181–190 of 767 posts
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What's the point of living an extra few years either? I'd rather die at 70 after having lived a healthy life, than 80 and suffered the last 10 years
You say that now. I bet you are going to be dancing by a different tune at 70.
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" GDP PPP can increase whilst your economy contracts. " Still, if PPP GDP increases, with all else being equal (eg. stable population) it would imply the standard of living is increasing. That is why PPP GDP captures a more accurate measure of the real world. Said another way, what truly matters isn't "GDP growth", but changes in purchasing power/quality of life.
No it does not, PPP is calculated based on a basket of 3000 fungible goods and services as well as other costs such as major infrastructure construction projects. It has zero account for quality or outcomes. It doesn’t care if you have access to healthy foods, it just cares how much would X calories costs, it doesn’t care what is the quality of the housing stock or the outcomes of your healthcare system. You can very…
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No one uses PPP for measuring growth, GDP PPP can increase whilst your economy contracts. PPP isn’t a good measure for population’s wealth or quality of life especially for developed economies either. The economy of the US is still twice that of the EU and its global purchasing power has also pretty much doubled.
In 2008 the dollar was historically cheap (70% of current), now it's pretty expensive. This swing is the main driver of this whole thing and means that yes, PPP is superior for looking at growth. Not ideal, but much better. Cheap imports are great for consumers, but a currency losing 20% certainly doesn't mean its economy has magically contracted 20%. If anything a weakish currency stimulates internal economic activi…
https://www.oecd.org/sdd/prices-ppp/purchasingpowerparities-...
Also GDP, GDP PPP and every other economic benchmark is calculated using CID - constant US dollar; specifically to avoid skewing results due to fluctuating exchange rates.
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Evidence? Evidence against: https://davidcard.berkeley.edu/papers/mariel-impact.pdf
The evidence is math. Even if you have a flat rate and everyone in the population is equally benefitted with social services, there are 50% of people who are contributing less than they take and 50% who are contributing more than they take. That looks even worse when we relax the flax rate assumption (most countries have progressive taxation) and the amount of social benefits a given segment receives (poor people ten…
Do you have a citation for that broad brush number for what they take?
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The US’s secret sauce is that is an empire that can, will and does constantly project its massive military and clandestine power around the world to further its interests at all times, while never having to deal with any of its blowback. And then americans laugh at the EU welcoming refugees you created in the first place, or pretend the EU is socialist while laughing at its massive energy crisis caused by its complet…
pretty certain it's the germans that decided to use the russian gas meanwhile the US was pretty upset about the idea
This is a bit of a frame trap. Here’s another metric: ==2021== Life expectancy in EU: 80 Life expectancy in US: 76 ==Rolling back to 2008== Life expectancy in EU: 79 Life expectancy in US: 78 What’s the point? Maybe GDP isn’t the most important indicator. The US can double it’s GDP by making healthcare more expensive and extracting every last dime from the elderly, but can it actually improve quality of life for peop…
Most of that life expectancy gap is due to obesity I'd guess.
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Yes but so many Americans are on Instagram and Tiktok that they feel poor since they are inundated with stories about people doing better than them.
Comparing your life to tiktok celebrities is toxic but comparing it to the impoverished halfway around the world is healthy?
This is a bit of a frame trap. Here’s another metric: ==2021== Life expectancy in EU: 80 Life expectancy in US: 76 ==Rolling back to 2008== Life expectancy in EU: 79 Life expectancy in US: 78 What’s the point? Maybe GDP isn’t the most important indicator. The US can double it’s GDP by making healthcare more expensive and extracting every last dime from the elderly, but can it actually improve quality of life for peop…
Apple was worth 2 trillion last year. This year it's worth 3 trillion. Five years ago, there had never been a US company worth 1 trillion before. Something is broken.
Apple is just crazy profitable.
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pretty certain it's the germans that decided to use the russian gas meanwhile the US was pretty upset about the idea
It was economical to buy the Russian gas delivered by pipeline. The US wanted to sell its more expensive LNG. And it ended up getting its wish after it supported a western aligned Ukraine and while no one wants to claim responsibility for blowing up nordstream, someone definitely blew it up and it helped cement the US as the gas supplier of Europe. I think the message is clear that it’s best not to upset the US.
see I can understand this logic pre 2014, but post 2014 (i.e. Crimea), absolutely not
the euros paid to putin were used to re-arm and those weapons are now being used in Ukraine
and if he wins then Eastern Europe is next in line
but yes germans saved 2% on their gas bills for 10 years