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Dupes took over the world

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Re: Dupes took over the world

#21

Post by wat10000 »

inigyou wrote: post #20
nine_k wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Centralization offers efficiency gains, else it won't happen. Your imaginary company in South Korea likely makes a million horseshoes employing only 1000 people, and the horseshoes are good quality, and the price is like 5% of the price of a handcrafted horseshoe. Many more people can afford horseshoes as a result.

Many fewer people can afford horseshoes as a result because all the money is at the horseshoe company.

The opposite is actually true in reality. More people can afford X than ever before, for nearly any X that doesn’t involve directly paying for someone else’s labor.

Re: Dupes took over the world

#22

Post by wat10000 »

pluralmonad wrote: post #18
cortesoft wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, the guy who invented the horseshoe died thousands of years ago. And the idea that one location making all the horseshoes means each village is minus one living is ignoring the other effects. Now, all the villagers can get cheaper horseshoes, so they don’t have to spend as many resources on shoes for their horses, and can now invest more into what their village is best at, and sell those goods to other villages.…

I've come to view the goal of things being cheap as an anti goal. The biggest contribution to us speed running killing our ecosystems. Maybe all of us going without more often would end up with a significantly higher standard of living in the long term.

Externalities must be accounted for. Once that’s done, cheap should correlate well with being less ecologically harmful.

Re: Dupes took over the world

#23

Post by xboxnolifes »

inigyou wrote: post #6
4ndrewl wrote: post #4

For the vast majority of human existence 'dupe culture' was the norm. So far this is just a tiny 200 year abberation.

The centralisation is abnormal. Used to have one blacksmith in each village making clone horseshoes and earning a living. Now there's one company in South Korea that makes all the world's horseshoes and earns a million livings while each village has minus one living. And the guy who invented the horseshoe is sleeping under a bridge.

The village grew as the world got smaller. The world has one blacksmith.

Re: Dupes took over the world

#24

Post by nine_k »

Joker_vD wrote: post #16
nine_k wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Centralization offers efficiency gains, else it won't happen. Your imaginary company in South Korea likely makes a million horseshoes employing only 1000 people, and the horseshoes are good quality, and the price is like 5% of the price of a handcrafted horseshoe. Many more people can afford horseshoes as a result.

But think of the jobs! There used to be a million people involved in horseshoe-making, now there is only a thousand, and the rest of that million now has to do something else! And since there is literally nothing else for them to do, they'll have to die out :( The most bizarre thing about the economical systems is that there indeed were cases where former workers of the industries that collapsed/disappeared indeed we…

It depends on the speed of change though. If a million-strong industry collapses overnight, it can lead to really painful social disturbances. If it winds down in 10 years, the transition can be much more smooth.

BTW see also https://www.edge.org/conversation/gin-television-and-cogniti...

Re: Dupes took over the world

#25

Post by inigyou »

wat10000 wrote: post #21
inigyou wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many fewer people can afford horseshoes as a result because all the money is at the horseshoe company.

The opposite is actually true in reality. More people can afford X than ever before, for nearly any X that doesn’t involve directly paying for someone else’s labor.

What doesn't involve paying for someone else's labor? You mean things that are pure profit?

Re: Dupes took over the world

#26

Post by inigyou »

nine_k wrote: post #24
Joker_vD wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But think of the jobs! There used to be a million people involved in horseshoe-making, now there is only a thousand, and the rest of that million now has to do something else! And since there is literally nothing else for them to do, they'll have to die out :( The most bizarre thing about the economical systems is that there indeed were cases where former workers of the industries that collapsed/disappeared indeed we…

It depends on the speed of change though. If a million-strong industry collapses overnight, it can lead to really painful social disturbances. If it winds down in 10 years, the transition can be much more smooth. BTW see also https://www.edge.org/conversation/gin-television-and-cogniti...

This is an intentional policy choice btw. You could just legislate the horseshoe company pays 90% of each displaced blacksmith decreasing by 5% per year.

Re: Dupes took over the world

#27

Post by Joker_vD »

wat10000 wrote: post #21
inigyou wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many fewer people can afford horseshoes as a result because all the money is at the horseshoe company.

The opposite is actually true in reality. More people can afford X than ever before, for nearly any X that doesn’t involve directly paying for someone else’s labor.

Depends on the overarching economical policies. During the British rule, the Indian textile weavers went out of manufacturing business and had to switch to sustenance farming, and then perish during one of the many famines. And the Parliament legally forbade the public relief efforts, such as fundraisers to buy and send corn to the affected regions, explicitly citing the concerns that such efforts would skew the market forces and unbalance the trade.

Re: Dupes took over the world

#30

Post by Joker_vD »

inigyou wrote: post #26
nine_k wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It depends on the speed of change though. If a million-strong industry collapses overnight, it can lead to really painful social disturbances. If it winds down in 10 years, the transition can be much more smooth. BTW see also https://www.edge.org/conversation/gin-television-and-cogniti...

This is an intentional policy choice btw. You could just legislate the horseshoe company pays 90% of each displaced blacksmith decreasing by 5% per year.

And hey, almost a million blacksmiths displaced is a huge block of voters that any elected politician would be glad to capture! Although I struggle to recall any of the examples of something like this happening in the real-world history.
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