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Why America's economy is soaring ahead of its rivals

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Re: Why America's economy is soaring ahead of its rivals

#191

Post by bloppe »

Leary wrote: post #181
bloppe wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

PPP matters on an individual level, but not at all on a national level. GDP at market exchange rates is what actually matters in terms of what a country can accomplish on the world stage. And even on an individual level, PPP struggles with accuracy, because things are only ever roughly equivalent. There's a reason why so many individual people are trying to move from China and India to the US and EU, despite all the…

Wrong. People move from China to India despite the higher prices in America precisely because the increase in wages is more than enough to offset the higher prices.

True, my comment was ignoring the fact that America's per-capita GDP is higher even after controlling for PPP. People can move for a lot of reasons. Having a much more transparent and predictable justice system is also one of them. For instance, my money would go a lot further in Russia, but then I'd have to live in Russia.

But the point stands that market-exchange GDP matters more when it comes to comparing the relative strength of countries, rather than individuals, since it endows the government with greater purchasing strength. An era of trade wars might test this theory, but the ramifications of absolute isolationism would be far more complex than that.

Re: Why America's economy is soaring ahead of its rivals

#192

Post by encoderer »

Leary wrote: post #177
TeaBrain wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

PPP is only useful for measuring regional purchasing power within a country. As a metric for comparing the relative strength of global economies it is irrelevant.

Just the opposite. PPP is less useful when comparing intra-country than inter-country. It's only relevant because there are barriers to trade, especially in services.

this is economist-brained and about the same as using CPI as the only measure of inflation.

They are models.

Re: Why America's economy is soaring ahead of its rivals

#193

Post by rootusrootus »

UncleOxidant wrote: post #171
wslh wrote: post #108

My two cents: the U.S. owes much of its economic strength to its robust legal framework. It provides a system where complex business disputes can be handled and enforced effectively, creating trust and predictability for investors and entrepreneurs. This institutional strength is often overlooked but is critical for fostering innovation and long-term economic growth. Incidentally, recent Nobel laureates in economic s…

Doesn't the EU also have a robust legal framework?

I would have thought so. But on the other hand, it seems to me like there is a lot more appreciation on the part of EU for laws to be enforced more in spirit than in letter. That might not be a good legal environment for businesses.

Re: Why America's economy is soaring ahead of its rivals

#194

Post by com2kid »

loxodrome wrote: post #98
spiderfarmer wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The EU is number one in quality of life and that’s all that matters to me. If we work just hard enough to maintain and maybe even improve it, other countries can do their pissing contest.

I’m an American living in France for the past two years and cannot wait to move back to the USA. The taxes are so extreme and salaries so low that no one can even invest in the stock market. If I stay here, I will be able to leave virtually nothing to my kids when I die. The EU can take its 5 weeks of vacation and go fuck itself.

Daycare in my city in the US is around 30k a year.

The city just dismantled its gifted program for schools, so if your kid is a high achiever plan on another 40k a year for schooling.

Even swim classes have a huge waitlist and are expensive. Any type of children's activity is absurdly expensive due to the high cost of living.

Housing is absurd, if you have a couple kids plan on spending 4k a month on rent for a place in a nice neighborhood.

Most Americans have around a thousand dollars in savings and that is it. Americans are, by and large, not even able to save up for retirement, with zero hope of leaving anything to their kids.

Tech worker salaries are a small bubble in all of this.

Re: Why America's economy is soaring ahead of its rivals

#195

Post by shusson »

naming_the_user wrote: post #148
spiderfarmer wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The EU is number one in quality of life and that’s all that matters to me. If we work just hard enough to maintain and maybe even improve it, other countries can do their pissing contest.

This feels like a huge generalization to me. The US, UK, EU and realistically most developed countries I would say have fairly similar quality of life within margin of error. I've travelled a fair amount and everywhere is basically the same. For an individual it's really going to come down to lifestyle and what you prefer. Some people like urban living and walkability, if that's you then you probably want Japan or ol…

> The US, UK, EU and realistically most developed countries I would say have fairly similar quality of life within margin of error.

Having lived in the EU (Netherlands) and the US (California), I would say the inequality in the US is much worse. Especially in larger cities. To the point where I sometimes wonder if I'm living in a "developed" country.

Re: Why America's economy is soaring ahead of its rivals

#196

Post by bluecheese452 »

WalterBright wrote: post #18
WhereIsTheTruth wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They served as bases to spread the American culture through music and cinema and later with the industry through the coal and steel community, to create a single and unified market The US did not want to create competition, but to break monopolies and to create a unified market for its industrial complex The remnants of that goal are visible today with Big Tech

My dad was part of the occupation of postwar Germany. The bases were there to protect Germany against the Soviets. I remember once on the autobahn around 1970, and a fighter came by hedgehopping at high speed. He was a few feet off the ground, and looked like just under Mach 1. The citizens didn't particularly like the noise and disruption, but they understood the need for the Air Force to train hard. I also remember…

Not at all surprised that despite your years of railing against socialism your dad was in the military. A true free market would provide for its own defense, not steal from taxpayers.

Re: Why America's economy is soaring ahead of its rivals

#197

Post by badpun »

Not a single word about shale oil and gas revolution, that started around 15 years ago? The US now has the one of the cheapest energy on earth, and probably the cheapest among the countries that matter. Pour all that cheap gas and oil onto an economy that was already a leader and you get lots of impressive growth.

Re: Why America's economy is soaring ahead of its rivals

#198

Post by bluGill »

anon291 wrote: post #139

> Globally, the top R&D spenders are increasingly concentrated in software and computer services I always find these sorts of statements strange because most software is not intended to be software but rather something else. For example, Adobe's suite should be classified under 'art supplies' or 'video production'. While true that it's software, in my mind, it's like classifying a car builder as a metal fabricator. T…

Software is a tool, so it should have some count toward that economy. Same as any other tool is a hammer part of real estate or iron?

Re: Why America's economy is soaring ahead of its rivals

#199

Post by 34573457 »

roenxi wrote: post #14

This is an interesting take, because it contrasts with GDP PPP [0] which is suggesting that America is in fact being overtaken by its rivals although it has managed to outpace the EU. China is claiming to already be ahead and India is well on track to gain absolute economic ascendancy relative to the US. And I expect that Asia is going to start developing some serious military muscle on the back of that because they…

Who cares? I'd rather be #1 in disposable income for my people personally: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disposable_household_and_per_c...

Re: Why America's economy is soaring ahead of its rivals

#200

Post by bluGill »

doctorpangloss wrote: post #168
anon291 wrote: post #139

> Globally, the top R&D spenders are increasingly concentrated in software and computer services I always find these sorts of statements strange because most software is not intended to be software but rather something else. For example, Adobe's suite should be classified under 'art supplies' or 'video production'. While true that it's software, in my mind, it's like classifying a car builder as a metal fabricator. T…

> Adobe's suite should be classified under 'art supplies' or 'video production'... Under this taxonomy, I think things would seem much more diverse. Will someone who has shopped at Blick for 20 years be able to develop a Photoshop plugin? It would be a stretch.

Most people who shop at Blick don't make their own canvas, clay. Many of them wouldn't know how. They could learn and some do, but many never will. Likewise they could learn to write software but most won't.
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