Word: vanishings
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...students of the Fed see any sign of dissent from the doves. "In the old days," says economist Kevin Flanagan of Morgan Stanley Dean Witter, "there was a debate over who was an influential hawk and who an influential dove." But today, Flanagan notes, any policy disagreements tend to vanish into Greenspan's carefully nurtured consensus. Concurs Fed governor Meyer, who has a reputation as a hawk's hawk on inflation: "Many members will voice some disagreement with the chairman's view in the go-rounds. But many of those will vote with the chairman...
...harsh right angles and rigid grid layout so despised by hapless cubicle-ites are also likely to vanish. In their place, workers might find themselves in a tentlike structure with a retractable roof, pitched right in the middle of a vast, open commons area. Screens stretching from poles could shift from transparent to opaque, depending on your mood and need for privacy. Don't worry about the noise from your next-door neighbor; acoustics technology can block that out. And don't fret about fighting for a windowed office either; with walls of flat-screen monitors raining down images...
...expect the Wild West atmosphere to vanish anytime soon. In just a few hours of trolling the Web, staff members at the Federal Trade Commission found 1,200 sites that touted questionable cures for such serious ailments as heart disease and AIDS. The government agency notified all of them that they were violating truth-in-advertising laws, but fewer than 30% removed the offending claims. Stronger measures are in the works...
Where will all these workers flock to in the coming years? Many of them, particularly those in information-based businesses like banking and the media, will telecommute (or, to be annoying, "telework"). For them, job titles will largely vanish--but so will weekends, or whatever is left of them. Technology will enable many of these people to become totally free agents, working at home for one or more companies on a more fluid schedule tailored to their needs...
...next distinction to vanish will be social. One thing that used to make teenagers teenagers was the postponement of family responsibilities, but these days even 30- and 40-year-olds are postponing family responsibilities, often permanently. Coming of age is becoming a lifelong process--it's not just for Holden Caulfield anymore. Teenagerhood as preparation for life makes no sense when the life being prepared for resembles the one you've been living all along. Meanwhile, teenagers are discovering that there are medical ways to escape the angst part of growing up. Why have an existential crisis...