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The Real Story of the Dutch Tulip Bubble?

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Re: The Real Story of the Dutch Tulip Bubble?

#21

Post by dang »

woah wrote: post #9
deadmetheny wrote: post #5

>“And in 2019, when you hear people complaining about Bitcoin and warning about it, what you are hearing are the voices of people in 1637 saying: you shouldn’t be involved in this trade. You’re the wrong person, you don’t know enough.” Why would you torpedo a good article at the very end with such a stupid paragraph?

Uh oh, this doesn’t match up with the narrative that Hacker News was hoping for. The reporter must be stupid!

Please don't post shallow dismissals here.

It's in particularly poor taste to diss a community that you belong to. You're as much a part of HN as anyone else is.

Re: The Real Story of the Dutch Tulip Bubble?

#23

Post by saalweachter »

apo wrote: post #14

> And in 2019, when you hear people complaining about Bitcoin and warning about it, what you are hearing are the voices of people in 1637 saying: you shouldn’t be involved in this trade. You’re the wrong person, you don’t know enough. Only this exact analogy is trotted out every time the Bitcoin exchange rate swings up or down very quickly. It's happened about a half dozen times now over the last 10 years. You see th…

Are there still underlying economics?

Re: The Real Story of the Dutch Tulip Bubble?

#24

Post by devereaux »

HN in 2010: don't touch bitcoin.

HN in 2019: it's Dutch Tulip Bubble! (in the midst of the next bull run)

Meanwhile, those who followed contrarian advice did great.

It feels like Slashdot calling the iPod lame.

Sometimes, it's not irrationality, but a true change.

Re: The Real Story of the Dutch Tulip Bubble?

#25

Post by notahacker »

DuskStar wrote: post #18
walshemj wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the south sea bubble which even caught Isaac Newton out might be the worst.

For some reason a tale of a governmental debt instrument being overvalued isn't quite as popular as one about tulips ;) The South Sea Company is a remarkable example of people ignoring the fundamentals of a stock in order to speculate, though. Or perhaps a story of people knowing just enough about the fundamentals to get themselves into trouble... (Many comparisons were made to the East India Company, which had a sim…

I think the fashion for similarly marketed investments (including the infamous "an undertaking of great advantage but nobody to know what it is") is probably the biggest lesson.

That people in the seventeenth century didn't really understand how to value the fundamentals of a new government trade monopoly is unsurprising and its subsequent overvaluation perhaps not that great an indictment of seventeenth century investors; a more widely applicable lesson is that price movement in this stock spilled over into newfound speculator enthusiasm for absolutely ridiculous ventures and companies pretending to be raising money for one purpose and actually spending it on something else.

Re: The Real Story of the Dutch Tulip Bubble?

#28

Post by grandmczeb »

buzzdenver wrote: post #27

In 1637, one gilder was worth about $10 in today’s money. 300 gilders would be about $3,000. That amounts to quite good yearly wage at the time. How does that work? $3k is not "quite good yearly wage" in most places these days.

The economy is much larger and people are much richer now than they were in 1637, even after adjusting for the cost of goods.

Re: The Real Story of the Dutch Tulip Bubble?

#29

Post by csours »

buzzdenver wrote: post #27

In 1637, one gilder was worth about $10 in today’s money. 300 gilders would be about $3,000. That amounts to quite good yearly wage at the time. How does that work? $3k is not "quite good yearly wage" in most places these days.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Purchasing_power

Purchasing power has increased along with inflation

Re: The Real Story of the Dutch Tulip Bubble?

#30

Post by logicx24 »

dmos62 wrote: post #7
deadmetheny wrote: post #5

>“And in 2019, when you hear people complaining about Bitcoin and warning about it, what you are hearing are the voices of people in 1637 saying: you shouldn’t be involved in this trade. You’re the wrong person, you don’t know enough.” Why would you torpedo a good article at the very end with such a stupid paragraph?

I had a similar qualm, but this summarizes it better: "The story of the tulip bubble boils down to a story of fools and greed, Goldgar says. And that’s why it sticks with us." There's something about reducing this to just greed. What I personally want, is a story that can contextualize that greed better, explore it more, and not just end with "that's greed for you" (paraphrasing).

Exactly. It's a complete mischaracterization to call every stock market boom and bust cycle a result of "greed," and yet people refuse to stop doing so. I guess it creates a sense of moral outrage, and makes readers feel righteously justified.
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