Morning Brew Daily - Airlines Could Pay You For Cancellations, America's Most Trustworthy News & Quiet Luxury is Trendy

Episode Date: May 9, 2023

Episode 55: Kyle returns as Toby continues his European adventure! Kyle and Neal explain why Airlines may be on the hook for compensating you for delays and cancellations. Plus, why the Weather Channel is America's most trusted media outlet and why iPad tipping culture is causing quite the stir. Neal and Kyle also debate if they could wear or afford "quiet luxury" and how one woman survived for five days on just... wine and lollipops. Learn more about our sponsor, Fidelity: https://fidelity.com/stocksbytheslice Listen Here: https://link.chtbl.com/MBD Watch Here: https://www.youtube.com/@MorningBrewDailyShow Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Good morning brew daily show. I'm Neil Fryman. And I'm still not Toby. On today's show, President Biden wants to crack down on airlines that screw you over when they cancel or delay your flight. And has tipping culture gotten out of control? We're also going to tell you the most trusted and least trusted news organizations and the emerging trend coming out of succession. Spoiler alert. It's not listening to rap music in the back of a taxi cab.

Neil, let's ride. All right. So still not Toby is actually Kyle Hagey, who is my colleague at more. Bruin is filling in for Toby while Toby's on vacation. Correct. You made your debut yesterday, and I gotta say, according to the YouTube commenters, it was a hit. Well, I think one, we should always listen to YouTube commenters. They're always even keeled.

I think I cut my ego in check. The only thing I did differently was I forced the bar I go to after work to play the YouTube video on every TV. Oh, God. That boosted our numbers. I'm happy about that. Yeah, so let's see if you get your sophomore slump going or keep it up. Pressure's on. Pressure is on.

Before we get into our news, our main news slate, the real biggest headline of the day is that Biden and House Speaker Kevin McCarthy are about to go into the negotiating room in the White House to try to work out a deal to raise the debt ceiling. The stakes are astronomically high because if they don't raise this cap, when the U.S. will default as soon as June 1st. And I'm looking at my calendar. Now it's May 9th, so just a few weeks from now. Yeah. If that happens, the economy and markets will tank. So a lot is writing on this negotiation today. What do you think they're eating in there?

Ooh, I'm going to go with something very cheap. Yeah, like what to show their dedication to. Oh, interesting. Not spending. I was thinking like a particular meal that would get you in the, like the compromising mood. They could pull a Trump and do a buffet of McDonald's. I like that. Yeah.

Show their unity around American ideals. All right. I have some great news for air travelers. President Biden said he's drafting up new rules that would make airlines help you out more when they cancel or significantly delay your flight because they messed up. Under these new rules, they would need to cover your meals and hotels when they leave you stranded at an airport, which seems a very baseline thing to do. But on top of this, this is a big deal. They might also be required to give you a cash payment on top when they do this. This brings the U.S., this would bring the U.S. more in line with what the EU and Canada do in terms of consumer protections for travelers.

Of course, this comes just weeks ahead of what is expected to be a wild summer travel season if they don't, the debt ceiling gets raised. Where passenger numbers are actually expected to top pre-pandemic levels this summer. The White House wants to show people that it's on their side ahead of this election season that's coming next year. Right. But there are some interesting stats in this study. The baggage fee revenue for U.S. Airlines was $6.7 billion. That also stood out to me. 2% of American Airlines revenue was from bag checking.

I'm a proud non-bag checker, so I feel like I have, like, let the airlines down here. You must stink on your vacation. The other thing that stood out, there's more than 30 miles of conveyor belts, an army of 2,000 workers. Like, really helped you understand just how much effort goes into. actually making airports run smoothly. Yeah. It's very impressive. You went deep into the baggage.

I got pretty excited about the baggage. For someone who doesn't check their bags. But what was interesting to me is that, you know, Biden made a big deal. And Buttigieg, the Transportation Secretary, made a big deal about this. But many airlines already do this. They offer hotels and stays for and meal vouchers for people that they cancel or delay. That's because last summer, the administration released, this online dashboard that allows people to compare refund and cancellation policies across airlines.

So they say that this dashboard just pressured the entire industry to go ahead of the regulation and say, okay, well, we're going to do this. So nine out of the top ten airlines already cover meal and hotel costs for canceled flights. Can you guess which one is the outlier? Spirit Airlines. No. Oh, wow. Nope, there's another one.

In the same vein. Frontier? Frontier. Oh, that's probably not good for spirit in front of your hands. Those are the first things that come to mind. Yeah, it does seem like they're just tightening up. The rules are making them more clear to consumers. I do think they need to add one more rule, and that is no standing up until your role is ready to leave the plane.

Why are people doing that? So it's a long flight. You've got to stretch your muscles a little bit. All right. We'll have to agree to disagree there. No clapping at the end of the plane. So we're going to move on to the next story, and this is a favorite topic for the media to talk about, and that is itself. Namely, the trust in media.

So UGov did a poll where they actually asked Americans to rank news organizations they trust or distrust. And then they were able to get a net trust rating. And I'm going to give you the top five in ascending order. Forbes at number five. What does ascending mean? We're going from five to one. From five to one. Yes.

So Forbes number five, a big win for the 30 under 30 crowd there. Then Wall Street Journal, the BBC, public broadcasting service or PBS. And finally, number one, the Weather Channel. Let's go. Neil, what's your big takeaway from this report? The one thing that has yet to be politicized in American life is apparently the weather or making fun of meteorologists when they're wrong. But I was surprised by this because I thought the weather had been politicized. I mean, we have this climate change thing.

I bet the weather channel is, you know, talking about climate change and documenting it. And I can't, and that hasn't pissed anybody off is a little surprising to me. It is really interesting. I feel like we should like sneak actual news into the weather channel now since they are high trust. Let's take advantage of that. I don't know anybody who actually watches the weather channel. I think it's on in like car wash places. That's the only time I see.

Maybe there's only three people they could survey. So maybe there's all sort of skewed there. I did find interesting how wide the gap is between Democrats and Republicans. So once we get past the weather channel and those top five ones and then you get into like these news channels, these cable channels, the gap is insane. Right. CNN had a 92 point trust difference between Democrats and Republicans. And I do think it is hard to move forward if we don't have any station where you feel like there's a sense of shared trust, which is a bit concerning. Weather Channel.

Well, this is why we sneak news into the Weather Channel. I also think the big winner from this was also LinkedIn influencers. Okay. Why? Because LinkedIn had the only net positive trust rating of all social media platforms. So LinkedIn is back. The cringe crowds out the misinformation. The cringe crowds out the misinformation.

Yeah, everyone's just super accurate about posting their, wins and it may be really annoying to read, but they're not actually lying except George Santos's LinkedIn. TikTok of that study, TikTok was the least trusted of any of the social media platforms with a negative 36 score. Another few takeaways was that Republicans do not trust any media, even right-leaning media. So Republicans trust info wars as much as C-SPAN. And C-SPAN just shows footage of Congress, like a live feed. And Democrats, trust OAN, which is this far right news source, more than Republicans trust CNN.

So you just have Democrats trusting like anything they watch on TV. It doesn't matter the channel for the most part. And then Republicans not trusting anything that they read or watch. And yeah, you're right, that's creating this like very stark divide about what truth, you know, what we see as truth and what we take as news. But go ahead.

I was just saying there was something that was really heartwarming is that morning brood, 100 trust rating across support for everyone. Yes, I did see that because they didn't sample us. I would like for us to be included in this one day. You gov. If you're watching, email Neil. All right. So I feel like we'd be close to the top. Right. I mean, we're pretty fair and neutral on this on this podcast, and I think we are in the newsletter too. Agreed. But both, so CNN, obviously 92% rating difference between Republicans and Democrats is trying to restore trust.

It fired Don Lemon, who was a controversial host. And this is how you restore trust. One person, Charles Barkley. Maybe. Yeah, so they're bringing in Charles Barkley and Gail King to host a, quote, non-political primetime show on Wednesdays every week. So as part of CNN's kind of rebrand away, there's a new CEO in town.

He said, I know that nobody trusts us. Like we have to restore trust. So Charles Barkley is going to do a lot of heavy lifting there. That show is going to get ratings that are incredible. And I do feel like if NBA on TNT just became a new show, it would also do amazing. Maybe. And Fox obviously has major trust issues of their own. They just had to pay $780 million in a defamation lawsuit.

And they fired their biggest star, Tucker Carlson. So it is always interesting to see how people view news sources. Morning Brew, we just have to go. anecdotally. All right, moving on. In these post-pandemic times, and I can say that because the World Health Organization actually said the pandemic was over, one of the biggest debates is over tipping culture and whether that has gotten out of hand. Sometimes you're prompted to pay 25%, 30%, and when you're just grabbing takeout for lunch. This might take it to a whole new level, what I read yesterday. The Wall Street Journal reported that self-checkout machines at

airports, stadiums, and cafes are prompting people to tip at least 20%. So customers are saying, this is hilarious. I'm being asked at tip, but I have no idea who I'm tipping because no humans provided me a service because this is a self-checkout kiosk. Plus, you as a company are deliberately not paying workers by replacing them with self-checkout kiosk. So this is a double whammy. But there's this certain level of guilt about not tipping. So the people, the customers who saw this told the Wall Street Journal that these

prompts amounted to emotional blackmail. Yeah, I mean, there's not, in these. Yes, there's nothing worse than when you're in a long line and everyone's watching you and you have to click no tip. And everyone behind you's like, oh, really? You're the no tip guy. It's emotional blackmail right there. Even if nobody, no human actually did anything for you.

You just grab the soda from the. Right. It's a way. It's a way to make more money. But I do think eventually we're just going to get fed up with it. And I'm interesting to see what happens there. The worst part is when it's like impossible to get. get to the no tip screen.

It gives you three options and you have to do a custom. You have to type in zero. It's like, are you sure? Are you really sure? It's pretty bad. It seems that we're all a little primed more to tip after the pandemic when service workers were on the front lines and going into work and doing all these things. When other people were able to stay home and there was this culture of we should tip a little bit more. We should be a little more generous.

And I think companies are kind of taking advantage of that right now to put things like this. Right. because they're like, oh, people are primed to pay more. We don't have to pay our workers as much. We can just kind of put the burden on the consumers and the customers to, you know, pay our workers a living wage. So there's this vibe that's going on that companies are definitely taking advantage of and no one benefits here. Agreed. It would be nice to have some insight on where the tips are actually going.

And who is relying on tips for their actual living wage? Because then I would be much more incentivized to tip. I feel like tipping is a big deal now because it's not. not just a jar anymore. You have these iPads or the point of sale software that makes the question so much easier to ask and harder to avoid than putting out a jar or something. Like you literally need to say no to a tip

to complete the transaction. It's part of the workflow of you completing a transaction. So it just reminded me of that Seinfeld episode. Have you seen that one? Oh, where he takes back the tip. Oh, it's a classic. For anyone that doesn't see it, George Costanza, puts in a tip, but the guy wasn't to the jar,

but the guy wasn't watching. So he's like, well, what's the point of me putting in the tip? I need the validation of this worker seeing me do it. And so, of course, when he's taking it out of the jar, the guy turns around and they get into a bit of a fight. With these tipping screens, we couldn't remake that Seinfeld episode, which is pretty bad. All right.

We will get into our next stories after this break. It's time to refresh your yard during spring backyard days at the Home Depot. Get low prices guaranteed on propane grills starting at $179, like the next grill three burner gas grill, or get $50 off a select Weber Spirit grill and bring big flavor to your backyard.

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Yeah, we've been hearing that a lot. news. Bring your AT&T or T mobile bill to Verizon and we'll give you a better deal. So get away from that unfortunate phone bill and get to Verizon. Run, ride, canoe. Whatever it takes, we'll be here. Bring your AT&T or T mobile bill to a Verizon store today and we'll give you a better deal on the best network. A better deal. No surprises. That's Verizon. Best Network based on Route Metrics, Best Overall Mobile Network Performing the U.S. Second Half 2025. All rights reserved. It must provide a recent consumer mobile bill in the name of the person who gave me the deal. Additional Terms Conditions and Restrictions apply. All right, Neil, I have some breaking news for you. And that is

Apparently some people are watching Succession, not just for Cousin Greg. And they're watching actually for the clothes, but they're not Gucci, they're not Chanel, they're not Prada. It is a term I didn't know until one hour ago, and that is quiet luxury. These are understated luxury pieces with really premium quality, but they're free of labels. Right. And there's actually some interesting statistics to back this up. Luxury items with logos have declined 18% year over year. and there's been 1.4 billion views for stealth wealth meaning

on Google search, which I love that branding. I think we finally found a term for your style. I think so. People have said I should go for this dark academia look, which I think is very similar, which is maybe just like the poor person version of, of what was this, quiet luxury, is that what it's called? Yes.

No, but I think first of all, I'm just, my style is simply quiet. There's nothing. I'm wearing a, I wear morning brew sweatshirts every day. But this was interesting to me because it seems like this has been kind of under the surface for a while. It's very old money, right? Like you don't need to show off your wealth and the people in succession are old money. They come from a family dynasty, a media dynasty. And, you know, they are just going to be investing in like $1,300 Tom Ford hoodies.

People are trying to say this like represents our time, right? Like inflation and people are pulling back. No, there's still expensive. Yeah, I know. They're still expensive. I was so confused. I think it's like as more people get Gucci and Chanel, it's become a little more accessible. I think it doesn't signal what it used to signal.

And it's also about who you're signaling to. And I think with quiet luxury, you kind of have to know the brands. So you're signaling to another elite, rich person that you're on their level. So I still think luxury is about. I see what you're wearing. You're signaling to me that it is target. Yes, I can tell. So, Neil, I have an interesting quiz.

for you. Okay. To really test if you are a quiet luxury guy or not, I'm going to give you five names and you're going to tell me if they're quiet luxury or one of my hometown teachers. Okay. Are you ready? Yeah. Okay. Number one, Landvin. Like Mr. Mrs. Landvin? Correct. Ah, sounds quite luxury to me. That's quiet luxury. Yeah. Ding ding. One for one. Number two, Canali. Canali. I am wearing some Canali underwear right now, so it's quiet under quiet lug. Wow, quiet luxury and dark academia over there. Incredible. Third, Kinch.

Mr. Kinch was your ninth grade biology teacher. First grade homeroom, but close. Pagachchnik. Pagachshnik. I am, I was looking at some kibachnik earlier this weekend, but it just wasn't the right cut for me. The shirt was a little too deep, so I decided not to, but it is quiet luxury. It is actually ninth grade social studies.

Oh, no. And the last one, Mackage. I don't think you're pronouncing that right. If it is a quiet luxury brand, but we'll say it's a luxury brand. It's quiet luxury. Yeah. Four for five, not bad. How do you spell that?

Mackage? Yeah. Like package with an M. Oh, really? It's probably macaw. Yeah, I was thinking like French, macas, but maybe not. Or like you don't pronounce the last few letters because it's French. Yeah.

Anyway, so Quiet Luxury. That was a great quiz. Thank you. What did I do? Four to five? Four to five. Quieta luxury has been around. It's not a succession thing.

It has been around a lot of another instance where people were talking about it was in the Gwyneth Paltrow trial when she was wearing all that ski stuff, like a Park City mom outfit. But the other big trend that's been influenced by a TV show is this Yellowstone cowboy fits that have been going around Brooklyn. Everyone's dressing in, you know, belt buckles and boots and these jeans. and flannel. So what is your,

what is your preferred style, do you think? Are you more of a quiet luxury guy or a Yellowstone urban cowboy? I'm actually going to pick a third option, and that is Norm Corps, inspired by Seinfeld. Okay. That's my style.

But if I had to go Yellowstone or succession, I think I'm going Yellowstone, it feels a little more practical. Right. In case the apocalypse comes, you're ready to hop on a horse and get out of here.

And you're a big sky guy. I'm a big guy. So it would be like a little more authentic. Yeah, we could say that. Yeah. Yeah. You're from Minnesota. You're a big sky.

You're just a visitor here. in New York. Exactly. All right, moving on. Mr. Beast has done it again. He's been super controversial. That's what I mean by that. The biggest YouTube star in the world whose name is Jimmy Donaldson released another provocative video that's racked up 37 million views and just as many hot takes. In this video, he pays for people who are deaf to get new hearing aids that can help them hear, which appears like a very charitable thing to do to buy someone as wealthy as. as he is and he's about to become a billionaire. But it's the way he went about it that has many people

calling it inspiration porn. So starting with the thumbnail, if you just look at the thumbnail here, it shows a smiling Mr. Bees looking like he's God with his hand on the shoulder of this kid who is crying tears of happiness and cupping his ear like he can hear for the first time. Plus, according to a deaf person who wrote an article

in the independent I read, it's more complicated than giving someone a hearing aid or a cochlear implant and they can all of a sudden hear again. It doesn't exactly work like that. They don't all work for everyone. You have to change them out. And some deaf people want to simply communicate through sign language. So it's this choice.

So this isn't the first time that Mr. B's has done something like this and caught praise and heat from both directions. He divided people back in January when he helped a thousand people blind people, a thousand blind people see again for the first time. Yes. I don't have a good take besides. I don't know enough about the deaf or blind communities to say. to have some sort of perception, but I will say the delta between how many times I've wanted to think about Mr. Bees

and been forced to think about Mr. Beast is so, this man is like if viral became a person. He's a retweet in human form and you cannot escape him. No, but he raises questions, right? Like he has us talking, I'm sure a lot of people who hear us now are going to, you know, go to their coworkers and talk about whether

what Mr. Bees is doing is ethical. I mean, Elon Musk thinks what he's doing is ethical. He's like, people definitely shouldn't be attacked for doing good. This is definitely a very loud strain of people who look at what Mr. Bees is doing and say, how are you criticizing him for, like, paying $3 million out of your own pocket to help a thousand people here again, which is almost a miracle. And so you have that strain of people. And then you have the other strain where it's like, sure, like, what he's doing is good,

but he's doing this in completely the wrong way. like look at the, you know, attention he's drawing to himself by the objectification of disabled people. So I know you're not thinking about him, but I think he raises really interesting questions about what it means to be a social media star, to have a lot of money and what you should do with that money, the state of our health care system. And like, do the ends justify the means? What is the actual outcome? It is a really interesting case study. And he also does these, you know, $50,000 giveaways to audience members. So he has taken marketing and done some new things to it.

And I do think that there's some controversy and probably some upside as well to what he's doing. I think he's like 26 years old or something. 25. Yeah, he does just need to get his YouTube views up to match us. But besides that, he's doing okay. Come on, Mr. Beast. Get at our level. All right.

Our final story is, we'll do this quickly, but an Australian woman was found after five days of being stranded in the bush near Melbourne. I pronounce that right. Melbourne. Well done. She survived. That's a quiet luxury brand, right? Yeah. And she survived on one thing, a bottle of wine.

She was on this day hike, and her car got stuck in an area without cell service, so she couldn't call for help. After she ran out of snacks and water, a bottle of wine that she had intended for her mom was the only thing she had left. So it's a crazy story, but she must have been pretty bored, though. Well done, Neil. This actually surprised me that this was news because surviving on the first. wine for five days sounds like college to me apparently there are also lollipops too

which also sounds like college Neil if you had to pick a non-water drink and a candy to survive on for five days what if the non-water drink was a can oh no you said a non-water drink and a candy to survive five days ago definitely wine why you guys would get you drunk to like not think about your current predicament and I like the taste but it would have to be chilled a man of like red wine just sitting out Sounds disgusting. Yeah, well maybe this will become a trend where you go into the woods non-alcoholic drinking a candy Try to survive I don't love candy I my favorite food is probably chocolate ice cream

It's creamy So good It does sound quite appealing I'd probably go with orange wine. It's already kind of funky like I'm going out with that and then I'd rather Starved it then I think Reese's peanut butter cups yeah some protein that would make you so thirsty you'd chug all the red wine or the orange orange wine. But there are a few other instances of people surviving on unconventional diets. Some funny stories. There was a sailor from Dominica who made it through 24 days at sea with nothing but a bottle of fill in the blank. Gatorade. Catchup. Oh my god. That sounds like a Minnesota

diet. Yeah. And then Heinz turned it into this marketing thing after obviously like they gave him a new boat. They tracked him down. Mr. Beas might have been behind that too. All right. Here's another one. To fill in the blank. I just turn this into a fill in the blank. Two women vanished for four days in Maine's icy wilderness and they were found. All they had left there was a half empty bottle of frozen solid Celsius energy drink. No, but kind of close. Red Bull? Mountain Dew.

Mountain Dew. Great choice. Yeah, but general, I wouldn't have wine on you. It's a diuretic and it causes a lot of dehydration. Frozen Mountain Dew sounds incredible. That should have been my answer. All right, Kyle. Well, sophomore slump did not happen today, I've to say.

I'm glad you feel that way. Yes, that is our show. I'm just this veteran here. It is Tuesday. Hopefully they work out a debt ceiling deal. Absolutely no fingers crossed, I think it'll take a while. Please email us at Morningbrewdaily at Morningbrew.com. It's always great to hear from you.

And always a big shout out to everyone who makes this show possible. Producer and editor is Emily Milliron. Our technical director is Eucheno-wa-Ogo. Samantha Velas and Raymond Lue are RRRR associate producers. Billy Minino is on audio. Hair and makeup was placed on leave because this show was way behind on the quiet luxury trend. And that is not okay. Devin Emery is our chief content officer, our show is a production of Morning Brew.

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