My simplified response to Paul Graham's simplified essay • Hacker News Board

Re: My simplified response to Paul Graham's simplified essay

#81

Post by retube » Tue, Jan 05, 2016, 5:05 PM UTC

edanm wrote: post #69

flannelcatering wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This is a meaningless statistic It's only meaningless if you cherry-pick your examples and draw your opinions from those examples. For 99 percent of the population, wealth is a fair reflection of the actual comparative wealth of individuals.

Is that true, or are you just saying it? E.g. this article argues that the numbers are indeed misleading: http://fusion.net/story/39185/oxfams-misleading-wealth-stati... I have no idea if it's accurate, but you just saying that his comment is a "cherry picked example" doesn't ring true (since most people in the US are indeed in debt). And anyway, you don't provide any reason to think you're right.

That fusion link nails it. Exactly my points elsewhere in this thread.

Re: My simplified response to Paul Graham's simplified essay

#82

Post by cmdkeen » Tue, Jan 05, 2016, 5:05 PM UTC

astazangasta wrote: post #15

drzaiusapelord wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I think we're quite close. USA: 5% unemployment, GDP per capita of $55,000, 78.74 years life expectancy, Human Development Index: 8, etc. EU: 9% unemployment, GDP per capita $38,000, 78.82 years life expectancy, Human Development Index: 6 average, etc. Yeah, we're not "close." Meanwhile countries like the BRIC nations, especially authoritarian autocracies like China or Russia, with terrible inequality and 100x the p…

This wealth is based on social cohesion, which can fall apart in a generation or two. Genghis conquered half of Asia and built an empire of great wealth and high culture, but lack of cohesion tore it apart not long after.

I think there is a better (though still rather disanalogous) comparison between the US with the decline of the Roman Republic into the Principate. Some of the same arguments apply to the EU.

In both cases a large (and roughly similar) number of people with different cultural splits (Red & Blue/North & South European) are increasingly feeling like their governmental structures are failing to represent them. Perhaps X00 million people is simply too many for our existing legislative structures to accommodate at this point in history.

Re: My simplified response to Paul Graham's simplified essay

#83

Post by jernfrost » Tue, Jan 05, 2016, 5:06 PM UTC

Great reply, although I disagree with the typical simplified assertions that the Soviet System didn't work. Without doubt the system had major flaws. But it is perhaps much more shocking that the system worked as well as it did given so many obvious problems with it. Taking a primitive peasant society and turning it into a space traveling civilisation was quite astonishing. One has to also keep in mind that for decades the Soviet Union had very impressive GDP growth.

The problem with discussing any of this is that the anti-socialism and communism feelings run so deep that people can't have a neutral discussion of the merits and flaws of socialism and communism. Anything positive can so easily be dismissed by the utter tyranny and inhumanity practiced by Stalin.

By the irony of this is that Stalin does reflect the nature of socialism nearly as much as people believe. Both China and Russia were terrible and totalitarian societies long before socialism and communism.

Still both the Soviet Union and China have turned into far more humane societies during socialism than they were at any earlier times.

Re: My simplified response to Paul Graham's simplified essay

#84

Post by billions » Tue, Jan 05, 2016, 5:06 PM UTC

Innovation is the primary driver for improved quality of life. The kings of 1900 did not fly across the globe in hours, have access to the variety of foods of our lower class, and connect with loved ones in seconds. Basics such as a bed or filtered water came from innovation. Taxing or otherwise slowing innovation will put brakes on quality of life improvements for everyone. When have top-down mandates ever been as efficient at fixing problems as an individual grinding away at a cause they care dearly about?

Re: My simplified response to Paul Graham's simplified essay

#85

Post by zepto » Tue, Jan 05, 2016, 5:06 PM UTC

skeolawn wrote: post #11

rcavezza wrote: post #4

Karl Marx would argue that his ideas might have worked if someone else implemented them.

Maybe he would, but all the experiments so far have failed for pretty much the same reasons and at enormous human cost. Meanwhile capitalism in whatever form it's tried has proven itself to be an incredible engine of poverty reduction and human/social progress. There's always been tension between capitalism and democracy and we may be at a point where some of the cracks are showing.

Either capitalism is a new phenomenon and we don't have enough data to know how stable it is beyond outlasting communism, or what you call 'capitalism' is anything except communism - in which case it has failed catastrophically many times throughout history.

Democracy is relatively new, and has proven hard to establish in most of the world, so there isn't a lot of evidence that it's stable.

Re: My simplified response to Paul Graham's simplified essay

#86

Post by masmullin » Tue, Jan 05, 2016, 5:07 PM UTC

PaulHoule wrote: post #43

tomp wrote: post #10

PG's simplified essay seems like attack on a strawman; he's mainly arguing that inequality is good, but then mostly everybody agrees with that. The issue people see (and PG conveniently ignores) is increasing inequality - not locally increasing (i.e. an enterpreneur becoming rich because of a successful business idea), but globally increasing inequality, which happens because of rent-seeking, tax avoidance, buying po…

We are all makers and takers. In elementary macroeconomics you learn it is impossible to make a profit because in a competitive market because it is rational for me to lower my price by one cent to get the deal and then it is rational for the competitors to do that until the point that profit is zero. Business, however, is all about making a profit, because even if discount personal gain, nothing can be sustainable u…

> In elementary macroeconomics you learn it is impossible to make a profit because in a competitive market because it is rational for me to lower my price by one cent to get the deal and then it is rational for the competitors to do that until the point that profit is zero.

I did not take macro economics, but this does not sound correct to me. If the profit is zero, then why do it? Surely the statement should read

...rational for the competitors to do that until the point that the profit is zero _plus one exchange unit_.

If there is no profit at all, then it is not rational to do the thing. Profit can be extremely thin, but it should still be there.

Re: My simplified response to Paul Graham's simplified essay

#87

Post by xiaoma » Tue, Jan 05, 2016, 5:07 PM UTC

tomp wrote: post #10

PG's simplified essay seems like attack on a strawman; he's mainly arguing that inequality is good, but then mostly everybody agrees with that. The issue people see (and PG conveniently ignores) is increasing inequality - not locally increasing (i.e. an enterpreneur becoming rich because of a successful business idea), but globally increasing inequality, which happens because of rent-seeking, tax avoidance, buying po…

The thing I would add to your comment is that inequality in productivity is increasing. And this is actually is good reason for increasing inequality of wealth distribution.

Rent-seeking, tax avoidance, buying political influence, monopolistic behavior, corruption and nepotism should go.

I'm somewhat torn on the inheritance issue though. From the point of view of young children, inheritance is unfair. From the point of view of the people who worked very hard to build wealth, not being able to give it to the most important people in their lives is unfair.

Re: My simplified response to Paul Graham's simplified essay

#88

Post by zepto » Tue, Jan 05, 2016, 5:07 PM UTC

tomp wrote: post #73

zepto wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please explain how ownership would be dispersed and nepotism be prevented?

Tax inheritance => rich people inherit stock => they must sell stock to pay taxes => ownership dilutes.

Who buys the stock, and why wouldn't they organize into clans?

Re: My simplified response to Paul Graham's simplified essay

#89

Post by Sealy » Tue, Jan 05, 2016, 5:08 PM UTC

> In the long run this leads to oligarchy and possibly even economic and societal collapse. We are nowhere near there

I totally agree with your point. I disagree with your opinion that we are nowhere near there... Just look at what the oligopoly practices of 'big banks' that were 'too big to fail' did to the global economy. They ALL used their money to influence the regulatory rules and the governments that governed them. Goldman Sachs was the worse at this, they were shameless in putting their ex employees into key White House positions.

They built a gated community around themselves to protect their giant profits and when it all went south, the TAX PAYERS, US, WE PAID FOR THAT.

Re: My simplified response to Paul Graham's simplified essay

#90

Post by efaref » Tue, Jan 05, 2016, 5:08 PM UTC

chimeracoder wrote: post #19

tomp wrote: post #10

PG's simplified essay seems like attack on a strawman; he's mainly arguing that inequality is good, but then mostly everybody agrees with that. The issue people see (and PG conveniently ignores) is increasing inequality - not locally increasing (i.e. an enterpreneur becoming rich because of a successful business idea), but globally increasing inequality, which happens because of rent-seeking, tax avoidance, buying po…

> globally increasing inequality At a global level, inequality has not been increasing. Globalization has been a huge win for developing nations in this regard (and the people who have paid the price are low-wage workers in developed nations like the US). This is not to say that we have to conclude that globalization has been a good thing overall for developing nations - there are lots of problems it has caused for t…

According to this UN report: http://www.un.org/en/development/desa/policy/wess/wess_bg_pa... global inequality has been increasing despite convergence of inter-national mean incomes. The rich have been getting richer faster than the poor have been catching up.