Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

What caused all the supply chain bottlenecks?

twitter.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

511–520 of 690 posts

Re: What caused all the supply chain bottlenecks?

#511

Post by ravel-bar-foo »

dragontamer wrote: post #504
ravel-bar-foo wrote: post #498

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your initial example is not making an argument against buffers in the supply chain, but against large production runs requiring large inputs. In the context of logistics, I think of a buffer as a system that slowly fills up due to excess capacity greater than demand, which can be drawn down in times when demand exceeds production. You seem to be referring to a buffer as a process which requires large inputs to get st…

> You seem to be referring to a buffer as a process which requires large inputs to get start producing. No. > I think of a buffer as a system that slowly fills up due to excess capacity greater than demand, which can be drawn down in times when demand exceeds production. Yes. That's what I mean. The steel furnaces __use iron__. This means that during the buffering process, the steel furnaces are "saving up iron", and…

Ok. So the problem is that your furnaces are too greedy. They are buffering up in the absence of oversupply. There are many in-game solutions to that, but in reality we use price signals. When price signals are not available, we shame people for being greedy and hoarding.

Re: What caused all the supply chain bottlenecks?

#512

Post by chii »

whatever1 wrote: post #508
chii wrote: post #468

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The market value of a company is true, aka the owners of this company must be taxed for the real value growth in their portfolio (since it constitutes income) well, if you follow this logical conclusion, why are you not taxing a baby because the baby's value is the future income of that person's job. Sure, it's unrealized, but you're still considering it income even though it's unrealized.

That is the definition of speculation. Maybe the baby does not make it to adulthood so it produced 0 value. It makes no sense to tax speculated value. If you are certain that your baby this year is bringing home tangible income due to its TikTok page, then yes tax it.

> It makes no sense to tax speculated value.

and yet, the claim originally was that it makes sense on the speculated value of stocks.

> If you are certain that your baby this year is bringing home tangible income due to its TikTok page, then yes tax it.

so tax the dividends, or tax the capital gains that are realized - because those are certain. To own stocks is to speculate.

Re: What caused all the supply chain bottlenecks?

#513

Post by darawk »

micromacrofoot wrote: post #384
darawk wrote: post #333

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The point is exactly what I said in the rest of the comment. He has already paid taxes on the cash he has in hand. The only assets he has not paid taxes on are the shares in AMZN that he has not realized the gains on.

sure but he’s got so much he has no incentive to touch it, and it gains all the same… if he makes a 5% return this year, take 2%…

You're right about that. My point isn't about his overall wealth, or whether it's socially good that he has it. A few comments up the tree, someone asserted that Bezos wasn't strongly incentivized by the value of his Amzn shares because he had already "cashed out", though. That's what I responding to.

Re: What caused all the supply chain bottlenecks?

#514

Post by kgantchev »

stainforth wrote: post #476
chii wrote: post #459

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is that? they arent forced to "buy" at gunpoint.

I mean in the sense of certain goods, like one needs to physically survive. And also the things for your business to survive.

Those goods are cheap and abundant.

Re: What caused all the supply chain bottlenecks?

#515

Post by joebob42 »

wahern wrote: post #419
roiboosxh wrote: post #380

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You cannot tax an asset that does not move. In what intervals would you do this? Your bank account would go to zero.

> You cannot tax an asset that does not move. Property tax taxes an asset that doesn't move, literally and figuratively. Before financial markets exploded, and especially in agrarian societies like the United States at its founding, a property tax was effectively a wealth tax. (It still is a wealth tax, technically speaking, it just no longer reaches the wealth of the richest in society.) > In what intervals would yo…

Well in an agrarian society property produce money though, right?

Re: What caused all the supply chain bottlenecks?

#516

Post by herendin2 »

zelon88 wrote: post #207

I worked at a company who made products on contract, but the contract stipulated the vendor we had to use to get the raw materials. The raw materials were just aluminum castings, but they were a custom shape specifically for this customer of ours. They could only be used for this one product. I noticed that the inventory levels of our vendor were dropping, but we weren't buying. Meaning our customer was ordering the…

Game theory. If the idea occurred to you, then one can almost guarantee it will eventually occur to others - and to someone at your competitor.

With that understanding, there's only one rational course of action: to secure your supply before they do, and your competitor realized all this.

The only real decision to make is whether to risk the more aggressive move of also locking up your competitor's supply.

Re: What caused all the supply chain bottlenecks?

#517

Post by randomdata »

starky wrote: post #450
KingMachiavelli wrote: post #186

How bad are the supply chain bottlenecks really? Compared to the amount of discussion on the matter they seem pretty minimal outside a couple sectors. I certainly don't see any lack of products being sold at grocery and big box stores. The only exception I see are some hot items like GPUs and game consoles but I don't they the supply chain itself is the constraint but rather the actual silicon. The only significant e…

Raw materials are seeing issues, which is trickling down to nearly everything. Metal costs have gone up >25% from what I've seen, plastics are nearly impossible to get from the large suppliers, etc. Many electronics components are majorly supply constrained right now, is isn't just silicon components, passives also have shortages everywhere.

Cash bids on corn are up ~70% from last year. The production figures do not suggest to me that the supply is constrained on the production side to justify a jump that large. Especially when we're seeing large increases across all kinds of commodities in unison, suggesting there is something else going on. Are people currently holding onto such resources as a hedge against inflation or what may be driving it?

Re: What caused all the supply chain bottlenecks?

#518

Post by whatever1 »

chii wrote: post #512
whatever1 wrote: post #508

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is the definition of speculation. Maybe the baby does not make it to adulthood so it produced 0 value. It makes no sense to tax speculated value. If you are certain that your baby this year is bringing home tangible income due to its TikTok page, then yes tax it.

> It makes no sense to tax speculated value. and yet, the claim originally was that it makes sense on the speculated value of stocks. > If you are certain that your baby this year is bringing home tangible income due to its TikTok page, then yes tax it. so tax the dividends, or tax the capital gains that are realized - because those are certain. To own stocks is to speculate.

Not really. My thesis is that IF the stock market is NOT a casino, then the capital gains are real income, thus they need to be taxed. For example if the stock prices were set by the companies and they were obligated to buy back shares at that price if asked, then indeed you have a valuable asset on hand. If the company increases the asking / paying price for the stock then you have real tangible income that you can realize. Similar to the interest you accrue from savings.

But if we agree it is a casino, then we should not tax air, only the ones who cash their earnings and walk out of the casino. And goes without saying that we should stop incentivizing people to gamble their money and pensions on this. 401k, Roth and all these need to go.

Re: What caused all the supply chain bottlenecks?

#519

Post by thayne »

rrrrrrrrrrrryan wrote: post #497
majormajor wrote: post #438

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If the spending doesn't re-balance again as restrictions are lifted this is not a temporary supply chain issue caused by just-in-time methodology, it's just the new normal. Even if spending stays shifted supply will be able to catch up eventually. Once people believe there's a predictable level of demand they will be able to plan output for it - or else someone else will capture that new market share.

Yes, eventually. From what I've read it's expected to take 6 months to a year after your "people believe there's a predictable level of demand" point.

And we have no idea how far out "people believe there's a predictable level of demand" is.

Re: What caused all the supply chain bottlenecks?

#520

Post by vmurthy »

CalChris wrote: post #24

The pandemic may be the proximate cause . But Petersen is saying the sufficient cause is Modern finance with its obsession with "Return on Equity." With a more robust economic system not so beholden to return on equity, this may not have happened even given the pandemic. Without such a robust system, other proximate triggers can cause similar effects.

Not being snarky but I find it hard when well-meaning folks like Petersen don't give alternatives. Maybe the obsession with RoE is bad but what's the alternative? What measure should CEOs care about if the shareholders who put them in charge aren't happy?
Post reply on HN