161–170 of 277 posts
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No one actually paid 90% income taxes. I wish that myth would go away.
Of course because that’s how marginal tax rates work. As to how much actual money was taxed at 91%, we don’t really have records for that but certainly the top 0.01% paid significantly more in taxes as a rate than they do today.
The value of the dollar over time is largely meaningless unless you are a dollar investor (i.e. sit on lots of cash in consumer tier bank accounts). Generally once you have enough cash that this would meaningfully impact you, you are already beyond sitting on cash. At the end of the day, the dollar or any other currency, is just a conversion tool for [value created] to [goods/services received]. A ratio of 3/1 is equ…
It's meaningful because you pay capital gains on nominal increase in dollar value even if there is no real change in value. Inflation is thus a tax on realized non-gains at roughly 1/5th the cumulative inflation.
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Petro-yuan =/= reserve currency. USD reserve = print USD for everything liquidity to sustain debt financed existence where Triffin hollows out industry, and financialize everything because having stupid amount of liquidity incentivizes certain behaviors. Petro-yuan = PRC gives swap lines to trusted partners to buy oil denominated in yuan in exchange for things like resources. Hormuz ships ~1 trillion USD worth energy…
The problem with that plan is that no one wants to trade hard commodities for a currency that can’t be spent. One part of the dollars appeal is that it spends the world over. The sanctioned countries frequently have more liberal access to dollars than to unsanctioned yuan. So no one is going to take up a lot of yuan trade unless that changes or they are forced to. But that puts China in a bind. Liberalizing their cur…
They do not need to liberalize currency. They just need to have stuff people want, and leverage to force them to transact in PRC preferred currency. Previously this was hard, PRC had goods, and affordable prices = reduce friction/switching cost vs USD liquidity, but USD liquidity still made USD transaction preferred. PRC had no leverage for others to transact in yuan.
But in persistent high global energy environment, if PRC controls basically global supply of cheap renewables... and 30% of GCC oil vs Iran enforcing petro-yuan, they have stupid leverage to snow ball system. Again key is this for 30% of GCC oil exports if Iran locks down (big if), it's not global petro-yuan, it's Costco membership only access petro-yuan.
30% of global oil is inelastic existential survival leverage, if PRC wanted to charge in blowjobs countries would pay in blowjobs, currency liberalization doesn't matter when selling water in desert.
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And a strong currency usually means weak manufacturing. And I don't know how a country can be strong without a solid manufacturing sector. Like, when we a war breaks out, we ask our enemies to sell us components and medical key ingredients?
Didn't know Switzerland was a "weak" manufacturer (currently one of the strongest currencies there is, also in wide use).
This study doesn't correct for baseline exponential decay due to inflation, to better highlight the meaningful variations. By comparing based on 1914 dollars it also causes old variations to be relatively more extreme and newer inflationary events to look less extreme. You must compare apples to apples. Finally the events are quite cherry-picked. It is a conclusion looking for a result, when the statistical reason fo…
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The bigger question is, why is that even the primary goal?
I believe the idea is to support the “real” economy vs a “paper” economy. The “real” economy manufactures stuff in meat space instead of making value through abstractions like financial derivatives. The real economies are tied to a stronger middle class and national security. That’s the thesis as I understand it.
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The problem with that plan is that no one wants to trade hard commodities for a currency that can’t be spent. One part of the dollars appeal is that it spends the world over. The sanctioned countries frequently have more liberal access to dollars than to unsanctioned yuan. So no one is going to take up a lot of yuan trade unless that changes or they are forced to. But that puts China in a bind. Liberalizing their cur…
You can buy from China though. And China is the largest import trading partner for the majority of countries in the world. They literally don't need to do anything to prop up a "petro-yuan".
So no one is going to use a controlled currency for a hard liquid commodity. So if China wants petro yuan they have to liberalize that, which will break their peg.
China could have more international trade in the yuan before all of Americas recent misadventures. But that has cast consequences for their economy, and possibly the ruling elites power structures.
This supports my hunch that the current Iran war creates a lethal trifecta that could potentially cause a dollar collapse. 1. Massive military overspend. 2. Petrodollar squeeze (Strait of Hormuz). 3. Allies pulling out: Europe and the Gulf diversifying both their investments and defense purchases. #1 creates oversupply of dollars and #2 and #3 lower demand. This study supports the idea that wars can indeed destroy pu…
Erase US government debt via hyper-inflation, and let the people that will still have liquidity buy all remaining assets the middle class will be desperate to sell at pennies on the dollar.
This supports my hunch that the current Iran war creates a lethal trifecta that could potentially cause a dollar collapse. 1. Massive military overspend. 2. Petrodollar squeeze (Strait of Hormuz). 3. Allies pulling out: Europe and the Gulf diversifying both their investments and defense purchases. #1 creates oversupply of dollars and #2 and #3 lower demand. This study supports the idea that wars can indeed destroy pu…
You should check your hunch against the reality, at least periodically. The US dollar has strengthened since the current US-Iran conflict started.
But if Iran does successfully force countries to stop using the petrodollar by only allowing countries trading in yuan through the strait, then we could actually see that reverse. IMO destroying the petrodollar is the primary clear "victory" Iran could achieve from this war
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I'll dig down 3 levels of "why". The endemic anti-intellectualism among white communities (especially rural and southern) has resulted in a steady decline of white people in well-paying professions in America. If you count the Jewish as a separate group, white people are likely a minority in corporate America. Combined with social upliftment of other groups ("wokism") and the opioid crisis (that has disproportionatel…
> white people are likely a minority in corporate America. Oh boy am I gonna need some actual data for this claim.
You can construct the definition of white collar in a way that makes it seem like it's mostly white people, but among high paying job titles within a company, absolutely I would say there are fewer than 50% non-Jewish whites.