Earlier this month, The Atlantic published an article on its website titled “The End of Reading Is Here” by Rose Horowitch. 

In it, Horowitch cites some pretty grim statistics, comparing the United States’ descent toward illiteracy to the destruction of the Library of Alexandria. She writes, 

The article goes on to explain that not only are people reading less, but what they are reading is also becoming less complex. Sentences are getting shorter. Literary devices are becoming less nuanced. Allusions and references to cultural cornerstones are growing scarcer. Teachers from across the country report students of all ages no longer possessing the reading comprehension skills once expected of their age range– everything from kindergarteners having heard nursery rhymes to high schoolers not being able to finish entire novels to college students struggling with the language of novels like A Clockwork Orange. 

Reading scores have been declining for a few decades now, so perhaps it should not be a surprise that we’ve arrived at this point, but it’s a gut punch nonetheless. 

I can’t imagine a children’s cartoon made in 2026 would even dare to reference Wagnerian operas, let alone craft an entire episode around them. But in 1957, Warner Bros did exactly that, and produced what is considered one of the greatest cartoon episodes in history. 

Bugs, Elmer, and Wagner aside, my fears about the literacy crisis go far beyond the cultural touchpoints in cartoons. 

I worry about what happens to us when we stop seeing intelligence and education as universal virtues worth pursuing. Part of me also worries that we’re already there. 

Take higher education as an example. Ask yourself why students choose to pursue a college education. 

What was your answer? What came to mind first? 

There’s a pretty high probability that the reason for getting an education that first popped into your head was something along the lines of “to get a job” or “employment opportunities.” Not “to learn.” 

To be fair, in our capitalistic environment, getting a job is critically important, and most high-paying careers do prefer or require college degrees. This has led colleges and universities to allocate the lion's share of their scant non-athletics resources to whichever degree programs are considered the most employable at the time. Business, computer science, and data science programs get new buildings, equipment, and dedicated recruiters because those programs bring in students on the promise of a career, and those students bring in tuition dollars. 

And yet, this cycle nurtures the seeds of its own destruction (hashtag Marx was right). 

First of all, curriculum development and consensus among academics are time-intensive processes, whereas fields tied to economic drivers are inherently competitive and rapidly evolving, meaning that what becomes part of the standard curriculum is largely outdated by the time students learn it. 

Second, supply and demand come into play. When there are relatively few skilled data scientists in a given geography, the ones available are in demand and can command more competitive employment offers. When there are more data scientists than data science jobs, they lose all bargaining power and typically have to compromise for lower wages and less rewarding work. The same is true for business, economics, and comp sci majors, too. 

Third, what’s lucrative and in demand in the job market changes constantly and varies tremendously depending on geography, the political climate, and macroeconomic conditions. To assume that a field is still going to be a fast track to employment at the end of a four-year degree is a pretty bold bet to make, especially considering how expensive college degrees have become (Ronald Reagan is to blame for that, btw– I won’t get into the details, but I will also never miss an opportunity to say that he was a dumbass). 

This cycle has never been more glaringly obvious than it is in the current AI craze. Even liberal arts colleges have made commitments to being “AI first” and to incorporating artificial intelligence into their curriculum. Outside of dedicated machine learning programs at technical institutions, these AI-first curricula changes often amount to “let students use Claude or ChatGPT to write their essays because we don’t care about original thought so long as we can convince ourselves that our students are being prepared for the modern workplace.” 

But, like… seriously? You think students, who are masters at doing the least and still getting their degrees, as they have been for generations, don’t already know how to use basic LLMs? 

On top of that, what’s new and cutting-edge in applied AI changes so. Fucking. Quickly. 

Nothing that makes it into course outcomes today will be relevant in the workplace six months from now. Also, you’ll notice that whenever Anthropic or OpenAI release new models, their performance is almost always benchmarked against “PhD-level analysis,” with claims that their models can match or outperform human-level thinking for those fields of study that are deemed highly employable. 

Our education system has short-sightedly jettisoned critical thinking and literacy in favor of fields of study that once promised high-paying jobs, but which are now increasingly at risk of being replaced by AI. 

And that, dear reader, is why the literacy crisis is so terrifying. 

It’s not just that our education system is atop shifting sands or that kids no longer get exposed to classic works of art in their cartoons. It’s that our society is so focused on short-term gains (jobs, efficiency, economic volatility) that we fail to value long-term opportunity. 

Reading is a deliberately slow act. Deep reading, in which you go beyond the words on the page to peel back layers of meaning, is an even slower act. Neither are immediately convertible into economic output, and are, therefore, not valued. 

But over time? 

Reading deepens your ability to think critically and focus for extended periods of time. It expands your vocabulary. It makes you more empathetic. It makes you more resistant to misinformation and propaganda campaigns. People who read extensively are less likely to develop dementia and other cognitive disorders. 

Kids who read more are better able to focus and practice the kind of emotional regulation that helps prevent non-heritable mental health issues. Conversely, kids who spend three hours a day on social media are more likely to struggle with depression, anxiety, sleep disruption, distractibility, and body image issues.  

Sorting through information and writing things out by hand triggers widespread brain activation, improves conceptual comprehension, and strengthens recall over time. Prompting an LLM to perform the same tasks simply leads to a mediocre document that nobody bothers to read or write. 

Literacy is a long-term investment that compounds year over year. It’s a diversified 401K that you contribute to on a monthly basis. Statistically, it will enrich you over time, even if there are market fluctuations (i.e., market fluctuations as a shifting job market). You’ll be able to weather a few storms and still come out ahead. 

Choosing to deem literacy as unimportant is like investing your family’s entire safety net into a crypto pump-and-dump scheme. Someone may get rich off of it. You may even see some short-term gains that outpace the 401K model! But everything can disappear just as quickly… and you won’t even be smart enough to know why. 

Suffice to say… thank you for reading this newsletter, and thank you for allowing me to write as me, throwing those ridiculous golden standards of writing for the web out the window (no longer shall I be shackled to short sentences, F-shaped reading patterns, or a sixth-grade reading level!). 

I don’t mean to be all doom and gloom, but I am terrified about the future of our country and our culture if current literacy trends continue. I see no outcome other than a deepening class divide and the rise of more idiotic demagogues like the current dumbass in the white house unless we embrace an educated, well-rounded, civic-minded populace. 

To that extent, I am starting a special side series on how to fall back in love with reading. You can check that out here if you’d like to join my rebellion/ cult of literacy. 

Until next time,

Blake