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American capitalism has taken an apocalyptic turn

economist.com

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Re: American capitalism has taken an apocalyptic turn

#121

Post by tim-tday »

randycupertino wrote: post #10

I would say with inflation, wealth inequality and skyrocketing housing, gas and grocery prices as well as super high amounts of consumer debt and families stretching to keep up it feels a lot like pre-bust 2005/2006 economy out there right now. We might not be on the cusp of a subprime mortgage bank crisis but it does feel ominous lately.

The new mortgage backed securities are the instruments trading the debt used to build AI data centers (the AAA rated debt that is anything but). The music will stop when there’s a blip in liquidity. Everyone will rush for a chair and there won’t be enough for everyone.

I don’t know when that will be but if the big ipos coming down the pike cause an everything squeeze that might do it.

Or maybe nothing is going on. What do I know?

Re: American capitalism has taken an apocalyptic turn

#122

Post by ProllyInfamous »

avidiax wrote: post #52
Stitch4223 wrote: post #8

> Perhaps the danger is not 2008, 1999, 1973 or even 1873, but 1789. 1789 was the year of the French Revolution [1]. The rest are years with financial crises. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_Revolution

The French Revolution is no longer possible. The surveillance state plus wealth mobility means the wealthy will be in New Zealand before anyone erects a guillotine, and the people that would foment a revolution are heavily surveilled and infiltrated.

My attorney's advice to me was:

>>"PL, don't build a guillotine"

PL> "I'm going to build a guillotine; be my lawyer and give me advice as if it's going to be built."

>>"... don't make it entirely functional."

PL> "It's going to be built functional."

>>"... hmm ... use a bicycle cable lock to add a safety to it – lock&key. But remember that my original advice was not to build it in the first place."

----

Exhibit Z

Re: American capitalism has taken an apocalyptic turn

#123

Post by tim-tday »

sfblah wrote: post #101
maxdo wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You just named symptoms not cause. 1. People vote for old idiots . 2. Local politics is all about milking any potential work with permits. Sky rocket housing due to that . 3. American lost engineering culture everywhere except software . Now software is dead as industry we used to know

Personally I think those are also symptoms. In my opinion, the cause is: 1. Easy money for far, far, far too long in the US and a complete political unwillingness to take any risk of a recession, no matter the long-term cost required to stave it off. In my mind, this explains the rich-poor gap, the rise of crypto, insane valuations, house-price inflation, the weird delta between US and rest-of-world standard of livin…

Hey, I like easy money.

Re: American capitalism has taken an apocalyptic turn

#124

Post by WalterBright »

stopping wrote: post #90
WalterBright wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How about a summary of Piketty's argument? We could start off with how are you worse off because of people wealthier than you?

If the top 10% of people suddenly had their wealth double overnight, it would have absolutely disastrous effects for the lower 90% of people. Prices for scarce goods (e.g. housing) would increase dramatically. The price increase dampens the overall demand for housing since a large fraction of the 90% are now priced out. The wealthy homeowners have an incentive to maintain that scarcity, and freely use their resources…

[flagged]

Re: American capitalism has taken an apocalyptic turn

#125

Post by crossbody »

thothless wrote: post #77
WalterBright wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How about a summary of Piketty's argument? We could start off with how are you worse off because of people wealthier than you?

your first question was better. "how does creating wealth hurt others?" most of this "wealth" is not "created" out of thin air. nor created at all. more like, transferred.

If your logic is right, people back in the Stone Age were all like Jeff Bezos with mega yachts and stuff... It all went downhill from then - the population has increased so much and everyone has gotten so much poorer :(

Re: American capitalism has taken an apocalyptic turn

#126

Post by ProllyInfamous »

mvdtnz wrote: post #93
avidiax wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The French Revolution is no longer possible. The surveillance state plus wealth mobility means the wealthy will be in New Zealand before anyone erects a guillotine, and the people that would foment a revolution are heavily surveilled and infiltrated.

[flagged]

We just need to make enough crowdsourced guillotines as if to make global escape impossible.

My workingclass neighborhood is already getting pretty hungry.

Re: American capitalism has taken an apocalyptic turn

#127

Post by satvikpendem »

WalterBright wrote: post #102
satvikpendem wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wealth is a positive not zero sum game. It is not transferred except in the most literal cases like lotteries and casinos.

Gambling is not a transference. The gambler is buying a chance to win money. It's an equal value for equal value. Zero sum are things like taxes, where the government just takes it, or robberies.

In casinos you transfer your money to the eventual winner, a 1:1 transfer minus the house's cut.

Re: American capitalism has taken an apocalyptic turn

#128

Post by Henchman21 »

c1sc0 wrote: post #61
avidiax wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The French Revolution is no longer possible. The surveillance state plus wealth mobility means the wealthy will be in New Zealand before anyone erects a guillotine, and the people that would foment a revolution are heavily surveilled and infiltrated.

Are you sure about that? Tech cuts both ways & asymmetric drone warfare has become cheaper than ever … how hard it is it to sink some yachts or down some jets?

Or take some data centers offline.

Re: American capitalism has taken an apocalyptic turn

#129

Post by saulapremium »

WalterBright wrote: post #95
shric wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Walter, I believe the idea against wealth inequality is not purely that there are wealthier people but that their wealth should be redistributed such that the wealthier people are less wealthy (but still wealthier) and the poorer people are less poor (but still poorer).

There have been many attempts at taking from the rich and giving to the poor, and the result was always everybody was worse off except the people who ran the government.

No, that is not always the result, very far from it. You seem to believe that society is just the natural state of things, and "government" is almost just in the way. It's an incredible blindness to the privilege you enjoy.

Re: American capitalism has taken an apocalyptic turn

#130

Post by srean »

WalterBright wrote: post #62
rickydroll wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When your part in wealth creation is having your wealth acquired by somebody else. Wealth creation only works when the the money available to buy wealth creating instruments is significantly less than the value of those instruments. How would markets behave if investment accounts had more cash in them than there were investment vehicles? I suspect it would be like what we see today in private equity with illiquid fun…

> When your part in wealth creation is having your wealth acquired by somebody else. That's called "theft". In a free market, transactions are mutually agreed upon. Equal wealth for equal wealth. > Wealth creation only works when the the money available to buy wealth creating instruments is significantly less than the value of those instruments. Your statement presumes that "value" is some construct independent of th…

In a hypothetical free market yes. But we don't have one. We have k-polies for small k.

I have come to doubt whether free market is even possible.

The rich will use their wealth to ensure (by corruption or otherwise) to bend the laws in their favor.

Wealth has power and they will exercise this power. Why wouldn't they ?

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