For two years, we've blamed AI for the disappearance of entry-level jobs. But what if that story was never true?

In this solo episode, Steve digs into new research from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York — a source with nothing to sell — that ties roughly 64% of rising unemployment among young grads not to AI, but to remote work. The finding that stopped him cold: when teams spread out, the everyday coaching that turns a 23-year-old into a capable professional didn't move to another channel. It just disappeared.

Steve unpacks why nobody noticed, how a thousand small rational decisions quietly pulled up the on-ramp for early-career workers, and why "AI does that work now" became a more flattering story than "we couldn't figure out how to develop people from a distance." Then he goes one layer deeper — past remote work to the short-termism driving companies to mortgage the next decade for this quarter's numbers.

The good news? If we pulled mentorship out, we're also the ones who can put it back. Here's how.

🎧 ~10 minutes. Got thoughts? Find Steve on LinkedIn — he wants to hear from you.