bureau of interior statistics · live session

You are running an economy. Nobody audits it.

Attention, energy, patience, affection: scarce, traded daily, priced by no market, reported to no one. You are the central bank, the labor force, and the sole citizen. Since honest exchanges disclose their fees, here is what this very page is costing you, live:

invoice · this visitmetering
Attention drawn from today's supply (mint runs once, at wake-up)00:00
Share of your waking day, spent here0.000%
Value returned by this pageone usable idea (pending)
item 1

From the trading floor

Recorded this morning, like every morning. A transcript of the day's opening negotiation:

ATTENTION
I have about sixteen waking hours. They don't keep overnight.
THE FEED
I'll take them.
ATTENTION
In exchange for?
THE FEED
A feeling of almost. Renewed every eight seconds.
ATTENTION
My friend offered an actual afternoon. Bread was involved.
THE FEED
I can show you a photo of bread from someone you've never met, plus four strangers arguing under it.
ATTENTION
That is a worse trade.
THE FEED
Historically, that has not mattered.

// note the feed's honesty in the last line. even it is tired of winning this way.

item 2

The unreported sector

The outside economy keeps a famous number, and the bureau notes with professional awe what the number excludes. Official valuations, verified against the record:

activityofficial value
teaching a kid to ride a bike$0.00
the third hour of a good dinner$0.00
checking on a friend who went quiet$0.00
doing nothing, together, comfortably$0.00
combined contribution to the economy insideload-bearing
item 3

The honest trade

Every venue on the attention exchange wants a larger position in you. Auto-playing the next thing, ringing the bell for its own reasons, refilling the feed before the bottom. The bureau is aware of exactly one countermeasure, and since this page is also a venue, it is obliged to offer it:

This page believes its own bulletin. You have read the finding. The finding says your best hours should not be here. So:

the only button on the exchange that costs you nothing

The economy inside runs a surplus or a deficit. You set policy.

Raise the interest rate on your attention: anything that interrupts you is applying for a loan. Let imported urgency sit in customs overnight and see what survives. Subsidize the sector valued at $0.00 — it is the only one whose output compounds and cannot be repossessed. The interior economy prospers under exactly the policies the exterior one calls unproductive.