The Breathing Room thesis. One paragraph that appears in every channel, and a series of essays that puts it to the test.
Happiness is not made in parliaments. It is made where people experience public space, on squares, in libraries, on trains, in conversation, and wherever someone looks after the thing that frightens most of us most: money. That care is not the state’s job alone. It is the job of companies too. Whoever buys labour as cheaply as possible buys dependence, and dependence comes back as fear, absence and resignation. The machines now moving into every office are the chance to do it differently: not to replace people with cheaper people, but to create room in which a full life becomes possible. That is the bet of this almanac.
What this means
- Not a critique of politics. Politics sets the frame. Happiness is experienced elsewhere: on the square, in the library, on the train, at the kitchen table when the sums work out.
- No party, no government. This site takes no side. It asks what lets people live well and who can contribute to it.
- Companies as participants. Shared responsibility, not blame. Every essay in the series ends with one paragraph: what a company can do tomorrow.
- Six chapters, one line. Money (care), AI (room), Change (dependence and exit), Culture and Design (public space), Strategy (care as a business model), Future (the bet).
The Breathing Room series
Every second Sunday at 10:00, in English and German, with sources, an audio version and a song. Working titles; links follow as the essays appear.
- Happiness Is Not on the Ballot (11 October 2026)
- The Bench on the Square (25 October 2026)
- The Employer Who Looks Away (8 November 2026)
- Cheap Is Expensive (22 November 2026)
- What the Machine Sets Free (6 December 2026)
- Care Is a Strategy (20 December 2026)
- The Bet (3 January 2027)
Join in
On Mondays the channels carry a number with a blank, on Fridays two truths and a lie, on the first Tuesday of the month a sentence to finish. The rules are on the Take part page.