly selected.

Our bets:

Bet 1: Humans will land on Mars by 2035 James says before, Maggie says later. Maggie thinks it will be China, James hopes it will be the US.

Bet 2: We’ll have generalizable robots in our houses by 2035 Maggie says no way, James says yes out of an unfounded sense of optimism.

Bet 3: The standard model of cosmology will be overturned by 2035 by something that aligns quantum physics and relativity. Maggie says yes, James says no.

Sebastian is an e-sports executive, investor, and entrepreneur. We made bets about the future of NFTs, the Creator Economy, and UGC gaming. In between, I learned about how working for Darryl Morey influenced how Sebastian thinks about predictions.

Here are the bets we made:

• The future of NFTs: No more than 2 of the top 50 NFT projects on OpenSea.io will still be there in October 2023 (Last 30 day trading volume)

• The future of the Creator Economy: If you look at the top 10 web3 companies in 2023, less than 30% of the value will come platform companies.

• The future of UGC gaming: By 2030, we will see the same fragmentation in gaming that we do in video. More hours of playtime for top UGC game platform more than the top studio game.

A transcript is available here.