ProPublica is a nonprofit newsroom that investigates abuses of power. Sign up to receive as soon as they’re published.This story is a collaboration between ProPublica and New York magazine.The unhappy heroine of “The Mistakes Madeline Made,” which premiered Off Broadway in 2006, hates working as one of 15 personal assistants to a financier and his family. The patriarch, she observes, “runs his home the way he runs his hedge fund — using a model to protect his family against the possibility of loss or waste or even just the unexpected.” His “Household System” demands perfection: Even the...…ProPublica is a nonprofit newsroom that investigates abuses of power. Sign up to receive as soon as they’re published.This story is a collaboration between ProPublica and New York magazine.The unhappy heroine of “The Mistakes Madeline Made,” which premiered Off Broadway in 2006, hates working as one of 15 personal assistants to a financier and his family. The patriarch, she observes, “runs his home the way he runs his hedge fund — using a model to protect his family against the possibility of loss or waste or even just the unexpected.” His “Household System” demands perfection: Even the...WW…

This article is published in partnership with . Get the best of The New Yorker, in your inbox. .This story is exempt from our Creative Commons license.On a Monday morning in April 2017, students at Sage Hill School gathered in its artificial-turf quadrangle, known as the Town Square, to celebrate seniors who were heading to college as recruited athletes. The 10 honorees lined up behind an archway adorned with balloons. One by one, they stepped forward as their sports and destinations were announced. Patricia Merz, the head of the private high school in Newport Coast, California, placed a...…This article is published in partnership with . Get the best of The New Yorker, in your inbox. .This story is exempt from our Creative Commons license.On a Monday morning in April 2017, students at Sage Hill School gathered in its artificial-turf quadrangle, known as the Town Square, to celebrate seniors who were heading to college as recruited athletes. The 10 honorees lined up behind an archway adorned with balloons. One by one, they stepped forward as their sports and destinations were announced. Patricia Merz, the head of the private high school in Newport Coast, California, placed a...WW…