That Peter Thiel is really good at picking winners and disruption.
let's hope that Peter Thiel can use his influence to do some good and not just for himself.
Ask HN: POTUS Donald Trump; What this means to Silicon Valley
21–30 of 169 posts
Re: Ask HN: POTUS Donald Trump; What this means to Silicon Valley
#22I'd guess it will be a harder sell to get software developers in Europe, Australia, NZ, etc. to move to the US.
NZ dev here. Trump getting in doesn't worry me I'd love to work in the US. I think it's all been overblown.
I'm also a dev from NZ, and I worked in the US a few years ago. Honestly it's not all it's cracked up to be, and I wouldn't choose to go back there. Trump didn't factor into that decision, but now it's even less enticing.
Re: Ask HN: POTUS Donald Trump; What this means to Silicon Valley
#23I think he will be fine for the H1B and and other skilled immigrant programs.
Lower corporate taxes would be good, but I don't think it will be realistic. However, some kind of deal for tax repatriation for large multinationals might be possible. This could bring a lot of money back into the country by the likes of Apple and others.
Tariffs might have some impact as well depending on the type of company/labor and source countries affected (China/Mexico).
Re: Ask HN: POTUS Donald Trump; What this means to Silicon Valley
#24That Peter Thiel is really good at picking winners and disruption.
That is very interesting.
There was a recent interview of Jeff Bezos where he was asked to comment about Peter Thiel. He said Peter Thiel is a Contrarian. He then said that Conventional Wisdom is generally right and Contrarians are generally wrong, but when Contrarians are right they are right in a massive massive way !
Re: Ask HN: POTUS Donald Trump; What this means to Silicon Valley
#25Data requests of Silicon Valley companies by the government may increase.
The list of people deemed "suspect" and spied on by the government using private data may grow and the people spied on may become, on average, browner and more Muslim.
Re: Ask HN: POTUS Donald Trump; What this means to Silicon Valley
#26I think for the most part, Pence would be the most experienced in the Trump/Pence duo. I would look into Pence's government style.
Re: Ask HN: POTUS Donald Trump; What this means to Silicon Valley
#27I actually think there is a possibility that it could be easier to get into US as highly skilled migrant under Trump presidency because of his anti-immigrant polities. If he raises a minimum income bar for H1B to 150K and keep the same cap, then it would be much less qualified applicants for H1B visas and therefore there would not be cap overflow with annoying lottery process. Of course, I can't predict what Trump is…
> which would be very stupid move
Why? Because the salaries of US-based programmers would rise? Because companies would be more motivated to train locals instead of importing foreigners?
Re: Ask HN: POTUS Donald Trump; What this means to Silicon Valley
#28I predict that not that much will change WRT valley issues. His bombastic statements were populist, I don't see anything on the policy agenda that seems it will hit the Valley in any meaningful way. Even if there are some trade-barbs with China ... the Valley doesn't export much there ...
we import quite a bit from China, so tariffs would be painful.
+ We are outsourced there but we are the customers in that equation. The Chinese will not make things more difficult for American buyers - they are in a very pernicious situation as it is.
+ As for tariffs: the thing is - we are already in a trade war. China can sell in the US at will. China blocks tons of American companies from selling to China.
American exports to China are almost nothing.
The Chinese are already 'attacking' and have little to retaliate with.
Also - manufacturers are already moving many things out of China etc. and the gov knows it.
Tariffs may pinch a little bit, but if they do - they would be offset by a commensurate uptick in American manufacturing.
The only thing the Chinese could do would be to block 'Pizza Hut' and possibly Apple, which would suck.
Because of the trade imbalance, the Americans can do far, far more damage than the other way around.
China does hold massive US reserves, and could play some tricks, but it's not going to get to that, moreover, the Fed is ready to mop up any liquidity if the Chinese step out of bounds.
China has been playing a great hand of poker against the West - dividing and conquering - US and EU leaders all kow towing to China, and if they speak up getting slapped down for 'fear of losing access' to China. But we don't have access ... and we're never going to get it. Why would they give us access?
It will take some leadership to re-establish proper trade relations, and even though I don't like Trump at all - if he gets more aggressive with China it would be almost surely a 'good thing'.
The area I would worry about is military i.e. South China sea etc..
I see a lot of Obamacare being repealed, a tougher stance on illegal immigration coming for sure. I don't think that will hit the Valley very hard.
Re: Ask HN: POTUS Donald Trump; What this means to Silicon Valley
#29I'd guess it will be a harder sell to get software developers in Europe, Australia, NZ, etc. to move to the US.
Eh... The Prime Minister of Australia is actively working against the technology industry here, and he actually states that preventing Australians from having better internet access is his biggest accomplishment.
Re: Ask HN: POTUS Donald Trump; What this means to Silicon Valley
#30That Peter Thiel is really good at picking winners and disruption.
Having watched and listened to Thiel for several years now, I came up with a pet hypothesis I call 'The Wolfian World' that I feel describes what's going on more accurately than the newspapers.