This is a short but important conversation with Rob Johnson, the president of INET, on what was and more important, not said at Davos. The super wealthy know that the governance structures around them are breaking down, but rather than take measures to shoer them up, they are be retreating into concrete bunkers.

This is the Iron Law of Institutions on a societal level: people would rather take steps to better their position with a given social order than make sacrifices that would make them better off in an absolute sense, if not in a relative one.

He’s also too kind about Obama, but Johnson is a generous-spirited sort, so he tends to hope for the best even when the evidence is otherwise. That makes his assessment of the mood among the top elite even more sobering.