Hawking: We need to rethink our attitude towards wealth • Hacker News Board

Re: Hawking: We need to rethink our attitude towards wealth

#51

Post by pandama » Fri, Jul 29, 2016, 6:59 PM UTC

gonvaled wrote: post #30

hackaflocka wrote: post #7

I don't understand the reaction to Brexit. It was democracy in action! These things happen, and it's alright when they do! There are so many countries that are not in the EU. Are they all doomed?

They are not doomed: the argument is that they would be better off in the EU. And that Britain would be worse off outside. Not that it would be a poor country; it would still be one of the richest countries on Earth. Just a bit poorer. That is the theory; we'll see what happens.

No we won't. We can't see both sides of the comparison in this ethereal plane.

Re: Hawking: We need to rethink our attitude towards wealth

#52

Post by notlefthanded » Fri, Jul 29, 2016, 7:03 PM UTC

hal9000xp wrote: post #44

chimprich wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Switzerland does have access to the EU single market and implements many features of EU law, such as free movement of people. The UK might end up with a similar arrangement eventually, but if we adopt most of the EU principles but without any political influence I fail to see what the point was. Even if we manage to find a satisfactory solution, we will have to go through a lot of pain to get there, and we were alrea…

I understand this but there is a reason why Switzerland decided not to join EU in the first place. I don't know exact reason. I suggest they preferred to selectively accept some terms instead of taking all burden of membership in the EU. I like open-economy and globalisation but I would prefer more decentralised system instead of concentrating all power in the single place and then impose regulations across the board…

I guess it comes down to whether being able to pick relationship terms à la carte outweighs the benefits of discounts via a bundle deal and having some influence via a seat at the table. There's a chance that, long term, this restructuring is worth the human-effort capital.

Re: Hawking: We need to rethink our attitude towards wealth

#53

Post by sctb » Fri, Jul 29, 2016, 7:15 PM UTC

test23428934 wrote: post #33

Let me guess -- You support Drumpf and you call yourself a "race realist". Heh.

We've detached this comment from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12188235 and banned this account for violating the Hacker News guidelines. You can't comment like this here.

Re: Hawking: We need to rethink our attitude towards wealth

#54

Post by rgbrgb » Fri, Jul 29, 2016, 7:22 PM UTC

elgabogringo wrote: post #11

He really lost me with the first two paragraphs... Oh, and the title. The Brexit? Really? He's using the Brexit to launch into a soliloquy on the meaning of life? It's not clear to me that the Brexit had to do with wealth as much as it had to do with sovereignty. It's also not clear that the Brexit will have a negative long run impact on Britain's wealth. I know this sounds crazy to all the super smart international…

I agree he maybe didn't connect them crisply, but I think the general idea is that even though staying in the EU has a higher net value for the British economy, that value is not being distributed to the working class who voted to leave. Instead it is collected at the top by a wealthy elite of land and business owners. It's a problem of team incentives (net UK economy) being misaligned with individual incentives (individual worker quality of life).

Re: Hawking: We need to rethink our attitude towards wealth

#55

Post by gonvaled » Fri, Jul 29, 2016, 7:26 PM UTC

pandama wrote: post #51

gonvaled wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are not doomed: the argument is that they would be better off in the EU. And that Britain would be worse off outside. Not that it would be a poor country; it would still be one of the richest countries on Earth. Just a bit poorer. That is the theory; we'll see what happens.

No we won't. We can't see both sides of the comparison in this ethereal plane.

That applies to each and every decission. If we accept this argument, policy discussions are meaningless.

Let's be less theoretical: if Britain does much better than the EU it could be due to:

1) EU was bad for UK

2) The UK is abusing its new position (tax heaven, ...)

3) ??

If the UK does much worse than EU, this means:

1) EU was good for UK

2) EU is bullying UK

3) ??

So we'll be able to see what is happening.

Re: Hawking: We need to rethink our attitude towards wealth

#56

Post by mjevans » Fri, Jul 29, 2016, 7:37 PM UTC

airesQ wrote: post #46

hal9000xp wrote: post #26

I actually don't understand why Brexit should necessary be bad for UK. Switzerland is doing very well outside of EU despite it's literally surrounded by EU members. Of course, there is a risk that UK won't do as good as Switzerland does but it's only risk, it's not established fact yet. Regarding article itself ... well, it's The Guardian so it's very predictable what they will write about wealth. Regarding author, i…

Why would the UK do badly outside the EU? Well because 45%+ of its exports go to the EU. And the EU is not just a trade deal. It is a single market, like the US is a single market, with a great degree of regulatory uniformity. Which means accepting laws from a central source (in the US it is Washington, in the EU it is Brussels). What you think would happen to Texas were to secede? With border controls? With its inte…

As a resident of 'Washington' I would prefer you qualify the capitol of the nation by either it's full name 'Washington District of Columbia' or the common short-hands there of 'Washington DC' or just 'DC'.

Please, stop confusing the state and the city liberated from all states in the nation.

Re: Hawking: We need to rethink our attitude towards wealth

#57

Post by roymurdock » Fri, Jul 29, 2016, 7:42 PM UTC

hal9000xp wrote: post #26

I actually don't understand why Brexit should necessary be bad for UK. Switzerland is doing very well outside of EU despite it's literally surrounded by EU members. Of course, there is a risk that UK won't do as good as Switzerland does but it's only risk, it's not established fact yet. Regarding article itself ... well, it's The Guardian so it's very predictable what they will write about wealth. Regarding author, i…

> I won't buy socialism in any possible form and any interpretation even from world famous scientist

This is a pretty ridiculous statement.

Do you believe in taxation? Do you believe there are some things that a collective organization of people can do better than an individual - be that organization a family, village, private company, or a federal government? OK, then you buy into and support the premise of socialism.

Socialism/capitalism isn't binary. Don't be arbitrarily afraid of either word or concept, but do be afraid of either extreme, as extremes are always untenable. Moving towards "socialism" by increasing taxation on the ultra-wealthy is a move to restore balance and guide us away from one extreme which has gained in popularity in the past 30 years.

I'm 23 and I live in the US. The fear surrounding terms like socialism/communism to this day, even with my generation, amazes me. My peers have learned to use these terms as an insult without knowing exactly why they are insulting - they just feel a vague sense that socialism is "un-American".

I get that we had to turn on the propaganda machine full blast during the cold war as the threat of nuclear extinction is no laughing matter. But with programs like social security, medicare, medicaid, etc. making up such a huge portion of our federal budget, maybe it's time to rethink our hatred and out-of-hand fear of simple terms that we use to talk about ownership and wealth redistribution.

Re: Hawking: We need to rethink our attitude towards wealth

#58

Post by Retra » Fri, Jul 29, 2016, 7:44 PM UTC

gonvaled wrote: post #28

rm_-rf_slash wrote: post #4

There will always be people who take great pleasure and submit extraordinary effort to accumulate massive wealth. These efforts cannot be ignored in the prosperous society we have today. We take refrigeration and electricity and indoor plumbing - unheard of for the Founding Fathers - for granted, and perceive those without it as living in extreme poverty. It is only when the pursuit of individual prosperity comes at…

Poverty is a relative term: somebody without a shirt is poor because nearly everybody has a shirt, not because shirts are absolutely necessary. Edit: not sure why I am being downvoted. Take the poorest man on Earth today; he is richer than most men alive 20 thousand years ago. I would argue that he would conquer any ancient society.

I don't think you understand how poor the poorest man on Earth today is, nor how ineffective that wealth would be for gaining influence in other cultures.

Re: Hawking: We need to rethink our attitude towards wealth

#59

Post by hx87 » Fri, Jul 29, 2016, 7:45 PM UTC

gonvaled wrote: post #39

mamon wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So you are suggesting that Poland should give up its financial stability (like being pretty much only EU country which did not suffer recession during 2008 financial crisis) and join Eurozone just to help you avoid small inconvenience with reimbursing business trip in foreign currency?

The Eurozone is suffering. All economic areas have up and downs. Being in a shared monerary union, you sacrifize some advantages for others: we compromise - I know, strange word. We are building a stable, long term monetary union. We are learning, we are improving and we will have a strong currency going forward. Next time another economy area is in distress, as it will unavoidably happen, remember about our crisis,…

Thanks to the magic of currency markets, I don't have to care about currencies either when I travel in Europe, even though I am American. Whenever I buy something, I use my credit card, and the charges are automatically converted to USD based on whatever the USD/EUR/GBP/etc rates are on that day.

The Eurozone can be a great idea, if some sort of fiscal union comes into being; otherwise the Euro will always be undervalued in the North and overvalued in the South, causing imbalances in investment and consumption.

Re: Hawking: We need to rethink our attitude towards wealth

#60

Post by nyolfen » Fri, Jul 29, 2016, 7:47 PM UTC

clavalle wrote: post #34

erdevs wrote: post #5

The article asks "can possessions stand in the way of fulfillment?" Experience tells me the answer there is certainly yes, they can and often do. I think achieving a cultural shift away from the accumulation of possessions is achievable-- as cities get more dense, as travel becomes more regular, safe and affordable-- and in some sections of culture this is happening already. The article also asks though if we can tru…

>The article asks "can possessions stand in the way of fulfillment?" Experience tells me the answer there is certainly yes, they can and often do. While this can be true, and I know a few people who seem oddly compelled to accumulate more at the detriment of the rest of their lives, I find that it is far more common that the lack of wealth stands in the way of fulfillment. On a different point, I see the market as an…

>Desperation and exploitation are not core features of a free market, Capitalistic system. In fact, I think they are a drag on Capitalism and the free market.

without making a value judgment, i think this extremely disputable, historically speaking