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Alan Greenspan has died

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Re: Alan Greenspan has died

#181

Post by Noaidi »

throw0101d wrote: post #170
Noaidi wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The separation of wealth during the Gilded age was caused by the same thing it is caused by today: rapid industrialization. This rapid industrialization began when the US was off the gold standard during the civil war. The 1920's gilded age was fueled by fiat money, the greenback. The great depression was triggered in part by imbalanced gold flows when we returned to gold back currencies. https://explaininghistory.or…

> The 1920's gilded age was fueled by fiat money, the greenback. So-called fiat money didn't become a thing until after FDR became president, which was after 1932.

I think at this point you should read a bit more about the antebellum period.

Re: Alan Greenspan has died

#182

Post by margalabargala »

boppo1 wrote: post #169
margalabargala wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Imagine a world in which prices regularly go down That world results in a lot of people individually deciding "why buy now, when I can buy for less later" and sitting on their money. That in aggregate makes the economy much worse. You're up against human nature here. Money may be an arbitrary numerical denomination of value, but people's behavior around it and how that affects the economy at large need to be accoun…

>That in aggregate makes the economy much worse. Does it really? A lot of our problems seem to stem from conspicuous consumption. People will still need things (food shelter clothing) and that will motivate purchasing. "Oh n0es people won't buy flavor of the month consumer garbage, what ever will we do" just doesn't track.

> Does it really?

It does, really.

Conspicuous consumption is a miniscule part of the economy, and for every person whose conspicuous consumption drops, you'll have 5 people who can no longer afford food and shelter.

If you'd like to learn more, I'd encourage you to take an economics class at any local community college. Intro level should teach you about lots of new things including this, much more than you'd learn reading HN comments.

Re: Alan Greenspan has died

#183

Post by notahacker »

clates wrote: post #159
mctaylor wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yup. I'm extremely unconvinced that a non-distributionary constraint (ex: limiting the money supply one way or another, i.e. the gold standard, bitcoin, etc.) fixes a distributionary problem. You know what would fix a distributionary problem? A (re)distributionary solution. The most obvious one is progressive/wealth taxation (a ceiling) and UBI (a floor). Keep competitive market dynamics, narrow the window in which t…

> Yup. I'm extremely unconvinced that a non-distributionary constraint (ex: limiting the money supply one way or another, i.e. the gold standard, bitcoin, etc.) fixes a distributionary problem. Well, that's good because that's not what limiting the money supply does. It _acts as a force against inequality_. It doesn't _fix_ or _prevent_ inequality that already exists and doesn't claim to stop organic inequalities fro…

It doesn't act as a force against inequality though. It literally acts as a force to force the have nots to work harder and pay more to convince the haves to offer them any money for anything (whilst maintaining the purchasing power of any cash rich people that don't want to risk investing in anything that might create any wealth for anyone else)

Re: Alan Greenspan has died

#184

Post by itsamario »

bhouston wrote: post #5

I'm not a gold bug but Alan was a proponent of the gold standard. He wrote about how the gold standard created responsible spending and more equality in the world: https://ritholtz.com/2008/11/gold-and-economic-freedom-by-al... The world we are in now, especially in the US, is one where there is near unlimited government credit but it is, according to many, papering over deep structural problems. At some point, these…

Big picture is credit gives the individual a chance. That occurred in the 80s and since we've have more go from rags to riches than all of history combined.

I hated the system but it's fair. English and the allied forces inherited the western world and nobody was willing to claim it, the king of England gave it to his daughter.

Gold should be revalued but we're entering a phase where America is leaving law and order for law and equity. Essentially WW2 is ending but most never bothered to consider if there's a goal to all the chaos.

Re: Alan Greenspan has died

#185

Post by unregistereddev »

NoboruWataya wrote: post #144
alberth wrote: post #105

For many Americans, Greenspan was the only Fed Chair known widely by name by the general public.

I'm not from the US and was born after Greenspan took up the position but I thought Paul Volcker was a pretty well known name during his tenure?

During his tenure, yes. Volcker remains famous among finance nerds, because it turns out he was right. He caused a recession and risked his own job, but in doing so he successfully reigned in runaway inflation.

While Volcker was controversial in his time and celebrated later, Greenspan was widely respected in his day. I remember Greenspan being sought for interviews national television to help explain finance topics to the general public.

Re: Alan Greenspan has died

#186

Post by bigfishrunning »

bko wrote: post #119
margalabargala wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Imagine a world in which prices regularly go down That world results in a lot of people individually deciding "why buy now, when I can buy for less later" and sitting on their money. That in aggregate makes the economy much worse. You're up against human nature here. Money may be an arbitrary numerical denomination of value, but people's behavior around it and how that affects the economy at large need to be accoun…

Keep reading the comment. Why do people buy iPhones today knowing that they can get a significant discount in 6-12m for that same iPhone

Because an iphone is a status symbol, and in 6-12m that same iphone won't grant the same status, a newer more expensive one will.

Re: Alan Greenspan has died

#187

Post by margalabargala »

bko wrote: post #119
margalabargala wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Imagine a world in which prices regularly go down That world results in a lot of people individually deciding "why buy now, when I can buy for less later" and sitting on their money. That in aggregate makes the economy much worse. You're up against human nature here. Money may be an arbitrary numerical denomination of value, but people's behavior around it and how that affects the economy at large need to be accoun…

Keep reading the comment. Why do people buy iPhones today knowing that they can get a significant discount in 6-12m for that same iPhone

The state of tech goods is such that they become obsolete and have a finite lifespan, due to battery and compute needs, as well as the "fashion" element of having the newest thing.

The price is dropping over time because you're getting something literally less valuable. The analogy would be, would you pay the same for a bag of rice expiring in 2 years, as one expiring in 2 months?

The argument you're trying to make, would be valid and convincing if Apple lowered the price of a new iPhone with each subsequent release.

Re: Alan Greenspan has died

#188

Post by serf »

OnlyANeurosci wrote: post #147
up2isomorphism wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It depends on how inequalities is defined. But from the wealth distribution point of view, today’s wealth distribution skews much more towards the top. Although the lowest living standards improve thanks to the technology advancement.

Ah the classic "you have a fridge, king louie didn't have a fridge therefore in the scope of ALL of human existence you are obscenely wealthy" trope. https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-nation/fox-cites-ownership-...

if you don't like that concept of value then let's make a new concept of value that can't be reviewed or compared through the ages -- but until then I am completely comfortable with the idea that a full detail continental map would have been invaluable to the Lewis and Clark expedition.

The trope is that having any store of value makes you wealthy; not the case : wealth is generated through financial value

Bill O'Reilly is just a pundit, not some maker of policy or human truth. He's a talking head, and not a particularly eloquent one.

Re: Alan Greenspan has died

#189

Post by expedition32 »

greenavocado wrote: post #55
throw0101d wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> He wrote about how the gold standard created responsible spending and more equality in the world: The Gilded Age, which had quite high levels of inequality, occurred when the gold standard was active: * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gilded_Age It should also be noted that the gold standard did not bring any kind of price stability: * https://archive.is/https://www.theatlantic.com/business/arch... Further, sticking…

The Great Depression was caused by France panic hoarding gold https://www.nber.org/papers/w16350 Semi-ironically France was the reason the US fell off the dollar standard after it panic hoarded gold AGAIN when the French government made one last, massive purchase of gold from the US using US dollars, paying $35/oz. A French warship arrived in New York in early August 1971 to load the gold and bring it back to France.…

The US spending more money than comes in has been the problem. You cannot blame that away.

(Don't get me wrong I am grateful that America spent billions on the CIA fighting commies and launching rockets to the moon but in hindsight that party was never going to last)

Re: Alan Greenspan has died

#190

Post by rustcleaner »

somenameforme wrote: post #177
throw0101d wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Gold Standard is probably a force that acts against inequality […] Is there evidence for this? During the Gold Standard era there were many periods of deflation, which is bad for people with debt: back in the day this was often farmers, nowadays it'd be anyone with student loans or a mortgage.

Two points I'd hit on: 1) Deflation causes debt to become more expensive. Inflation causes your money to become worth less. There's a simple solution to debt becoming more expensive, but no practical solution to you getting a pay-cut every year, especially when a sizable chunk of people don't even realize they're getting a pay-cut and don't want to be unthankful for a "raise." That issue alone already causally explai…

>So if the 'Gilded Age' saw deflation of ~30% over some decades, what will historians in the future call an era of thousands of percents of inflation over some decades?

The 'Gelded Age' where the average man had his balls cut off by inflation?

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