US employees aren’t doing so hot; in fact, they are the unhappiest they’ve been since the start of 2020, according to a new report from HR software company BambooHR. The finding joins a growing list of recent surveys that show workers feel unmotivated by and disengaged with their 9-to-5.

We don’t know how many times the average employee rolled their eyes during their daily stand-up, but we do have other striking data points that reflect growing worker dissatisfaction:

• Of the 57,000 workers across 1,600 companies polled by BambooHR, employee sentiment dropped 10x faster since January 2023 than in the previous three years.
• Another gauge of worker motivation from the ADP Research Institute hit its lowest level in August since June of last year.

Why are workers so bummed?

BambooHR’s report points to lingering health and economic impacts of Covid, layoffs, and return-to-office mandates. Employees in the tech industry, where RTO mandates have been on the rise, recorded the sharpest decline in happiness over the past three years (-145%). And many are deciding they’d rather quit than commute.

• When Grindr, the dating app, told all 178 employees to return to the office at least two days a week last month…roughly 45% resigned.
• A Deloitte report from August found that 66% of remote workers would quit their jobs if they had to go back into the office five days a week.

How to be happy right now: Build some houses. BambooHR found high demand, rising wages, and getting to witness the resplendent view from atop a giant hanging beam made construction the happiest US industry in the first half of the year. Meanwhile, education and healthcare posted record-low levels of happiness.—MM

Incredibly valuable blue-chip art isn’t just for hanging on the walls of a $500m yacht anchored in the Adriatic. Nope, not anymore.

Masterworks is taking on the billionaires at their own game, buying up paintings by world-class artists like Banksy and Picasso and securitizing them for its investors.

When Masterworks sells a painting, like the 16 it’s already sold, investors reap their portion of the net proceeds. Its investors have already realized annualized net returns of 17.8%, 21.5%, 35%, and more.

With over 800k users, offerings can sell out in minutes, but Morning Brew readers can skip the waitlist to join with this exclusive link.

Coco Gauff shrugs off protests, reaches her first US Open final. The 19-year-old American tennis superstar is one win away from her first Grand Slam victory after defeating Karolina Muchova at Flushing Meadows last night. Their match was interrupted for 50 minutes when four climate protesters started yelling from their seats, and one of them glued his feet to the ground. “If that’s what they felt they needed to do to get their voices heard, I can’t really get upset at it,” Gauff said. She’ll face Aryna Sabalenka of Belarus in the final tomorrow.

An American is currently trapped deep inside a cave in Turkey. A massive international operation is underway to rescue Mark Dickey, a researcher trapped 3,675 feet underground in Morca Cave after he started suffering gastrointestinal bleeding while co-leading an expedition to map the complex cave network. Dickey is an experienced cave rescuer himself, which would be useful if he weren’t a 15-hour journey away from the surface and nearly incapacitated. After rescuers from Hungary reached his location to perform emergency blood transfusions, Dickey was well enough to send a video message to us surface dwellers, saying he had been “very close to the edge.”

Jimmy Fallon accused of creating toxic workplace. Fourteen former and two current Tonight Show staffers complained to Rolling Stone about the publicly affable late-night host’s “erratic” behavior, which has allegedly included humiliating and belittling employees. Some staffers speculated that the alleged mistreatment stemmed from Fallon’s alcohol use. A source told Page Six, however, that the work environment at The Tonight Show improved drastically when showrunner Chris Miller was hired last year. After Rolling Stone published its article, Fallon reportedly apologized to his staff during an all-hands Zoom meeting.

Though it likely won’t attract a line outside your local Barnes & Noble like Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows did, Walter Isaacson’s upcoming biography of Elon Musk, which will be released next week, is already causing a stir thanks to an excerpt obtained by CNN.

According to Isaacson, last year Musk secretly ordered his engineers to turn off Starlink satellites near Crimea as Ukrainian submarines approached the Russian naval fleet for a sneak attack. Ukraine, which relies on Starlink for communication, was forced to abandon the operation.

Why’d he do it? Musk reportedly turned off Starlink due to discomfort with the idea that his internet-beaming satellite network was enabling a Ukraine offensive, which he believed could lead to a larger conflict involving nuclear weapons. He asked Isaacson, “How am I in this war?” And said, “Starlink was not meant to be involved in wars.”

But it has been very involved in the Ukraine war. Musk sent Starlink satellite dishes to the frontlines following Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine and the subsequent wipeout of the internet in parts of the country. These dishes became instrumental to Ukraine’s communications infrastructure…until, for that crucial period, they weren’t.

Big picture: While Starlink is still operating in Ukraine, Musk’s power grip—and ability to single-handedly impact the course of the war—is a major concern for top US government leaders. Many said they treat Musk like an “unelected official,” according to The New Yorker.—CC

Let’s be real—it probably won’t. But “Heart on My Sleeve,” featuring AI-generated vocals made to sound like Drake and the Weeknd, is now under Grammys consideration after being officially submitted for best rap song and song of the year. There may be no better sign that mainstream music is entering its AI era.

Earlier this year, the song—released by an anonymous producer who goes by Ghostwriter—went viral for how well it mimics the two music stars’ voices with AI. The Recording Academy read the room and updated its Grammys guidelines to allow songs with AI elements to be considered for awards, though the governing body still requires submissions to have a significant human contribution.

• Recording Academy CEO Harvey Mason Jr. said “Heart on My Sleeve” is “absolutely eligible” for February’s Grammys because its lyrics are human-penned.
• The catch: Nominated songs must be commercially available in stores, online, or via streaming services, so the AI track could be disqualified for lack of retail distribution.

The music renAIssance: This week, Ghostwriter dropped another AI single called “Whiplash” that imitates rappers Travis Scott and 21 Savage. Alongside its noncommercial release on TikTok and X, Ghostwriter issued a call to action to the real Travis Scott and 21 Savage—and any other interested artists—to license their voices in exchange for royalties. Looking at you, Grimes.—ML

Stat: NFL running backs just wanna be appreciated. Total pay for the once-marquee position has increased just 11% since 2011, compared with at least 90% for every other offensive position, the New York Times reported. And not a single running back ranks in the league’s 100 highest-paid players—a stark contrast to the late ’90s when star runners like Barry Sanders filled their wallets as much as the stat sheets. The Great RB Market Crash is mostly a result of the NFL evolving into a pass-first league, and team executives now consider the position as replaceable as your childhood goldfish. Bengals QB Joe Burrow, meanwhile, just got a $275 million extension that makes him the highest-paid player in NFL history, per ESPN.

Quote: “We’re here to discuss the petition. I love cream cakes. They’re my favorite.”

Ryanair CEO Michael O’Leary took a brief pause from delivering a petition to the European Commission in Brussels to lick the cake off his face after climate activists did their best Steve Aoki impression and launched a soy-based cream cake at the airline executive. O’Leary was in Brussels to lobby officials to protect flights moving through French airspace from recent air-traffic controller strikes.

Read: “A plague on the industry”: book publishing’s broken blurb system. (Esquire)

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Read: The 13 books on the longlist for the Baillie Gifford Prize for Nonfiction.

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Jigsaw: Your task is to complete today’s jigsaw puzzle without getting a tomato stain. It won’t be easy—play it here.

Friday puzzle

Below are pictures of 16 items. Your task is to divide them into four groups of four that share a common link.

Good luck! (Also, we’re considering turning this type of visual puzzle into a weekly feature on our website. If you enjoy playing it, please click this link.)

Things that are strung: bow & arrow, guitar, kite, tennis racket

Things that can come after “snow”: globe, leopard, pea, tire

Things that sound like a letter of the alphabet: bee, queue, sea, tea

Things that are natural spheres: blueberry, frozen water bubble, moon, pearl

Word of the Day

Today’s Word of the Day is: resplendent, meaning “attractive and impressive through being richly colorful or sumptuous.” Thanks to Lyle from Lake Havasu City for the resplendent suggestion. Submit another Word of the Day here.