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PaperclipPerfector  4d ago (text post)   17003 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of July 13, 2026

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I've worked for 4 different libertarian/right leaning think tanks. 2 of them as basically an intern, and two of them as web developer after I worked in private industry for a while.

I'd recommend against it.

The cons:

  1. Pay is shit
  2. Internal politics at these places is rough. Far worse than companies because competency won't protect you, and far worse than the government because firing is easy.
  3. You aren't making a difference. The right leaning organizations mostly end up designed to bleed old rich people of their money. Being effective has some correlation with that but not much. The leftist organizations end up designed to bleed the government, old people, and other organizations of their money.

The pros:

  1. As easy as a government job, no one knows if you are effective or not. No profit to say you succeeded. Fundraising is the exception, everyone knows if they are successful. That is basically a sales job.
  2. Less rules. Drink and do drugs in the office, hookup with underlings, and just have some mediocre level of output and be likeable.
  3. Occasionally feel like you are doing something and your job is meaningful, also most people outside the industry will think you are doing something meaningful. You are wrong in the moment and they are wrong in general, but feeling good things is still nice.

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