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Lambda School leaked documents show poor performance over the last two years

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Re: Lambda School leaked documents show poor performance over the last two years

#371

Post by boringg »

kirso wrote: post #325
lmm wrote: post #303

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think knowing any specific mathematics is necessary for CS, but having the capacity to learn mathematics is, and most people who have that capacity end up with a degree somewhere in the science umbrella. You don't need calculus specifically, but you need the ability to abstract, to form rules and express precisely where they apply and where they do not.

Maybe the question is then whether someone has that curiosity about maths?

True curiosity and then follow through to be able to learn. Which I would argue is aptitude.

Re: Lambda School leaked documents show poor performance over the last two years

#372

Post by eru »

lmm wrote: post #364
eru wrote: post #333

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not every brand is getting worse. Some are staying the same, and some are improving. The regulation you suggest seems a bit silly. If transparency is good for a brand, companies can already implement it. (And if customers don't care enough to pay for transparency, why force them to?) What's the externality that your proposed regulation is trying to internalize? Also keep in mind that disclosure regulations put an und…

> What's the externality that your proposed regulation is trying to internalize? The externality is the cost of staying informed. The theorems about the efficiency of a free market assume perfect information. If someone reads Consumer Reports and decides that brand XYZ is making a good product they want to buy, but brand XYZ switches to producing lower-quality products in between when the review is written and when t…

> The theorems about the efficiency of a free market assume perfect information.

Huh? That comparatively freer markets make people better off in the real world is an empirical observation, and doesn't rely on theorems. (You can make a few assumptions and prove a few theorems, if you want to. But it's not essential.)

> If someone reads Consumer Reports and decides that brand XYZ is making a good product they want to buy, but brand XYZ switches to producing lower-quality products in between when the review is written and when the reader buys the thing, then we lose all the benefits that the free market was supposed to give us.

Eh, there's a simple fix that people intuitively implement already: trust brands more that have been around longer.

Assume the delay between the review being written and you buying stuff is eg a quarter of a year. Then, simplified, someone who goes only for brands that have been around for at least ten years only runs at most a 1 in 40 chance of getting duped like this.

By the way, the name for the scheme you are describing here is an 'exit scam'. See eg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exit_scam

I challange you to find some econ papers that describe exit scams as externatilities.

> The externality is the cost of staying informed.

Btw, that's not an externality. That's just a regular cost.

Re: Lambda School leaked documents show poor performance over the last two years

#373

Post by eru »

harry8 wrote: post #358
eru wrote: post #332

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In a sense, this is all about interest rates. If capital becomes abundant enough that rates of return become low enough, then the long term becomes more and more important in corporate planning. If interest rates are high, then short term gutting of the business _is_ the rational move. (Interest rates have been rather low in the last decade or so. Not sure if that had much of an influence?)

Disagree with that. The decision is between a higher probability shorter realization, bigger annualized result vs longer realization, lower annual return (possibly bigger return if things go particularly well) with a bigger probability of things going wrong, especially a few years into the future where the crystal balls get less sure of themselves. I can get a real 30% return this year and I'm out with high probabili…

You are right that a more nuanced analysis needs to take risk into account.

Sorry, I was talking about real interest rates. Inflation doesn't make a difference to them. Real interest rates _do_ make a difference.

> Just get the hell away from bonds which will hemorrhage value from the inflation.

Bond interest rates already price in expected inflation.

Re: Lambda School leaked documents show poor performance over the last two years

#374

Post by eru »

Frondo wrote: post #369
eru wrote: post #335

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Or the timeless play of load it with debt, payout themselves and declare bankruptcy. Well, as long as they sell the bonds only to consenting adults, what's wrong with that?

This model is not good for society as a whole.

What do you mean?

Some people prefer riskier investments. Let them have it.

Other people prefer safer investments, let them have what they want, too.

There's nothing inherently sacred about bonds. It's just a contract that basically says 'either we pay you x dollars on time, or you get to take ownership of the company'.

Re: Lambda School leaked documents show poor performance over the last two years

#375

Post by harry8 »

eru wrote: post #372
lmm wrote: post #364

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What's the externality that your proposed regulation is trying to internalize? The externality is the cost of staying informed. The theorems about the efficiency of a free market assume perfect information. If someone reads Consumer Reports and decides that brand XYZ is making a good product they want to buy, but brand XYZ switches to producing lower-quality products in between when the review is written and when t…

> The theorems about the efficiency of a free market assume perfect information. Huh? That comparatively freer markets make people better off in the real world is an empirical observation, and doesn't rely on theorems. (You can make a few assumptions and prove a few theorems, if you want to. But it's not essential.) > If someone reads Consumer Reports and decides that brand XYZ is making a good product they want to b…

> Btw, that's not an externality. That's just a regular cost.

It can be either or both. Information discovery can simply be a cost of transaction, sure, fine. Find out about the stuff you're thinking of buying. Regular transaction cost.

Where there are markets and methods of transacting in those markets where one can assume the product that was being sold previously with a given name is precisely similar to the one being sold when you want to buy it there is some information acquired without additional cost. If it becomes more popular for some market participants to start messing with that such that everyone has to double check everything all the damn time even when purchasing from people who would not tolerate selling like that because of the uncertainty that is now in the marketplace. That is clearly a cost imposed on people not involved in those messed up transactions. The honest sellers have an additional cost to demonstrate they aren't crooks. The buyers have an additional cost to find that out. The sensible buyer buys from the honest seller with an additional transaction cost that has nothing to do with a change in policy or behavior of either party, it's a result of some other transaction they were not party to and had no control over. That's an externality. One usually enforced via social norms first ("I've come back because you lied to me!" - we've all seen someone, somewhere taking out their fury like that) and regulation second (because yelling at shop attendants is a rubbish thing to do).

Pretty sure such externality, while undesirable in itself, does not render useless all the benefits of a marketplace. The idealised form of the microeconomic model known as "perfect competition" has perfect information as an assumption. As soon as you apply the model to a real market that assumption has to be somewhat relaxed. The relaxation may make little difference (eg there's not much to know, it doesn't change much and we all basically know it) or an immense difference (eg insider trading on the stock exchange). Such models are for positive economics (describing what is happening) rather than being prescriptive about what should happen (normative economics).

I hope explaining the jargon doesn't come off as being a condescending idiot here. The jargon is used for gatekeeping in many of these discussions and it bothers me that this is how it works.

Re: Lambda School leaked documents show poor performance over the last two years

#376

Post by cm2012 »

vasilipupkin wrote: post #337
cm2012 wrote: post #295

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think we completely agree. Unless you have a clear job benefit (like studying CS) you should only go to college unless you're already rich and it doesn't matter.

Respectfully, this is nonsense. Employers still very much prefer people with college degrees for many roles, even if the degree itself isn’t 100% relevant to the job.

A four year degree is better than nothing. But its much worse than a few years work experience in your career field.

Obviously there's a huge exception for technical college degrees like CS, science, etc which are worth a ton. This applies to degrees in business, liberal arts, etc.

Re: Lambda School leaked documents show poor performance over the last two years

#377

Post by mbesto »

blululu wrote: post #291
mbesto wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Every time I’ve seen a company bought by private equity, it spells the beginning of the end. I regularly work with PE firms. You can't paint the whole industry with one brush stroke. I've seen more than a handful of companies get bought by PE to become very successful for everyone involved (PE, management, customers)...and the opposite. That being said - it's very common to see companies in the large cap space ($5B…

> While you might have had a poor experience, the rest of the market may have been willing to wait in 15 minute lines for $10 bottles of water. If you disagree with PE, the easiest way to "stick it to them" is to vote with your wallet. Simply stop going to Sea World and you'll see PE change their tune pretty quickly. Ironically this is exactly the sort of attitude that the parent is complaining about. You could never…

> Ironically this is exactly the sort of attitude that the parent is complaining about.

And this attitude would exist regardless of whether PE is involved. When you get the $1B+ market cap size, these entities are not benevolent entities - they are profit seeking machines.

Re: Lambda School leaked documents show poor performance over the last two years

#378

Post by mbesto »

antasvara wrote: post #300
mbesto wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Every time I’ve seen a company bought by private equity, it spells the beginning of the end. I regularly work with PE firms. You can't paint the whole industry with one brush stroke. I've seen more than a handful of companies get bought by PE to become very successful for everyone involved (PE, management, customers)...and the opposite. That being said - it's very common to see companies in the large cap space ($5B…

The issue is that a company purchased by PE often has built up a positive image of their brand. Sea World probably has thousands of positive reviews online; by the time the online consensus catches up to the reality of the experience, it's very easy to be fooled. That's where the money is made: when costs are cut but the brand still has a positive perception. PE doesn't have to change their tune; by the time consumer…

Any business can do this regardless of whether PE is involved. What's your point?

Re: Lambda School leaked documents show poor performance over the last two years

#379

Post by harry8 »

eru wrote: post #373
harry8 wrote: post #358

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Disagree with that. The decision is between a higher probability shorter realization, bigger annualized result vs longer realization, lower annual return (possibly bigger return if things go particularly well) with a bigger probability of things going wrong, especially a few years into the future where the crystal balls get less sure of themselves. I can get a real 30% return this year and I'm out with high probabili…

You are right that a more nuanced analysis needs to take risk into account. Sorry, I was talking about real interest rates. Inflation doesn't make a difference to them. Real interest rates _do_ make a difference. > Just get the hell away from bonds which will hemorrhage value from the inflation. Bond interest rates already price in expected inflation.

Real interest rates are the growth rate in the overall economy, which doesn't change much or at least shouldn't in the absence of a crash and recession. For a country getting much above the world economy growth rate is a short term thing that doesn't last. You hit oil (norway) Your capital stock was low (post ww2 germany & japan, pre economic liberalization of china) but you have an educated and entrepreneurial population and you can catch up fast by investing, then reinvesting in capital. Then it tails off when you get back to parity).

The world economy growth rate is set by population growth and technical progress. (Both new technology and new ways developed to use existing tech better).

>Bond interest rates already price in expected inflation.

Look at the incredible growth in the S&P500 during a pandemic with all the economic carnage going on with that vs the bond rates. Then if you still think so, bet so, but against my strongest feelings, which are obviously not any kind of investment advice. There are cashflow timing tax effects to consider there as well. Bond returns are depressed by central bank policy and some capital is forced to allocate there when its a bad deal. (Pension funds mandated to invest in bonds and nothing "risky" like equity). Look at the number of ways an investment in bonds can surprise on the downside. Look at the lack of room with interest rates where they are to surprise on the upside. Unanticipated inflation is a redistribution from lenders to borrowers (can pay it back with worthless currency while the asset it bought appreciates). It's always "unanticipated" in most of the yield curve when it hits.

20 Year US Govt Bond yield is 2.07% sayeth the search engine [1]. That's anticipating basically no inflation at any point for the next 20 years and a 2%ish economic growth rate in the economy. Seem like a reasonable assumption? Bond income (coupon payment) is taxable as you get it. Capital appreciation of equity isn't taxable until you sell it. In times of inflation that really matters and causes you to make a small fortune out of a bigger one.

[1] https://ycharts.com/indicators/20_year_treasury_rate

Re: Lambda School leaked documents show poor performance over the last two years

#380

Post by RNCTX »

harry8 wrote: post #245
edgefield wrote: post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every time I’ve seen a company bought by private equity, it spells the beginning of the end. The strategy always seems to milk every last drop of cash from the business, without any long term sustainable plan. As an anecdotal case, I visited Sea World over the summer and half the concessions and shows were closed. It was still expensive and crowded and and there were service bottlenecks everywhere. Long lines for a b…

It's an issue in market information where regulation can't really work [1]. Vendors have a brand. They establish the value of the brand such that purchasers have a signal that they aren't going to be ripped off. For example you can be pretty sure coca-cola isn't going to cut costs to the point where they don't care about putting poison in the bottle - and you don't need regulation to know they won't do it. Zeus-Cola?…

How do you know you prefer unregulated markets?

I'm coming up on 45 and through my whole life, markets have been regulated in favor of corporate officers and the government agencies and officials paid to represent them.

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