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Evidence for man-made global warming hits 'gold standard'

reuters.com

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Re: Evidence for man-made global warming hits 'gold standard'

#61

Post by dmix »

arcticbull wrote: post #57
dmix wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not seeking to defend Reagan's policies but I'm curious when did David Stockman said Trickle Down in the Atlantic? Was it their policy during the administration as trickle down is characterized? He is a political pundit who was trying to rebut a (now) common political myth. The fact he parroted it back in an article a decade or two later doesn't mean it was the policy of the executive branch or any economist. Whi…

By the way, thank you for posting the article, it was a great write-up and an enjoyable read. I found the Stockman quote in a November 1981 WaPo/Atlantic article [1] which would have been, if I'm not mistaken, in his first year in office as OMB director? Sorry I'm not more familiar with this, I'll have to do some more reading too. [1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/opinions/1981/11/22/w...

You sound like a smart guy and it'd take me pages to properly respond to everything. I try to avoid online political debates because I haven't found much ROI in investing in them. But I'm sure Sowell would be highly critical of the mainstream economic policies of both parties in recent eras. He's far more preferential towards earlier US economics.

I will say that there's a big myth that the US has been on some big market-oriented supply-side binge since the 1980s which is a giant myth in itself. The size of western governments, everywhere, has exploded since the 1970s... even if the tax rate hasn't.

Sowell would be just as critical of any policy directly benefiting the wealthy as well. He sees the far bigger problem as the countless "well-intentioned policies" intended (or at least sold) to help the poor/middle class that back fire, do nothing, or more often creates highly inefficient systems where only the politically connected get social benefits.

I highly recommend his book "Wealth, poverty, and politics" [1]. It'd do a 100x better job than me at explaining his general worldview, which is closest to mine. And it's hardly just lower taxes for upper/middle and keep the rest of the political machine the same (which is probably worst of both worlds IMO).

[1] https://www.amazon.com/Wealth-Poverty-Politics-Thomas-Sowell...

Re: Evidence for man-made global warming hits 'gold standard'

#62

Post by wtvanhest »

lazyjones wrote: post #42
wtvanhest wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Personally, I'd like to see a financial market develop that allows people to predict future global temperatures in short, mid and long term time frames. (let's say 5 years, 10 years, 30 years). That market would reveal humanities unbiased view of climate change predictions. It would give us a great tool to put things in perspective.

Good suggestion, but first you'd need consensus on methods for measuring and calculating global temperatures. Currently, several different methods are used by established institutions and the results come with a relatively large confidence range. Personally, I'd rather bet on temperatures at single stations than what these observatories calculate. Here are some details: https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/research/monitorin…

That is a feature of having a financial system. People with really good incentives would attempt to find an agreeable way to measure earth's temps.

Re: Evidence for man-made global warming hits 'gold standard'

#63

Post by sbenitoj »

arcticbull wrote: post #13
sbenitoj wrote: post #2

As a supporter of living in a world of sane money, I’d like to see Reuter’s publish an article with a similar title like — “Evidence for gold standard as superior form of money hits 'gold standard': scientists”

The transition away from the gold standard and years of living in a post-gold-standard world show that fiat is a totally reasonable system of money. I'd love to see you support or justify your claims, so we can at least debate from a basis of shared understanding and fact instead of hyperbole. Your statement is completely unrelated to the topic at hand.

Fair point that my comment is off topic, I’ve been rightly downvoted and flagged for it : (

But I’ll respond to your comment in hopes that it might pique the interest of some sensible non-commenting lurker, and if it’s my lucky day perhaps you’ll genuinely consider my response as well.

When you say it’s a “totally reasonable system of money” I’m going to make the assumption that you believe this because there has been an absolutely, never before seen in the history of mankind, massive rise in the standard of living over the past 100+ years. Implicit in your statement, however, is that transitioning away from hard money (Eg a gold standard) and towards a fiat standard is in some way the cause of this rather than it merely being correlated (no doubt you’re well versed, like most people on HN, in the correlation vs causation problem).

My specific claim is that the massive increase in technology (including information technology) is the cause of this rapid rise in the standard of living, and this improvement has actually masked the serious and growing problems with fiat (such as recurring and exacerbated financial crises).

I can’t “prove” this conclusively anymore than you can “prove” a fiat/credit economy is the cause of it — we can’t re-run the 20th century on a hard money standard and compare the outcomes of the two. But it sure is convenient for governments to tell people that hard money is bad, but never let us test it out to see for ourselves, which begs the question, “cui bono?”

In this situation it’s clear who benefits from fiat currencies — nation states. The ability to print money at will and fund your own expenditures with that newly minted money (whose value comes from savers), is a temptation that no man can be trusted with. I believe this overwhelming temptation is WHY the market (billions of consumers acting voluntarily over thousands of years) ultimately settled on gold — it’s near impossible to pass counterfeits and the difficulty of mining it makes it a naturally low-inflation money.

The biggest downside to gold, however, is that governments have successfully prevented it from being used as money (through coercion, obviously). I believe this is why cryptocurrency is an interesting experiment, no doubt governments and their 3-letter agencies are using propaganda to control the narrative there, but unlike gold they can’t control the supply or prevent its circulation with coercion.

Re: Evidence for man-made global warming hits 'gold standard'

#64

Post by sbenitoj »

arcticbull wrote: post #23
dnautics wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you consider the sharp upturn in divide between the rich and the poor since 1972 to be "totally reasonable".

I definitely don't! I also don't attribute that to fiat currency. I attribute that at least within the United States to "trickle-down economics," reduction of the top federal income tax rate in the US from 92% in the 1940s (and 72% in the 1970s) to 37% this year [1], and the estate tax from the high 70% range [2] in the 1970s to 0% moving forward. The reduction in the social safety net and the government services aff…

Rich people don’t just put their money in a vault and let it inflate into oblivion — they spend it or they invest it, both create jobs.

Re: Evidence for man-made global warming hits 'gold standard'

#65

Post by sbenitoj »

arcticbull wrote: post #37
AlexB138 wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> if you let rich people keep more of their money, they have more of the money. If you simultaneously take from poor people, they stay poor. Not to join the debate here, but the use of language here really interests me. When talking about the rich, it's that we "let [them] keep more of their money" as if "we" (the government) has a right to every cent a person makes. When talking about the poor, we "take" from them,…

That's a really interesting insight! I hadn't caught myself doing that, thanks for pointing it out.

It’s not a coincidence — you use “we” because you’re a progressive and progressives view themselves as part of the government. Conservatives use “they” because they (rightly) understand they’re NOT in power.

Re: Evidence for man-made global warming hits 'gold standard'

#66

Post by arcticbull »

sbenitoj wrote: post #65
arcticbull wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a really interesting insight! I hadn't caught myself doing that, thanks for pointing it out.

It’s not a coincidence — you use “we” because you’re a progressive and progressives view themselves as part of the government. Conservatives use “they” because they (rightly) understand they’re NOT in power.

Well, in a democracy we all are, that’s kind of the idea for better or worse.

Re: Evidence for man-made global warming hits 'gold standard'

#67

Post by arcticbull »

dmix wrote: post #61
arcticbull wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By the way, thank you for posting the article, it was a great write-up and an enjoyable read. I found the Stockman quote in a November 1981 WaPo/Atlantic article [1] which would have been, if I'm not mistaken, in his first year in office as OMB director? Sorry I'm not more familiar with this, I'll have to do some more reading too. [1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/opinions/1981/11/22/w...

You sound like a smart guy and it'd take me pages to properly respond to everything. I try to avoid online political debates because I haven't found much ROI in investing in them. But I'm sure Sowell would be highly critical of the mainstream economic policies of both parties in recent eras. He's far more preferential towards earlier US economics. I will say that there's a big myth that the US has been on some big ma…

When people engage I always try and challenge my assumptions and learn from y’all, that’s part of why I come here in particular. Here’s what I’ll do, I’ll add your book to my reading list and I’ll follow up one day when I get through it. I can’t guarantee you’ll change my mind but I’m sure I’ll get a lot out of it!

Re: Evidence for man-made global warming hits 'gold standard'

#68

Post by arcticbull »

sbenitoj wrote: post #63
arcticbull wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The transition away from the gold standard and years of living in a post-gold-standard world show that fiat is a totally reasonable system of money. I'd love to see you support or justify your claims, so we can at least debate from a basis of shared understanding and fact instead of hyperbole. Your statement is completely unrelated to the topic at hand.

Fair point that my comment is off topic, I’ve been rightly downvoted and flagged for it : ( But I’ll respond to your comment in hopes that it might pique the interest of some sensible non-commenting lurker, and if it’s my lucky day perhaps you’ll genuinely consider my response as well. When you say it’s a “totally reasonable system of money” I’m going to make the assumption that you believe this because there has bee…

Thing is since the switch wages have kept pace with inflation even at the low end, and logically the poor have the least money so by extension the least exposed to inflation of cash on hand. Either way nobody should be holding money but instead using it to buy productive assets in which case it wouldn’t affect them right? On average home values outpace inflation in the US too, and that’s most Americans biggest investment. It inflates away debts, too, in that the principal always decreases in value in constant dollars.

Thus, it’s not clear to me how inflation affects any invested individual, it’s just a regular haircut for unproductive capital. Any other wealth accumulation would be a failure of tax or social policy not monetary policy.

Inflation doesn’t come at the expense of savers because savers don’t save cash, that’s because of inflation, and its not a bug, it’s a feature. It’s exactly the incentive you call out — to allocate your capital to investments which outpace inflation instead of sitting on it. I can’t think of any good reason a wad of dollar bills should be worth more tomorrow (or even keep value) by virtue of me just ... having them — can you?

Re: Evidence for man-made global warming hits 'gold standard'

#69

Post by sbenitoj »

arcticbull wrote: post #68
sbenitoj wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fair point that my comment is off topic, I’ve been rightly downvoted and flagged for it : ( But I’ll respond to your comment in hopes that it might pique the interest of some sensible non-commenting lurker, and if it’s my lucky day perhaps you’ll genuinely consider my response as well. When you say it’s a “totally reasonable system of money” I’m going to make the assumption that you believe this because there has bee…

Thing is since the switch wages have kept pace with inflation even at the low end, and logically the poor have the least money so by extension the least exposed to inflation of cash on hand. Either way nobody should be holding money but instead using it to buy productive assets in which case it wouldn’t affect them right? On average home values outpace inflation in the US too, and that’s most Americans biggest invest…

Yes — increasing the supply of money decreases the purchasing power over time of all other dollars in existence and simultaneously encourages people to make risky investments to avoid the value of their money from decreasing.

Re: Evidence for man-made global warming hits 'gold standard'

#70

Post by arcticbull »

sbenitoj wrote: post #69
arcticbull wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thing is since the switch wages have kept pace with inflation even at the low end, and logically the poor have the least money so by extension the least exposed to inflation of cash on hand. Either way nobody should be holding money but instead using it to buy productive assets in which case it wouldn’t affect them right? On average home values outpace inflation in the US too, and that’s most Americans biggest invest…

Yes — increasing the supply of money decreases the purchasing power over time of all other dollars in existence and simultaneously encourages people to make risky investments to avoid the value of their money from decreasing.

They needn't be risky, just yielding more than 2% like government bonds. If the government goes under their bonds are no good, but neither would your dollars be. Literally anything other than stuffing them under your mattress. Nothing's stopping you from buying precious metals either (physical, ETF or mining company shares). If you want your own wealth to be "gold backed" ... just buy gold. Then you can even borrow against it to make other purchases. Hey, it's basically "be your own bank" but with real assets.
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